Johnny Nicholson: Make clubs use their vast resources or take a Covid firebreak now
Chelsea's Christian Pulisic has a shot on goal during the Premier League match at the Molineux stadium, Wolverhampton. Picture : Nick Potts/PA Wire.Â
On a weekend where a full slate of games were played in Germany where almost everyone is vaccinated, on Plague Island most English games were called off. With it being revealed that a large minority of Premier League players have not been vaccinated, it seems too much of a coincidence that it is here that is so cursed with the virus. As everyone who isnât a paranoid conspiracy theorist knows, the jab reduces chances of catching it and of infecting others and reduces the effects of infection. If youâve got 25% of players exposed to the virus without protection, is it any wonder the disease is ripping through teams? The problem is, this is not going to get any better now. Not for a long time. The unvaccinated have ensured it will keep washing through clubs affecting different teams at different times, creating chaos and havoc. As a consequence, the fixture list is in serious jeopardy of collapsing, the validity of the competitions are under question.
Youâve got to feel sorry for Leeds United, they have a great vaccination programme but an appalling injury list. When Jack Harrison was carried off hurt, making 11 players out with injuries, manager Marcelo Bielsa mustâve wished they couldâve had a few Covid-infected players in order to get the game called off. They are effectively being punished for being Covid-free. It does not seem fair when they literally have a whole team injured. They even had 15-year-old Archie Gray on the bench. I refuse to believe any of the other clubs whose game was cancelled could not have done likewise. It made defeat against Arsenal inevitable. Few sides could put up much of a performance when they have so many players out injured but even so, the first half was especially poor. They must be praying for some sort of firebreak to be introduced just to give themselves a chance to get some players off the treatment table.
Apparently, the Premier League and EFL will postpone a game if a team has fewer than 14 first team players available. But this makes no sense as all Premier League clubs have huge player resources. Manchester United have 38 first teamers listed on their website so they must have 24 out due to injury and Covid. Have they really? I mean, really? If so, letâs see the data. They also have 22 Under-23s. Why can't they bring in as many as needed from that squad instead of a notional 25 first teamers? What are these players for if not to play when others cannot? Not a single club in the top two divisions would not be able to field 14 players drawn from their ranks, as long as the U-23s were deployed. If, for some reason, the league does not insist they do this, they may as well call the games off for a couple of weeks instead of messing around and leaving fans stranded on their way to games when they call the match off late. After all, clubs have wanted a winter break for years. Take one now.
Last week I speculated that Mikel Arteta might be trying to get his expensive stone in the shoe, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, out of the door in January. In the subsequent week, the player has stopped training with the first team and has basically been isolated from everyone. If that ainât a message that is easy to understand, I donât know what is. His manager wants him gone. There is always a sucker in football but it will be a mighty foolish one who takes him on, at least in Europe. Arsenal will no doubt offer to pay a proportion of his wages to a buyer, but even so, who would pay him any amount of money when he is not reliable and is doing a good impression of someone who has been disincentivised by massive wealth?Â
Meanwhile, the Arsenal team found some away form in the first half against a decimated Leeds team. They had 11 shots on target to Leeds' zero. But they faded in the second in the face of a Leeds team that just got up on its hind legs and started fighting back with a noisy crowd behind them. It seemed to scare Arsenal until they got the fourth. Arsenal's last 18 Premier League goals have been scored or assisted by an under-23 player, which is very much their direction of travel, since they seem to have realised the folly of paying players in their early 30s ÂŁ350,000 per week. But why were they playing in a horrible blue zig-zag shirt? Blue is Spursâ colour. Red and white doesnât really clash with white - it was good enough for the 1972 cup final - so there was no need to change to this, their pointless âthird shirtâ other than for commercial reasons. Itâs a nasty thing that looks like a 1980s polyester duvet cover. Do they really need the relatively small amount of money this strip will bring in? No. Is tradition and heritage worth more? Yes, obviously.
Even though most games in the Premier League were called off, there were still absurd VAR decisions, none more absurd than the decision not to send Granit Xhaka off for his tackle on Raphinhaâs ankle, which could easily have put him on the pile of Leeds broken bodies. It wasnât that it was missed. You couldnât miss it. It was as clear an assault as you could see. An echo of the days of Leedâs legend, Norman âbites your legsâ Hunter, appropriately enough. The referee did nothing, doubtless waiting for the eye in the sky to make a decision for him. No decision was forthcoming. What the VAR was seeing instead of the clear red card incident before his eyes, we can only speculate. The suspicion is they donât want to show the referee up by telling him heâs missed something obvious. VAR is making referees worse by giving them a get-out clause for every decision, it is adding nothing except angst and bitterness at its inadequacies and stupidity. At the end of the VAR check, Xhaka just laughed. Even he knew it was ridiculous.
Eddie Howe is a poor defensive coach. In his five Premier League years with Bournemouth they conceded 330 goals at an average of 66 per season. So far it doesnât look like heâs learned anything. OK, Newcastle were the victims of another appalling VAR decision in their 4-0 loss to Manchester City, but they are shipping goals at an alarming rate, regardless. They slinked out of St Jamesâ Park having had just one shot on target. It is hard to see what Howe has done or has even attempted to do, to make Newcastle any tighter in defence. Surely he should have done something, but they are comically easy to play through. Heâs getting a free pass, of course and the desperate fans are hoping spending money in January will save them. But even if they buy a whole new defence, who can have confidence that Howe will have the nous to organise them properly? He has no form of being able to do so and nothing in his first weeks in the northeast suggests he has the first clue what to do.
Chelsea wanted their game against Wolves cancelled, but still fielded a side of internationals. Admittedly the criteria for postponement is far too opaque and Thomas Tuchel spoke well about the confusion that the current wooly guidelines are creating, but there is nothing worse than the already over-privileged complaining that they donât have enough privilege. Tuchel may try to blame a stunted goalless draw on lack of resources but in truth, this carries on their stuttering form of recent weeks. The sleek, well-oiled, modern machine of the first third of the season, that took them to the top of the table, has turned into a spluttering malfunctioning operation that lacks a bit of penetration and creativity and is now six points adrift of Manchester City at the top of the table.
If being unvaccinated puts the rest of a playerâs squad in greater danger of ill-health, makes the club financially worse off because they canât play games, and risks spreading the disease more widely, then players canât excuse their anti-vaccination decision asâ a private matterâ. Of course it isnât. It affects everyone else the same way running through a crowded room holding a pair of scissors does. The way some managers have excused their players saying it is the individualâs choice, as though weâre talking about what car they might buy or that it is personal, the way, say, a vasectomy might be, has been poor. However, given that the spreading of a disease is the business of everyone, they should release data on who is and isnât jabbed, tell players if they donât get the jab, they wonât play and they wonât get paid. There is no excuse, this is serious stuff, it's time to take a hardline on these refuseniks and not let them hide behind this spurious and inaccurate defence.
It was an absolutely sizzling game between Spurs and Liverpool, packed full of incidents and absolutely awful refereeing. Harry Kane should have been sent off for a shocking high-speed over-the-ball leg-breaker. There was no doubt. It was the nearest thing to kung-fu youâll see all week. Once again VAR bottled the decision. VAR also denied Liverpool a clear penalty for Emerson Royalâs push on Diogo Jota. The referee shouldâve called it. VAR shouldâve called it. Neither did, perhaps each scared to undermine the other. Pathetic. Klopp was booked, fights broke out in the second half, Liverpoolâs second might have been a handball by Mo Salah. Andy Robertson, who had scored, seven minutes later, was sent off for a tackle that was as bad as Kaneâs. It is this kind of sturm und drang that we all love about football and Liverpool, with their direct play, always invite the opposition to have a go. In this game the revitalised Antonio Conteâs Spurs were well up for the fight, and it made for fantastic entertainment, the very opposite of the more planned and mathematical football more typical in Manchester City games. A draw was a fair result but, oh, the refereeing!
