Manchester City lost a third consecutive league match and Nottingham Forest climbed out of the relegation zone with the Tricky Trees’ 3-1 victory over the Citizens on Saturday. Liam Delap scored twice to power Forest with his first City Ground goals of the season. The 23-year-old spent ten years as a Manchester City youth player. He subsequently had a successful run at Ipswich Town before flopping at Chelsea last season. Embattled Nottingham Forest Manager scored a fabulous win and can only hope that a Delap renaissance will help an attack that has scored fewer goals than all but two Premier League teams this season. Manchester City, meanwhile, has lost its way. The Citizens have scored only two goals in the three recent losses, and the defense has looked exceedingly vulnerable. Goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma is coming under increasing scrutiny, and the Italian goalkeeper can be faulted in part for two of the three Nottingham Forest goals on Saturday.
Arsenal has taken advantage of City’s swoon and now holds a six-point lead at the top of the Premier League table over surging Brighton, now the Gunners’ closest pursuer. Arsenal defeated Hull City 1-0 on Saturday with Martin Odeggaard’s goal providing the Gunners with an 11th consecutive home win across all competitions at the Emirates. Defense remains at the heart of the Gunners’ success with the defending champions having conceded only five goals all season after the club’s seventh clean sheet in the win over Hull.
Brighton, 1-0 winners against Manchester City last week, have now leapfrogged the Citizens in the table with the Seagulls’ 2-0 win over Brentford. Diego Gomez scored the opening goal for Brighton before Brentford self-destructed with Igor Thiago’s 23rd minute red card. Pascal Gross added a 42nd minute penalty kick for the Seagulls’ final margin. Brighton is becoming hard to overlook in the title chase as Manager Fabian Hurtzler presides over what may be the most balanced side in the league with a stunning league leading goal differential of 19. So far this season, the Seagulls have scored 11 more goals and conceded only two more goals than table leader Arsenal. Ten-man Brentford, meanwhile, failed to manage a shot on target and sank to eighth in the table. Some Penalty from Pascal Gross that👏🤩 #BHAFC https://t.co/Lz1hGG6VqB
Liverpool is back in the top four after a 3-1 stroll at Selhurst Park against now bottom of the table Crystal Palace and its endangered manager, Pierre Sage. While Sage was always going to find it difficult to match the success of former Palace manger Oliver Glasner, his results to date are abysmal. Four consecutive league losses and the looming relegation threat put Sage squarely on the hot seat entering the international break. Eagles’ Chairman Steve Parrish is unlikely to risk Crystal Palace’s 14-year Premier League run on the struggling French manager.
The Eagles share the relegation zone with Sunderland and Manchester United. The Black Cats remain in the bottom three despite upsetting Chelsea 1-0 at the Stadium of Light. Sunderland earned its first Premier League win since August when Enzo le Fee converted a penalty kick in the 36th minute of play after a controversial call on Levi Colwill who engaged in a mutual wrestling match with Sunderland’s Bryan Brobbey to draw the foul. Chelsea has now bracketed a win over Manchester United with losses to Tottenham Hotspur and Sunderland. Blues supporters are less than pleased with the third consecutive Premier League loss to Sunderland which comes two weeks after the brutal loss to rival Spurs at Stamford Bridge.
No one came away happy from a 4-4 final at Old Trafford. Aston Villa went up two goals after three minutes as the curtain seemed ready to come down on Michael Carrick’s run as manager of the Red Devils. The home team responded, however, to knot things up 2-2 by halftime. Aston Villa then took another two-goal lead in the second half only to have Manchester United score two stoppage time goals to salvage a point. Aston Villa essentially threw the same game away twice. Despite the double comeback on Sunday, Manchester United supporters remain unhappy with a defense that has allowed more goals across all competitions than any club in Europe’s top five leagues. Despite Sunday’s point, the Red Devils enter the international break in the relegation zone with Carrick’s fate still hanging in the balance.
Newcastle Manager Matthias Jaissle will also not be sleeping well this break. The Magpies drew 1-1 with Fulham when the home Cottagers knotted things in the 83rd minute, three minutes after Newcastle took the lead. A win would have greatly helped Jaissle’s prospects, which had dimmed with four defeats in five matches entering the match at Craven Cottage. Fulham supporters are feeling a bit better after a horrid start to the season, the Cottagers now having gone four matches unbeaten entering the break.
Everton, meanwhile, won a second consecutive match by rolling over Coventry City 3-1 to start the Premier League weekend on Friday. Thierno Barry scored twice for the Toffees who are a surprising sixth in the table despite having scored just 12 goals in 10 matches despite Friday’s outburst.
Right behind Everton in the table is another surprising club. Bournemouth has now won four in a row after a 2-1 victory over Ipswich as the Cherries’ Evanilson scored in his fifth consecutive Premier League match. The Cherries seem to have now successfully transitioned from former manager Andoni Iraola to new man Marco Rose after a bumpy beginning to the season. Interesting to note is that Iraola also got off to a rough start before taking the Cherries to new heights. Iraola qualified Bournemouth, with the smallest stadium in the Premier League, for Europe before heading off to Anfield as Liverpool manager.
The momentum from Tottenham Hotspur’s recent three match winning run was stopped cold at Leeds with the Whites prevailing by a 1-0 margin. Noah Okafor scored in the 79th minute to give Leeds its first win over Tottenham Hotspur in more than five years. The Whites won for the first time in six league matches, frustrating a Tottenham Hotspur side which left Elland Road angry over a first half VAR decision. It took four minutes of VAR review before the decision was taken to keep 11 Leeds players on the field despite Jason Bogle’s vicious challenge on Spurs’ Mathys Tel.
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