Cherries on Top

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I knew that Livepool would be out for revenge after we so convincingly beat them at the Vitality Stadium only a few days ago, add to that the fact that our players were getting tired from the number of matches that we played in December and you have all the ingredients for a tough away game at Anfield.

Liverpool started this match of really well and Danny Ings, who put in an excellent performance, scored a hattrick within the first 36 minutes to make it 3-0 at half time.

During the break I reminded the team of what they had done to Liverpool in the previous game and told them that they could do it again if only they believed, it worked as we looked like a totally different team dominating the match in every single aspect, unfortunately we only managed to get 2 goals in return and thus the 3 points would stay at Anfield despite us deserving far more.

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December Review
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Overal December was a rather good month for us, given the packed schedule that we had and the opponents that we faced I feel that we did what was expected of us and perhaps even a little bit more.

The loss to Manchester City was to be expected but our overal performance was very pleasing, the game against Newcastle could have easily gone the other way around if only we had a little bit of luck on our side.

The win against Aston Villa is huge as they are currently also fighting against relegation. The win against Liverpool was simply brilliant and totally deserved as we dominated every aspect of the game while the draw against Tottenham was also a very decent result. Our second game against Liverpool ended with a loss but again with a bit more luck we could have easily won that one as we were the better team by far.



Table
View attachment 203999As we head into the new year we find that Arsenal are still dominating the league while Chelsea are following closely in 2nd place. Manchester City have moved back into the top 4 and find themselved in 3rd place right before Manchester United who complete the top 4.

At the bottom we find Stoke City who have fired their coach Hughes and replaced him with Frank de Boer. Then we find ourselves, despite picking up our fair share of points in December we are still in quite a tricky position and there is now a 6 point gap between us and the 17th place which would let us stay in the Premier League. Finally we have Aston Villa in 18th place just 1 point ahead of us.


News
Our striker Kermorgant has come to me once more telling me that he is missing home as a result I have allowed him a short leave of absence once again. I certainly hope that this is the last time because while he doesnt play often we lack real depth in the striker department and given the packed schedule that we have rotating is going to be a must.

This is our draw for the 3rd round in the FA Cup
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A Look Ahead: January
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We start of the new year with an extremely important game against Crystal Palace. Palace are currently in the 17th place so getting a good result against them would be huge. We then face Leeds United in the FA Cup before playing a home game against surprise of the season Norwich. Finally we end the month with another very important game against current bottom side Stoke City.​
 
Ooh you're in a tough position mate, but this all makes for good reading! I'm sure you will be able to turn it around, great start to the story!
 
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View attachment 203991The new year began with an extremely important match against Crystal Palace. Palace are currently in 17th place just above the relegation zone so a win would see us close the gap towards that save zone.

This match was a really tight affair and one could see why both teams are so close to each other in the table. Crystal Palace opened the scoring in the 17th minute as Sako made it 1-0 for them. We immediately replied through Murray, who has been in excellent form recently, and brought us on level terms again.

Palace however weren't going to let that stand and only a few minutes later again grabbed the lead as Wickham made it 2-1. We then pushed forward to get another equaliser and did so as Murray made his second of the evening.

In the second half both teams continued to be evenly matched but we did manage to grab the lead in the 66th minute as Wilson capitalised on a mistake from Hangeland. Unortunately Palace managed to score once more in the 76th minute and so the match ended in a 3-3 draw.

Overal I guess this isn't the worst result, a win would have been nice but a draw is probably a fair result given the match itself.​
 
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View attachment 203984Then came the FA Cup match against Leeds United. During Pre-Season we also played a match against Leeds United which went rather badly as they beat us 3-0, given our early unexpected exit from the Capital One Cup I am determined to do better in the FA Cup so I expected nothing but a god result from this match.

As you can see from the statistics we pretty much dominated the game from start to finish. I am annoyed by the fact that we only managed to score a single goal as we should have scored a lot more but overal a very convincing win that sees us go through to the 4th round in the FA Cup.

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Norwich have been the major surprise of the season and went into this match being 5th in the league so I knew we had to be at our best if we wanted to get something from this game.

Luckily we were, we just didn't manage to score a single goal and the only reason for that was Ruddy, John Ruddy... No matter what we threw at him he just kept it out, to make matters even worse Norwich then took the lead totally against the run of play.

I was furious and made my feelings very clear, the team got my message and before half time we managed to finally score, twice for that matter, and so we headed into the break with a 2-1 lead.

During the second half we continued to dominate but again Ruddy... there is this song called Ruby from the Kaiser Chiefs that goes Ruby, Ruby, Ruby, Ruby... well I literally went Ruddy,Ruddy,Ruddy,Ruddy! During the match... Then in the final seconds of the game Norwich made matters even worse as they equalised through Robbie Brady...

I have no words for this match, we should have won it, simple as that... Lets just call it a Rudimentary performance from our side...​
 
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This was a huge game for us, Stoke are currently the only thing between us and the last place so a win here, or atleast a point was vital.

We actually started this match of really well and we actually the better team... then however these 2 things happened...View attachment 203964View attachment 203963Both of them got injured during the first half forcing me to use up 2 of my substitutions. To make matters worse with Kermogant back in France because of his homesickness I had no adequate replacement for Murray up front.

Still we continued to be the better team but as Murray who had been in fantastic form recently was now gone we lacked a player who could finish the chances. Wilson just isn't in form at the moment so while he gave it his best shot they just weren't getting past Butland. To make matters worse Stoke did manage to score a goal during the second half and so we suffer a very damaging loss.

Not only do we lose to a direct relegation competitor, we also suffer the relatively long loss of an in-form Murray... things are looking rather bleak for us now.​
 
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This match is what happens when you suffer the loss of an inform striker. With Murray out it looked like I had no suitable replacement for him upfront. Luckily Kermorgant returned from France no longer homesick so he immediately went into my 1st team.

The draw against Blackpool looked like it was a bit of good fortune for us as this is a game that we should be winning comfortably. Unfortunately things haven't gone how we expected them to go so far this season and this game was no exception.

Blackpool got of to an excellent start and took the lead within the 6th minute, we quickly took control from the game again but didn;t manage to get a single goal to show for it.

In the second half Blackpool again started of really well and scored directly from kick-off to make it 2-0 for them. It looked as if we were going to suffer another early cup defeat but luckily the team woke up and managed to make things level before the end of the game.

Another game that we simply should have won but another game in which we didn't. Atleast we have a good chance of progressing to the next stage as an home game against Blackpool, certainly if we DO finish our chances should be an easy win.​
 
xJamieWilliams said:
Ooh you're in a tough position mate, but this all makes for good reading! I'm sure you will be able to turn it around, great start to the story!
Click to expand...
Yup, things are looking quite tricky but I'm not giving hope up yet. We've proven that we can get good results against some of the league top teams, we just need to get a little more consistent and start picking up some wins. Glad you're enjoying it so far :)
 
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January Review
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Of the 5 games that we played in January we only lost 1, unfortunately we also only won 1.

The Crystal Palace result was probably fair given the match itself. The FA Cup game against Leeds was a very convincing win for us though I am somewhat disappointed that we didn't manage to express this in the scoreline.

The Norwich game was a very frustrating one, on paper the result doesn't look bad at all given the fact that Norwich have been performing extremely well this season but in reality we deserved to win that match 100%. The only reason why we didn't was Rudy, nothing got past him.

The Stoke game was also very frustrating as not only did we deserve to get more out of the match we also lost 2 very important players to injuries the most notable one being Glenn Murray who had been in very good form but is now going to be out for the next 2-3 months.





Table
View attachment 202184At the end of the month we find that Chelsea have taken over the lead from Arsenal and are now 1 point in front of them. City are still 3rd while United are still in 4th place so not much changed in the top 4.

At the bottom we find that things are also exactly the same as they were at the end of December. Stoke are still in last place despite their win against us, we are still in 19th place while Villa are 18th only 2 point ahead of us. Crystal Palace are 17th and are now 5 points in front of us.



News
During the Blackpool match we unfortunately suffered another injury blow
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A Look Ahead
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As you can see February will be a rather tough month. We start of with a home game against Leicester City, then we face Swansea City.

Then we play our FA Cup replay against Blackpool before playing what is going to be a very tough game against Manchester United. We end the month with an away game at the Stadium of Light.
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This game was a very disapointing one, the scoreline really flatteres Leicester because as you can see from the statistics both teams were very evenly matched.

Leicester went into the half time break with a 1 goal lead as Vardy had given them the lead in the 15th minute.

Then in the 48th minute the deciding moment of the match happened as Cook got sent of for a professional foul thus leaving us 1 man down and 1 goal behind. Vardy quickly capitalised on this and scored his second goal of the evening in the 51st minute of the match.

Vardy then capped off his impressive performance by scoring his 3rd of the evening in the final minute of the match.


During the match Kermorgant got injured and so we are left without any real strikers except for Wilson and the poorly performing King.
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View attachment 202066After the loss to Leicester the team has looked somewhat down. Getting a good result against Swansea would be huge for the team.

We started the game of relatively well and within 24 minutes we found ourselves with a 2 goal lead. Then the match totally turned around and Swansea bossed us in every aspect.

They managed to grab an equaliser in the 38th minute and so we went into half-time with a 1-2 lead. In the second half Swansea continued were they left off and did everything they could to get things level again but luck just wasn't on their side.

Usually we are the better side but end up without the points to show it so I am glad that this time it is the other way around. While I am obviously not happy with our performance I do feel that this win could be very important as it will give a boost to the team.​
 
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View attachment 202059The previous game against Blackpool was one that we simply should have won. I am actually still amazed that we didn't but as we didn't we now have to play a replay adding another fixture to our already packed schedule.

The team were aware of the fact that they are by far the better side and were determined to show it to the world as we got of to an excellent start. Our entire first-half performance was simply spectacular and we went into the break with a 4 goal lead.

As I felt that the match was won I decided to bring everything down a notch in order to keep the players fresh as we've got a huge fixture against Manchester United coming up. The second half was as a result rather boring and without any notable moments worth mentioning.

Credit to Callum Wilson who was absolutely brilliant picking up 3 goals in the proces
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So with this win we have qualified for the 5th round in the FA Cup and we will be playing the following team
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While cup matches are never easy to predict on paper this does seem as a very favourable draw. Maybe we can make up for our poor performance in the Capital One Cup with our FA Cup run.​
 
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After two consecutive wins in a row we face Manchester United. Our previous meeting ended in a 2-2 draw at Old Trafford so I felt that with a bit of luck maybe we could upset the odds once again...

Unfortunately this was not the case things looked well in the beginning of the match as it was us that managed to score the first goal through Wilson who gave us the lead in the 14th minute. United then woke up and before the first half was over managed to turn things around in a 2-1 lead for them.

In the second half United continued to showcase what they were capable of and managed to extend their lead to 5-1. We managed to get one back in the 78th minute as it was again Wilson that scored for us but United weren
't impressed by this and in the final minute of the match managed to score once more to make it 6-2 for them.​
 
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View attachment 202042After our heavy defeat at the hands of Manchester United I was hoping that the team would bounce back to right what they did wrong. Unfortunately they didn't.

Don't know what to say about this game to be honest, Yeovil played really well and took their chances while we didn't.

While we have already achieved what the board wanted us to I am still dissapointed as Yeovil is really a team that we should be winning from and getting into the 6th round would be a rather good achievement for us but alas it just wasn't meant to be. Atleast now we can focus 100% on our battle against relegation in the BPL.
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Our previous meeting with Sunderland ended in us getting our first ever win the Premier League. During that game we completely outclassed them and so I felt that despite our recent hickups something good could come out this match.

Just like in the 1st game against them we were by far the better team both our goals were scored within the first half hour of the game.

We then went on to control the game and got a few opportunities to extend our lead but in the end we didn't manage to do so. Overal a very pleasing victory and 3 very important points for us in the final game of the month.​
 
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February Review
View attachment 202034So February, all in all a decent month. We managed to get 6 out of 12 points in the Premier League which isn't bad for us as we can definately use the points.

We also got a very convincing win against Blackpool in the FA Cup but our dreadful performance against Yeovil does somewhat diminish that result.


Table
View attachment 202033Chelsea are still leading the table while Arsenal still follow very closely with only 1 point between them. Given the number of fixtures that are left to be played I'd say that the title race is going to be between the 2 of them. City are still 3rd while United are still 4th. Leicester have had a very impressive month and as a result find themselves in 5th place.

At the bottom we still find Stoke and it looks like they will probably be the first team to get relegated this year. Villa are currently in the 19th position as we have overtaken them and now lie in 18th place with 24 points. We are now only 2 points behind 17th placed Palace and thus the "safe zone". It should be noted that Palace have played 1 match less then us as their fixture against Tottenham has been postponed.



News
View attachment 202029The first price of the season has gone to Tottenham as they have won the Capital One Cup. This is very good news for Pochettino given the fact that he is under high pressure because of them underperforming in the league.



A Look Ahead: March
View attachment 202028March will be a very tough month for us as we face some tough teams. We first face West Bromwich Albion in a very important game given that they are only 5 points in front of us in the 15th place. Then we face Arsenal at the Emirates, not expecting to get much from this one.

Then we have a mid-week game against Everton before finishing the month of with a game against Southampton at St Mary's.


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View attachment 202025This was a very important game for us, in the previous month we closed the gap to the "safe zone" by a big margin and our win here has seen us continue along this road.

What makes this win even more important is the fact that we'll be facing Arsenal next and since that one is pretty much a guaranteed loss getting 3 points here is very satisfying indeed.

It wasn't all positive however as we lost 2 players to injuries, luckily they were only minor ones
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View attachment 202020Before this game started I knew that we would be hard pressed to get a good result out of this one and I was right.

Arsenal have been really excellent this season and this game was no exception. They dominated possession and created plenty of opportunities while we almost created nothing. In the end the only positive thing to take from this game is the fact that Arsenal only managed to score twice as they should have scored a lot more.​
 
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