PREMIER LEAGUE ROUND-UP WEEK 1 2011/12

It’s soon come back round again, that’s right it’s the Premier League season again. This weekend has seen a fascinating opening showing from the teams involved. Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool all drew game they would have thought winnable, whilst Bolton stormed to the top of the table. No home games were won by the home teams until Monday evening, and a game was postponed.
Featured Matches
Liverpool v Sunderland
Newcastle v Arsenal
Stoke v Chelsea
West Brom v Man United
Man City v Swansea


HUNGRY WOLVES CLAIM COMEBACK!
Blackburn 1 v 2 Wolves
Formica 20’ Fletcher 22’
Ward 47’

• Roberts brushes past three men with great strength to play Formica in to beat Hennessy to put Blackburn ahead.
• The lead only lasts two minutes as Fletcher heads in from the back post after a well –flighted cross Jarvis.
• The winner comes via a penalty early in the second half. Whilst Robinson saves Fletcher’s effort from the spot, the ball goes out wide and is crossed in to meet a superb left-foot volley from Ward.
• Blackburn tried valiantly to gain an equaliser, but the full time whistle beat them to it. Mick McCarthy, though pleased with his team’s victory stressed about “not getting carried away” whilst Steve Kean admitted that “different areas of this team still need strengthening”.


SAME OLD STORY AT CRAVEN COTTAGE!
Fulham 0 v 0 Aston Villa

• Craven Cottage lived up to its status as the Mecca for draws in spite of a disallowed goal for Darren Bent and some great saves out of both goalkeepers. At the end of the game Martin Jol professed, “we would have liked to have points on the board”.


LOVELY LARSSON SAVES A POINT!
Liverpool 1 v 1 Sunderland
Suarez 12’ (pen) Larsson 42’

Anfield welcomed the start of yet another football season. After all of their investment, it will be interested to see what the next 9 months holds in store for them. Their opponents Sunderland have also been making some smart signings; Seb Larsson, Wes Brown and Connor Wickham being just three of them.
The game did not take long to have its first flashpoint. With 5 minutes gone, an overly casual piece of defending from Kieran Richardson caused his clearance to be intercepted by Suarez. Suarez sprinted clear, and attempted to round the keeper before being tugged down by a recovering Richardson. Somehow, the Sunderland number 3 avoiding seeing red, but did concede the penalty. Suarez duly blasted this over the bar in a poor effort to keep the deadlock.
This deadlock was not long lived though, seven minutes later, Liverpool found themselves with a wide free-kick out on the right flank. A brilliant, flat delivery from the left-footed Charlie Adam found a deflected header from Suarez, which found the net to help the Uruguayan atone for his earlier mistake and send Liverpool ahead.
Liverpool continued to dominate as Andy Carroll found himself blasting the ball into the back of the net, only to have it chalked off due to a debatable shove on Anton Ferdinand. Stewart Downing found himself beating four men with a superb, winding run from the right before cutting in and shooting with his left from 25 yards, only for the bar to deny him.
Having weathered this, Sunderland then formed a chance that would precede a more dominant showing from them in the second half. Reina hesitated to come for a Larsson free kick that almost allowed Sessegnon to head home three minutes from half time.
On the other side of the half time break, Sunderland came out firing on more cylinders to take the attack to Liverpool. Then, on 57 minutes, this pressure told. El Mohamady whipped in a cross that floated over all the Red’s defenders to an unmarked Seb Larsson, who then executed an unbelievable volley into the far corner to put the teams back on a level heading.
The only other chance was an Andy Carroll header being denied by Mignolet before the final whistle sounded.
It had been a competitive game of two halves. Liverpool had failed to kick on for all three points in the second half and it had shown in the sloppy defending that allowed Larsson to show up unattended for the equaliser. Downing looked impressive on his Liverpool debut as well as Charlie Adam, who claimed the assist. Larsson and Wes Brown did likewise for Sunderland, with Brown showing all his experience in his defending to keep Liverpool at bay.


QPR BOLTED OUT THE DOOR!
QPR 0 v 4 Bolton
45+2’ Cahill
67’ Gabbidon OG
70’ Klasnic
79’ Muamba

• Campbell has a goal disallowed in the first minute for offside.
• Kieran Dyer picks up horrible injury a minute later.
• Gary Cahill opens his account for the season with a glorious curling effort for 20 yards to put Bolton ahead in first half injury time.
• Halfway through the second period, a wide Eagles free kick runs across the goalmouth, with Gabbidon sliding the ball into the back of the net for an unfortunate own goal.
• Three minutes later a deflected shot from Klasnic after a good flick on from Kevin Davies puts Bolton 3 – 0 up.
• The final nail in the coffin came via a great Bolton move which resulted in Muamba finishing neatly after a good through ball from Klasnic.
• Warnock surmised, “We’ve got to learn quickly after this. We capitulated after 2 – 0, but we’d rather be here than the Championship.”


HOOLAHAN THE HERO AS POINTS ARE SAVED!
Wigan 1 V 1 Norwich
Watson 21’ Hoolahan 45+1’

• Di Santo wins a penalty for Wigan after DeLaet knocks him down following some slack defending from the Belgian. Ben Watson converted this penalty to put the Latics ahead.
• Hoolahan replied in injury time as Wigan keeper Al-Habsi spilled a cross to leave him with an easy finish.


GERVINHO SEES RED IN ST JAMES’ PARK STALEMATE!
Newcastle 0 v 0 Arsenal

Unfortunately for the neutrals, football was not treated to quite as entertaining a spectacle as it saw in this fixture last year when Newcastle reversed a 4 – 0 deficit to take a point. Instead, what they got was a tense game, on Arsenal’s part, it was mostly due to the speculation surrounding two of the most prominent players, Nasri and Fabregas and the fact that they were not taking part. For Newcastle, it was likely down to Joey Barton’s involvement after a full u-turn from those up-high in the St James’ Park club.
The first chance of the game fell to Tomas Rosicky, who generally impressed as cover for the absent Fabregas. Aaron Ramsey had slid across a ball to him on the edge of the area, which Rosicky curled narrowly wide after a fluid build up.
Indeed, Arsenal had much of the early running as a deflected Van Persie shot left Tim Krul scrambling in the Newcastle goal. This was followed soon after by a goal line clearance from Simpson to prevent Arsenal taking the lead. Robin Van Persie then went the closest yet, with a free kick from the right corner of the box that skimmed the roof of the net with Krul struggling to stop it if it dipped further.
An interesting incident then happened. Having been dispossessed by Song, Joey Barton was on the floor, Song then subtly stamped on the back of Barton’s leg so that the referee could not see and got away with it in spite of Barton’s protests. Barton went on to twitter a post-game statement, “if the roles were reversed and I’d stamped on him, it would be so much different”.
This episode only served to spice up the game. After Theo Walcott made Krul stretch to save an effort, Gervinho found himself tripped in the area. A penalty was not given, but Joey Barton then took it upon himself to drag Gervinho to his feet aggressively and accuse him of cheating and diving. Gervinho then struck out at Barton with a slap, to which Barton fell theatrically, clutching his face. The referee then came over and gave Gervinho a red card, whilst Barton only got a yellow. Arsene Wenger was displeased by this and remarked, “I don’t understand the red card, the referee didn’t see the incident and had his back turned to it. It is either a yellow to each player or a red to each player.” Video evidence supported Wenger’s claims about the referee view (or lack thereof) of the coming together.
In the last minute, Arsenal countered, three against two, but squandered the opportunity. This served to encapsulate their performance, whilst Newcastle managed to defend well enough to keep them out.


CHELSEA FAIL TO UNLOCK STOKE CODE!
Stoke 0 v 0 Chelsea

This game saw the possible re-emergence of a sharp Fernando Torres. He may not have scored, but he did just about everything but. After a poor start to his Chelsea career, he shielded the ball expertly, showed well-timed changes of pace and beat men aplenty as he took the man of the match award.
In spite of the 0 – 0 score line, there could easily have been 5 penalties. Kalou, Torres and Lampard were all felled in the box for Chelsea, whilst Stoke had a Terry handball rejected as well as having Shawcross dragged to the floor by Terry as they battled throughout the match at set-pieces. On review, it appeared that the Torres and Lampard penalty claims were - in most eyes – penalties, as was Terry’s handball at the other end.
The first half went mostly Stoke’s way. Their set pieces were well delivered and caused Cech and his defenders more than a few problems. Not only this, but their open play was not bad either. Ashley Cole was caught sleeping by a ball in behind him to Walters, who’s cross was denied by Cech.
This does not mean that Stoke had it all their own way. Bosingwa had an early effort put round the post by the highly impressive Asmir Begovic. Robert Huth then found himself having to produce a well-timed headed clearance from a good cross. Ramires - who also had a striking impact - managed to bully his way through several players only to have his squared pass run across the face of goal to waste.
The second half then saw Chelsea start to take over the game, really pressuring the Stoke defence. Stoke however, failed to fold and refused to back down as Chelsea threw all they had at the Potters. Torres failed to turn and score from a Terry knock down following a corner just before a rasping 25 yard shot from John Obi Mikel had to be tipped over the bar by Begovic.
The last 25 minutes saw a much more stretched game with plenty of end to end play. It was still Chelsea that were having the better of the play and this was not helped when Etherington had to go off with a suspected broken arm. Malouda hit a stinging shot straight at Begovic, and a deft chip from the newly-introduced Anelka nearly beat the stopper, who was just able to tip the ball onto the bar before saving from Kalou.
The final whistle saw a slightly despondent Chelsea, disappointed at not being able to either score or take three points back to London. However, all credit must be given to the solid Stoke back four and there supreme goalkeeper for keeping the Blues out for the duration of the game when a late winner looked nigh-on inevitable.


YOUNG SHOWS MATURITY ON DEBUT TO MAKE UP FOR DE GEA HOWLER!
West Brom 1 v 2 Man United
Long 37’ 13’ Rooney
81’ Reid OG

United were quick out of the blocks on this occasion, as opposed to their sedate approach in the Community Shield. Ashley Young marked the beginning of his debut with a well-aimed freekick that narrowly evaded the head of Danny Welbeck to put United into an early ascendency.
They would not have to wait long however. Wayne Rooney opened the scoring on 13 minutes following a great exchange with Young, who he back-heeled the ball to and was laid off by. He swivelled onto his left foot and slid the ball into the far corner from the edge of the box.
United should have doubled their lead ten minutes later after brilliant work from Welbeck and Rooney to tee up Nani, who could only fluff his shot over the bar.
Wigan then had their first chance of the game with Paul Scharner forcing a good save out of new boy David De Gea. Cleverly then had a chance denied down the other end within seconds, as the ball was taken away from him in a certain goal-scoring position. Another minute later, the Baggies got themselves right back into the game after Tchoyi battled well to get the ball across to Brunt, who then passed on to Long. Long then managed to steal half a yard with a step over to get a shot off at De Gea. De Gea was well placed enough to save it, but his movements were to slow and he could only let the ball roll underneath him as West Brom found their equaliser.
De Gea almost made a gaffe just short of half time as a cross/shot from the impressive Tchoyi came worryingly close to beating him.
United were dealt another blow soon into the second as Nemanja Vidic had to limp off with a hamstring problem that had flared up early in the first half. But United reacted well to this, with Rooney not getting the timing on his flicked header required to beat Foster, whilst Young nearly caught Foster out with a good curling effort.
Soon after this Ferdinand began to struggle with an injury of his own and quickly had to go off to be replaced by Phil Jones for his full United debut. A spot of luck finally came to the Mancunian’s as Ashley Young cleverly beat a couple of men to get his cross in, which was deflected him by Tamas and Reid into the far corner to secure United a later winner in the last 10 minutes.
Despite West Brom’s attempt at a last minute on-slaught -even bringing Ben Foster up for a free kick - United managed to hold out and claim the 3 points. Fergie was far from pleased though, “David should’ve done better” was one of his first comments on West Brom’s goal. Will the new keeper be good enough?


KUN CLICKS TO MAKE CITY SLICK!
Man City 4 v 0 Swansea
Dzeko 57’
Aguero 68’
Silva 71’
Aguero 90+1’

Man City dominated this game from the opening whistle, this is not meant to offend Swansea supporters, whose team bore up well under such pressure. Keeper Vorm was a particular standout with Swansea stringing a few nice moves together at times.
AS the headline suggests, this match was mostly about the appearance of one man. New record signing Sergio “Kun” Aguero came on with an hour gone and completely changed the game for his team. Until he was brought on, David Silva and Yaya Toure had been City’s best performers, with Silva creating the first goal that Edin Dzeko managed to dispatch, and Toure with his marauding runs and power.
Within 8 minutes of his substitution, Aguero’s named was being read out by the speaker after he got to back post to tap in a great ball across by Micah Richards. Three minutes later, he attempted an outrageous, audacious piece of skill when he kicked the ball over Vorm’s head, and seemingly out of play. Instead of giving up on the ball, we kicked it over his head for the on-rushing David Silva to put City 3-0 up and in an unassailable position with 20 minutes remaining.
Vorm managed the save of the match after a pass back was awarded. Yaya Toure blast the shot from 16 yards, underneath the wall. An unsighted Vorm managed to stretched out an arm with the ball literally about to cross the line.
Unfortunately he was to be beaten one final time though, when Aguero sized up an amazing 25 yard dart into the bottom corner to end the rout and bring Swansea into the Premier League with a bang of reality in injury time.


TEAM OF WEEK; GK - Begovic (Stoke), CM - Brown (Sunderland), CM - Huth (Stoke), LB - Warnock (Aston Villa), RB - Richards (Man City), CM - Muamba (Bolton),RCM - Young (Man United), LCM - Larsson (Sunderland), LWF - Silva (Man City), CF - Suarez (Liverpool), RWF - Aguero (Man City).