[Stig]

Wasn't watching the BT coverage care to elaborate? against Sociedad a penalty was given when the ball deflected off Martinez knee and that was given as a handball and yet tonight wasn't?

The laws of the game state that if there was an accidental handball in the lead-up, and not by the goalscorer, then the strike stands

 

[Red in STL]

It's very disturbing that we allow a team to score almost three times as many goals as they deserve according to xG.

,
Exactly why stats are mostly BS, they make no sense half the time

 

[kaku06]

Next week;















De gea















AWB Maguire Lindeloff Malacia















Mctominay Sabitzer















Sancho















Pellistri Elanga Garnacho































But the Hag will go full strength, he won't take risks at this point

What the feck is this? Ban him for this shit.

 

[kaku06]

Where is that cnut pellegrini laughing now? Had lot to say on the 7-0, take that you prick.

 

[Eddy_JukeZ]

Antony sure does. So the next time he has 3 team mates open to square it to for an open goal, he can spot them.

Honestly, he deserves a hairdryer for that. Just insane selfishness.

 

[Cheimoon]

There were lots of comments on the match-day thread claiming that sending out Sunday's team was a bad move - the players should be punished for their performance at the weekend. If you sent me out to play in sleet and snow I would feel I was being punished! I also think it was fair to give the players a chance to redeem themselves - after all they are professionals and probably felt really disgusted with Sunday.
Commentators are funny - mine - on DAZN - offering advice to Betis when the ball went to Antony "you have to be careful - you just never know what he's going to do!" Actually I do!!

Yeah, I heard that in the match summary. And lo and behold, Antony cut inside and fired off a shot into the far corner. Well, ai never...!!!

It's nice that it went in though, must have made the commentator feel that he was totally right there.

 

[bosskeano]

good thing is that this will or should kill the tie off plus being able to bring on 5 guys today....makes the selections for Southampton easier on the weekend

 

[always_hoping]

The laws of the game state that if there was an accidental handball in the lead-up, and not by the goalscorer, then the strike stands

Wasn't accidental though, intentional used his arm to control the ball.

 

[amolbhatia50k]

I guess it doesn't matter if you're wasteful in possession when you're playing against a bunch of farmers and chain-smokers.

More Pellestri, please.

Betis are a very good team. Not sure what you’re on about.

 

[amolbhatia50k]

Superb performance by the team. You can see how far we’ve come when a 1-4 loss seems flattering to your opponents. More than individuals I really love how we love the ball as a team.

Well done to Bruno and Antony for their attacking play. Pellistri has to play more - always makes an impact.

 

[bosskeano]

we've played barca, sociedad and now Betis...three of the top 5 teams in LaLiga and battered 2 of the three

no one can say we aren't headed in the right direction.....Betis are lucky it wasn't 6 or 7

 

[tenpoless]

Where is that cnut pellegrini laughing now? Had lot to say on the 7-0, take that you prick.

Leave him alone he's ancient. When he farts dust comes out.

 

[amolbhatia50k]

What I like is that we are now starting to see more of these games where for a half we are basically the only team playing and the opposition are doing nothing but hanging or failing to do so. This wave after wave or United pressure is a lovely thing to watch for us fans. Reminds me of those home games against SAF - once we got our tails up it was mesmerising.

 

[bringbackbebe]

Leave him alone he's ancient. When he farts dust comes out.

 

[Isotope]

Delighted with the win. We're finally battering Spanish teams under ETH, which is something we basically never did before even when facing Celta fecking Vigo at Old Trafford.

We made the current La Liga's leader our biatch in home and away games, even with the ref helped them. Even under SAF, it's rarely (if ever) happened.

EtH is building something beautiful.

 

[York]

The laws of the game state that if there was an accidental handball in the lead-up, and not by the goalscorer, then the strike stands

Care to provide a link?

 

[Steve 007]

Lots of positives. The team bounced back. The manager proved his worth again by playing the same team and not throwing them under the bus this week Mourinho style. 4 great goals especially Rashford and Anthony. Bruno superb his best performance in a long time. Solid at the back. Pellistri looks a player. Sancho got more minutes and did ok. Wout scored at OT.

A few negatives, if Wout was a better finisher we’d have won by 7-8 goals. De Gea who I love had a nightmare. Confidence looked in the ditch from him, not really a shock. Dalot looked off it. Fred did some wonderful coast stuff then passed the ball straight to the opposition.

 

[RedDevilQuebecois]

Lots of positives. The team bounced back. The manager proved his worth again by playing the same team and not throwing them under the bus this week Mourinho style. 4 great goals especially Rashford and Anthony. Bruno superb his best performance in a long time. Solid at the back. Pellistri looks a player. Sancho got more minutes and did ok. Wout scored at OT.

A few negatives, if Wout was a better finisher we’d have won by 7-8 goals. De Gea who I love had a nightmare. Confidence looked in the ditch from him, not really a shock. Dalot looked off it. Fred did some wonderful coast stuff then passed the ball straight to the opposition.

Pretty much the same assessment.

Sabitzer is unlucky to be ruled out of this one because of injury. It was the kind of game that he would have played so Fred can enjoy have a little bit of rest.

I hope Pellistri will have more chances in the Premier League soon because I think he can provide something different and yet effective of his own as well. Gotta need him if Antony doesn't have a good game.

Honestly, we looked great although finishing was left to be desired so many times. Real Betis were just not in it at all. At the end of the day, we are in a good position to go through just a week later and we have not sustained a single injury to any of our regulars. Bring on the Saints.

 

[DJ_21]

Can’t keep Gettin bailed out by the 2nd halves. Need to have a decent first halve or some teams will punish us and be 2/3 up in first halve. Onto the next game.

 

[Waynne]

To be fair we won 16 out of the last 20 matches before last Sunday. And I think we showed aggression, character and hunger in all those matches.

Yeah but when facing Liverpool all that they've learned somehow went out the window. Perhaps the drubbing was needed to remind the players that they need to be more consistent in how they approach games.

 

[Desert Eagle]

The laws of the game state that if there was an accidental handball in the lead-up, and not by the goalscorer, then the strike stands

Didn't look accidental, he had his arms in a cradle position and used it to help control the ball.

 

[Steve 007]

Can’t keep Gettin bailed out by the 2nd halves. Need to have a decent first halve or some teams will punish us and be 2/3 up in first halve. Onto the next game.

In fairness we were good in the majority of the first half. We could have been 4 up before they scored if we had someone like Kane up too. It’s glaringly obvious we need a top striker.

 

[quadrant]

You could see the confidence had taken a hit with that wobble at the end of the first half, so I'm very happy that the team came through.

By the end, my main criticism was that we didn't score more. A three goal lead is safe, but a five goal lead is a done deal.

That said, we have quite a few area for concern still. Antony's goal shouldn't hide another limited performance. Shaw looked pretty leggy at times. When we struggled at the end of the first half, Fred had another spell where his head seemed to go.

Weghorst, you can't really complain about. He's playing to his maximum level in terms of effort and skill. I wish I could say that about more players. But a world class striker is grabbing a hat trick from the chances he got.

De Gea showed the problem we have with him. The goal wasn't a mistake, I'd say that goal goes in against typical keepers the majority of the time. But if you have a keeper who can't kick, catch or command and whose only strength is shot stopping, thats exactly the kind of shot you'd want him to save.

I was really pleased with the quality from the bench. Obviously Pellistri had a great cameo. Malacia and AWB played well, Sancho didn't quite click but looked lively. Given that Eriksen, Sabitzer and Martial were unavailable, it shows the bench is decent.

Also, quick shout out to that Betis defender who tried to block Rashfords shot with his face while lying on the floor. Almost a shame he didn't succeed, that would have been epic.

Betis are a pretty ordinary team, I'd rate them below the likes of Fulham and Brighton, but somehow Spanish football always translates well onto the European stage, so we have to mark that down as a really good win. Follow that up with a professional performance in the return and we can look forward to another round.

 

[justsomebloke]

The move of the match though was Martinez, with three attackers crowding him and playing his way through in his own box.

Yeah. And a big shout-out to De Gea there, for putting him in a position where he had no other choice.

 

[RaddyRed]

Perfect response from the players. Was a flat atmosphere at times, but understandable after the weekend.

Fair play to the Betis defender trying to block Rashfords goal with his head whilst lying on the floor.

Spent the last 5 mins watching the police batter the Betis fans. I'd say a few of them are sore this morning.

 

[justsomebloke]

Phew, that was tense for a while. At half-time, I thought it looked like there was a serious risk we'd go into meltdown mode again, but then we blew them away with one of the best second halves of the season.

However, not a uniformly good match on the player side. We were carried by the central spine of Fernandes (who had perhaps his best game this season), Casemiro, Martinez and Varane.

De Gea with abysmal passing that might easily have cost us, and not sure he got the positioning right for their goal?

Shaw okay, some good offensive interventions but things aren't looking secure defensively down his side the way they did not long ago.

Dalot poor, lucky he didn't cost us a goal with that backpass. He just isn't progressing back to old form since his return, is he. His confidence looks shot. AWB was very obviously an improvement.

We got very much the bad Fred yesterday - late into things, lost more one-on-ones than he won, passing involvement more negative than positive.

Rashford - scored a wonderful goal, but didn't succeed with much after that. But I'm thrilled that that now seems to be his baseline.

Antony - tries and tries, gets a great goal, but even with that it doesn't really add up to something more than goodish. At this point, he's not a player who makes a major contribution.

Weghorst - well, he gives his all, and this is as much as you'll get. Credit to ETH for integrating him into the team as someone who brings something, given how limited a player he is compared to his teammates up front.

 

[Real Name]

I guess it doesn't matter if you're wasteful in possession when you're playing against a bunch of farmers and chain-smokers.

More Pellestri, please.

What the actual fek.

 

[Real Name]

Antony the guy who was terrible for 89 minutes and 55 seconds of that game.

Game was on yesterday, did you watch it?

 

[Oscar Bonavena]

The move of the match though was Martinez, with three attackers crowding him and playing his way through in his own box.

Call me an old school dinosaur if you like but I don't like to see my centre halves attempting to dribble past opponents in our own box! However as someone said, de Gea put Lis in an awkward position where that was the only option left open to him. I don't think he wanted to do that!

The joke of it is that having done that, 3 seconds later Fred kicked a cross field pass straight out of play!

 

[MrBest]

What the feck is this? Ban him for this shit.

You can address me directly you spineless poster. If you had asked, no I didn't waste my time putting spaces, it's a bug on my Internet explorer. Calm down.

 

[MrBest]

Where is that cnut pellegrini laughing now? Had lot to say on the 7-0, take that you prick.

Mods, ban him for foul language.

 

[Ibi Dreams]

Should have been more than 4. Great response, Liverpool game already forgotten

 

[CG1010]

Felt we should have had at least one more goal which would have killed the tie, but good response and helps keep the season on track.

The tie IS over. When was the last time we lost a game by 3 or more?
..

 

[AFC NimbleThumb]

The tie IS over. When was the last time we lost a game by 3 or more?
..

 

[Bastian]

Call me an old school dinosaur if you like but I don't like to see my centre halves attempting to dribble past opponents in our own box! However as someone said, de Gea put Lis in an awkward position where that was the only option left open to him. I don't think he wanted to do that!

The joke of it is that having done that, 3 seconds later Fred kicked a cross field pass straight out of play!

I thought at the time it crystallised the imbalance of our team.

 

[OmarUnited4ever]

we should've scored at least 2 more goals in that second half and go to Betis with a comfortable 5 goals lead.

Missed chances and fecked up several attacking transitions!!

But I am pleased with the one and I am confident this tie is won.

Worst performer was De Gea (with his terrible distribution) and Dalot

 

[mctrials23]

Didn't look accidental, he had his arms in a cradle position and used it to help control the ball.

Yeah, really strange decision. He literally made a nice little basket to ensure he would control it. It hits his arm and at that point it was so likely based on his actions that it has to be intentional.

 

[Kag]

Missed the match. Looks like a good response.

The bed wetters won’t be too happy. Or maybe they will, until our next loss.

 

[Zed 101]

I don't want to rail on Antony, but I find him very frustrating, slows the play down, pure one footed, one trick, on the plus side he occupies players, and when his one trick works he scores.... but compare to the left where we have Rashford, Sancho and Garnacho, the right we have Antony, Pelastri and ??? Diallo, I think Pelastri and Diallo can show us something, not sure that Antony has anywhere to go

 

[justsomebloke]

I don't want to rail on Antony, but I find him very frustrating, slows the play down, pure one footed, one trick, on the plus side he occupies players, and when his one trick works he scores.... but compare to the left where we have Rashford, Sancho and Garnacho, the right we have Antony, Pelastri and ??? Diallo, I think Pelastri and Diallo can show us something, not sure that Antony has anywhere to go

Note though how good he was when he briefly switched to the left side. He racked up several good interventions, including a couple of really good low crosses, during that brief period.
Maybe that's a way to go, making increased use of side-switches between the wingers during games?