Liverpool romping in Premier League
Defending champ Manchester City falls 14 points back after loss to Manchester United
LONDON — Liverpool took a giant step toward its first title since 1990 on Saturday when the Reds’ 3-0 win at Bournemouth combined with Manchester United’s 2-1 victory at Manchester City to leave the defending champions 14 points adrift of the English Premier League leaders.
With second-place Leicester, which plays on Sunday, 11 points behind Liverpool, Juergen Klopp’s side is odds-on favourite to finally secure the silverware that has eluded them for so long.
On a dramatic league day, individual honours went to Tottenham Hotspur’s Son Heung-min, who dribbled almost the length of the pitch to score in his side’s 5-0 rout of Burnley, and Everton caretaker manager Duncan Ferguson, who inspired a 3-1 win over Chelsea in his first game in charge.
United, which beat Spurs in a mid-week match, blew City away with a dazzling first-half performance at the Etihad, which was capped by a VAR-awarded Marcus Rashford penalty and a strike from Anthony Martial.
Although David De Gea had to be at his sharpest to keep City at bay after the interval, when City scored through Nicolas Otamendi, United was well worth its victory — Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s first as player or manager in a Manchester derby.
“We’ll remember this one, we look so dangerous when we get the ball and go forward against arguably the best team in the world,” said Solskjaer.
Guardiola, whose team has dominated the Premier League with back-to-back title wins, was reluctant to talk about its position in the league.
“It is not time to think about that. We have to think about what we have to do and think about the next game. Doesn’t matter if six, eight or 14 points, we have to continue. We are a fantastic team,” he said.
The only sour note for United, which now is fifth, came in the second half when midfielder Fred appeared to be hit by a missile thrown from the crowd as he went to take a corner in front of agitated City supporters. The Brazilian was not seriously hurt.
Fred was also the target of what appeared to a be a racist gesture from a fan in the crowd, captured by television images.
City said they were working with police to identify the fans involved in the incidents and said they had a “zero tolerance” approach to discrimination and “anyone found guilty of racial abuse will be banned from the club for life”.
Liverpool, which won 4-0 on their previous two visits to Bournemouth, again shuffled their side, making seven changes from the mid-week Merseyside derby.
Two of Liverpool’s lesser lights, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Naby Keita, responded with goals before Mohamed Salah completed the formalities in a win which saw Liverpool keep a clean sheet for the first time in 14 games.
FERGUSON REWARDED
At Goodison Park, Everton looked nothing like the side which had subsided so abjectly at Liverpool, obviously re-energized by the fiery presence of Ferguson in place of Marco Silva in the dressing room.
The Scot’s decision to switch formation was rewarded instantly with a goal for Richarlison before Dominic Calvert-Lewin added a double to send the crowd wild.
Although Ferguson said he had thoroughly enjoyed his first game in charge, he will not be asking for the job fulltime.
“Honestly, I won’t be going asking for the job. I’m just here for Everton. It was an unbelievable experience; one I’ll never forget. We want the very best managers in the world at Everton Football Club. It’s one game. It’s one result.”
The win moved Everton away from the relegation zone, with most of its rivals playing on Sunday.
At the Tottenham Hotspur stadium, Spurs delivered exactly the sort of response to its defeat at Manchester United that manager Jose Mourinho wanted.
Although Harry Kane scored twice to make it eight goals in nine games against Burnley, Son took the headlines with a superb effort that started just outside his own area and saw the South Korean slalom through half the opposition before slotting home from inside the box.
Lucas Moura and Moussa Sissoko completed the scoring against a Burnley side which has conceded nine goals in four days.
“Sonny stole the show today,” said Kane, who is not often overshadowed in front of goal. “An unbelievable goal, a great counter attack. All he wants to do is work hard and play for the team.”
Struggling Watford ended a string of three straight losses against Crystal Palace in a scrappy game watched by its incoming manager Nigel Pearson, whose first game in charge could not be harder – a trip to Liverpool on Saturday.
WASHINGTON — The Dallas Cowboys scored 17 points in the fourth quarter on Thursday night but it wasn’t enough to ward off a brutal 31-24 loss at the hands of the Chicago Bears.
Luckily for Dallas, the Cowboys (6-7) will remain in first place in the NFC East even if the Philadelphia Eagles (5-7) beat the New York Giants (2-10) on Monday night, thanks to the Cowboys’ win over the Eagles in October. But this season, for both the franchise and the division, has been a complete bust.
According to data provided by TruMedia, NFC East teams are 3-18 against opponents with winning records, the division’s worst such mark at this point of the season since the NFL expanded to 32 teams and realigned into eight divisions in 2002.
In another bit of ugliness, NFC East teams are just 10-26 in games outside of their division — again, the worst mark at this point of the season since the birth of the current league configuration.
The next-worst division this season?
The AFC West, which is 14-18 in out-of-division games.
In fact, the NFC East is putting together one of the worst out-of-division records of the past 18 years.
Only the 2008 NFC West, 2014 NFC South, 2008 AFC West and 2004 NFC West were worse at this point in the season.
NFL rules dictate division winners earn playoff berths, so each of those division winners, despite their futile mark against non-division teams, were represented in the postseason.
And surprisingly, they weren’t embarrassed.
In 2004, the NFC West sent the Seattle Seahawks (at 9-7, the division champion) and the St. Louis Rams (at 8-8, a wild-card team) to the playoffs. The Rams beat the Seahawks
in the wild-card round but then fell to the Atlanta Falcons 47-17 in the divisional round. In 2008, the NFC West was represented by the 9-7 Arizona Cardinals, who lost to the Pittsburgh Steelers in Super Bowl XLIII.
That same season, the AFC West’s San Diego Chargers (8-8) won their wild-card game before losing to the Steelers in the divisional round.
And in 2014, the 7-8-1 Carolina Panthers gave the NFC South a playoff win (over the Cardinals) before losing to the top-seeded Seahawks, the eventual Super Bowl runner-up.
As mentioned earlier, the Cowboys sit at the top of the division heading into Sunday, with a 63 per cent chance at winning the division (that estimate is based on 1,000 simulations of the remainder of the season, using teams’ actual win rates, projected win rates based on total points scored and allowed and a regressed win rate that accounts for having played less than a full season). The Eagles have the next-best chance at 37 per cent and the Washington Redskins, despite a 3-9 record, are still mathematically alive in the divisional race.
The remaining game that could swing this outlook the most is the Week 16 matchup between the Cowboys and Eagles. According to the New York Times Playoff Picture, an Eagles win in that game would improve their playoff chances from 33 per cent to 60 per cent, while a loss would shrink their playoff chances to a mere four per cent. That’s irrespective of any other result over the next few weeks.
If the Eagles manage to win their next two games (vs. the Giants and then at Washington), Dallas Week becomes much more important.
A win in that scenario would push Philadelphia’s playoff chances from 50 per cent to 87 per cent, while a loss would reduce them from 50 per cent to 10 per cent.