How good is our football?

THE question posed in the headline should really be, “how competitive is the Premier League?” because as I alluded to last week, there are some glaring imbalances in what the hype machine — and, in fairness, the viewing figures around the globe — tells us is the world’s most popular league.

As I said last week, all bar the top six clubs in the Premier League have a negative goal difference while at the time of writing all bar the top nine clubs are genuine relegation candidates, leaving just Arsenal, Burnley, Leicester and possibly Watford ostensibly the only clubs with nothing left to play for other than qualification for the dreaded Europa League. (Plus Citeh who are, of course, walking away with the title.) It makes for a relatively thrilling race for the last three Champions League places, but surely there has to be more to the national game than the likes of United, Liverpool, Spurs and Chelsea competing for scraps?

There is an argument to be made that having 11 clubs competing to avoid relegation is a sign of a healthy league — but is it really? What we are seeing now from these clubs when they play the top five is banks of defenders sitting behind the ball desperately hoping to not get hammered, while offering next to nothing going forward. OK, occasionally the likes of Newcastle can beat the other United, but all these clubs are focusing on is their games with other stragglers.

Unfortunately it’s not only the small clubs rolling over; such is Citeh’s dominance, United and Chelsea in particular have benched millions of pounds-worth of strikers and employed the same tactics as the relegationthreatened clubs when playing the presumptive title-winners. Healthy? Not in my book. Lest we forget, United and Chelsea are two of the richest clubs on the planet and spend accordingly, yet they’re both happy to roll over and have their tummy tickled by Pep Guardiola.

Keep going this way and the Premier League will soon be as uncompetitive as La Liga, Serie A, Ligue Un and the Bundesliga. Reach that point and the world’s favourite league will soon lose its cachet.

Sucker punch

Sometimes you’ve just gotta hold your hand up. Did Spurs deserve to go out of the Champions League on Wednesday? No. Were Spurs the better team over the two legs? Unquestionably. So why are Juventus and not Spurs through to the quarter-finals? Because for the opening 10 minutes in the first leg the Spurs defence was all over the place, and around the hour mark in the second leg the Juventus coach, Massimiliano Allegri, showed why he is a master and Mauricio Pochettino is still an apprentice.

Allegri’s staggered substitutions bamboozled the Spurs defence so much that they failed to react to a crucial change of formation. Suddenly a Juve team that couldn’t so much as lay a finger on Spurs looked a different animal. Two shots on target (their only ones in the game) in three minutes and it was all but game over. Juventus were everything we expected them to

be, cynical, frequently dirty and masters of the black arts, but they were also something else — winners — and that is something Spurs still can’t say about themselves.

From Russia (via Zurich) with love

Well that’s it then; the people in power have spoken and VAR will be used in this summer’s World Cup in Russia. Fifa boss Gianni Infantino officially announced this last week in Zurich, proclaiming that the move “would be good for football and referees”. Interestingly enough, he didn’t comment on the fact that money-loving Fifa have for the past six months been looking for an A-list company to sponsor the VAR breaks in each game. Coming to our screens this summer: VAR presented by Pepsi. At least six times per game.

Pass of the week

Harry Kane’s sumptuous cross-field ball to Son Heung-Min for the South Korean’s second goal against Huddersfield. Those calling him a “one-season wonder” and “just a striker” seem to not see or even just choose to ignore his hold-up play and ability to see and make a pass. If he had an exotic-sounding name and played for Real Madrid while advertising everything from fragrances to Yfronts, while dating a pop or movie star, no-one would be questioning his abilities.

Team of the week

Matt Ryan, Brighton; Daryl Janmaat, Watford; Shane Duffy, Brighton; James Tarkowski, Burnley; Jan Vertonghen, Spurs; Son Heung-Min, Spurs; David Silva, Citeh; Ki Sung-Yeung, Swansea; Glenn Murray, Brighton; Pascal Gross, Brighton; Sadio Mane, Liverpool. Manager: Chris Hughton, Brighton.

This week’s big games

English Premier League — today: 2.30pm United v Liverpool; 5pm Everton v Brighton, Huddersfield v Swansea, Newcastle v Southampton, West Brom v Leicester, West Ham v Burnley; 7.30pm Chelsea v Palace. Tomorrow: 3.30pm Arsenal v Watford; 6pm Bournemouth v Spurs. Monday: 10pm Stoke v Citeh. Scottish Premiership — tomorrow: 2pm Rangers v Celtic. Champions League, second legs — Tuesday: 9.45pm United (0-0) Seville. Wednesday: 9.45pm Barcelona (1-1) Chelsea.

When United went to Liverpool in the autumn Jose Mourinho parked the biggest bus he could find to escape Anfield with a 0-0 draw. With the two clubs separated by just two points will he do so again? At home?

Six Nations

Today: 4.15pm Ireland v Scotland; 6.45pm France v England. Tomorrow: 5pm Wales v Italy. This promises to be the pivotal weekend of the Six Nations. Ireland will clinch the title a week early if they see off the Scots and England go down in Paris. From an English point of view the runes aren’t looking too good. While they will probably be favoured in Paris against a typically up-and-down French side, they will be desperately hoping that the Scots can reproduce the form that saw them take England apart two weeks ago in Edinburgh, against an Irish team that will start massive favourites to see off a side that constantly suffers from chronic travel sickness.

And finally

Last week’s question: which club broke their transfer record last summer to buy a striker, only to break it again in January, ostensibly to replace the previous record signing? Alexandre Lacazette cost Arsenal the thick end of £52 million when he signed in the summer and started brightly before tailing off, possibly because of the way Arsene Wenger set the team up. So, looking for goals in the second half of the season, Wenger splurged another £56 million on Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang who didn’t start off brightly before tailing off possibly because of the way Arsene Wenger set the team up. Meanwhile, to partially offset these purchases, Arsenal offloaded the consistently good Olivier Giroud to Chelsea. Go figure.

This week: not sports-related but connect From Russia With Love, ‹stanbul and Mack the Knife. Bonus: name the player who began his career at Burnley before going on to win a total of nine national titles in three different countries.

Bingo full house call of the week: “Meeeeeeeeee . . . I think?” Coming after Mrs Walker (bless her) had somehow contrived to make a false call on the earlier single line.

A tale of three Gooners

A big warm welcome back to the island to one of my favourite Gooners, John Copping. I’m sure you’ll enjoy your time here, John, as long as you stay away from any sporting media and try not to look at your Arsenal-emblazoned satellite dish or the plaque on the wall. An equally warm welcome to John’s sister-in-law Linda, who I’m told is coming out for a wellearned respite from hubby Ron’s constant moaning about Arsenal.

Speaking of which . . . a mate of mine, Peter Monk, in order to get away from Arsenal-angst, tells me he is off to Ethiopia for six months to do some charitable stuff. Hopefully he finds the inner peace he so desires, but unfortunately I think there is a very good chance (here’s hoping) that Arsene Wenger will still be in place when Peter returns.