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Monday Football
31 December2007
by Jerrad Peters

Most compelling viewing
Everton 1-4 Arsenal
For three-quarters of an hour, it appeared as though Arsenal would fail to capitalize on Manchester United’s 2-1 loss at West Ham. Arsene Wenger, his side trailing Everton 1-0 at Goodison Park at the break and a point adrift of United in the standings, could probably foresee the Sunday headlines as he strolled into the tunnel. Gunners lack bottle. Gritty Everton conquer placid Arsenal. Wenger’s youngsters choke in the clutch. You can bet that the 58-year-old manager conveyed just as much to his players in his half-time talk. And you can bet that they listened.

Less than two minutes after the restart, Eduardo da Silva equalized for the visitors. Gael Clichy launched an impressive cross into the area which the Croatian cradled before easing the ball past Tim Howard. Although there were shouts for hand-ball, referee Martin Atkinson was not swayed by the protestations. And rightfully so. The 36-year-old Yorkshire man was superb on the night; even though both sides did their best to spin his head off his shoulders.

Eduardo was at it again 11-minutes later – turning Phil Jagielka inside out as he made his way to goal. With Arsenal seemingly in the driver’s seat, the Toffees were provided an advantage when Nicklas Bendtner was sent-off in the 74th-minute.

Having already accumulated a yellow card in the first half, the 19-year-old Dane made a leaping, two-footed tackle into the knees of Everton striker Andrew Johnson. It might well have been a straight red. As it happened, the hosts converted their surplus manpower into a string of opportunities.

Nevertheless, it was 10-man Arsenal which notched a third tally against the run of play. Manuel Almunia’s goal-kick came to a roll just outside Howard’s box when Joseph Yobo made a match-altering miscalculation. The 27-year-old Nigeria defender, instead of clearing the ball away from a streaking Emmanuel Adebayor, allowed it to arrive at the feet of the American ‘keeper. The absence of decisiveness allowed the Arsenal striker to strip Howard of the ball and dribble, unchallenged, into the back of the net.

Frustrations at a boil, Mikel Arteta was red-carded in the 84th minute when he elbowed Cesc Fabregas in the face. The Arsenal midfielder played-up the injury; and, truth be told, Atikinson should rather have produced a yellow card. With Fabregas writhing in pain on the pitch, players from both sides started pushing and shoving one another – and, for a moment, it looked as though the melee might have turned ugly.

Now 10-men per side, Arsenal proceeded to rub salt in the wound when Tomas Rosicky rounded-out the scoring in added-time. With the victory, the Gunners leap-frogged United to their familiar spot atop the table with 47-points. Everton meanwhile, are joint-sixth with Aston Villa on 33-points. Both sides will play their second match in four days on Tuesday when Arsenal host West Ham and Everton visit Middlesbrough.

Notable results

West Ham 2-1 Manchester United
West Ham should be delighted with this result. The three points ensure that Alan Curbishley’s outfit enter the New Year in the top-half of the Premier League table. A far cry from last season when the club had just sacked Alan Pardew and looked destined for relegation. With 29-points already in the bag, the 2007-2008 Hammers are more a threat to the top-six than the bottom-three.

Having said that, United were absolutely dreadful. Aside from Cristiano Ronaldo’s lovely header just prior to the quarter-hour, the visitors mustered little in the way of opportunities throughout the remainder of the 90-minutes. Ronaldo managed to miss a penalty in the 68th-minute before the hosts finally came to life.

A pair of free-kicks turned the game on its head; although United did not deserve the full three points anyhow. Anton Ferdinand leveled matters in the 77th-minute before Matthew Upson nodded home the match-winner just five minutes later. In truth, after Ferdinand’s equalizer, West Ham played United into the ground and always appeared to be headed for the win.

Tottenham Hotspur 6-4 Reading
Last week, Spurs notched 11-goals. In doing so, they finally bumped a pitiful goal-differential above zero for the first time this season. And how. With 41-goals already this term, Spurs have outscored everyone in the Premier League, including 40-goal Arsenal and 37-goal Manchester United. Of course, their opponents have been very nearly as prolific. Through 20-rounds, only Reading, Sunderland, and Derby have conceded more goals than Tottenham.

Of course, even Spurs’ defense is not poor enough to lose when their forwards are scoring five or six goals per match. In that regard, they are very much the football equivalent of the NFL’s Indianapolis Colts of several seasons ago. It’s a somewhat reversed adage. A good offense is a good defense. The fans may agree. Here’s betting Juande Ramos probably doesn’t.

Dimitar Berbatov’s quadruple obviously overshadowed a fine performance from Dave Kitson. The 27-year-old Reading striker popped a brace, Saturday, and is now one of nine Premier League players with at least eight goals so far this season. Both of his tallies put the Royals in the lead; although, a certain Bulgarian cancelled the visitors’ advantage on each occasion.

Berbatov was outstanding – scoring a natural hat-trick between the 7th and 73rd minutes before adding a fourth in the 83rd. His second, a laser-like blast past Markus Hahnemann was only exceeded in attractiveness by his control, spin, and pin-point effort on his third marker.

With the three points, Spurs have climbed to 12th in the table. Reading, ahead of the London side ahead of kick-off, are now in 13th-place with 22-points.

Falkirk 2-1 Hearts
Ahead of Saturday’s journey to Falkirk Stadium, the Hearts players held a closed-door meeting. With four losses on the trot, they saw the weekend as an opportunity to enter the New Year on a winning note. Or so they hoped.

Ruben Palazuelos gave Hearts the lead just prior to the half-hour. A goal up, the visitors appeared content to sit on their advantage and grind out the remaining 62-minutes. Never a good idea; and Falkirk made them pay with just 12-minutes remaining on the clock.

Carl Finnigan and Michael Higdon scored three minutes apart to send Hearts reeling into 2008. With 28-points from 20 matches, Falkirk are a single point behind Dundee United’s Intertoto Cup berth for next summer. Hearts, meanwhile, have 20-points and are only assured of remaining out of relegation only because Gretna is completely out of their element.

PSV Eindhoven 2-0 NAC Breda
With Feyenoord drawing Herenveen on Saturday, PSV Eindhoven took the opportunity to join their Rotterdam rivals atop the Eredivisie. With 36-points from 17-rounds, PSV are the official leaders by virtue of a goal-differential which is superior by four.

Danny Koevermans notched his 10th league goal of the campaign in first-half stoppage-time. Denmark international Kenneth Perez doubled the spread after regular time had expired in the second period.

While the current top-three of PSV, Feyenoord, and Ajax is hardly a departure from the norm in Dutch football, 2008 looks sure to bring a competitive conclusion to the league. Ajax are just three-points behind the top two and are, themselves, level on points with Groningen. Surprising Twente have 32-points, as do Roda, creating the likelihood of a 6-pronged race down the stretch.

Key contributors
Eduardo da Silva
The Brazilian-born Croatia international opened his Premier League account, Saturday. Already having scored seven goals in other competitions, the 24-year-old now has nine on the year and is, without a doubt, the most lethal third-choice striker in English football. With an impressive goalscoring record with Dinamo Zagreb over six seasons until last summer, Eduardo was always going to be a top-notch forward. Arsene Wenger’s patience in setting him loose, however, has proven even more astute than Eduardo’s prowess in front of goal.

Dimitar Berbatov
In one, fell swoop, Berbatov doubled his 2007-2008 Premier League goalscoring output. Just how many more he will score this term in a Spurs shirt is the matter of the moment. In an interview with Sunsport on Sunday, the Bulgarian’s agent, Emil Dantchev, admitted that his client would like the opportunity to join another club in January. In brief, Dantchev’s message was essentially that the 26-year-old has outgrown Tottenham and would prefer a club with loftier ambitions. Juande Ramos, when queried about the issue, responded that there was little he could do to effect Berbatov’s exit. Manchester United offered 19M-pounds for the former Bayer Leverkusen hitman in the summertime. A successful bid this time around would likely eclipse the 25M-pound plateau.

Kenwyne Jones
Of all Roy Keane’s summer signings, Jones has proven the best value for money. Still, when it was announced that the Sunderland boss had shelled-out 6M-pounds plus Stern John for the Trinidad and Tobago international, more than a few eyebrows were raised. Simply, the 23-year-old has been worth every penny. In Saturday’s impressive 3-1 win over Bolton Wanderers at the Stadium of Light, Jones was everywhere – making Kieran Richardson’s opener on 14-minutes and scoring the match-winner just after the half-hour.

Mark Clattenburg
This is not in reference to Clattenburg’s performance in officiating the Birmingham City-Fulham match on Saturday. Rather, it is an attempt to uphold 32-year-old’s good sense of humor and sportsmanship – elements too often found lacking in match officials. As the two sides played to a lackluster 1-1 draw at St. Andrews, Birmingham winger Gary McSheffrey picked up Clattenburg’s yellow card from the pitch. In returning the card to the referee, the 25-year-old playfully “showed” him a flash of yellow. It was all in good fun, and Clattenburg appeared to be as amused by the gesture as everyone else in the grounds.

Man of the weekend

Phil O’Donnell
In many ways, Phil O’Donnell’s entire career was heartbreaking. As a tenacious young midfielder in his first stint at Motherwell, Scotland manager Craig Brown proclaimed him to be the best, box-to-box midfielder in Britain. That may have been something of an overstatement; but he was unarguably in the top heap at his position. In both 1992 and 1994 he was named the Scottish PFA Young Player of the Year.

Still, it never really panned out for O’Donnell. Brown capped him for Scotland a single time; and by 1994, he had made a 1.75M-pound move to Celtic. It was at Parkhead that the Bellshill-born midfielder won his only SPL title, in 1998. He also won the Scottish Cup in 1995 – adding to the 1991 Cup he won with Motherwell. But after battling fitness issues throughout the late-nineties, he was dealt to Sheffield Wednesday in 1999.

O’Donnell played just 20-matches for the Owls between 1999 and 2003 – scoring a single goal. Finally, in 2004, he rejoined Motherwell on a free transfer. Now in his thirties, he settled well at Fir Park and was named club captain.

With the Steelmen leading visiting Dundee United 5-2 at the weekend, O’Donnell was set to be substituted by Marc Fitzpatrick in the 78th-minute. As he made his way toward the touchline, the soon-to-be 36-year-old collapsed to the ground. He was immediately attended to by paramedics before being rushed to Wishaw General Hospital. Having suffered a seizure, he was pronounced dead shortly thereafter.

O’Donnell leaves a wife and four children. His nephew, David Clarkson, is also a Motherwell player and scored twice in Saturday’s win. The New Year’s clash between Celtic and Rangers has been canceled in his honor.

In a November interview, O’Donnell offered the following reflection on his career, “I will be 36 in March and I am just trying to play as long as I can and enjoy it. Honestly, each game is special to me. I have missed too many games in the middle of my career to stop playing at the age of 35; so I will play as long as I can.”