English Premier League Review: Week 7

1. Liverpool fails to pick up the much-needed 3 points at home:

The Reds’ struggle has been the story of the league thus far as they continue to underperform. Against Tony Pulis’ Stoke City, who had drawn 4 of their first 6 matches, you know that Liverpool fans were hoping to take the three points that would push them to mid-table and back into the hunt for the Champions League spots, but Stoke played superb defense and frustrated the more-talented Liverpool squad in their 50^th appearance at Anfield in top-flight English football (their record at Anfield: zero wins, eleven draws, 39 losses).

This is not meant to take any of the glory from the Stoke squad, just rather speak of the disappointing season from Liverpool through seven league matches. Brendan Rodgers, disgusted with his players after their loss to Udinese on Thursday, made eight changes to the squad (with quick turn around, that is to be expected), but the first team was unable to break through the Stoke defense.

Luis Suarez, known for his fantastic play but plagued by a reputation of diving, did both in the match. After what was called later “an obvious dive” in attempt of a penalty, he almost scored. Tony Pulis, who has taken it upon himself to become the diving watch dog, spoke of the incident afterwards, “Retrospective decisions are made on a Monday and Luis Suarez should be punished. The one in the penalty box was an embarrassment and how he wasn’t booked I don’t know.” Rodgers retorted as calling the criticism “wrong and unfair.”

Why don’t you take a look for yourself?

Liverpool was looking to build on their 5-2 win at Norwich City last week, but were let down again. They’ll be home against a basement-dwelling Reading squad after the international break on October 20^th.

2. Manchester City is climbing the table:

City made a move to third after this weekend’s matches and did it against a stubborn Sunderland side handily with a 3-0 win at home. And when I say handily, the score line truly didn’t show how dominating they were in this match. Sunderland suffered 28 shots in this one and 15 corner kicks, as their defense was often caught in compromising positions.

The win extends City’s unbeaten streak at home to thirty-three. That includes 30 wins and 3 draws.

Aleksander Kolarov’s curving free kick vs. Sunderland

3. How long will Chris Hughton stay at Norwich?

The season is really looking grim for the Canaries as they drop another match, this time away at Chelsea. They simply did not look like a Premier League side against the Blues, who can do that against virtually anybody, but comes after a 5-2 home loss to the ailing Liverpool.

The Canaries are still win-less, but because of how early the season is, a win could push them out of relegation zone, but with three absolute routs this season, their goal differential sits at -12, digging a hole a bit deeper for them to climb from as the season progresses.

The question on every one’s mind isn’t if Hughton will be pushed out, but barring a miracle change of form starting against Arsenal home at Carrow, but when he will be relinquished. If the Canaries make a decision too quickly or too late, they could be without another viable option as they attempt to climb up the table.

As we see it, it surely seems that Norwich is going to have to make some great moves in January in attempts to shake up this squad.

4. West Brom shine, QPR scores two after the match is out of reach:

Mark Hughes, QPR Manager

West Brom scored two quick ones thanks to James Morrison (5’) and Zoltan Gera (22’) to take the match control and grind out another win which puts them at a surprising 14 points so far in 7 matches. The Baggies are really outperforming what most of us thought they would be able to do thus far.

Another tale of a manager in trouble, Mark Hughes’ QPR squad is dead last in the EPL and winless, losing five of their seven matches this season. The problem: QPR is not this bad on paper. They really aren’t. At The Farm Club we were expecting a mid-table finish, at least I was. We’ll see what they do to try to turn this ship around.