Premier League Round 12: The Good, The Bad And The Ugly

The Good

Rob Elliot

When Tim Krul’s season was lost while on international duty with the Netherlands it meant that Rob Elliot would have to pick up the slack as Newcastle’s goalkeeper.

Goalkeeper is a vitally important position, particularly for sides like Newcastle that reside in the bottom half of the table and see quite a high number of shots against per game.

I thought losing Krul would be the last straw in what had been a mightily disappointing season for Newcastle because in limited duty over the past few seasons with Elliot has been less than stellar.

According to whoscored.com, Elliot’s average match rating has been a 6.34, 6.32 and 6.39 during the past three seasons.

Elliot’s first two performances did not yield anything to give Newcastle supporters hope that he could adequately fill Krul’s shoes as his match ratings against Norwich City and Sunderland were 6.41 and 5.47 respectively.

Newcastle’s next match saw them square off against Stoke City and Elliot performed much better. He earned a 7.19 match rating according to whoscored.com, though opposing goalkeeper Jack Butland stole the show as he has done for much of the season.

This past week Newcastle had a vitally important match against fellow relegation candidate Bournemouth. At season’s end the difference between staying in the Premier League to play Manchester United, Manchester City and Arsenal or going down to the Championship for dates with Leeds United, Brentford and Bristol City could be as little as 1 point, or goal difference for that matter.

Each side were looking for someone to step up and provide a spark.

Who would have guessed that Elliot would provide it?

Bournemouth’s hard-luck campaign continued as Elliot played the game of his life between the pipes.

According to The Daily Mail’s match zone, Elliot contributed five saves, two catches and six punches to Newcastle’s 1-0 victory away to Bournemouth.

The Cherries peppered Newcastle’s goal for the duration of the match and Elliot stood up to each shot and cross Bournemouth sent in.

Here are the statistics from the match to get an idea of just how much Elliot was under siege.

Bournemouth took 20 shots to Newcastle’s two.

Newcastle failed to earn a corner kick while Bournemouth amassed 16.

Bournemouth held a sizable possession advantage as well.

Just as it has for most of the season, though, lady luck chose not to smile upon Bournemouth. They have been ravaged by injuries and seem helpless to stop their slide down the table.

Elliot’s phenomenal performance took Newcastle from being one point behind Bournemouth and in the first relegation position, to two points ahead in the first place above relegation.

Whether or not Newcastle can stay there will depend largely on how the players in front of Elliot perform. He may have ditched the glasses and reporter’s notebook for the match against Bournemouth, but the large majority of Newcastle’s remaining fixtures are far more likely to see the average citizen, Clark Kent type of performance from Elliot than his Superman impression in goal this past week.

The Loic Remy v. Jack Butland Penalty Decision

One of the hot-button topics from round 12 of the Premier League was match official Anthony Taylor’s decision not to award Chelsea a penalty kick which could have seen them tie the match against Stoke.

Here is how it happened:

Remy was sent through on goal and Jack Butland slid in an attempt to cut out the threat before Remy could take a shot at goal.

When Butland slid in for the ball it gave Remy a decision to make. That decision was to leave his feet on the ground and let Butland go through him, or take a touch out to the side to set up a shot.

Remy opted for the latter, but slipped and was unable to release an accurate shot. The chance went begging and Chelsea lost 1-0 away to Stoke City.

Chatter ensued about the play as soon as the final whistle went, but was all the talk warranted?

The NBCSN studio crew thought it was a surefire penalty kick. The announcing duo of Arlo White and Graeme Le Saux disagreed with the studio crew.

Keep in mind that Le Saux played for Chelsea and he did not think it was a penalty kick.

The crew from the NBCSN studio argued that Butland’s intent was to foul Remy. He was willing to go straight through the player to keep him from taking a shot and that meant the play should have resulted in a penalty.

Think about that for a moment.

Are we really arguing that the potential for intent to foul a player, not actually fouling them, is now worthy of a penalty? As if making the rules even more subjective would make the match official’s job any easier.

Think about another aspect of play in the penalty area that has become increasingly subjective and messy throughout the years.

The handball rule has been a mess for years now. Watch any play involving suspicion of handball and you will see that everyone has a different interpretation of the rule.

Some will say that it should only be a penalty kick if the handball is deliberate. Others say it should only be a penalty if the player is a certain distance away from the ball when it is kicked. The point is that everyone has their own interpretation of a rule that has been in the game for a very long time.

Then we have people saying that the intent to foul Remy in the box should result in a penalty because Remy was not coordinated enough to keep his footing and release a shot at goal?

Give me a break.

What else is Butland supposed to do in that situation?

The keeper has a right to make an attempt to steal the ball from the attacker. His intent was to keep Remy from scoring a goal, as it should be.

Remy’s intent was to score a goal himself, as it should be.

They both made conscious decisions and the referee made one too. He decided it was not a foul because there is no way you can give a penalty for a play in which the attacker was not even touched by the defender.

Butland slid. Remy avoided it. Remy shot and missed. That was it. That is the end of the play.

When you start talking about intent to foul in the box, as opposed to actually fouling, then we’re moving into territory where the referee could call a penalty on nearly every trip down the pitch.

Arguing that a penalty should be given because you think Butland’s intent was to foul Remy opens up a can of worms that should never be opened.

If you lash out at someone in the box and trip them, then that is a penalty. If you lash out at someone, but he is agile enough to avoid it and take the shot anyways, then that is not a penalty.

To start awarding penalties for the potential intent to bring someone down in the box is as asinine as it gets.

Let’s keep the game as simple as possible for the referees. Less subjectivity is a good thing.

Next: The Bad