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Soccer Saturday: Your Running Commentary

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RadamelFalcaoManUnited2-AstonVilla2014 (Getty)

By ADAM TROXTELL

All eyes will be on Loftus Road in the mid-afternoon English Premier League action.

Manchester United will be looking to bounce back from a loss last weekend and maintain fourth place in the league. Also, fans and neutrals alike will clamor to see if Radamel Falcao starts for the visitors.

Speculation over the Colombian’s future was rife this week after he was left out of the squad last weekend. Falcao, who has scored three goals in 12 matches on loan at Man United this season, was rumored to be unhappy with the current situation.

The team that halted Man United’s unbeaten run last week, Southampton, travels to Newcastle in the late game in England. In Spain, Villarreal will try to keep pace in the race for Europe in a home match against Athletic Bilbao.

Lyon travel to Lens in an effort to stay on top of Ligue 1 for another weekend.

If you will be watching today’s action, feel free to share your thoughts, opinions and some play-by-play in the comments section below.

Enjoy the day’s action (today’s schedule after the jump):

TODAY’S SOCCER ON TV

7 a.m. – beIN Sports USA – Derby County vs. Nottingham Forest

7:45 a.m. – Fox Soccer Plus – Hamilton Academicals vs. Celtic

10 a.m. – NBCSN – Queens Park Rangers vs. Manchester United

10 a.m. – beIN Sports USA – Millwall vs. Ipswich Town

10 a.m. – beIN Sports en Espanol – Real Sociedad vs. Rayo Vallecano

10 a.m. – Premier League Extra Time – Aston Villa vs. Liverpool

10 a.m. – Premier League Extra Time – Burnley vs. Crystal Palace

10 a.m. – Premier League Extra Time – Leicester City vs. Stoke City

10 a.m. – Premier League Extra Time – Swansea City vs. Chelsea

10 a.m. – Premier League Extra Time – Tottenham vs. Sunderland

11 a.m. – beIN Sports Connect – Lens vs. Olympique Lyon

11 a.m. – beIN Sports Connect – Equatorial Guinea vs. Congo

Noon – beIN Sports USA – Empoli vs. Inter Milan

Noon – beIN Sports en Espanol – Valencia vs. Almerica

12:30 p.m. – NBC – Newcastle United vs. Southampton

2 p.m. – beIN Sports en Espanol – Villareal vs. Athletic Bilbao

2 p.m. – beIN Sports Connect – Gabon vs. Burkina Faso

2:45 p.m. – beIN Sports USA – Palermo vs. AS Roma

3:15 p.m. – Univision Deportes – Penafiel vs. FC Porto

5 p.m.- beIN Sports Espanol / beIN Sports Connect- Chile vs. Venezuela

6 p.m. – Univision – Cruz Azul vs. Santos Laguna

7:10 p.m. – beIN SPorts Espanol/beIN Sports Connect – Brazil vs. Uruguay

8 p.m. – Univision Deportes – Monterrey vs. Pachuca

9 p.m. – Telemundo – Leon vs. UANL Tigres

Comments

    • Listen, you’re super cute, and I like jokes as much as the next girl, but this is serious business.
      There was a mass exodus from this site as people started to realize that that contest was no more than charade. You can probably talk to one or two of them, puttering around your local plaza, looking disenchanted.
      There was a TV movie based on this whole fiasco, that almost nobody watched, but was critically well received. As someone who punched up that script, along with Ali Dia and FRANK, I can promise you that the scarf hasn’t been sent to anyone, unless very recently.
      I wanted the film to have a happy ending, so I pushed Ives hard to send that scarf, for months, I begged, politely pleaded, and downright ordered him in the name of God, but to no avail. He would always reply like this: I’m getting to it, I’ve just been really busy.
      Okay, that’s fine, but you have the time to watch–the also critically acclaimed TV epic that nobody watched–The Wire, three times?

      Sutheen’ don’t smell right, Lucy.

      Reply

      • This guy is freaking hilarious. Some of the best SBI comment section satire I’ve ever read. Brilliant stuff – unironically.

      • I understand your call for Contest Justice. I too would like to see the dark night of contest winner non-announce-ism eradicated by the glorious light of day. Since it is MLK a weekend I will lend my support to your most noble and gentlemanly of causes with the words of Dr. King

        “The time is always right to do what is right.”

        – MLK

  3. Sunderland had 35% possession……. 8 shots 4 on target compared to Spurs’ 25 shots 18 on target. Fletcher missed a sitter. Defoe should have shot but cutback and lost the ball. Danny Graham seems like he didn’t get the memo that he was on the field; 2 weak shots. I can’t wait to watch Sunderland get relegated with their forwards scoring 2 goals the rest of the season…..

    Reply

    • oops, didn’t mean to post my reply to your post. but since I’m here now, most know what Sunderland is. I think Defoe is a nice fit there because he can poach, which is what they need from their strikers imo because of the struggles most football fans are aware that team has had creating chances and especially for their strikers, even if some don’t want to admit it here

      on Jozy, he’ll be the man at TFC, targeted early and often without hesitation, which is a good thing and we’ll see what he can do with that

      Reply

  4. So many surprises:

    – Sunderland lost.
    – No forwards scored.
    – Defoe failed to score for the first time in a debut.

    Well, we can all forget about Sunderland as they slip back into obscurity.

    Reply

    • but can the Jozy haters eat crow about how “sunderland are terrible” isn’t an excuse, etc…? perhaps the jury is still out but it’s not looking good. Sunderland should get 20 to life for murdering football

      Reply

      • My opinion has always been that the teams problem wasn’t Jozy but he himself isn’t good enough to raise the level of the team.

        Essentially unlike Dempsey he cant make stuff happen on his own. He is a good role player but not a star.

      • i can live with that view. my usual disagreements come with those saying he is “terrible”. #HyperboleKills

      • Nothing wrong with being a good Role player. The Dutch got third in the WC with a bunch of hood role players + Robben|RVP| Blind.

        No one would call Ron Vlaar a star but he does know what he is doing as does Jozy.

      • additionally, what’s interesting is he used to be more of a player that dribbled at people. albeit in the MLS and Dutch league. I think Poyet’s system wanted the lone striker to just occupy and wait for a cross letting the other mids make runs in on goal. whereas jozy wanted to play 1-2s and such and he couldn’t get his teammates (besides Giacc) to play those passes.

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8PBWS28vC30

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hdvcYCBi0YU

      • additionally, what’s interesting is he used to be more of a player that dribbled at people. albeit in the MLS and Dutch league. I think Poyet’s system wanted the lone striker to just occupy and wait for a cross letting the other mids make runs in on goal. whereas jozy wanted to play 1-2s and such and he couldn’t get his teammates (besides Giacc) to play those passes.

      • You’d be one of the only fair ones. We read so many comments on a weekly basis about how bad Jozy is. Truth is, he’s not bad, as long as…

        The ball stays low, and
        He can have service, preferably from the wings.

        Sunderland never had the quality to send it to him from the wings and their midfielders had trouble keeping possession in their part of the pitch, much less delivering quality service. Why do you think there are so many midfielders scoring?

        I feel pretty sorry for Defoe: as good as he is, I don’t think he can resurrect that team himself either. Jozy learned quite a bit at AZ about fundamentals and mental fortitude; team leadership was not one of those things, however.

      • Wrong in all counts. Jozy’s struggles are with the fundamentals. Thence the missed sitters. He can’t control the ball to save his life. He can’t judge a ball in flight and confidence is non-existing.
        Just because you want it to be true doesn’t make it so. I appreciate you trying to sound knowledgeable and contributing with this site but you are so far off maybe you should be more tolerant of other’s opinion. Even if they’re as ignorant as yours.

      • Falcao, Falcao, Falcao.

        Please sit down with. Make yourself comfortable and join us. We are the American Self-assurance Saviors.

        Our mission is to provide glowing, unflinching and blind praise to our American athletes to ward off any negative commentary. Reality be damned, we continue to fight perception with fantasy by utilizing buzzwords like: context, circumstance, nuance, and “haters”.

        In our club A.S..S., we disregard any differing opinion and instead place blame on non-Americans. Please take a moment to copy and paste our educated responses to fend off any would-be-assassin to our fellow countrymen:

        “It’s the league.”
        “It’s the club.”
        “It’s the manager.”
        “It’s the system.”
        “It’s the teammates.”
        “It’s the agent.”

        Just remember, at A..S.S. we don’t claim to know we reality, we just claim to say others don’t when it doesn’t support our narrative. Please keep up the good fight against the haters, Falcao and welcome aboard!

      • Dear mr School:
        Thanks for the warm reception. A man with my convictions is not used to such effusive welcoming. However, I must decline your invitation to join your illustrious group. I feel that the many years I’ve spent following the beautiful game and, more importantly, supporting our boys in stars and stripes, have allowed me the freedom of being somebody not encumbered by insecurities nor the need to belong to the rah-rah crowd. Again, thanks for your consideration and keep fighting the good fight and may God with you in your noble endeavor.
        Yours Truly:
        Falcao

      • Disappointed, Falcao.

        You know what this means, right? You’ve immediately become a hater that doesn’t watch games and has an agenda. Any post you make that differing from our opinions facts is quite obviously an honest assessment trolling and threatens our narrative.

        Should you wish to continue stating what your eyes see lying and calling a duck a duck not watching games, we will be forced to respond to your posts with the usual excuses reasoning and label you a realist hater.

        Regretfully,

        The Sheep

      • You two obviously did not see any of Jozy at AZ. He showed his skill and goal scoring ability there. He did not play up to his potential at Sunderland. And he was surrounded by a horrible team with even worse tactics (they are actually decent tactics if you are trying to keep a bad team up, but awful for trying to score goals). y’all have fun jerking each other off though.

      • You two obviously did not see any of Jozy at AZ. He showed his skill and goal scoring ability there. He did not play up to his potential at Sunderland. And he was surrounded by a horrible team with even worse tactics (they are actually decent tactics if you are trying to keep a bad team up, but awful for trying to score goals). y’all have fun playing with each others’ puds though.

      • Old school,

        if a team’s midfield has twice as many goals as their forwards, what conclusion would you take from this?

      • @DDfBL

        don’t bother. old school quickly transitioned from someone trying to argue his point (however unfounded) to someone who’s merely a sarcastic troII.

        not sure why he’s so invested in jozy looking bad, but it really doesn’t matter. point is, as long as he’s troIIing, he should be ignored until he stops. (easier said than done, i know.)

      • Yeah, I guess when he was at AZ the ball just rolled into the net on its own and they had no one to give the stat to but Jozy.

        Ignorant? I guess trolls don’t look in the mirror often. Old School, do you even own a mirror or do you just look in the dirty puddle under your bridge?

  6. Random, but Kyle Walker looks like a low IQ player today… i haven’t seen much of him but if this is his style then yikes. over/under of Yedlin’s minutes this season?

    Reply

  10. Great free kick by Larsson. Another goal by a sunderland midfielder. Fwiw, Defoe won the foul at the top of the box. He didn’t do anything to win the foul, the defender just made a lazy late tackle. Larsson made him pay

    Reply

      • hmmmm well people that watch the games know…… Jozy missed a horrid sitter in one of his final Sunderland games. Fletcher’s today was just as bad. that is all. continue your random shade. we’ll be here using facts to make points……

      • I don’t know, man. Sounds an awful lot like you’re implying Jozy doesn’t finish chances. Please keep in mind his teammates are horrible…it’s not Jozy. Everyone who watches their matches know Jozy never receives service. Ever. Never has.

        Stick to facts, please. Jozy is good and Sunderland is bad.

      • Your crush on me is adorable and only rivaled by the one you have for Jozy.

        I promise I won’t get jealous but be mindful of it in the future.

      • your overly-sarcastic response loses its value.

        to clarify, i wasn’t “implying” anything. i stated two facts: Fletcher missed a sitter today, Jozy missed one 2 weeks ago. what people take from that is on them. if i was implying anything it wasn’t that “jozy doesn’t finish chances” it was just that Jozy gets ridiculed excessively for missing said chances while others don’t. both Danny Graham and Fletcher had easy chances within 10 yards and missed both. Jozy would have been on the front page of the UK tabloids mocking him. in case you haven’t noticed, I’m not a fan boy, most of my comments are to reduce hyperbole such as “Jozy is a terrible player”. That is false. ill agree Jozy isn’t world class but he is a couple of things A) He’s a talented player that can succeed in the right system, the same goes for a lot of good players. and B) he’s currently our best option after Dempsey. moving forward in a NT perspective, supporters should want to find a striking partner for him rather than shun him to the bench for being said “terrible player” who’s “done nothing but waste minutes and not score for the US” (very false)

      • Too long of a post to not contain: “Jozy is good and his teammates are bad.”

        Jozy was being held back by his teammates that never gave him service.

      • What is up with continually mocking people while making no point of your own? It’s really tired — especially when the people you are mocking are actually making valid points.

      • “White Knight with a mocking name. Ironic and beautiful.”

        yet you still continue to mock with no point……. I hope you’re not a lawyer…..

      • was fully aware. it was a random place to interject a shady comment like that. My initial statement was only made to point out the fact that Sunderland’s other forwards don’t play world class ball either. yet no one harps on them. this season, half way through, fletcher is leading the Fwds with 4 goals (on pace for 7). Wickham has 2 — one being essentially an own goal where the opposing defender tried to clear it but it hit wickham and bounced in the goal. so basically the forwards as a group are on pace for 9 goals roughly…….. total…………..

        2014- STs- 16 goals MIDs – 19 goals
        2015- STs- 6 goals MIDs – 12 goals
        so as jozy played less the forwards scored less (remember jozy had a few assists last season as ST, thats how he likes to play, team-ball)

      • Here’s some statistical facts:

        10: Bad Sunderland players
        1: Good Sunderland player

        10: players not named Jozy
        1: player named Jozy

        0: players able to give Jozy service
        30: amount of goals he would have scored if he received service

        I think I’ve made my case. It’s science.

      • A) what exactly is your point? are you sarcastically lamenting Jozy or lauding him?

        B) the only facts u stated were “10: players not named Jozy
        1: player named Jozy”

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