Flying Kiwis – December 27
Chris Wood – Burnley (English Premier League)
The festive period in England means an excessive amount of football and the fixture lists weren’t nearly as generous as old mate Santa as far as Burnley were concerned. Hitting up Christmas with a game against Tottenham followed by a Boxing Day contest against Manchester United.
Yeah well the first one didn’t go as planned. Burnley’s fantastic front half of the season has been built upon a solid and dependable defence, which is kinda incredible considering they sold their best defender, Michael Keane, to Everton in the last transfer window, and have rolled through injuries to both Tom Heaton and Ben Mee at times. Not a team that appeared to have much depth but then system > individuals, after all.
It all started with that 3-2 win over Chelsea on opening day and they’ve only once conceded more than one goal in a Premier League game since and that was away to Manchester City so no dramas there. Gotta make that two games now, however.
James Tarkowski was (controversially?) handed a retrospective three game suspension after an elbow on Glenn Murray that went unspotted last game and without him Kevin Long came in to start. And Kevin Long took roughly six minutes before he nudged Dele Alli in the box and conceded a penalty. A little soft but Alli’s quick feet were too much and Harry Kane dispatched the spottie into the upper right of the goal, sending the keeper the wrong way for added kicks.
Chris Wood had one major moment of note here, working hard to win the ball back from Serge Aurier in the attacking third. He fed the ball wide to Steven Defour and then gassed it to the near post where the cross was swiftly played. It was narrowly out of reach. Then he collided with Hugo Lloris in goal and took a fair while to get back up. Instead of an equaliser he picked up an injury.
You could see on the replay that Woody’s knee copped a fair twist in the collision and he spent a minute getting treatment on the knock. He was able to jog off down the sideline and jumped back on to try run if off but he only lasted about another minute before he was back on the deck and had to be subbed off. Ashley Barnes came on in his place.
As for the rest of the game, well Burnley should already have been down by two or three when Wood was replaced. It was only some wasteful finishing from Kane and Moussa Sissoko that kept it at one and the thing about Harry Kane is that if he misses one he probably won’t miss the next. As it happens he did… but he was creating trouble all game and for once the Burnley defence seemed all twisted and tangled. With 20-odd minutes left he made it 2-0, slipping through one on one and burying it. Then ten minutes later he completed the hat-trick with a sharp finish on his left after making space with a lovely drop of the shoulder. The Woodsman will have been taking notes – this was Kane’s seventh hatty of 2017 (he scored his eighth on Boxing Day), matching all on his own the three goals that every other team has combined to score at Turf Moor previously in this term.
Lancashire Telegraph: “Chris Wood 6 - Afternoon ended early by injury, but one bright moment in winning the ball and launching a dangerous attack.”
Right, so the leg wasn’t good enough to play on the short turnaround for Boxing Day. Which meant one more player missing as Burnley went to Old Trafford to play Manchester United. Rough task there? Yeah sure… for Man United. Sean Dyche has gotten results against the odds all season and it took the undermanned Clarets just a couple minutes before Ashley Barnes had them in the lead and when Steven Defour whipped in a free kick later in the half it was almost too much to believe.
It didn’t last. Jose Mourinho made a couple changes at the break and United were a lot better in the second half. Romelu Lukaku missed a good header but Jesse Lingard turned in a cheeky flick and with Burnley clinging on for the win Lingard scored again in injury time for a 2-2 draw. More than many Clarets fans will have been expecting even still.
Up Next: Away to Huddersfield on Sunday at 4.00am and then home to Liverpool at 4.00am on Tuesday (NZT)
Winston Reid – West Ham United (English Premier League)
A run of three games in eight days didn’t do a whole lotta favours for the Hammers, who began things by welcoming Winston Reid back from a one game suspension as they took on Arsenal at home for a place in the EFL Cup semis. Not even two weeks after grabbing a 0-0 draw against the same jokers at the same venue in the league, although with both teams making a few midweek cup alterations to their XIs that didn’t really matter. No Ozil, Sanchez or Lacazette for Arsenal who rested every single starter from their previous PL match, while Joe Hart, Domingos Quina and Declan Rice all started for West Ham.
Winnie was there alongside James Collins and Angelo Ogbonna at the back. Solid back three and one that could back itself to withhold a Gunners team without their three star attacking talents (Walcott, Giroud and Welbeck are all still internationals, granted). They couldn’t stop Arsenal from controlling the ball, they had pretty much two thirds of it, but they could limit the chances they had to face. For all that possession Arsenal could only muster eight shots all game and only one in the first half hour. This was some dull football, to be honest.
But sloppy as Arsenal might have been, West Ham offered nothing going forward from their solid defensive base. Then that base made one lapse late in the first 45 and Danny Welbeck was able to bundle in what proved to be the winner, Winston Reid failing to win the initial aerial challenge. Aaron Cresswell got a shot off from a free kick about an hour in and that was literally the only one West Ham managed all game. Hence a 1-0 defeat knocks them out of the cup. Ugly game but a fair enough result.
The Telegraph: “Mathieu Débuchy has been in impressive form recently on the right and his run into space was then brilliantly picked out by Coquelin. The cross was also excellent, with Welbeck timing his run perfectly to get between Winston Reid and James Collins. Welbeck missed with his attempted header but the ball dribbled fortuitously down his body and then squirmed past goalkeeper Joe Hart off his shin.”
It was really the one lapse all game, Winston made 10 defensive clearances, as did Ogbonna while Collins made 8. Goes to show how they were dealing with what they had to face, assisted by some slack stuff from an out-of-match-fitness Theo Walcott, but one mistake landed fortuitously for Welbeck and that was the difference.
The game that followed that though… yowza. West Ham hosted Newcastle who were without a win since October having lost eight and drawn one of their past nine games. Meanwhile West Ham were still all in on the Moyes Resurgence regardless of a League Cup exit and so when Marko Arnautovic gave them the lead with a lovely solo effort barely five minutes into things it looked like another promising performance for WHU was on the way. Reid had Ogbonna and Aaron Cresswell in his back three this time, with Adrian at the back. David Moyes persisting with the defence that did so well in their last few games. They were already 1-0 up…
About that… Winston gave away a free kick at the back a few mins later and Henri Saivet somehow managed to curl it into the bottom corner past Adrian, who was slow to react. There went that lead and with Michail Antonio and Cheikh Kouyate both looking less than 100% after coming in as doubts they didn’t much look like they were going to get it back.
Newcastle on the other hand, those jokers turned up to play and they really should’ve gone into the break with the lead. Ah well, it didn’t take them long to find it once play resumed. Christian Atsu nutmegged Pablo Zabaleta and cut it back to Mo Diame. That bloke had already found a spot of space in the box and his big right foot did the rest. West Ham had a gift-wrapped chance to get back into things nearly straight away when Antonio won a penalty with about the only decent thing he did all game, only for Andre Ayew to miss with a pretty crap attempt.
If the first half was average, the second was a bit of a recent classic. Soon enough the Magpies were were hot on the counter attack after a deflected Zabaleta ball forward and Atsu’s speed and combination with Joselu set up the third goal. West Ham weren’t going away quite yet, Ayew was ready to make amends and he cut it back to 3-2. Twenty more minutes of reserved madness left, but no more goals were scored.
Football.London Player Ratings: “Winston Reid – 5 - Gave away a needless free kick that led to Saivet's equaliser. Struggled up against the pacey Newcastle wingers throughout and picked up an injury late in the first half. His fitness is becoming a real cause for concern. Better in the second half but not up to his usual standards.”
The knock was nothing too bad. He’d made a gas down the sides to get back on defence after a corner kick turned into a counter back the other way and as he was running back, giving Atsu a shove in the back for tactics, Zab came running forward and hacked the ball into the back of Reid’s calf, by the looks. Took a fair amount of treatment but after limping off he was all good to return and eventually finish the match. Hardly his best though, Newcastle’s pace and physicality made it tough for him although he still made seven defensive clearances, more than anyone else on his team. A couple well-placed passes forward as well, finding some space.
Winston Reid: “It was terrible, from our point of view, conceding three goals, giving goals away, and they could have had another two in the first half,” said Reid, with brutal honesty. We didn’t do the things that we’d been doing the last couple of weeks and we didn’t take our chances as well, the chances that we had, so it wasn’t good at one end and it wasn’t fantastic at the other. Fortunately enough, we have another game on Tuesday, so we’ll go again then. The games are coming thick and fast now and we need to go to Bournemouth and make sure we pick up some points.”
Strong quotes from Winston and it’s all well and good… but he didn’t get to have much of a say over that game against Bournemouth. That’s because he was dropped to the bench for James Collins. On the bright side it means he didn’t have to play three times in barely over a week.
Crazy game down on the coast too. James Collins made use of his selection ahead of Reid to put the Hammers up seven minutes in with a good header at the near post from a corner but Bournemouth responded with fire, Dan Gosling equalising before Nathan Ake had then in front before the hour. A loss to the Cherries would’ve been devastating after all their hard work recently, right now Bournemouth are the only team keeping them out of the relegation zone.
So shout out to Marko Arnautovic who scored twice in the last ten minutes to put WHU in front. Absolute dramatics and we weren’t even finished. Callum Wilson made it 3-3 in the third minute of injury time with a goal that was initially flagged for offside then overruled while Wilson’s final touch came off his arm and was allowed to stand. Needless to say that Davie Moyes wasn’t chuffed. There was also controversy earlier on when Simon Francis more or less kicked Kouyate in the face and only got a yellow.
Anyway, we’ll find out soon if Winston was rested or dropped or if there’s a slight injury there or maybe all three because the games aren’t slowing down from here.
Up Next: Barely any rest, the Hammers play West Brom at home next Weds at 8.45am and then Spurs away two days later at 9.00am (NZT)
Ryan Thomas – PEC Zwolle (Dutch Eredivisie)
That there game could’ve been a memorable one had Mike Den Heijer been called upon from the bench but alas he’s still being made to wait for his debut at NEC Nijmegen. 21 times he’s been amongst the subs for the recently relegated Dutch side but so far all 21 times he’s had to watch on unused. NEC are tearing it up though, places in that team are hard to earn. They followed defeat in the KNVB Cup to PEC Zwolle by winning 7-2 away at AZ II, which has them second on the ladder and with a game in hand that could take them top for automatic promotion. Wait and see.
One guy that did get subbed in that game was Ryan Thomas, who was replaced with about a dozen minutes left – marking the first time all season that he’s been off the park. Up until then he’d been ever-present in every competition. It was only right given they were 2-0 up thanks to goals from Younes Mokhtar and Terell Ondaan (Erik Bakker’s missed penalty in the opening stages not even mattering), so shout out to Thommo on continued excellence. The PECers move into the quarter-finals where they’ll play AZ Alkmaar in very early February.
And that right there is some hefty praise for the kiwi midfielder. Arnold Bruggink is the pundit, a former forward who played a couple times for his country and whose club career is probably best remembered for his spell at PSV around the turn of the millennium. He rates Thomas extremely highly, talking up his vision and awareness before comparing him to Ajax starlet Frekie de Jong, a player who is being linked heavily with Manchester City at the moment.
“We are talking a lot about Frenkie de Jong, he is so comfortable with the ball. Because you are so comfortable at the ball, you have much more time to look around. Thomas always does that. He has exactly the same qualities as De Jong.”
Then, in between then and the league game on the weekend he had his birthday, turning 23 years old. Good on ya, Thommo.
Yet Thomas wasn’t in the lineup come the last league game of the year. Didn’t miss a second over the first 17 games his team played but he wasn’t even in the squad that went to ADO Den Haag. Doubles for Erik Falkenburg and Bjorn Maars Johnsen made that one a whitewash, the PECers going down 4-0. All it took was taking Ryan Thomas being missing and they lost all balance. Huh. Still fourth on the ladder at the winter break, at least.
The reason Thomas was unavailable was that his partner gave birth to their first child! So amongst an incredible year for that dude, there’s one more thing to feel blessed for. A healthy little daughter. If you’re gonna miss a game then it may as well be for the miracle of birth and his stocks at Zwolle only improved in his absence anyway. Now he’s got a couple weeks off with the newborn as the Dutch league takes a short hiatus.
Oh look, another Team of the Week selection in VL? Umm, no actually. Since he didn’t play. Instead this is the Team of the Season so far and here he is among the best of the best.
Up Next: 7.45am against NAC Breda on January 21 (NZT)
Deklan Wynne – Colorado Rapids (American Major League Soccer)
Oh well, okay then. Anthony Hudson ain’t playing around here. First he snagged Kip Colvey in the waiver draft and now he’s only gone and traded for Deklan Wynne. Bit of a surprise as the rumour was that Wynne had been offered an MLS deal at the Vancouver Whitecaps similar to what Myer Bevan signed but then to be fair it was also tough to see an avenue into the first team there for him, unlike Bevan who has a chance of playing for a spot on the bench.
Deklan Wynne had emerged as the All Whites’ first choice left back by the end of Anthony Hudson’s time in Aotearoa so it’s not a huge leap for Huddo to pounce on him here after already signing Colvey. The only shame is that it breaks up the All-Whitecaps, with only Stefan Marinovic and Bevan still left there from 2017’s quartet, as many kiwis as now play for the Rapids. But this gives Wynne more of an opportunity to play to all goods. He joins via trade, with $100,000 in ‘Targeted Allocation Money’ going the other way.
What’s ‘Targeted Allocation Money’? Yeah, good question. The short answer is that it’s yet another complicated bit of salary cap paperwork which doesn’t really matter. The longer answer is available on Wikipedia.
Sporting Director & Interim General Manager Pádraig Smith: “Top-level left-sided players can be tough to find, but in Deklan we believe we've found someone who has both the technical gifts and the aggression to be a long-term solution for us. We're excited to welcome him to the club.”
So probably not too likely that Deklan’s starting in the first week, Kip Colvey might be in the same boat as well. They give Hudson a couple players at training who better understand what he’s trying to get them to do, who know his methods, and can help impart that stuff to the rest of the team. Arguably neither is quite ready for the top flight in America which means that loan outs might be a smart idea, get some games in and challenge for places later in the season. That’s definitely what the plan seems to be for Wynne.
He leaves the Whitecaps having played once for the top team in a Canadian Championship semi first leg, appearing as a substitute, and played 35 times for the now-defunct Whitecaps 2 team in the USL all up, scoring two goals (both in 2017). For the ‘Caps this is a pretty clever move too, getting some valuable salary cap wiggle room for a player that wasn’t likely to play for the first team in the short term. For the record, Marinovic joined on a contract that brought him $78,000 in guaranteed salary so that extra hundy K can go a long way.
Whitecaps FC head coach Carl Robinson: “We'd like to thank Deklan for his dedication to the club during his two years in Vancouver. This move will give us additional flexibility as we continue to build our roster for the 2018 season”
Up Next: Impress the gaffer all over again
Marco Rojas – sc Heerenveen (Dutch Eredivisie)
The first half of Marco Rojas’ first season in Holland ended as an unused sub away to AZ Alkmaar in a game that was going pretty well until the last ten minutes. Or… maybe not fantastically well or anything. Ricardo van Rhijn hit the crossbar after like five minutes so they were never clear of the danger the that AZ offered as they tried to keep their outside hopes of a title challenge alive. Heerenveen then came out stronger after a scoreless first half and following a close one from Morten Thorsby it was Pelle van Amersfoort who gave SCH the lead. Michel Vlap came close to doubling it but his shot was saved.
Then is all got feisty. Kicks and shoves, fouls and cards. Entertaining stuff but not the most composed footy and Heerenveen’s hopes of victory took a blow when Thorsby chopped down Alireza Jahanbakhsh and received a second yellow. Off ya go, son. Obviously then AZ went all out on the attack and they almost had the leveller but for the offside flag on Van Rhijn. Didn’t take much longer, Denzel Dumfries put the ball in his own net with ten minutes left and then substitute Fred Friday scored a late double as AZ came outta there with a 3-1 win.
Leaves Heerenveen in ninth on the table, right in the middle. A hot run of form gave them a head start but it’s been trickier since then with only two wins in their last 12 games – following four in their first six. Rojas has played in 13 of those 18 games, three of them being starts. That’s 382 mins all added up with one goal to show for it. After his last spell in Europe it’s a bit underrated how immediately he’s settled into that first team and now he’s got a few weeks off, with a training camp in there somewhere, to kick on into the second half of the season.
Up Next: Off until Jan 21 at 8.45am when Heery go to Vitesse (NZT)
Jeremy Brockie – SuperSport United (South African Premier Soccer League)
One last game for the year for Jeremy Brockie and unfortunately it just meant more of the same post-Confed Cup Final hangover for his blokes. SSU drew 1-1 with Bloemfontein Celtic, Brockie playing the full game as Darren Smith cancelled out Sepana Letsoalo’s opener with 15 minutes left to salvage a point for SuperSport. Not bad from Smith, the young gun scoring on debut. Not as flash from Brockie, whose best chance to score was saved by the BC keeper. Means five games in the PSL without a win now and SuperSport’s hopes of coming back to challenge for the title are slipping away in a hurry, although Mamelodi Sundowns lost so that helps. As does the two week break that they get now.
Then again, things could be very different by the time it all resumes with a transfer window imminent and Brockie known to have fancied a move away earlier in the campaign. Again the chatter is taking off, with Sundowns legend Zane Moosa chatting to Goal.com about Brockie’s potential availability (amongst others)…
Zane Moosa to Goal: “He (Brockie) is a player who knows how to put the ball in the net, that’s his strength. He is good in the air and he can shoot with both feet. If Sundowns manage to get him, I think he can be a player who can be an asset to any team.”
SuperSport rejected Brockie’s transfer request a while back but it sounds like with their continental exploits all done for 2017 – and Brockie without a goal in the PSL since October – it’s been suggested that they might be open to listening to offers. Orlando Pirates and Mamelodi Sundowns are the two teams that have been most linked to him. All a matter of ‘the right offer’ coming along now.
Up Next: SuperSport vs Kaizer Chiefs, 5.00am on Sunday, January 7 (NZT)
Tommy Smith – Ipswich Town (English Championship)
Nice sweater.
Hey and on the subject of Tractor Boys, here’s Monty Patterson scoring another goal for the U23s…
Up Next: Ipswich vs Derby on New Year’s Eve at 4.00am (NZT)
Stefan Marinovic – Vancouver Whitecaps (American Major League Soccer)
The competition has arrived…
Up Next: Chilling on holiday, probably
To Absent Friends…
The Premier League players are cracking into their football at double pace but most leagues around the place, particularly in Europe, take a well-earned break around Christmas time. Hence why Flying Kiwis will be kinda shallow this week and next. Not to mention that the USA stuff is out of season right now – Kip and Deklan can’t even make their proper debuts for the Rapids until February when they take on Toronto in CONCACAF Champions League action with the MLS to begin in March. Even worse for Hannah Wilkinson and Ali Riley whose 2018 Swedish season doesn’t commence ‘til April. Which is also about when the NWSL in America starts up for the new season too, although Rebekah Stott has her Melbourne City stuff to stay busy with before then.
Most of these comps start back up in two weeks, so the end of the first week of 2018. Erin Nayler will be back in action then for Girondins, as will Olivia Chance and Anna Green in the WSL in England. Same for Jeremy Brockie in South Africa. Tyler Boyd has to wait a couple more days for his next game on January 10, a wait made worse by missing Tondela’s 1-0 win over his parent club Vitoria Guimaraes due to ineligibility. Scored in his last game and doesn’t get to play again for three weeks, poor lad.
The two lads in Holland, Thommo and Marco, they get even longer with a full month off. That’ll involve training camp and a friendly game or two but they don’t play again in the Eredivisie until January 21, each of them. Meanwhile chilly old Germany means that Amber Hearn and CJ Bott are off until the start of February with their Bundesliga commitments. Katie Rood’s Juventus are off until the second weekend of January, a week prior to the Eredivisie. And now you know!
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