1) Mignolet may be gone for longer than people think
When Manchester City dropped Joe Hart for a spell in the middle of last season he missed a few games, returned the stronger for it and City went on to win the title. People imagined something similar would happen at Liverpool with Simon Mignolet when the goalkeeper lost form and confidence – that he would be back sooner rather than later that is, not that his team would end up with the title. But Brendan Rodgers saying he would be out indefinitely has made it seem as if the goalkeeping position is now Brad Jones’s to lose. The impression is that Mignolet may not be seen for some time and that Liverpool will be actively seeking a goalkeeper in the transfer window. Unless Rodgers has a target clearly in mind this seems an odd way to go about things. Practically every successful Liverpool side one can name has been built around a really strong goalkeeper and January is not necessarily the best time to be buying the sort of player who might be around for several seasons and needs to inspire confidence in his defenders. Neither has Jones conspicuously impressed since gaining his chance. In their last two league matches Liverpool have conceded five goals and would have suffered two defeats but for Martin Skrtel’s last-minute equaliser against Arsenal. None of the goals was due to errors by Jones, though he might have performed better at Old Trafford. But, if the aim was instant improvement or uplift, it has failed to happen. Liverpool are still conceding too many goals and there is more uncertainty than ever over their goalkeeping position. Paul Wilson
• Rodgers criticises Arsenal’s Sánchez for ‘dive’
• Paul Wilson: Markovic’s wasted chances cost Liverpool victory they deserved
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2) United a muddled up jigsaw
After conceding that the 1-1 draw at Aston Villa could cost his Manchester United side the title come the end of the season, Louis van Gaal pointed to Manchester City’s game against Crystal Palace earlier in the day, highlighted how their neighbours had managed to run out 3-0 winners despite being held at half-time and said “that’s the difference”. City, without a recognised striker, had managed to force the door open. With Radamel Falcao and Robin van Persie leading the line at Villa, Wayne Rooney and Juan Mata behind them and Antonio Valencia and Ashley Young on the flanks, United created little and resembled a jigsaw puzzle put together with the wrong pieces. Perhaps the question should be not so much whether United have dropped two points that could cost them the title but whether they were ever really in the race in the first place. Stuart James
• Match report: Aston Villa 1-1 Manchester United
• The Premier League fans’ half-term verdict: part one
3) Pellegrini shows his flexible thinking
The question of whether Manuel Pellegrini can be tactically flexible was answered in the positive with the false No9 shape fielded for Saturday’s 3-0 win over Crystal Palace. No Sergio Agüero, Stevan Jovetic and Edin Dzeko meant the Manchester City manager had to come up with the Plan B that can be lacking, both in domestic competition and against the continental elite. Proving how necessity is, indeed, the mother of invention, Pellegrini worked “all week” in training on deploying James Milner in the “ghost” centre-forward role against Palace, the utility player asked to scatter the visiting defenders by making surges across the park so that the City midfield could make runs into space and score. Despite two goals from David Silva and a third from Yaye Touré making it a success Pellegrini later played down any notion of using the system again, once more citing his preference for having one or two “genuine” strikers. But now he knows City can prosper another way and so do future opponents. Jamie Jackson
• Pellegrini: City are hitting form at the right time
• Match report: Manchester City 3-0 Crystal Palace
4) Martínez’s lack of substitutions was baffling
With Everton lacking attacking impetus, it was unusual to hear their manager, Roberto Martínez, explain his reasons for not making any substitutions during the defeat at Southampton. The Spaniard said he believed the right men were on the pitch for him to win the game and a change of personnel would not have made any difference. “I don’t think it was a day we had to try to get an advantage with our substitutions,” he said. Instead he highlighted an apparent lack of luck, adding: “I think everything that could have gone wrong did go wrong.” But with Samuel Eto’o marked out of the game by Harrison Reed, making his first start for Southampton, and Ross Barkley less influential out wide than he was in a central role against QPR in the previous game, it must have been frustrating for Aiden McGeady and Arouna Koné among those on the bench merely left to observe. Alan Smith
• Match report: Southampton 3-0 Everton
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5) Aston Villa can trouble better teams than Manchester United
With the various dictionary compilers ratifying neologisms like nobody’s business, it cannot be long before astonvilla earns an entry, an adjective used to describe an enervating and perpetual void. But it really need not be this way. Villa Park is one of the country’s best grounds and the Holte its best end, at its best, a sprawling mass of well-intentioned disorder. And, though they have lost the “civilised chat” of Roy Keane, in Paul Lambert they have a manager of entertaining belligerence with a keen footballing eye, whose team now has a spine – in both senses of the word. Protecting Brad Guzan, the defensive duo of Ron Vlaar and Tetchi Jores Charlemagne Ulrich Okore are doughty, scary and smart; ahead of them Fabian Delph is that modern rarity, a midfielder who actually plays in the middle of the field, requiring no excusing prefix of “attacking” or “defensive”; and up front Christian Benteke and Gabriel Agbonlahor give them touch, pace and edge. If they can keep these men fit, they will continue to trouble the division’s better sides. Daniel Harris
• Match report: Aston Villa 1-1 Manchester United
• United must improve, Van Gaal tells Ferguson
• Jamie Jackson: Carrick is lauded by Van Gaal
6) For how much longer will Bruce’s goodwill last?
The question of goodwill in football is an interesting one. Steve Bruce, having taken Hull into the Premier League, kept them there with some comfort and taken them also to the FA Cup final, has a good amount built up on Humberside, which is just as well because, if not, he would be in fairly serious trouble. Hull have gone 10 games without a win but perhaps more troublingly they have failed to score in seven and are kept off the bottom only by a Leicester side going through a similarly calamitous run. There are mitigating factors, of course, and Hull’s injury problems – which Bruce was at pains to highlight – are such that Manyor Figueroa, on loan at Wigan, and Tom Ince, currently lent out to Nottingham Forest’s bench, will both be recalled posthaste. Still Saturday’s team did contain players signed for north of £25m in the summer, plus Gaston Ramírez, a pricy loan from Southampton. What Hull currently lack in numbers they should make up for in quality – or, perhaps more accurately, theoretical quality, identified as such and paid for accordingly by Bruce quite recently. “That frustration goes back to Stoke, West Ham, Newcastle, West Brom in the cup and Arsenal where we conceded last-minute goals,” said Bruce after the game, talking as if that run of five games was down to nothing but bad luck and not the responsibility of he or his players. “Unfortunately that erodes what could have been six points and we wouldn’t be in this situation.” Injuries, late goals, under-performing expensive players … sooner or later the excuses will run out for Bruce and the same goes for his cache of goodwill. Nick Miller
• Match report: Hull City 0-1 Swansea City
• Premier League fans’ half-term verdict: part two
7) There is still hope for Leicester …
The bad news for Leicester City is that they are bottom of the table at Christmas, winless in 12 matches and committing the kind of errors that makes it look as if they have booked a one-way ticket to the Championship. The good news? Well, their predicament is not entirely hopeless. Sunderland escaped from a similar position last season and West Bromwich Albion managed it in 2004-05 while there were parts of Leicester’s performance in the 2-0 defeat at Upton Park on Saturday that were encouraging. Yet just when they appeared to be gaining a foothold in the match Paul Konchesky’s moment of madness, a blind backpass that was read by Andy Carroll, led to Leicester falling behind in the 24th minute and allowed West Ham to take control. Leicester’s task is not hopeless yet, given that they are only five points adrift of Crystal Palace in 17th, but they need to cut out the individual errors. Jacob Steinberg
• Match report: West Ham United 2-0 Leicester City
• Harry Redknapp considers QPR move for Ravel Morrison
8) Common sense and patience at the Lane … who knew?
In some respects Érik Lamela is the ideal player for Tottenham. The Argentinian international is expensive, frequently infuriating but provides occasional flashes of brilliance: it is tough to imagine a more perfect pairing between player and club. Lamela’s magnificent goal against Burnley was his first in the league for Tottenham in his 26th Premier League appearance but Mauricio Pochettino spoke after the game of a new beginning for the player. “We need to understand Érik is still young, he has a big talent but it was difficult his first season in England,” said Pochettino. “This season he is fit – in the beginning it wasn’t easy for him to play but he just needed time.” The patience seems to be paying off for Spurs, as does an acceptance that form trumps reputation. Their current revival (two defeats in the last nine games, one by Chelsea and the other with a very ‘Europa League’ team against Besiktas) has been built round picking such as Ryan Mason, Nabil Bentaleb and Harry Kane, often over more expensive and/or more established players like Paulinho, with Roberto Soldado eventually relegated to the bench this weekend as well. There is not a massive amount flashy about Spurs at present, just patience and an intelligent use of the best available resources – what in other walks of life would be called ‘common sense’. They are not particularly used to thatt at White Hart Lane but such revolutionary thinking could be just the thing to set them back on track. Nick Miller
• Match report: Tottenham Hotspur 2-1 Burnley
• The top 100 players in the world, 2014: 100-71
9) West Brom look like a team with hope, despite defeat
Harry Redknapp was magnanimous in victory at Loftus Road, lingering not on Charlie Austin’s headline-hogging hat-trick but on how well West Bromwich Albion had played in the first 25 minutes. West Brom could have been more than 2-0 up had they taken their chances as Alan Irvine’s promising front three of Silvestre Varela, Stéphane Sessègnon and Brown Ideye produced some fine combinations. So the lasting impression after Rangers’ 3-2 victory was that one of these teams had demonstrated they have a chance of escaping the relegation arm-wrestle at the end of the season and that, oddly perhaps, it was not the one that ended up winning the match. It is to be hoped Irvine can survive through the coming weeks. Ideye, in particular, has been a slightly frantic figure to date (a quick scan of recent Ideye-related headlines throws up: “Ideye: I”m not shit” and “Irvine: Ideye no longer a rabbit in headlights”) but his record in Switzerland and Ukraine is fine. He has strength and good movement. He could still prosper. Similarly Varela is a player of genuine pedigree, a Europa League winner with 26 caps for Portugal. The way he twice glided away from Richard Dunne before his goal was evidence enough of his class. QPR may have won the game at Loftus Road but their football was blunt, spirited and reliant above all on the adhesive qualities of Bobby Zamora’s chest. They will rely on these rollicking home victories to survive. West Brom, for their part, looked like a team with hopes of something better. Barney Ronay
• Match report: Queens Park Rangers 3-2 West Bromwich Albion
• Why QPR have not won a single away point in eight matches
10) Armstrong is one to watch
Newcastle United’s Adam Armstrong stepped off the bench in the second half of his side’s 1-0 defeat by Sunderland at St James’ Park and, despite finishing on the losing side, the 17-year-old forward – or very attacking midfielder – was fabulous. The intelligence of much of Armstrong’s movement is fantastic. He still has much to learn but, in some ways, admiring the England youth international’s wonderful positional sense was one of the best parts of the derby. Alan Pardew’s substitutions are, justifiably, being questioned in the wake of a fourth straight defeat by Sunderland but no one should crticise him for introducing one of the brightest local-born products of Newcastle’s suddenly burgeoning academy. Louise Taylor
• Match report: Newcastle 0-1 Sunderland
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