Career The Saviour Cometh

[Rob]

Goodness me this will be a close one.

[BatiGoal]

Time to throw in the towel I say. 😁 

[Ian]

On 28/03/2020 at 17:32, Foxy said:

This really is going down to the wire 😬

 

On 28/03/2020 at 18:14, Rob said:

Goodness me this will be a close one.

 

On 29/03/2020 at 04:26, BatiGoal said:

Time to throw in the towel I say. 😁 

Thank you for the comments and apologies for not replying earlier.

The next update will be up in about five minutes.

[Ian]

We had to pause the season due to lockdown but now we’re back to finish it off where the challenge is to beat the drop with Norwich City. As a quick recap you can see below we are positioned at 18th with two games to go against Newcastle (away) and Aston Villa (home) so let’s see how it all panned out.

 

09 May 20: Newcastle United v Norwich City: Premier League, St James’ Park (att: 49,109)

The away side started like a house on fire in this relegation dogfight and in the 12th minute Onel Hernández raced onto a Todd Cantwell through ball to slot the ball through Rob Elliot's legs to give the canaries a thoroughly deserved lead. Unfortunately the celebrations were finally halted after VAR overturned the goal as a stray hair from Onel’s right eyebrow was deemed to be offside at the time of the original pass much to the bewilderment of everyone connected to Norwich City. The canaries got their reward shortly after though as after winning a free kick on the edge of the box Onel Hernández stepped up and rattled it into the back of the net and there was no overturning that one. The game was a scrappy affair from then on as Norwich were reluctant to overcommit and the toon just couldn’t create any real chances of note as they frantically tried to produce something to avoid the drop. In the end the canaries ran out with what could be a very important result in their bid to avoid relegation and the toon were left devastated as they’ll now be playing Championship football next season.

Result: 0-1

 

Other important results in the relegation battle

Saturday 9th May 2020

Brighton 1-2 Burnley

Sunday 10th May 2020

Arsenal 4-0 Watford

Aston Villa 1-2 Manchester United

Bournemouth 1-0 Southampton

Monday 11th May 2020

Crystal Palace 0-1 Everton

Friday 15th May 2020

Manchester United 0-3 Southampton

 

So looking at the league table before our final game against Villa you can see that all we need to do is avoid defeat and we’ll be safe unless Watford have a field day against Liverpool.

 

17 May 20: Norwich City v Aston Villa: Premier League, Carrow Road (att: 22,704)

Norwich knew that a draw would more than likely be enough for them to avoid the drop so you could understand them being a bit cautious in the opening minutes of this game but they were anything but as they took the game to Aston Villa who had nothing much to play for. Ben Godfrey rose highest to head a Onel Hernández corner in at the near post past a flailing Pepe Reina in the 11th minute to give the hosts the kind of start they’d surely dreamt of. The canaries were largely dominant for the rest of the first half and had a few more half decent attempts at goal but couldn’t extend their lead. In the second half Norwich sat back and it looked like they were just hoping to get to the final whistle when in the 63rd minute Ben Godfrey turned from hero to villain as he took out Jack Grealish with a truly awful tackle to receive his marching orders from referee Lee Probert. It got worse for the canaries as the subsequent free kick was taken from out wide right by a limping Jack Grealish and headed in by Borja Basón to level the game up. The game kind of petered out after that as Norwich with ten men weren’t going to overcommit and Villa just couldn’t or didn’t even really seem too eager to push on and the game ended up a stalemate. Reports of the other results had come through and as the final whistle was blown a full pitch invasion ensued as the Norwich City supporters just couldn’t contain their celebrations.

Result: 1-1

 

We did it and avoided the drop. Watford managed to beat Liverpool by a solitary goal which whilst not being enough to put them above us was enough for them to also avoid the drop as Bournemouth lost out to Chelsea so it’s Bournemouth who will join Aston Villa and Newcastle in playing Championship football next season.

 

The final table looked like this with Man City winning the league and Liverpool, Spurs and Chelsea making up the top four. Man Utd missed out on a Champions League place and Everton and Wolves* will join them in the Europa League as Arsenal just missed out.

*We will replace Wolves if we win the FA Cup final against Manchester United.

 

Thank you for reading but we aren’t finished yet as we still have a trip to Wembley for the FA Cup final against Man Utd so I’ll be back later to let you know how that went.

[Xysian]

Nice one, now get that FA Cup!

[Rob]

Well done Ian. I do find it funny that the game still had Watford beat Liverpool though.

[Ian]

2 hours ago, Xysian said:

Nice one, now get that FA Cup!

Thank you, hopefully we can win it as it’s be a nice little bonus.

2 hours ago, Rob said:

Well done Ian. I do find it funny that the game still had Watford beat Liverpool though.

Thanks Rob, yes I was just thinking that as I was writing out the update.