Premier League – Who’s Hot and Who’s Not?

Hot team
A few teams deserve a special mention this week. Manchester City were exceptional for forty-five minutes at Fulham but their opponents were poor. Birmingham defended heroically against Chelsea to earn themselves three crucial points. Blackpool continue to amaze in mid-table although they rode their luck at times to beat Wolves. Bolton go from strength to strength and tasted life in the top four after their demolition of Newcastle. Stoke had a fine win at West Brom.

Liverpool had a good home win, but to be fair, West Ham handed it to them on a plate. Manchester United won without looking great. Blackburn had a decent win over Villa but whacking the ball in the box and hoping for the best isn’t my kind of football.

That leaves Tottenham who are worthy winners of this award. First away win at a top four club in sixty-nine attempts, first win at Arsenal in seventeen years. 2-0 down and out of the game at half-time. It was a fantastic second-half comeback and could have a positive psychological effect on all at the club as they now believe they are a top four team.

Not Hot team
To be fair, Arsenal deserve a mention for throwing away a game in which they were in total control. Chelsea also deserve a mention for failing to score at Birmingham despite spending about three quarters of the game in the Birmingham penalty area!

Fulham can’t avoid a mention either. They were really bad against Manchester City.

However, we must look further down the table to find our ‘not hot’ team. Wolves and West Ham are locked together at the bottom, some five points adrift of everyone else. They both lost away games this weekend. Wolves battled away, played some decent football, had attempts at goal and probably deserved to get something from the game. West Ham didn’t do any of that. They are the ‘Not Hot’ team in just about every way.

Hot keeper
He looked a bit shaky for England against France in the week but Birmingham keeper Ben Foster certainly enhanced his reputation as one of England’s best two keepers in his showing against Chelsea on Saturday.

He made save after save in what at one point became Ben Foster v Chelsea. He was outstanding and if ever one player has played a disproportionate role in bringing three points to his side, this was it.

Not Hot keeper
To a large degree Heurelho Gomes at Tottenham has eliminated the comical mistakes of his early days at Tottenham from his game. He has shown himself to be a top keeper most of the time.

However, he is still prone to mistakes and his pathetic attempt to stop Nasri opening the scoring for Arsenal on Saturday could have cost his team dearly. He must have been a relieved man when his outfield colleagues produced the comeback they did.

Hot defender
Although he had to rely on his keeper and the woodwork to help him, Birmingham’s Roger Johnson was outstanding in the face of a Chelsea onslaught on Saturday. He and his partner Scott Dann showed the bravery, spirit and fight that teams like Birmingham desperately need if they are going to compete with teams like Chelsea.

Not Hot defender
It could, of course, be complete bad luck, but Arsenal’s Laurent Koscielny has already been red carded twice in his fledgling Premier league career. On Saturday he was yellow carded for a late tackle and a more strict referee may have already shown him an earlier yellow card and the Frenchman would have seen his third red.

I think it is crucial for him and for Arsenal that he quickly adjusts to Premier League football as he clearly hasn’t done so yet. The other thing he needs to learn is that when you have a completely open goal to head the ball at, from six yards out, when your team have just lost a 2-0 lead at home to their fiercest rivals, it is best not to put it over the bar.

Hot midfielder
I haven’t been particularly impressed by Manchester City’s former Barcelona man Yaya Toure prior to yesterday, but he certainly showed what he can do in the game at Fulham. He almost played up front in the game, but he was always in space and he always kept the ball.

Toure was strong, inventive and effective. He was everything I expected when City first announced his signing.

Not Hot midfielder
All season he has been one of my ‘Hot midfielders’ but on Saturday Newcastle’s Kevin Nolan let himself down.

Not only did he not play very well generally in a poor team performance that saw them lose 5-1, he seemed to orchestrate an attempt to unsettle Bolton with physicality rather than football and gave away a really silly penalty as well. All in all, not a day to remember for Nolan.

Hot striker
For quite some time Bolton fans and football fans in general, could not understand why they had bought Johan Elmander. He showed very occasional glimpses of being a half decent player but they were occasional and only half decent!

This season, Elmander has become a clever, brave, goal scoring striker who has formed a devastating partnership with Kevin Davies and taken the unfashionable side into the top four. On Saturday Newcastle tried to bully him out of the game. He made them look silly.

Not Hot striker
Wigan’s Columbian striker Hugo Rodallega leaves me confused as to whether he is a really good striker or a bit useless. I just can’t make up my mind.

One thing I do know is that when your team are 1-0 down at Old Trafford and you have just been reduced to ten men, the last thing you would do would be to dive into a reckless two-footed tackle that would give the ref no choice but to send you off. Oops.