This was a big full weekend of football this weekend. The English clubs each had respective derby day matches, with each starting at 6 am my time on Saturday and Sunday respectively. Nurnberg also had a big match against 3rd ranked Borussia Monchengladbach, luckily being at a much more manageable 8:30 am on Sunday. That meant that for once none of my matches would overlap each other. I didn’t quite make it for the 6 am first kicks either morning – Saturday I woke up at 7 and Sunday I woke up at 6:15 – but it was quite nice being up that early. Snowflakes were dropping peacefully outside (both mornings) and I could focus on just the matches in front of me. The world seemed hushed specifically to allow me to get my weekend football fix.
For those who don’t know, derbies abroad are the equivalent to rivalries in America. Much like the rivalries North Carolina and Duke for college basketball or the Yankees and Red Sox for Major League Baseball, derbies are typically a local affair. The greatest derby in football in my opinion is between the sides of Glasgow, Scotland – Celtic and Rangers. For my English teams, Oxford were playing Swindon Town from just thirty miles down the road. Newcastle’s derby against Sunderland was even closer. The Tyne-Wear derby, named after each town’s respective rivers, is the battle of the northeastern England Premiership clubs, towns that are less than five miles apart, if not touching. One can guess that each derby, just like American rivalries, can be quite heated.
With that said, let’s get down to it –
Oxford United vs. Swindon Town – Following that quick primer on derbies, Oxford’s was even larger than a normal derby as Swindon were leading the league standings. You would then think that I would have been up right at 6 am for the match. I did indeed set my alarm nice and early for a Saturday morning… but apparently turned off the 6 am alarm in my sleep and then woke up at 7 am. I took my place in front of my laptop right as the second half was beginning. Although this was a big derby, it was still just a League 2 match so there wasn’t a live feed anywhere to be had – even in England most likely. As always when I can focus solely on an Oxford match, I pulled up the match tracker along with the Oxford United forum to follow the action… and to catch up on what I missed.
Unfortunately I missed a lot in the first half and was quite mystified from what I saw on the match tracker. The first big event was a red card sending of in just the 11th minute! Unfortunately, that red card was on Oxford striker James Constable. The Yellows were down a man from nearly the beginning.
As can oddly sometimes happen in soccer though, the team that loses a man becomes more threatening. Such was the case on Saturday. Constables sparked something in Oxford, and more specifically with the crossing ability of midfielder Lee Holmes. Oxford were rewarded with a free kick in the 16th minute in which he crossed into the box. Asa Hall found that cross and drilled it in goal from a 1-0 lead. Oxford were amazingly up 1-0 being down a man.
Holmes was at it again just two minutes later in the 18th, taking a break up the left and ground crossing it into the box. Oli Johnson was on the end of this one, putting it past the Swindon keeper for a 2-0 lead. Now with a two goal lead especially, Oxford just had to sit back and protect the lead.
In the second half – the half that I was awake for and was able to follow – Oxford did just that, playing all defense and not even taking a shot. They apparently wanted to make up for the lack of shooting though, with yellow cards. Oxford picked up six yellow cards in total, all happening between the 67th and 89th minutes I might add. More importantly though they kept Swindon’s eight second half shots (twenty for the whole match) out of the goal. Oxford United beat Swindon Town, taking the surprising 2-0 win.
Beating the league leaders in Swindon Town, moves Oxford closer to the top of the table. They still sit in 7th, but this big win hopefully gives them confidence and momentum to move higher through the promotion spots, not down out of them.
Newcastle United vs. Sunderland – Before waking up at 6:15 for Newcastle’s derby against Sunderland, I had a dream about the match sometime during the night. I had an unfortunate dream that the Magpies were down 5-2 at the beginning of the second half. Luckily though, they scored immediately as the game restarted to make it 5-3. My dream ended as Newcastle seemed to be roaring back. I began watching a live stream of the match, hoping that the Toon wouldn’t have to battle back from that much of a deficit.
Like Oxford, Newcastle had an early match event go against them early in the match. Instead of a red card though, it would be a yellow card and a penalty rewarded to Sunderland. Toon defender Michael Williamson was called for the yellow-card foul in the 24th minute for doing some fairly rough jersey pulling in the box on Sunderland’s Michael Turner. Sunderland’s Nicklas Bendtner put the resulting penalty past Krul to go up 1-0. Newcastle, who had been looking quite flat, would now have to play catch-up. Besides a Demba Ba header hitting off the bar in the 44th, nothing would be too threatening in the remaining minutes of the first half.
Alan Pardew substituted in Hatem Ben Arfa right at the beginning of the second half, which did help. Ben Arfa sometimes doesn’t look up enough – to make a good pass to an open teammate for instance – but takes the game right at defenders with good pace. The game would also take a turn in Newcastle’s favor in the 58th minute, with a Sunderland midfielder being sent off with a red card. It wasn’t too surprising, as the teams collectively had yellow cards up to that point. The play would now be much more open in the middle, but Newcastle would not get a goal right away.
Pardew would add another spark into the Newcastle side in the 72nd minute, taking out Cisse (who was looking a bit off) and putting in Shola Ameobi. In an odd way, Shola Ameobi would provide a great chance at a leveler just a few minutes later. In the 80th minute, he would be brought down in the box, earning a penalty for Newcastle. Ba stepped up to the line looking to bring the Toon even, but it wasn’t to be. Sunderland’s keeper kept Ba’s effort out. In all fairness, Ba’s shot was low and to the right, but not nearly close enough to the corner to really test any keeper. It was a chance wasted.
As the official match clock clicked away the 90th minute, the officials luckily announced that there would be five minutes of stoppage time added. There was still time to make things even…but the Toon didn’t need all five minutes to do it. In the 1st minute of stoppage time, Yohan Cabaye crossed the ball into the box which Michael Williamson flicked from the center, to Shola Ameobi who knocked the ball past Sunderland’s keeper. The game was now 1-1 and although there was a few minutes left on the clock to go ahead, Newcastle really didn’t make the most of their last few chances. Still the players and all the Geordies in the stadium were proud enough with the dramatic draw. It wasn’t a win, but one heck of a finish.
Neither team would take the derby spoils, but it would be a classic. Like any good derby, the cards were flying out of the referee’s pocket. It would easily beat this season’s first meeting of six yellows and one red. Sunday’s game would provide nine yellow cards and two red cards. The final red would also go against Sunderland and be awarded after the final whistle, for a player basically berating the ref. Just another derby day…
Newcastle remains in 6th place in the standings, now though just two points behind 5th place Chelsea.
FC Nurnberg vs. Borussia Monchengladbach – Nurnberg didn’t have a derby match, but did have a big fixture against third place Borussia Monchengladbach. Der Club’s manager Dieter Hecking went at this match with a very good tactical mind. Hanno Balitsch was suspended for the match (too many yellow cards), so Hecking couldn’t run Nurnberg’s ideal 4-2-3-1 as Balitsch plays in the defensive midfield in front of the back line (the 2 in that 4-2-3-1 formation). He could’ve defaulted to the classic 4-4-2, as they have before when they don’t have the personnel for the 4-2-3-1. Instead though, Hecking was cognizant of Gladbach’s own 4-4-2 formation and so to change things up, Nurnberg ran the not-so-common 4-1-4-1. Hecking’s tactical plan was genius.
I was watching a live stream (that was actually in English too) and Nurnberg was keeping pace with Gladbach. Gladbach maybe seemed a bit flat but their star Reus was still flying around per usual. Nurnberg’s numbers in the midfield though seemed to actually give them the advantage. However, as Nurnberg is better defensively than offensively, the first half was kept even. Shot-wise, Nurnberg actually come out on top with five shots compared to Gladbach’s four, but Gladbach had more on target – three compared to Nurnberg’s one.
The second half tilted more into Der Club’s favor. They were still playing defensively as usual, but seemed to be attacking more, not just relying on counter-attacks from defensive stops. I guess, looking at the match tracker, they sufficiently dominated on both sides of the ball. On offense they got nine shots off with three being on target. Defensively, they were even more impressive limiting Gladbach to just four shots, with only one being on goal and the rest being blocked.
Moving away from the stats though, Nurnberg still wasn’t making things happen on the pitch, more importantly not getting an goals. I thought this would do down as a scoreless draw, which I would’ve been fine with playing a higher ranked Gladbach. Nurnberg, with some substitutions late in the half, seemed to be making a push for a score. Fresh legs can often make the difference and I was happy to see that would be the case in this match. Hecking substituted in Albert Bunjaku for Jens Hegeler in the 84th minute and sure enough Bunjaku would be the difference maker, as he score just three minutes later in the 87th to put Nurnberg up 1-0 late. Fortunately his goal would be the last shot of the match and Nurnberg would get the narrow (almost last second) win over Monchengladbach.
Der Club have now won three in a row and move up a spot to 9th place. Ironically (as I mentioned last week), this is the best place they’ve been since being in 9th after losing to Gladbach on September 24th. Even with this standing, I don’t feel like they’re completely safe from relegation. There might be a lot of teams between them and relegation, but they are only nine points above the relegation playoff spot (the 16th spot in the table).
*Also it should be added that this is the first time since that same September 24th weekend that my three teams are not only all in single-digit league positions but also are all in the top half of their respective league tables.
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