Chris Kamara looks back on a Premier League weekend which saw Andros Townsend continue his fine form, Arsenal score a spectacular goal and more dubious refereeing decisions...
A terrible decision at Stamford Bridge
I remember the first couple of years I was working on
Goals on Sunday and there were one or two of the laws of the game I wasn't 100 per cent certain of and if referees were watching our programme as soon as I said anything out of turn they were quick enough to clamp down and say to me 'you don't know what you're talking about.' Since that time I've had to make sure I'm 100 per cent certain I know the laws of the game. Now I know that, but I also know that players are not 100 per cent sure of the rules of the game.
On Saturday, from what I could see, the referee wasn't in the worst position. He was quite far away from the incident because he was waiting for the goalkeeper to kick the ball. In the first place the reason he took himself further up the pitch was because he knew the keeper was going to launch it and in the second place the assistant on the far side is looking across. Now his excuse after the game was that he thought the goalkeeper had dropped the ball as if he was going to roll it out and kick it but it didn't stack up.
When a goalkeeper is going to roll the ball out he looks behind him, every single keeper in the Premier League would do that because it's a natural reaction. They look behind, left and right and then they throw it on the floor, then they touch and launch it up field.
When they've got the ball in the hands there is no need to look behind because that part of the moment is an acceptable part of a keeper's remit so I didn't buy the excuses at all. It was just an absolutely rank bad decision and who knows what would have happened in the game.
Big decisions like that that are so straightforward, it should be something where Mike Riley gets those officials together and says, 'look this isn't something that is acceptable, this isn't something we should be allowing.'
Don't get me wrong, we all make mistakes but this is a situation where they need to say 'we can't let this happen again and you need to go back and look at the laws of the game, make sure you know what's going on and then can move on from this and hopefully it doesn't happen again'.
Sunderland sunk by first goal
I was at this game and for the first 45 minutes Sunderland were never ever going to concede. I was talking to Swansea fans at half-time and they said it was the worst they'd seen their team play at home under Michael Laudrup. They created no chances and were snuffed out by the opposition; a couple of half chances here and there for Sunderland could have put them in front.
The difference in the game was the first goal. It came from a set-play, which I presume Gus hasn't had a lot of time to organise, now he knows a few more of their weaknesses at set-plays and he'll probably do things a bit differently.
But as soon as they conceded that goal from the set play you might as well have blown the whistle because the game was over. The confidence had gone, the desire they'd got from being resolute for 55 minutes just ebbed away completely and the longer the game went on the more goals Swansea were going to score.
The whole game had a feeling of inevitability about it and that's what happens when you're struggling and that's what Gus needs to erase almost immediately. It's not easy, I've been there myself when I took over a struggling Stoke City team and couldn't reverse the slide.
It won't be easy but he's got a bit more time, we're only in October and there's long way to go; he has time and decent players, it's just a matter of getting those players back to playing with confidence again.
City looking slick
That first goal was brilliant; the ball from Negredo to Aguero was from another planet. West Ham set up to defend and make life difficult for them and City basically just brushed them aside and they looked every bit top draw. Player for player there isn't any better team, but being able to produce the goods away from home and roll their sleeves up and have a go hasn't been easy for them. Getting that first away win now will make the difference.
Fully deserved 100 for Stevie
Steven Gerrard deserves that 100th Premier League goal because he's been such a level-headed player and so loyal to Liverpool. There was a brief opportunity for him to leave the club and go to Chelsea and his advisers even spoke to them, but Liverpool is his football club and he stayed there.
He's won the Champions League, FA Cups, League Cup and the only thing that has eluuded him is the Premier League title, but he still has aspirations of that happening before he finishes with his football club. For any midfielder to score 100 goals in the Premier League is brilliant, you couldn't wish it on a nicer person.
