Premier League 21-22 Round 4 is a review of the fourth weekend of matches in the 30th edition of the Premier League, season 2021 – 2022. A feature where Power of Pop returns to a sports focus – viz. football – in our musings on pop culture. This weekly review will feature our observations of the various encounters amongst the twenty English clubs that make up the Premier League.
Premier League 21-22 Round 4 Saturday 11th September 2021
Big spending clubs will always have too much quality for all the poorer inferior ‘others’. Cristiano Ronaldo made all the headlines as expected as he scored two goals against a hapless Newcastle in his 2nd debut for the Red Devils. In the end, a comfortable 4-1 win will have Man United fans dreaming of sweeping all before them, especially with the talismanic Portuguese in their ranks.
Over at Stamford Bridge, the 100 million quid spent on another returning messiah – Romelu Lukaku – looks like a bargain (according to Chelsea coach Tuchel – but of course only of course if you have a cheatin’ billionaire owner) as Chelsea barely got out of 2nd gear to down Aston Villa 3-0.
Meanwhile, ominously enough, Man City are getting into the groove of winning matches, scoring goals and conceding none, dispatching Leicester 1-0 at the King Power. Looks like Liverpool are the only hope of true blue real football fans to provide an obstacle to the ambitions of free spending cheaters.
For the rest of the clubs who do not have the kind of money spent by our three title favourites, it was once more a fight to get back on an even keel. Like the Arsenal who finally scored and earned their first points against the even worse Norwich (now firmly rooted to the bottom). Similarly Wolves got their first two goals of the season, condemning their hosts Watford to consecutive defeats.
Brighton is proving to be the early surprise package, a last minute winner placing them in the top four (!) for the moment, while very early leaders West Ham continue to drop points, this time at Southampton. The other notable point being Marco Antonio’s red card – talk about the Player of the Month award being a poison chalice!
That leaves us with ex-leaders Spurs’ abject display at Selhurst Park, losing 3-0 in the process. A combination of injuries, mismanagement, poor decision making and sheer bad luck provided Crystal Palace – managed by ex-gooner Patrick Viera of course – the best opportunity to earn their first win of the season. Spurs did all they could to help – Japhet Tanganga getting himself sent off, Eric Dier early first half injury, Ben Davies’s sloppy handball AND most of all the fiasco of not having Davinson Sanchez, Cristian Romero and Giovani Lo Celso, unavailable due to COVID-19 restrictions.
Premier League 21-22 Round 4 Sunday 12th September 2021
Only one Sunday game and it involved the neutral fan’s best hope for the Premier League title : Liverpool. Why? Because unlike their closest rivals, Liverpool have elected not to spend obscene amounts of money to strengthen their squad.
Judging from their emphatic 3-0 win at Leeds United, Liverpool are well-placed to provide a robust challenge to both Manchester clubs and Chelsea.
That said, Leeds played into Liverpool’s hands, playing an open game which allowed Liverpool to creative a hatful of chances that if Liverpool forwards (especially Sadio Mane) were more clinical, this match might have ended up with a cricket score. Thoughts go out to youngster Harvey Elliot who broke his ankle and is looking at long term absence. Such a pity.
Premier League 21-22 Round 4 Monday 13th September 2021
Round 4 is wrapped up with the Toffees breaking into the Top 4 with a home win against Burnley. As the Champions League places will basically consist of the Manchester clubs, Liverpool and Chelsea, the 2nd tier clubs will be fighting for the scraps i.e. Europa League (!) qualification.
Everton demonstrated that it might have what it takes to at least be one of the best of the rest. Though Burnley might consider themselves unlucky not to have been running away with the game at half-time, having missed a couple of excellent opportunities in the opening 30 minutes.
But even then, when Ben Mee gave Burnley the lead it looked as if Burnley had done enough to secured three vital away points. However, they were undone by three Everton goals in six minutes, including a ‘worldy’ from ex-Spur Andros Townshend. And that was that.
As you can plainly see, we are still working on how best to present this Premier League review series. Originally presented at the Powerofpop Facebook page.
… still there’s more …