Dirk Kuyt vows to win back his starting place, while Alan Pardew heaps praise on his strike force. Paul Lambert names an unchanged lineup and is rewarded with another three points as Norwich climb to ninth ahead of a trip to Old Trafford. Jack Wilshere is likely to be out till February, while Alan Tate tries an oxygen chamber to mend his broken leg. Here’s some quick Scribbles ahead of a busy day, folks:
Swansea defender Alan Tate doesn’t do things in half measures. Having broken his leg in a golf buggy accident, the twenty-nine year old has now turned to using an oxygen tank in order to speed up the healing process. Tate was initially expected to be out till Christmas but is hoping to return sooner:
“I go into the chamber three times a week for an hour. I’ve done 10 sessions and the results so far say it is helping and speeding up my progression.”
Dirk Kuyt has vowed to fight for his place in the Liverpool XI after becoming something of a peripheral figure of late. The Dutchman has started three league game this season and his team have been victorious on two of those occasions but despite a start and a goal in last week’s Carling Cup match at Brighton, Kuyt has seen just twenty minutes game time since gameweek 4.
Alan Pardew has been singing the praises of strike pair Demba Ba and Leon Best. The duo linked up brilliantly as Ba fired a hat-trick past Blackburn last weekend and with Hatem Ben Arfa nearing his return to a first-team league start, the Newcastle boss set a challenge for the in-form strikers ahead of this weekend:
Him (Ba) and Besty had as good a game as a pairing as any other strikers since I have been at this club. There is huge pressure to deliver at this club and they both delivered against Blackburn. Now they have to deliver at Wolves next week.
Jack Wilshere could be out of action until late February. That’s the prognosis after the Arsenal midfielder had an operation on his problematic ankle injury, with a statement on the Gunners website yesterday saying he’ll be sidelined for four or five months. Good news for Fantasy owners of Aaron Ramsey, then, with the Welshman likely to be the main beneficiary, with Mikel Arteta sitting deeper alongside Alex Song.
Reports this morning suggest Theo Walcott is due to miss out on Arsenal’s Champions League clash with Olympiakos tomorrow and may be a doubt for Sunday’s match with Spurs, though Arsenal have yet to make any official statement on the matter.
Paul Lambert fielded an unchanged starting XI for yesterday’s visit of Sunderland. Having tinkered so dramatically in Norwich’s first few games, consistency of selection proved key last night as the Canaries picked up their second win in succession. Bad news for Fantasy owners of Ritchie De Laet and Grant Holt, then, with both missing out once again. Holt did appear in a brief thirteen minute sub appearance, while De Laet stayed benched and will miss the weekend match with Man United due to the loan arrangement with his parent club.
Sunderland conceded their first goals with John O’Shea in the side last night. The Irishman’s previous two league appearances had produced clean sheets but the Black Cats were a shadow of the team that had hammered Stoke 4-0 the previous week and O‘Shea was not a happy man after the defeat:
We couldn’t get in behind Norwich and put them under pressure, whereas they managed to do that and fair play to them. We played a lot in front of their back four, rather than getting in behind and that’s something we’re going to have to work on.
