Tuesday’s Premier League football was an exhilarating ride, with goals aplenty, zero clean sheets, last-minute levellers and a tense top-of-the-table clash.
Continuing the Gameweek 21 inquest, it’s the Scout Notes for Nottingham Forest 1-1 Liverpool and West Ham United 3-2 Fulham.
JOTA IMPACT
With a Double Gameweek coming up, it’s a good time for Liverpool players to be making a positive impression.
Diogo Jota (£7.2m) did just that at the City Ground, scoring within 30 seconds of being introduced. He was also twice thwarted brilliantly by Matz Sels (£4.9m), registering four shots in his half-hour cameo.
Jota was, with the benefit of hindsight, always likelier to prosper against Forest’s low block. A sniffer of goals and pincher of half-yards, he was better equipped to bypass the parked bus than Luis Diaz (£7.5m).
“Yes, he made a big impact already before when he came in against Fulham but then after that game, he had a bit of a setback and then the games he came in afterwards I also felt he needed a bit more time to get into his rhythm. That’s not only with him, I see that with other players as well that were out for a few weeks or a few months. It is difficult to get this intensity going in these Premier League games immediately.
“And it was very pleasing to see that today he might even have been better than against Fulham when he came in. He had a big impact, he was the one, apart from Mo [Salah], that had a few chances to score our second goal.” – Arne Slot on Diogo Jota
What does it mean for Double Gameweek 24, then? Well, probably not great news for Diaz and his owners. We’ve still got over two weeks, and four more Liverpool games, to come before the ‘double’. There may be more injuries. Diaz could play himself back into undroppable form. But the likely dent that Jota was going to make into Diaz’s Gameweek 24 match-time just got a bit bigger.
Darwin Nunez (£7.0m), suspended in Gameweek 21, will also be available from this weekend onwards.
UNLUCKY 13 FOR SALAH
So, then, it was indeed a good week to oppose Mohamed Salah (£13.7m) with the captaincy – looking solely at the outcome, anyway.
Forest did what Forest do best and shut down the Egyptian for much of the game. After 78 minutes, he’d only had one, scuffed, shot.
But with the hosts wilting (as the ‘xG race’ image below shows), a late flurry of attempts could have rescued a haul from this rare blank. Sels tipped over a curler, while another effort was agonisingly cleared off the line.
Salah ended up with six shots in the box by full-time, a tally that no one can better in Gameweek 21 so far.
There was also the below chance which the stats collectors won’t have picked up, thanks to Salah’s miscontrol in a glorious position.
— c (@kdjdjdjdjdjksks) January 15, 2025
Ultimately, it was a first blank in 13 matches.
Elsewhere, there was a ninth straight start for Cody Gakpo (£7.4m) on the left. Is Diaz now second choice in two positions?
Trent Alexander-Arnold (£7.2m) started as expected, too, making light of the weekend’s minutes with the second string. Callum Hudson-Odoi (£5.2m) was more than a handful and had the beating of the much-discussed right-back at times but this was, at least, no repeat of the Manchester United horror show.
FOREST’S SEASON IN MICROCOSM
The brief summary of Forest’s performance on Tuesday basically encapsulates their season.
Sels inspired between the sticks. The defence throwing bodies in the way. Chris Wood (£6.9m) scoring from very few chances; just one in this case. Brilliantly organised, dangerous in transition. How many times have we written the same thing in the Scout Notes in 2024/25?
17 – Murillo made 17 clearances against Liverpool; the most by a player in a Premier League game this season. Indeed, the second-most was also by Murillo, making 15 against Brighton in September. Mountain. pic.twitter.com/8A6Pp7uux8
— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe) January 15, 2025
The absurdly consistent Tricky Trees proved here, as they did at Anfield, that they can compete with the best and belong in second.
One new recent feature of Forest’s displays is Anthony Elanga‘s (£5.2m) productivity. His assist for Wood’s strike was his sixth attacking return in as many games, his last blank coming in Gameweek 15.
“First of all, you have to make sure you win the first ball and then the second or the third ball because they play the ball off Wood, who is a very strong target man, and then they have got these quick forwards that can hurt you as well.
“But then the moment you win the second or the third ball there are 11 players behind the ball and it is so difficult to score against teams that play in a low block; it’s so difficult to create chances against teams like that.” – Arne Slot
ROBINSON CLOSING IN ON 10 ASSISTS
“The best team lost the game.
“It’s completely our fault we didn’t win the game.” – Marco Silva
Marco Silva, one of the more restrained Premier League managers, was palpably seething after Tuesday’s match in east London. Not angry at the match officials or VAR intervention – at his own team.
Fulham quite simply shot themselves in the foot, not for the first time over the last few Gameweeks.
Above: Premier League teams sorted by errors leading to goals over the last three Gameweeks. Fulham hadn’t conceded one of those in the first 18 matches.
Having presented goals to Bournemouth and Ipswich Town in previous matches, they gift-wrapped West Ham another two.
Individual mistakes from Andreas Pereira (£5.0m) and Bernd Leno (£5.0m) were mercilessly punished by Carlos Soler (£5.0m) and Lucas Paqueta (£5.7m). If we’re being uber-critical, Leno – usually such a solid pair of hands – could perhaps have done better with Tomas Soucek‘s (£4.9m) goal, too, air-clawing at the Czech midfielder’s header.
Other than those strikes, West Ham had one shot all game – in the 92nd minute.
Fulham were, as Silva said, the better team. The Cottagers outshot their hosts 21-4, with Harry Wilson (£5.2m) and Raul Jimenez (£5.7m) hitting the woodwork. Sasa Lukic (£4.8m) and Adama Traore (£4.7m) missed with swipes of the ball from close range, too.
They’re actually a pretty good team, Fulham, but this was one of those days.
That said, the visitors had some fortune with their two strikes. Alex Iwobi‘s (£5.9m) brace came from cross-shots that found their way past Lukasz Fabianski (£4.1m).
How’s your luck, Antonee Robinson (£5.0m) owners? The American international provided two straightforward passes to Iwobi before those cross-shot-goals, so claimed assists for both. That took him to a remarkable nine assists for FPL 2024/25, four ahead of any other defender.
Even though there was a Hartley’s factory-worth of jam involved with these latest attacking returns, so much of Fulham’s play comes down their left that it’s never a complete surprise when Robinson is involved.
PAQUETA UP FRONT, KUDUS SUB EXPLAINED
A bit of good fortune for the Hammers, then, but even “the effort and the willingness to fight for each other” (in Graham Potter’s words) was an improvement on recent West Ham performances.
The shape-shifting Potter was smart with his in-game tactical tweaks, too, the kind of proactivity that was rarely seen under Julen Lopetegui.
One player who has looked markedly better in the last week is the hitherto barely interested Lucas Paqueta.
Here the Brazilian started up top for the Hammers, although his goal came after Danny Ings (£5.0m) was introduced and he had taken up a wider role.
And don’t get too carried away with an ‘out of position’ tag: Ings may well start up top in Gameweek 22 and West Ham will almost certainly sign a striker in the transfer window.
“Danny had a massive game against Aston Villa [in the FA Cup on Friday], he hasn’t played consistently for a while. So, I just thought then to go from Friday to Tuesday was big for him [and he’d be] more useful at the back-end of the game. Obviously, he’s come off the bench and really helped us.” – Graham Potter on why Danny Ings didn’t start
Soler impressed on the left, while Aaron Wan-Bissaka (£4.6m) carried on where he left off under Lopetegui with another attacking return.
A player yet to really kick into gear under Potter is one of the great FPL hopes, Mohammed Kudus (£6.2m). Offered some pointers from the bench about his off-the-ball work, he was hooked early just after the hour and stropped off. Potter, as you’d expect, was diplomatic.
“I felt at 2-1, I didn’t think the game was going to be won by us playing really nice football, unfortunately. I thought it was going to be a bit of a scrap and it was about pressure and it was about being together.
“Danny [Ings] coming on probably helped us with that, even though it’s a tough one because Mo’s a top, top player. But he was really suffering, Mo, I thought, from a tiredness perspective after a massive game against Aston Villa. So, he’s going to be important for us on Saturday. It’s going to be time to recover now and get ready for another big game.” – Graham Potter
DON’T COUNT YOUR CHICKENS WITH FABIANSKI JUST YET
Fabianski has now started both of Potter’s matches in charge.
Opinion is divided on his role in Fulham’s two goals: should he have covered the trajectory of Iwobi’s untouched crosses better?
Either way, it’s still too early to be making assumptions that he’s Potter’s first choice.
Alphonse Areola (£4.2m) hasn’t been in the West Ham squad over the last week, with the usually reliable exwhuemployee saying that the France international is injured.
Only when he’s fit will we really be able to tell if Fabianski is number one.
