The Weekend Review: Here come the yips

From the Premier League to the FA Vase, for paying subscribers it's time for a weekend round-up.

Say what you like about the inequalities of modern football, there are times when it really does feel as though just about anybody can beat anybody in this season’s Premier League. None of the division’s top five teams actually won last weekend, which may well be a statistical blip but which also demonstrates something about the human condition. Nerves can get to the best of us, and that seems to have been the case this weekend across the length and breadth of the game in this country.

It all started at Goodison Park on Saturday lunchtime, with Everton and Arsenal playing out a relatively uneventful 1-1 draw. Three points would have cut Liverpool’s lead at the top of the table down to single figures and it did look as though that was the direction in which things were headed when the spritely Leandro Trossard gave the visitors the lead, but a clumsy second half challenge by Miles Lewis-Skelly handed Everton a penalty kick and honours ended up even.

This match set the tone for the weekend of missed opportunities. The biggest of these in the Saturday 3pms came at Portman Road, where the match between Ipswich Town and Wolves was essentially a final opportunity for the home side to close the gap between third and fourth bottom to something that could be overturned.

This all looked possible when Liam Delap—realistically, it was never going to be anybody else—gave Ipswich an early first half lead, but Ipswich gonna Ipswich and two second half goals from Paolo Sarabia and Jorgen Strand Larsen gave Wolves the win and opened the gap to a surely insurmountable twelve points. Ipswich aren’t down yet, but it’s only really a matter of time before they are.