Rocco's Round-Up (2/2/24 to 8/2/24)

Friday, 2nd February 2024

The Mighty Whites are always mighty in white, and got the weekend off to a perfect start with a 1-0 win at Ashton Gate, moving them into the promotion places for the first time this season. That’s now five league wins out of five in 2024, four clean sheets, and goals from all seven of Farke's formidable forwards. Motoring on Together!

Saturday, 3rd February 2024

Thumping away wins for Leicester and Southampton made it a slightly sobering Saturday, but Ipswich lost at Preston and have only won once in eight games. Quantity of January signings doesn't always correlate to points gained, in fact, it almost never does.

Sunday, 4th February 2024

SNAKES & LOSERS: Who's hot and who's not...

HOT: Jack Harrison - Played every minute of Everton's six games since the turn of the year, scoring two goals, and is now second top scorer and assister for the Toffees.

HOT: Diego Llorente - The new manager at Roma has kept faith with Deigo, and with three successive wins Roma are up to 5th. A permanent 4m transfer is looking more and more likely.

HOT: Luis Sinisterra - The King of the Snakes has started most games since the turn of the year, helping Bournemouth into the tranquil waters of midtable with impressive goal contribution stats per 90.

HOT: Rasmus Kristensen - He was benched for the last game, but the speeding Dane had started 8 Serie A games in a row before that, and still played 30mins in Roma’s 4-0 win.

HOT: Marc Roca - Still a regular for Betis, who are doing enough to stay on the fringes of La Liga’s European places. His 84.2% passing accuracy is lower than all four of Leeds’s midfielders.

NOT: Sam Greenwood - Starting every week for Boro, though his goal contributions have dried up. He’s now registered just one goal and one assist since November.

NOT: Cody Drameh - Seems to have found his level as a regular in an ambling bottom half Championship team. Currently injured until the end of Feb, and links to Borussia Dortmund have dried up.

NOT: Max Wober - The Warrior has been ‘out for a few days with illness’ since late December. I'm starting to get a little worried about him, though not worried enough to google the situation.

NOT: Brenden Aaronson - With 13 substitute appearances in a row, Aaronson must be on course to break a record. His club remain one place off the relegation zone, and his stats are comically bad. Still awaiting his first goal contribution in the Bundesliga (1 goal and 3 assists in 52 appearances in Europe’s major leagues).

NOT: Andrea Radrizzani - Sampdoria remain one place above the Serie B drop zone, albeit with a five point cushion, and Andrea Pirlo has joined the long list of managers that were afforded more patience than the only manager to deliver the slimy Italian any success.

NOT: Victor Orta - Sevilla are only out of the drop zone on goal difference, and Victor was called a liar by one of his players this week. (They won for the fourth time this season on Monday night. Sigh)

Monday, 5th February 2024

Lovely presser by Farke today, who condemned the snowflakes who make a big deal of fixture 'congestion'. Two games a week is not congestion (if you want to learn about fixture congestion you can pre-order 'The Sons of Revie', out 15th April!) and as the Fuhrer pointed out, we played football every day as kids and never wanted to stop.

Tuesday, 6th February 2024

Those fretting about the trip to Plymouth didn’t seem to be fretting about the possibility of extra-time on the south coast, and it turns out there was nothing to fret about. United soared into the FA Cup's last 16 and the extra 30mins became a blessing, because a 4-1 pummeling is always more of a boost than a workmanlike 1-0 win. 

Wednesday, 7th February 2024

It was a big night for the club's cup campaigns. The Leeds-Chelsea rivalry will be renewed in the FA Cup for the first time since the 1970 final, thanks to Bohly's Billionaires overcoming Aston Villa (in concerningly impressive fashion), and United’s under 18s overcame Sheffield United on penalties to set up an FA Youth Cup quarter-final with Liverpool. Exciting times!

Thursday, 8th February 2024

Paddy's Poddy caused uproar this morning, as he revealed details of the abuse he got for taking and missing the penalty against Newcastle last season. It was a tough listen, although learning about his personal chef made me feel a little less sad. In the afternoon came a mix of uproar and indifference when Fabrizio Romano confirmed Bournemouth are triggering the buy-out clause for Luis Sinissssssterra. Setting the fee at 20m seems daft to me (Orta haunting us from the grave again, and probably not for the last time), but in the game of Snakes and Losers it's now 2 down, 8 to go.