OTB Football
FINAL ONE STANDING:"I wouldn't be at all surprised if Villa went on to win the league" | Can Arsenal bounce back? | OFF THE BALL
30 Jan 2026
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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The final one standing by William Hill on Off the Ball. Download the app and play today. 18 plus gamblingcare.ie yep this is Final One Standing your guide to the Premier League weekend David and Shane with me today just look at the pictures lads this is like the first really well rounded good Premier League weekend in a long time
It's like this Leeds Arsenal game tomorrow is just absolutely intriguing to me with Leeds' home form. And then you have two pretty big fixtures of the way we look at it. Is it a top eight now? Are we allowed to say top eight?
Big eight? Yeah, I think it's a top eight now. Especially after five teams qualifying a top eight in the Champions League during the week. Straight to the last 16. That's it.
And watching Premier League teams struggle
with other English teams in a way that they don't with European teams which is still something that I think is we're struggling to get our head around but it is especially the it was the Burnley Spurs game last week that was such an eye-opener after they just took care of business against Dortmund and I was like I'm not really surprised that they almost lost to Burnley even
yeah it's funny because even the crap games on paper this week are actually half like even Wolves Bournemouth you'd probably look at and say that's the last one I'm going to look at but Wolves are in decent bit of form Bournemouth are good to watch or like Chelsea West Ham say which would be a nothing three o'clock Chelsea take care of business and suddenly West Ham are in some kind of form and are winning games yeah
Yeah, Villa, Brentford, two teams that like to play football the right way.
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Chapter 2: What makes this Premier League weekend particularly exciting?
Lee Phelps from William Hill is with us. Lee, how are you? Yeah, really good, thank you. Yeah, it's interesting the way you introduced that because I remember when I did the prep for this weekend, I was looking thinking this is a nightmare weekend to pick tips in because it's so open. But yeah, yours is a positive way of looking at it.
Liverpool-Newcastle, I like that there's not that many 8 o'clock Saturday night kick-offs, but it feels like Liverpool-Newcastle always has to be a night game. All they want to do is just recreate the 4-3. They'll give us every chance they possibly can for the rest of time, every time Liverpool-Newcastle play. But it is funny how it does actually seep into our subconscious.
There's no world in which we won't look forward to a Liverpool-Newcastle game.
The first one that we had this season was fantastic, wasn't it? Anthony Gordon, of course, going off.
Chapter 3: How are Arsenal and Leeds positioned ahead of their upcoming match?
Yeah, brilliant, brilliant game. There's something about them that wherever they are in the league tables, whatever's happening in those clubs, yeah, something amazing happens. It's like, I mean, Liverpool were obviously coast. You look at the midweeks, like chalk and cheese, weren't they? Obviously, Newcastle had it all on going away to obviously one of the best teams in Europe.
Got a good result in the end. And Liverpool, you know, I mean, it looked like the Carabao players came for the shopping at Liverpool 1 rather than anything else, didn't it? Liverpool really eased to a big win there. But the manager was saying last weekend, wasn't he, that they were like running on empty pretty much after losing to Bournemouth. So, you know, what's going to happen?
I don't know which Liverpool... to trust it I don't know what's going to happen they're 4-5 they're a touch of odds on Newcastle have got an awful record at Anfield in the league 1994 the last time they won there they were away from this season doesn't suggest anything yeah doesn't suggest anything that they were away from this season either so they're just under 3-1 which
you know i'd like to make an argument for it but i can't the draw is just under three to one and like i think because of the way you've said it's well rounded i've seemed to have gone through a lot of draws yeah i know he's sitting on the fences but it's like a lot of these games you can see finishing in draws i never understand why he's sitting that way draw picking a draw is sitting on the fence you've got three options and a draw is one of them it's one of those like i didn't
it's harder to pick a draw sometimes isn't it there are less draws than wins and look if you pick a draw treble you know you're doing really well because you're usually getting a really nice price about if you manage to get two or three draws into a double or a treble yeah no one would be surprised to see this one being a score draw would they like 2-2 what do you think lads because I think Lee's right I would look at this and just go oh my head hurts because both of them doing well in Europe Newcastle
Newcastle, like even their home form last Sunday was just like, oh, you know, they were kind of well, they were kind of taking, Villa kind of took care of business against them in a way that you almost wouldn't expect at St. James' Park anybody to do. And it's just, they're having, they're having, I suppose, moments throughout the season. That's why they're not like,
ridiculously far Spurs down the league but generally their form has been poor and nowhere near the form of last season or three seasons ago but Liverpool I just don't trust them in any game at the moment David No you can't like Newcastle I think one of the big things for Newcastle this week and Eddie Howe speaking about this this morning is whether Bruno Goumerice is fifth Yeah
He obviously missed the game last week and there was a stat last week, I think in something like 150 plus games that Bruno Grimmerice has been part of at Newcastle since he joined in 2022. He's missed nine of them and Newcastle have failed to win any of those nine. So he is Mr. Newcastle.
He's probably one of the best midfielders and one of the best signings Newcastle have made in, I guess, the Premier League era. And I think it all hinges on whether he's available to play tomorrow night. But with Liverpool, like... If they don't win tomorrow, they'll become the first Liverpool side to fail to win any of their opening six-league fixtures of a calendar year since 1954.
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Chapter 4: What are the implications of Newcastle's recent performances?
But Leeds home form has been absolutely brilliant. And I don't think they're a pushover for anybody. They're also a team that like Forrest a few weeks ago, Arsenal won't be able to physically bully and wear down over the course of a game. They are significantly better than them quality wise. So that might come out.
But I just everything points to this just being a struggle for Arsenal tomorrow afternoon.
Yeah, I tend to agree. I mean, I don't know what it is about the football psyche. Non-Arsenal fans are just waiting for them to slip up, aren't they? Obviously, last weekend, there was kind of a bit of celebration just in the general football community that the title race was still alive.
Yeah, and given how good Leeds are, like you say, I think there'll be a fair few Leeds fans wanting to get on them at just under five to one. The draws, like you say, three to one, you can, there's a few games this weekend where I've been looking at putting, so you basically go Leeds and the draw. There's a few of those. I like Fulham and the draw at Man United as well.
And like I said, there were a few of those where you think Everton and the draw is a bigger price than Brighton to win, for instance. So there are a few of these kind of like, where you just take two results out of the three and, Look, if we whittle it down to, can Leeds score? I think the answer to that is yes. Arsenal are leaking goals.
We know Leeds, we think Leeds have scored in every game except one at Elland Road this season. If you look at the last six Premier League games for Arsenal, they've had two 0-0 draws against Forest and Liverpool. and conceded seven goals in the other four matches. They've only conceded 17 all season. So they are leaking goals. They're making mistakes at the back. Leeds, I think, can punish that.
So they can score. That's like tick one. Both teams have scored. I think Arsenal can score as well. That's both teams have scored. So whichever way you go in it, I think you add both teams to score in. The obvious way to go would be Arsenal to win it and both teams score in at 12-5. But the score draw at 9-2, I do like it lit up. Look, Elland Road, everyone knows it's a cliche.
It's a great place to play football. It'll be rocking with Arsenal coming to town. They did beat them 5-0 at their place, remember, earlier in the season. I think this is where... If Arsenal get a good result here, if they get a win here, scruffy win, play them off the park, whatever, it's a huge, huge win for them, I think. If they slip up a bit here and City do beat Tottenham, then it's on.
I think then we start to test Arsenal's mettle, don't we?
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Chapter 5: How does Liverpool's current form affect their matchup with Newcastle?
And four points is a lead that is, yeah, it's OK at this time of the year. And I know Keith Tracy has been speaking like, you know, Arsenal don't need to panic. But if I'm an Arsenal fan and we've seen it there last Sunday, I would be panicking because this team I do not trust.
The other thing I thought was interesting during that match last week was the fact that the manager... he's been criticised, I guess, for not letting his team attack, not letting his team off the leash and go for it. Look at the big games against the big teams. Against the Liverpool side, they should have gone and beaten. City team, they should have beaten. Chelsea team, they were down to 10 men.
They didn't really put the foot down on the pedal. They couldn't do it last weekend. Then all of a sudden, on 58 minutes, he sends four players on and he's got all this, go on attack. It's like, well, you haven't been doing that all the season. It felt like a bit of a, it felt like a, like a panic move. Oh, it was a panic move, wasn't it? Cause you know, like it felt like even more like, hang on.
And you know, when you think about the, the atmosphere in the ground, This is a team who are top of the table, apparently the best team in Europe, maybe the world, apparently, and the crowd's getting after them because they're losing to Manchester United early on in the game. It's like, what? You know, go and win the game. This is why this is a big test, isn't it? How do they bounce back?
How do they bounce back? Having played in midweek, even if it was a bit of an easy run out for them, go and attack Leeds.
and beat them you know you beat them 5-0 at your place go and beat them again like that it's going to be a fascinating I agree it's a fascinating game shame it's tucked away at 3 o'clock I don't know why this isn't a Sunday game Yeah because even when Mourinho scores the equaliser last week last weekend again from a set piece the crowd gets behind them for a couple of minutes but you still feel if United get one more chance here in possession they're going to score they're a better team by far Yeah the big thing for me in terms of
I think we're all quick to jump on it being a mentality issue with Arsenal and sometimes there isn't evidence to suggest that. The evidence to me is as soon as they went 1-0 up on Sunday... The goal that Manchester United equalised with was the third chance in three minutes. And they all came from absolute brain farts in defence.
And they finally put it away in the third time with the worst mistake of them all. And I'm like, that doesn't happen. You've just scored. I don't know whether that's because they start concentrating because they'd had the breakthrough or whether they were like, we have to win from here and it's even more pressure. But they completely collapsed. And they got back into the game and so on.
And it took a wonder strike to win it, fair enough. But I think that is absolute evidence for me that there's something real going on there, mindset-wise.
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