Garth Crooks’ Team of the Week: Ollie Watkins, Andre Onana, Gabriel Jesus, Cole Palmer

After every weekend of the Premier League, BBC football pundit Garth Crooks gathers his thoughts and gives you his Team of the Week.

Andre Onana (Man Utd): As far as goalkeepers are concerned, I don’t rate the Cameroon international very highly at all. However, in a week when Manchester United went out of the Champions League, to go to Liverpool and keep a clean sheet, bearing in mind everything else that is going on at Old Trafford, was quite an achievement. It would have been churlish of me not to have included Onana in my team having had such a decent game at Anfield. Every save he made he should have saved but his double-handed stop from Virgil van Dijk was particularly impressive. Let’s hope for Manchester United’s sake he doesn’t return to type next week.

Diogo Dalot (Man Utd): Jurgen Klopp might not have been delighted with a 0-0 scoreline but I can assure him that Manchester United would have been delighted with a point at Anfield. The man who I thought played with his heart and not his head was Diogo Dalot. The Portugal international had a fine game and was naturally frustrated when the referee didn’t give him the throw-in when the United defender was convinced he deserved it. Why Michael Oliver took the player’s reaction so personally by sending him off, when a final warning was more than enough, said more about the referee than it did the player. What happened to referees that would speak to players and occasionally put them on notice instead of always trying to find the law in the game that justifies their over-officiousness?

Alex Moreno (Aston Villa): I wasn’t the least bit surprised to see Unai Emery punching the air when Alex Moreno equalised for Aston Villa against Brentford. After all, they deserved it. Moreno had produced a goal-saving tackle earlier in the match and was clearly up for this fixture. What then took place during the course of the afternoon were more like scenes from a Christmas panto than a Premier League fixture. Players pushing and shoving each other and falling all over the place for no apparent reason made for a poor spectacle. However, the pantomime villain was Ben Mee who received his first red card in 10 years and quite rightly. It was a shocking tackle on Leon Bailey. The speed and the height in which he flew into the challenge could have done untold damage had Bailey not pulled out of the tackle.

James Tarkowski (Everton): Michael Keane got the goal but it was James Tarkowski’s performance that made all the difference. Everton are flying. They are no longer talking about a 10-point deduction but more about the points they have picked up since their sanction and the impressive way they are currently playing under Sean Dyche. As for Dyche, the Everton manager doesn’t look anything like the stressed individual we saw on the touchline in the early part of the season, desperately asking for more effort from his players, but a man who looks in control of footballers who seem to enjoy playing for him.

Amadou Onana (Everton): Boos rang out around Turf Moor after Burnley’s two-goal defeat against Everton and suddenly Vincent Kompany’s position looks under threat. Meanwhile, Everton go from strength to strength and look like a very dangerous team whoever they play. I don’t think I’ve seen an Everton team look so dangerous on set-pieces. James Tarkowski, Michael Keane, AmadouOnana and Abdoulaye Doucoure, all six foot-plus, attacking the six-yard box like their lives depended on it. The superb header scored by Onana was typical of the barrage of artillery the Burnley defence was under when it came to set-plays. Meanwhile, Burnley fans need to press the pause button and realise that they are in a four-team race to stay in the Premier League with everything to play for. Announcing their descent now is totally counterproductive. Their players need to know that their home crowd are firmly behind them because they are going to need them to survive.

Lewis Miley (Newcastle): It looks like Newcastle United may have unearthed another gem. Lewis Miley is his name and his game reminds me more of a Steven Gerrard than a Paul Gascoigne. More comfortable on his left side than he is on his right, but that didn’t seem to matter the way he struck the ball so sweetly with his right foot to score his first goal for his club. Miley has come into the Newcastle side at the right time. The team are bursting with good professionals who will look after him. In fact, Bruno Guimaraes and Anthony Gordon were instrumental in supporting Miley’s game on the day. Fulham, on the other hand, suffered from a referee with a shocking attack of playing to the St James’ Park crowd. Raul Jimenez’s challenge that led to his red card was an embarrassing striker’s challenge but nothing more.

Michael Olise (Crystal Palace): I’m not sure what Fernandinho would have made of Manchester City’s performance against Crystal Palace. The former City captain, who won five titles with the club, didn’t look particularly excited about matters even when they were 2-0 up. I thought City made hard work of this and really had no business conceding two late goals and missing a golden opportunity to go second in the table, having looked so comfortable for so long in the game. However, when you have a talent like Michael Olise in your team, who can step up and convert a penalty past one of the best keepers in the world away from home, when your team has lost five games on the spin, it says volumes for the player’s confidence, not to mention competence. Great point for Palace under any circumstances.

Cole Palmer (Chelsea): The Chelsea manager’s job is one of the most sought-after posts in the game and there will be a queue of possible candidates wanting it should the position become available. However, what is in Mauricio Pochettino’s favour is that he is developing a very watchable team. Raheem Sterling is in excellent form, and has been ever since Gareth Southgate left him out of a number of England squads. Conor Gallagher, Moises Caicedo and, in particular, Cole Palmer, who looked majestic against Sheffield United, are all exciting prospects. Chelsea are still in the Carabao Cup and with a good run of games a European finish isn’t out of the question. This season may not be the write-off some have suggested and Pochettino is still very much worth the wait.

Gabriel Jesus (Arsenal): I heard one pundit say that he shouldn’t miss his goal. Well he didn’t, but I have seen chances like the one Gabriel Jesus expertly buried with his head against Brighton missed. I thought it was a fabulous header, not least because he was heading into an empty net from a deflection and at an angle with only a narrow corridor to aim at. The Brazil international froze like a predator, waiting before making perfect contact with his head and directing the ball exactly where he wanted it to go. It was an important goal as it set Arsenal on their way back to the top of the table. I’ll be very interested to see if they are still there in the New Year.

Ollie Watkins (Aston Villa): I’ve never quite understood why football fans feel totally obliged to shout all kinds of abuse towards players but are almost offended when they receive a response. Ollie Watkins’ winning goal for Aston Villa against Brentford must have provided him with an enormous amount of pleasure and clearly solicited a response from the player to a section of the crowd who obviously had a problem with the former Bees striker. What was said was difficult to ascertain but it caused a hell of a fuss. Quite why Brentford’s Saman Ghoddos, followed by his team-mates, had the audacity to try and stop Watkins from enjoying his moment beggars belief. How dare they? How about trying to stop Watkins from scoring in the first place, that way you don’t get a response from the opposition at all.

Mohammed Kudus (West Ham): This lad is on fire at the moment. He’s been outstanding for West Ham since his return from the international break while on duty with Ghana. Against Wolves he scored two well-taken goals and now looks a handful for any defence. Considering West Ham had to contend with a midweek European fixture against Freiburg three days earlier, they looked surprisingly fresh. Wolves, on the other hand, looked off the pace and while Gary O’Neil has done a decent job so far at Molineux, he needs to guard against any complacency from his players. There’s currently clear water between his team and the bottom five clubs and he needs to keep it that way. He needs to see at least 30 points on the board before he starts to think about making for the finish line.

The Crooks of the Matter

Former Premier League referee Mark Clattenburg joined in the video assistant referee (VAR) debate this week, claiming that referees could leave the game as players lose faith in officials because of inconsistencies around the use of VAR.

“The problem you’ve got now is that the players now don’t trust the system,” Clattenburg told BBC Radio 5 Live. I’ve got news for Mr Clattenburg: the players are not alone, the majority of fans and managers don’t trust the system either. Even pundits are beginning to regret the promotion of its technology into the game. In short, VAR, in its current form, has been an unmitigated disaster and must either undergo a root and branch review and be updated with the buy-in of players and managers or be scrapped altogether.

Head of refereeing Howard Webb countered by insisting that: “It would be foolish to take away a tool that can remove clear errors from the game.” But that’s the problem, many of VAR’s interventions are not clear and this constant uncertainty cannot continue because too many people are starting to lose faith in the modern game.