Daily Archives: November 4, 2024

The Briefing: Are we set for a thrilling title race and can Forest’s form continue?

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“Welcome to The Briefing, where every Monday this season The Athletic will discuss three of the biggest questions to arise from the weekend’s Premier League football. This was the round of games where Tottenham produced a brilliant second half to thrash Aston Villa, Southampton finally got their first win of the season — and Ipswich came so close to theirs — while Chris Wood’s amazing form continued. We will ask whether the flaws of the contenders will give us a thrilling title race over the coming months, what Ruben Amorim will think after watching Manchester United’s draw against Chelsea and whether Nottingham Forest are the most impressive team in the 2024-25 Premier League so far. …”
NY Times/The Athletic (Video)

Defensive issues have impacted Manchester City’s week – could they undermine the entire season?

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“All of a sudden, Manchester City look rather mortal. If Wednesday night’s Carabao Cup defeat at Tottenham Hotspur can be chalked up as a blessing in disguise for a side with a packed schedule, Saturday’s Premier League loss away to Bournemouth was, at best, sobering, and at worst, genuinely concerning. It means City have been beaten in consecutive games for the first time in over a year. The last time it happened was September 2023, when they lost 1-0 at Newcastle United in the Carabao Cup’s third round and then 2-1 at Molineux by Wolverhampton Wanderers in the league three days later. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

The overstuffed football calendar is reducing quality but increasing drama – Jonathan Wilson

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“It was a very good weekend for Liverpool, and a pretty good weekend for the Premier League. It’s one round of games, and blips and quirks do happen. But that three of the top four on Saturday morning could lose felt not only invigorating – maybe this isn’t a league entirely predetermined by how much money you have – but also, perhaps, part of a pattern. And that pattern is of football that is a bit patchy, a bit scratchy, a bit lacking the sort of fluidity and quality we’ve become used to, which is perhaps not so good. Moisés Caicedo’s equaliser aside, Chelsea’s draw at Manchester United in Sunday’s showpiece was an extremely limited game. The sense this autumn has been of a lot of sides packed with good players not playing particularly well. …”
Guardian

With Spain still mourning Valencia’s flood victims, why did La Liga play on?

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Girona’s Miguel Gutiérrez, one of many players with a connection to Valencia who featured in La Liga, dedicates his goal to victims of flooding.
“Thousands of people were at Mestalla this weekend, huge queues all along Avenida de Aragón where Valencia’s players arrived, but there was no game on, not here. They came instead with water, food and clothes for victims of the greatest natural catastrophe the country has seen: floods that have killed more than 210 people and destroyed towns and lives in the Horta Sud, just inland and south of the city, where a year’s worth of rain fell in eight hours. Hundreds of cars and vans turned up and unloaded, and many more made their way by foot. More than a million tonnes of aid filled the space under the stand, silent above them. …”
Guardian (Video)