Liverpool’s style impressed Brighton manager Fabian Hurzeler
“To fully gauge the impact of Arne Slot at Liverpool since his arrival in June, you need only talk to those around his squad. The Athletic has been told that at least three players at Anfield have said in private that Slot’s methods could have served the team well during times in recent seasons when they just missed out on the biggest prizes. This is not to denigrate Slot’s predecessor, Jurgen Klopp, an Anfield legend who brought the club unparalleled success in the Premier League era and over a far longer period of time than the Dutchman has worked on Merseyside. The ease of the transition has also, in part, been down to Klopp laying such solid foundations. …”
NY Times/The Athletic
Arne Slot at Liverpool – what the rest of football thinks: ‘He’s cool as hell’
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“The #MeToo movement swept through Hollywood and fundamentally shifted the paradigm of accountability for powerful individuals accused of sexual misconduct. It ignited a global reckoning that sought repercussions for actions long shielded by status, money, and influence. The movement dampened the careers of comedians, actors, film and television producers, and executives accused of inappropriate sexual behavior and led to the criminal convictions for some high-profile figures such as Harvey Weinstein, R. Kelly, Danny Masterson, and Bill Cosby—though Cosby’s conviction was later overturned. It has also extended beyond Hollywood and seen a similar reckoning in the music industry, academia, medicine, finance, and even religious and political institutions. In the arena of sports, one of the most shocking and biggest sexual abuse scandals centered around Larry Nassar, who served as the team doctor for the United States women’s national gymnastics from 1996 to 2014. During his tenure, he exploited his position to sexually abuse hundreds of young athletes, many of whom became Olympians. …”
“A sharp, anxious intake of breath, followed by a round of applause that carries a mixture of quiet admiration and, more than anything, relief. On other occasions, it ends with supporters shaking their heads and asking why. We are talking about the crowd reaction to — and I’m borrowing this description from a colleague who is a regular at Stamford Bridge — ‘the most dangerous pass in football’. 
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“Amad scored a brilliant late winner in the Manchester derby shortly after earning the penalty that had put Ruben Amorim’s team level as 
“It was an April’s day in an era when 
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“The setting was 
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“Ruben Amorim has faced a range of clubs during his first six games as 
“The signs have long been there, pointing us towards the inevitable. And tomorrow, unopposed, 
“The 
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“Even now, 20 years on, it is a moment which takes the breath away. Steven Gerrard had no right to score the goal that he himself described as the most important of the 186 he plundered for 
“The Laws of the Game are the codified rules of 
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“David de Gea said on day one that he wanted to ‘make history’ with 
“… The accolade for the most penalties taken with a 100% success rate used to be solely held by former 
“Less talk, more action? Having stepped out of Austrian football for the first time in his career, Christian Ilzer has taken the opposite approach as he seeks to establish himself and to find his feet at Hoffenheim. Appointed to the top job little more than a week ago, the new head coach took over an alarming situation, with his new European-qualified team teetering just above a weak-looking bottom three. Yet he immediately felt that making time to chat was the best start. …”
“While they were humbled by an attack-minded Monaco on Friday evening at the Stade Louis II, as 
“… A — Paulino Alcantara Not 
“A team flying at the top of the league playing at home against a side without a win in six games brought the result you would expect, as Arne Slot’s 
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The 1943 Santa Cruz squad. Players marked with a red cross died during the tour.
“Five games into the new-look 
“The numbers alone are frightening. Viktor Gyokeres has made 25 appearances for club and country so far in 2024-25. He has scored 33 goals. He was top scorer in the Portuguese top flight for Sporting CP last season with 29 goals (eight more than anyone else). He has already scored 16 in the league this season (again, eight more than anyone else) and only failed to score in six of those 25 games in all competitions. He scored nine for Sweden in the recent Nations League group stages. He has scored 67 goals in 69 matches for Sporting since joining from 
“… Hello! 
“There was absolute silence at Valencia’s Mestalla stadium at 1.59pm on Saturday, as a crowd of 43,975 remembered the victims of the horrific flooding that struck the region last month. An incredibly emotional pre-game ceremony began with people from the areas most affected by the flooding bringing a huge Senyera, the Valencian regional flag, donated by 
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“Before every training session, the Sudan men’s football team line up together and link arms. The captain calls them to attention for a moment of silence, which is broken by another shout before they clap three times in unison. It doesn’t matter where they are; it’s when they put everything else to one side and focus solely on football. They can’t play matches at home because, since April 2023, the north-east African country has been gripped by a bitter civil war between the government-led national army and the rebel Rapid Support Forces (RSF). As many as 150,000 people have been killed, 
“Modern football coverage has never been so focused on individuals, at a time when the game itself has never been so systemic. The reaction to 
“At a time of significant uncertainty around 
“It was the elephant in the room that Arne Slot went out of his way to address. Up until the last international break, 
“From the local businessmen propping up boyhood clubs to the Gulf states chasing reflected glories, an eclectic mix has taken over English football’s top 20 clubs. Owners of 
“Kylian Mbappe is France’s star forward and one of the most recognisable players in world football. The Real Madrid player was France’s captain at Euro 2024 and has 48 goals for Les Bleus — but for the second consecutive international break he has been left out of the squad by manager Didier Deschamps. It has not been a straightforward few months for Mbappe. He has struggled for form at the Bernabeu since joining after his contract expired at Paris Saint-Germain — though he remains in a legal battle with them over unpaid wages — and in October reports linked him to an alleged rape in Sweden. …”
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“At a 
“The history of soccer in the United States is littered with failed leagues, all attempting to do the same thing: Americanize the world’s game. For nearly a century, proponents of the sport in the U.S. altered the long-standing rules of the game to make it more high-scoring, more action-packed, less… foreign. Some of those rule changes and innovations — the use of substitutes, for example, or the backpass law — were truly groundbreaking and 
“Gedling Town Football Club was a 
“Has the Premier League title race been whittled down to two teams after just 11 games of the season? Leaders Liverpool had the dream weekend after victory over Aston Villa coupled with defeat for Manchester City against Brighton – and 
“Different season, same 
“Even before Galatasaray signed Victor Osimhen on loan from 
“The FA Cup – the oldest football tournament in the world – begins its 144th edition on Friday the 2nd of November 2024. The number of teams entered has increased from 732 to 745, and the growth of the 9th tier is the reason for the increase. The lowest-placed team to make it to the 1st Round this year is Hednesford Town (of south Staffordshire), who are in the 8th tier, in the Northern Premier League D1-West, and who are currently drawing an impressive 1,265 per-game (in home league matches). …”
“Today should have been Thomas Tuchel’s inauguration day. The man who 
“Fairytales continued in the 
“Welcome to The Briefing, where every Monday this season The Athletic will discuss three of the biggest questions to arise from the weekend’s 
“All of a sudden, 
“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 
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.
The 17-year-old became the youngest scorer in the clásico as Hansi Flick’s side ran riot in second half
Amine Harit (third from right) reacts after being sent off by François Letexier.
“There is an understanding that a league table does not truly “take shape” until clubs have played 10 of their allotted matches in that season’s competition. It is an ancient and arbitrary threshold we have created for ourselves, but it has merit. First, it is a nice round number. Second, it’s… double figures. …”
Scissors Kick 