“Martyn Kelly remembers wishing he had a stool to climb on like the rest of the kids in the ground to get a better view. The world’s first official penalty shootout was not something he wanted obscured by other people’s heads. On a warm evening on 5 August 1970 at Boothferry Park in Hull, a star-studded Manchester United reached the end of extra time level at 1-1 with second-tier Hull City in a cup match. Six weeks earlier, football’s lawmakers had decided to end the days of the coin toss to decide winners in favour of five players from each team taking a kick from 11 yards out with just the keeper to beat. … No-one knew yet that this new method of deciding a tied football match would become a nerve-shredding experience some fans, players and managers can barely watch. …”
BBC
Ian Butler scored Hull City’s second penalty
When football turned to penalties to end ‘cruel’ system
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“Cesc Fabregas’s ‘dribble’ was a one-two. He used to come short to receive the ball, attract pressure, offload a pass with the outside of his foot, run into space and ask for it back. … Whenever Fabregas talks about the game, it is patently clear he has thought deeply about it for his entire life. Not just the tactical side of it, but the skill and technique that go into every single action on the pitch. Questions don’t need to be probing and he offers forthright and detailed responses. You come away from his press conferences feeling you have learned something, thankful for the depth. In a football culture as developed and tactically-minded as Italy, you’d expect this to be welcome and to some extent it is. A new generation of Italian coaches and match analysts study Fabregas. They take ideas from him and find inspiration. …”
“The U.S. men’s national team hoped that these spring friendlies, the last before coach Mauricio Pochettino selects his World Cup roster, would reinforce the positive momentum of the fall. Instead, a deflating loss served as a warning for what can come against some of the world’s best teams and against the game’s attacking players. 
“The headline attraction for a section of fans when England meet Uruguay at Wembley on Friday will not be the players on the pitch, but the head coach in the away dugout. Because this international friendly marks the return to British shores for Marcelo Bielsa. Leeds United supporters who idolised the Argentinian during his 44 months in charge at Elland Road are taking this long-awaited opportunity to acknowledge the impact he had on their lives before his sacking in February 2022. While there will be 90,000 in attendance at England’s national stadium in north London, the pockets of Leeds fans in every corner of the place will hope to use the time to properly say goodbye to an icon of their club. …”
“Kees Smit made a winning start to his international career as the Netherlands impressed in the latest game of their World Cup preparations by triumphing 2-1 at home to a Norway team who were missing Erling Haaland. The Dutch, who face Japan, Tunisia and either Sweden or Poland in Group F at the finals in June and July, fell behind in Friday’s friendly in Amsterdam to a fine curling strike from 21-year-old Benfica attacker Andreas Schjelderup on 24 minutes. They responded with a header from Liverpool captain Virgil van Dijk 11 minutes later, then took the lead early in the second half when Manchester City midfielder Tijjani Reijnders finished off a fine, flowing team move. …”
“Italy can breathe again — for now, at least. A tension-racked evening in Bergamo saw Gennaro Gattuso’s side edge past Northern Ireland in their World Cup play-off semi-final. Second-half goals from Sandro Tonali and Moise Kean proved enough, and while Italy’s performance was far from perfect, it enabled them to take a big step towards this summer’s tournament in the U.S., Mexico and Canada. We analyse the major talking points. …”
“Welcome to the final mid-season international window of 2025-26, the last chance for managers to work with players before naming their World Cup squads. Over the next 10 days, we will find out the identity of the final six of the record 48 qualifiers, with 22 nations still in contention via two play-off routes, one in Europe and the other playing out a rest-of-the-world mini-tournament in Mexico. So there are plenty of key decisions to make, while lots of players need to make a good impression now or risk missing out on the tournament altogether. We asked 20 of our writers to answer the key questions that will be addressed this month. You can use the tabs to scroll to the areas that interest you the most: European play-offs, inter-confederation play-offs, players, around the world (featuring key issues facing assorted managers), USMNT, England, Canada and how ready the co-hosts are off the pitch. Let’s start with perhaps the biggest question of all. …”
“Arne Slot’s name was being bellowed inside Anfield 10 months ago as fans celebrated the 5-1 thrashing of Tottenham Hotspur that secured a 20th league title. The Dutchman was master of all he surveyed, hailed as a hero for delivering the Premier League in his first season in English football after accepting what seemed a treacherous job in succeeding Jurgen Klopp. Those days seem very distant now. …”
“THERE WAS a time when West Bromwich Albion were comfortably named among the top clubs in English football. They were, essentially, a ‘cup team’, a perfectly respectable label for any club in the days when the world didn’t revolve around the Premier League and nothing else. Albion were difficult opponents, especially on their own ground, the Hawthorns. The club also had some excellent players: Jeff Astle, Asa Hartford, Tony Brown, Cyril Regis, Laurie Cunningham, Bryan Robson and Derek Statham, to name but a few. When Albion won their last major trophy, the FA Cup in 1968, that brought their silverware haul to five FA Cups, one League Cup and one league title. The list has not been added to since Astle’s goal that beat Everton in 1968. Not only that, Albion have been in a slow decline in recent years and 2025-26 is their fifth consecutive Championship campaign and at the moment, they are hovering, precariously, above the relegation trapdoor. They recently won two games, ending a 13-game run without a victory. …”
Roberto Bettega
“Considering the attritional nature of Premier League football at the moment and the focus on dead-ball situations, you could be forgiven for looking at a 2-0 Manchester City win against Arsenal in the Carabao Cup final, with two headers from a defender, and concluding it was another contest about physicality and getting the ball into the mixer. But City’s victory at Wembley on Sunday owed to a clever tactical plan, rotations of positions down the flank, and well-worked goals. …”
“‘My players made the decision that they wanted to be around the ball, to respect the ball and show unity and leadership.’ Liam Rosenior’s explanation of the Chelsea huddle just before kick-off against Newcastle last weekend is destined to be one of the most memorable quotes of the season. Not only did referee Paul Tierney loom in the midst of the players’ centre-circle gathering like a sort of PGMOL meerkat, but their head coach also introduced the idea of reverence towards an important, but ultimately inanimate object: the PUMA Orbita Ultimate (Thrill Edition). …”
“On Tuesday, Senegal were stripped of their Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) title, two months after beating Morocco in the final. The Confederation of African Football (CAF) appeal board named Morocco as the new champions. This came after Senegal manager Pape Thiaw and his players walked off the pitch in protest at decisions made by referee Jean-Jacques Ndala during that final, leading to a 17-minute delay before they returned and eventually won the match 1-0 following extra time. However, CAF has awarded Morocco a 3-0 victory in a move that has stunned observers across Africa and the football world. William Troost-Ekong is a former Nigeria captain who won the Player of the Tournament at AFCON 2023 and featured at the 2018 World Cup. …”
“It has not been a great week for Premier League clubs in the Champions League. Just two of the six teams that made it into the last 16 are through to the quarter-finals, with the other four losing their ties by a combined score of 28-11 on aggregate. Newcastle United’s 8-3 loss to Barcelona and Chelsea’s 8-2 against Paris Saint-Germain will especially sting, given both Premier League sides matched their opponents for a sizeable part of the four games. …”
“We’re at the business end of the Champions League, with the eight quarter-finalists now decided. It’s a heavyweight line-up, with four of the competition’s five most successful clubs still in the tournament, plus last year’s winners Paris Saint-Germain and Premier League leaders Arsenal. Real Madrid (15), Liverpool (six), Bayern Munich (six) and Barcelona (five) have won 32 of the 70 European Cup/Champions League trophies between them since Madrid lifted the first trophy back in 1956, but who has their name on this year’s trophy? …”
“It was the only moment all night when a hush descended on Anfield. A fervent crowd had been braced for the net to bulge. Instead, there was a collective state of incredulity at the sight of Mohamed Salah failing to convert a penalty just before the break. The Egyptian attacker, who had scored 10 successive spot kicks for Liverpool since missing against Real Madrid in November 2024, was furious with himself. He had got it horribly wrong — clipping the ball so tamely down the middle that the Galatasaray goalkeeper, Ugurcan Cakir, who had dived to his left, was able to use his right boot to hook it away. …”
“Barcelona advanced to the Champions League quarter-finals with a 7-2 (8-3 aggregate) win over Newcastle United. Newcastle started the game well, but when the ball broke to Raphinha in the visiting team’s box in the sixth minute, the former Leeds United forward fired past Aaron Ramsdale to open the scoring. Although Newcastle levelled in the 15th minute, when Anthony Elanga latched onto a fine ball from the left before firing past Joan Garcia, Marc Bernal scored following a Raphinha free kick moments later, restoring Barca’s lead. Elanga equalised once again in the 28th minute, meeting a low cross at the back post to fire home, but the game swung in Barcelona’s favour again just before half-time. Kieran Trippier committed a foul on Raphinha in the box, with referee Francois Letexier awarding a penalty after consulting the pitchside monitor. …”
“As Real Madrid edged nearer and nearer to 
“The result of the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations final has been reversed, with hosts Morocco now standing as 3-0 winners after a stunning decision from the competition organisers. The Confederation of African Football released a statement on Tuesday evening, 57 days after the final, saying that its appeal board had declared that Senegal have now forfeited the game, which they had won 1-0 on January 18. CAF said the decision came after an appeal from the Royal Moroccan Football Federation (FRMF) following that match, which Senegal won in extra time 
“The contrast could hardly have been greater. On Tottenham Hotspur’s previous visit to Anfield 11 months earlier, Arne Slot’s name was chanted repeatedly by the Kop. An emphatic 5-1 victory ensured that the Dutchman became just the fifth manager in the Premier League era to win the title in his first season in English football. Having surpassed all expectations since the departure of the beloved Jurgen Klopp at the end of the 2023-24 campaign, the club’s first league triumph secured in front of their supporters for 35 years triggered scenes of unbridled joy. It felt like the start of a new golden era. …”
“Welcome to the latest edition of Inside Barcelona, our weekly series to follow throughout La Liga’s 2025-26 season. We will bring you key information and analysis on the biggest talking points in and around the Camp Nou, cutting through the noisy world of all things Barca with reporting you can trust. The information contained in this article reflects multiple conversations with various sources at the Spanish champions, all of whom wanted to speak anonymously to protect relationships. …”
Askou has kept faith with most of the backroom staff he inherited
Legia Warsaw fans show their support
Jagiellonia Bialystok’s players celebrate a goal against Strasbourg in the UEFA Conference League
“Liverpool’s return to the summit of the Premier League last season dovetailed with a return to profitability, and the club’s 2024-25 financials, publicly released last Thursday, unveiled the platform from which they launched last summer’s £400million transfer splurge. The champions booked a £15.2million profit, their best financial result since the 2018-19 season and a first profitable year in three. Revenue shot up £89m and 15 per cent to £702.7m, easily a club record, making Liverpool only the second English side, after Manchester City, to top £700m in annual turnover. …”
“The received wisdom was that the Premier League would have three, possibly four, of its six representatives in the quarter-finals of the Champions League. It might now be lucky to have one. Expectations have flipped in 48 hours. It is one of the reasons we love this sport and, in particular, this competition. Fatigue has been the lens through which people have viewed the shortcomings of the Premier League teams halfway through the round of 16. …”
“Welcome to the latest edition of The Alternative Premier League Table, where each week, The Athletic analyses the entire division through a specific lens. And with over 75 per cent of the Premier League campaign in the books, now feels like a good moment to assess fan sentiment about their team’s season. To that end, we’ve taken the team ratings data from Fanalysis, an app where fans can rate their team’s performances, including those of the players, manager and even referees, after every match. 
“… The FA Cup needed a result like Port Vale 1 Sunderland 0 and a hero in the form of Kiwi international Benjamin Waine, who scored the winning goal on an emotional afternoon. It wasn’t the only shock of the round, either, as Southampton won at Fulham. At one stage, it looked like Wrexham might spring a surprise against Chelsea, who came from behind twice and were assisted by VAR to take the game into extra time. They then scored twice in the extra half hour, the goals coming from constantly-jeered Garnacho and in-form João Pedro. The other games all followed the script – Arsenal winning at Mansfield, Manchester City beating Newcastle United, Liverpool disposing of Wolves and Leeds United beating Norwich City. West Ham United and Brighton drew 2-2 with the Hammers winning the penalty shoot-out. …”
“It was in the sixth minute of Tottenham’s Champions League last-16 tie against Atletico Madrid that Antonin Kinsky’s night began to unravel. A routine phase of build-up had worked its way back toward the Spurs goalkeeper, which should have set up a relatively straightforward action, but just as he attempted to play out from the back, his footing suddenly gave way on the slippery surface and he landed on his backside. As the ball squirted loose, panic set in for the young goalkeeper, who was making his Champions League debut, and after a squirmish in the box, Marcos Llorente slotted home to give Atletico an early lead. …”
“There are many things this match will be remembered for. The goals, the errors, the disbelief that Tottenham Hotspur could be 4-0 down within 22 minutes. But, mainly, it will be for the sight of goalkeeper Antonin Kinsky walking down the tunnel, a comforting hand over his shoulder, after the goalkeeper was brutally substituted in the 16th minute after two calamitous slips in an opening 45 minutes like no other. The Czech’s Champions League debut went horribly wrong and now Tottenham not only face having to play a second-leg tie against Atletico Madrid when already 5-2 down but also likely face an inquisition over head coach Igor Tudor’s call to haul off his 22-year-old goalkeeper with the game in its infancy. …”
“On a dramatic night at St James’ Park, Newcastle United looked like they had secured a famous victory over Barcelona only to be denied by a penalty deep into stoppage time. With the last kick of the game, Lamine Yamal converted a spot kick after Malick Thiaw tripped Dani Olmo inside the box. It meant honours were even in a thrilling first leg of this last-16 Champions League tie. Newcastle looked to have won it when Harvey Barnes scored from close range from Jacob Murphy’s cross. By the time the hosts finally scored, they had missed a host of chances as they repeatedly used their pace to get in behind the high line of Barcelona’s defence. …”
Virgil van Dijk and Galatasaray’s match winner, Mario Lemina
“Goals from corners have been arriving at an unprecedented rate in the Premier League this season. 
“‘Anti-football’, also known colloquially as 
“… Italy’s fourth World Cup was won in typical Italian fashion — they rarely win international trophies in great style, but there’s always great drama involved. This success played out with Serie A, their domestic top flight, in a crisis. The Calciopoli scandal revealed that various club executives had been effectively choosing favourable referees for their teams’ matches. A complex storyline that was unfolding throughout the tournament, the main sporting consequence was that Juventus were stripped of the previous two years’ Serie A titles and relegated to the second division. …”
“There was quite a crowd building outside the Wrexham Lager Stand on Saturday afternoon: children, parents, grandparents, all waiting for a glimpse of their heroes and perhaps, if they were lucky, an autograph or a selfie. Wrexham’s players were happy to oblige. Kick-off was barely an hour away, an FA Cup fifth-round glamour tie against Chelsea that would leave a huge global TV audience enthralled, but one player after another did the rounds, signing every shirt, match programme, ball or scrap of paper that was eagerly thrust in front of them. …”
Iran’s players celebrate after qualifying for the World Cup but there are doubts as to whether they will participate in the tournament
Italy’s players perform the fascist salute before the start of the 1938 World Cup final against Hungary in Paris
“Following Liverpool’s late defeat by Wolves at Molineux earlier this week, head coach Arne Slot lamented that it was the ‘same old story and sums up our season’. And it does. Liverpool have now lost five times to 90th-minute-plus goals this season, the most ever by a team in a single Premier League campaign. What should be a rare event has become worryingly commonplace for the reigning champions. 
“Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall was speaking to the media after Everton’s 2-0 win against Burnley on Tuesday when Rodrigo Gomes scored for Wolverhampton Wanderers against the home side’s Merseyside rivals Liverpool. The loud cheers from fans in the concourses and corporate lounges at Hill Dickinson Stadium in response to that goal temporarily shifted attention away from the post-game debrief with broadcaster TNT Sports. …”
“Liverpool beat Wolverhampton Wanderers 3-1 to advance to the sixth round of the FA Cup on Friday night. Cody Gakpo hit the Wolves upright in the opening exchanges, but he was ruled offside. Neither side broke the deadlock in the first-half, even though Liverpool did have six shots at the Wolves goal. Wolves had none — the same as on Tuesday night. Just five minutes after the break, though, Gakpo broke before playing in Mohamed Salah. Salah worked the ball well to Curtis Jones, who then played in Andy Robertson to strike from distance. …”
“The 
“In the coming days and weeks, as they try to avoid being swallowed up by the relegation quicksands, maybe the relevant people can get round to answering an intriguing question. It is the one that is surely being asked already in the boardrooms of Tottenham Hotspur, Nottingham Forest and West Ham United, given the jarring reality that one of those three clubs is likely to drop out of the Premier League and be playing in the Championship next season. Where did it go wrong? …”
“The cold, hard statistics make for uncomfortable reading. Liverpool have lost five Premier League games after conceding in the 90th minute or later this season, 
“After years of planning, the World Cup is now just 100 days away. This summer’s tournament in North America will almost certainly be the most-viewed sports event ever, watched by millions (or more likely billions) of fans across the world. But it also offers a huge opportunity to attract a whole new audience, particularly across the United States, where soccer has long been on the rise but still does not dominate the sporting landscape as it does in so many other countries. This will be a World Cup watched by diehards and those who have never engaged with the sport before. With that in mind, we have compiled this article as a guide to everything you could possibly want to know about the tournament, from the most basic questions for those who have never watched the sport to far more intricate details about how teams play, the politics of this tournament, the ticketing situation and much more. With 100 days until the tournament, our reporters have answered 100 questions. …”
“When Brentford manager Keith Andrews said before his side’s 1-1 draw with Arsenal this month that he ‘likes creating chaos’, he certainly would not have meant this. A visit to Burnley, languishing in 19th, turned into one of the matches of the Premier League season. Brentford had it… before they didn’t. Burnley thought they had it… but Brentford hit back. And there was still time for more. Breathless as it sounds, that does not do justice to the chaos of Burnley 3-4 Brentford — nothing might unless you were among those at Turf Moor to witness it first-hand. …”
“Another weekend, another London derby defeat for Tottenham Hotspur. And though this was not against arch-rivals Arsenal, failing at Fulham is just as damaging. After last week’s 4-1 loss, fans will have wanted to see a reaction, and there were first-half protests and chants against the board. There will have been anger, too, that Harry Wilson’s early opener was allowed to stand after a similar incident in the north London derby last Sunday. There could be no complaints over the second Fulham goal, though, as Alex Iwobi fired home with brilliant technique from outside the area. …”
“If somebody had told you that, this season, a team would break a Premier League record by scoring seven successive non-penalty set-piece goals, who would you guess? Mikel Arteta’s set-piece machine at Arsenal? Brentford, who appointed a set-piece coach as their manager? Either way, Liverpool would probably not have been towards the top of your list. …”
“Arsenal have cleared another major hurdle in their bid for the Premier League title. Mikel Arteta’s side restored their five-point advantage at the top of the table with a hard-fought 2-1 win over Chelsea, which once again relied on their prowess at dead balls, with both of their goals coming from corners. Chelsea looked impressive for long spells and had a goal disallowed for offside in stoppage time, but were ultimately undone by Pedro Neto’s second-half red card — yet another moment of indiscipline that has cost them dearly this term as they pursue Champions League qualification. We analyse the main talking points. …”
Benjamin Sesko makes it 1-1 deep in stoppage time at West Ham.
“Football’s lawmakers attempts to combat timewasting will subject substitutions, throw-ins and goal-kicks to time limits from this summer. There are also changes to expand the scope of the sport’s video assistant referee (VAR) system, which will now be permitted to check and review red cards ‘arising from a clearly incorrect second yellow card’, cases of ‘mistaken identity’ when a yellow or red card are shown, and cases of a ‘clearly incorrectly awarded corner kick’. The International Football Association Board (IFAB) met for their annual general meeting near Cardiff on Saturday and ratified changes to the laws ahead of the World Cup beginning in June. …”
“The first half of Everton versus Manchester United was a low-on-entertainment slogfest. The Monday night kick-off was in keeping with many Premier League games this season, with teams finding it harder to create goalscoring chances in open play and focusing more on set-piece opportunities. Football can often be described as “a game of mistakes”, and this season has seen an increase in games where teams are so focused on avoiding them that they lose sight of how to proactively force one from the opposition. Thankfully, the second half brought something more entertaining. …”
Scissors Kick 