Tag Archives: Chelsea

Chelsea were mesmerised by Flamengo’s wide combinations. This is how Filipe Luis’ side do it

“After beating Esperance de Tunis with two goals that perfectly encapsulated their offensive style, Flamengo’s wide combinations proved effective in their 3-1 victory against Chelsea on Friday. Luis continued with the regular Flamengo setup, with Jorginho partnering Erick Pulgar in midfield and Luiz Araujo, Giorgian de Arrascaeta and Gerson behind the striker. However, the deviation came up front, where Gonzalo Plata, who is more of a winger than a centre-forward, started in place of Pedro. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

Does football have a doping problem?

“Arsene Wenger had a lot to get off his chest in the autumn of 2015. His Arsenal side were in danger of exiting the Champions League at the group stages and their 2-1 loss away to Dinamo Zagreb had become an acute source of irritation. Not because Arsenal had stumbled against their weakest opponents, but because the Croatian side had triumphed with a player — Arijan Ademi — who had returned a positive drugs test after playing the full 90 minutes. Ademi would eventually be given a four-year suspension (later reduced to two on appeal) after traces of the banned steroid stanozolol were found in a routine urine sample, but Wenger bristled at Zagreb facing no disciplinary sanctions from UEFA, European football’s governing body. ‘That means you basically accept doping,’ he said. …”
NY Times/The Athletic
NY Times/The Athletic – Mykhailo Mudryk’s doping charge explained: Can Chelsea sack him if found guilty and could he appeal?

Which Premier League team has the toughest start to the 2025-26 season?

“There may be two months to go until the 2025-26 Premier League season gets underway, but the release of the fixture list has whetted the appetite of fans across the division. Consisting of 38 rounds of matches over nine months, with each team playing their 19 rivals once at home and once away, the opening few games are often decisive in building momentum to set the tone for the campaign, or derailing it through diminishing confidence. These early matches alone will not define a season but they play a significant role in shaping its course, and naturally attract the attention on fixture-release day. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

Ranking the best and worst Club World Cup home kits: Divorcee vibes, pixel madness and flawless Tunisian flair


“The revamped Club World Cup is effectively a brand new tournament and with a fresh competition comes a selection of mostly new kits. For this summer’s 32-team extravaganza in the United States, teams are allowed to play in new looks, whether that be special-edition tournament-only strips or what they’ll be strutting their stuff in for the entirety of the 2025-26 season. Or, should they wish, they can carry on wearing the same shirts as they have done already this year. Whatever the approach of each of these Club World Cup competitors, nothing can spare them from the critical eye of The Athletic’s Nick Miller, who has ranked all 32 home strips from worst to best. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

WorldCup2026, one year to go: What still needs to be sorted?


“The men’s World Cup is one year away and 13 nations — including its host countries the United States, Canada and Mexico — have secured their places in the expanded 48-team competition. Some 75 per cent of the matches will be played in the U.S., across 11 cities. Mexico will host the opening matchday in Mexico City and Guadalajara, but the involvement of Canada and Mexico will cease after the round of 16, with all games from the quarter-finals onwards to be played in the States, including the final at MetLife Stadium, in New Jersey, a short distance from New York City. … As the clock ticks down, The Athletic details just some of the most pressing challenges, reputational risks and supporter concerns about the United States’ portion of the competition, which will encompass 78 of the 104 games that will be played between June 11 and July 19 next year. …”
NY Times/The Athletic
NY Times/The Athletic – World Cup 2026: Who’s qualified, who’s struggling and which underdogs have a shot at glory?

The National Guard was brought in after protests in Los Angeles

Your complete guide to the 2025 Club World Cup – the groups, the teams and the storylines to watch

“The Club World Cup begins on Saturday, June 14, when Inter Miami take on Al Ahly at Hard Rock Stadium in Miami. How will Lionel Messi and friends get on? Are they likely to get out of Group A? And what about Real Madrid? The world’s biggest club have replaced Carlo Ancelotti with Xabi Alonso, their former midfielder, and signed Trent Alexander-Arnold and Dean Huijsen in the mini transfer window before the tournament. They’re also after Alvaro Carreras from Benfica and one of the hottest prospects in world football, River Plate’s 17-year-old forward Franco Mastantuono. Benfica and River are part of the fun in the United States, too. …”
NY Times/The Athletic
NY Times/The Athletic: One year from a home World Cup, USMNT with fanfare has fear of being a flop
W – 2025 FIFA Club World Cup

Premier League tactical trends 2024-25: Goalkeeper long passes, inswinging corners and fast breaks


“It feels a lifetime ago that Arne Slot spoke about the importance of winning duels after Liverpool won away 2-0 to Ipswich Town on the opening day of the season. Nine months, 379 matches and 1,113 goals later — the second-most in a Premier League season behind 2023-24 — Slot’s Liverpool have waltzed to the title, the promoted trio are relegated for the second consecutive season, and Nottingham Forest are the first team to double their points tally from one Premier League campaign to another. It was also a season packed with tactical intrigue. Let’s dive into the trends from 2024-25. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

The Athletic’s 2024-25 Alternative Premier League Awards

“It’s that time of year again. Liverpool have finally lifted the Premier League trophy after securing the title last month, but the main prize is not the only thing being handed out. Mohamed Salah hoovered up the individual awards, with 29 goals securing the Golden Boot and 18 assists grabbing the Playmaker award for the second time in a Liverpool shirt. Golden glove? That goalkeeping accolade was shared between Nottingham Forest’s Matz Sels and David Raya of Arsenal, with 13 clean sheets apiece. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

Premier League roundtable: The best and worst of 2024-25

“Manchester City’s dominance finally came to an end, Liverpool were able to celebrate the title in front of their fans for the first time in 35 years, two of the ‘Big Six’ finished in the bottom six and the promoted clubs all went straight back down.Those might be the raw headlines from 2024-25 but this Premier League season offered so much more — this was the campaign, don’t forget, when a player got booked for imitating a seagull. Seb Stafford-Bloor, Tim Spiers, Nick Miller, Oliver Kay and Stuart James reflect on the highs and the lows as another year of English top-flight football reaches its conclusion. …”
NY Times/The Athletic (Video)

Just how entertaining is the Premier League in 2025?


“It’s fair to say that this season’s Premier League campaign has lacked the dramatic final flourish many were hoping for. Liverpool were crowned runaway champions when they had four games left to play, while the relegation battle fizzled out as promoted trio Leicester City, Ipswich Town and Southampton swiftly returned to the Championship with little resistance. This has fed into a wider conversation — often debated furiously online — about whether English top-flight football has become dull. This came to a head after a drab, goalless Manchester derby in April characterised by sterile, risk-averse possession, with both United and City generating chances deemed to be worth less than one expected goal. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

Postecoglou to Wrexham, Guardiola to Saudi and Frank upstairs? Predicting each Premier League manager’s next job

“In football, we obsess over which team is going to win every competition, where every side will finish in the league and the future transfer destinations of top players. What we talk about far less is where managers will end up, other than in the unemployment queue — which, obviously, is only a metaphorical image because in reality they’re all multi-millionaires and set for life financially. Which club will Marco Silva call home after he leaves Fulham? Ever wondered where Crystal Palace’s Oliver Glasner will work next? Nope, us neither. But maybe it’s time we started. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

Chelsea await the bad boys of Europe: Why Legia Warsaw have become a headache for UEFA

“Tonight’s trip to Chelsea, in all probability, will be the 16th and final European game of Legia Warsaw’s season. A 3-0 first-leg deficit in the Conference League quarter-finals has left a mountain to climb, and the adventures of Poland’s biggest club will likely end at Stamford Bridge. UEFA is too diplomatic to publicly celebrate any club’s exit, but parting with the perennial bad boys at least rids their disciplinary department of a long, nagging headache. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

Reader poll results – Discussing Kevin De Bruyne and the most influential midfielders of the Premier League era


Steven Gerrard – Liverpool 1998-2015
“… Pep Guardiola of Kevin De Bruyne’s impending exit from Manchester City. De Bruyne’s impact at City since joining from Wolfsburg in 2015 has been huge, with the Belgian scoring 106 goals in 413 appearances, contributing to 187 Premier League goals (scoring or assisting), equalling the assist record for a single season and winning 19 trophies. While Guardiola was careful about discussing where he stands in the greatest player debate, the City coach praised his ‘influence in our success in the last decade’. Which had us asking, who are the most influential midfielders of the Premier League era? …”
NY Times/The Athletic

What is a ‘smash and grab’ win in soccer – and which ones did our writers most enjoy?


“The ‘smash and grab’ win. It is one of soccer’s most exhilarating — and agonising — results, a point underlined by Liverpool’s improbable 1-0 win over Paris Saint-Germain in the Champions League last night. But what precisely is a ‘smash and grab’ and which ones rank as their most memorable? Here, The AthleticAdam Hurrey offers his definition, and our writers choose their favourites — please add your own in the comments below. …”
NY Times/The Athletic (Video)

Time is ticking: The Premier League player contracts to watch out for at each club

“Premier League clubs will already be planning who they want to bring in this summer when the transfer market reopens, but making sure they hold on to key players is also a major part of successful squad building. As Liverpool have found out with Trent Alexander-Arnold, Mohamed Salah and Virgil van Dijk, it can be challenging for clubs if contracts drift into the final year, or even the final two years. Here, we look at which Premier League players are entering a crucial period in their deals. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

Why 12 Premier League teams are fighting for a place in next season’s Champions League

“Last season, the Premier League failed in its efforts to grab an additional qualifying place for the Champions League, but 12 months on the situation is looking much more promising. As in 2023-24, two of UEFA’s domestic leagues will be rewarded with an extra slot. Last season Germany’s Bundesliga and Italy’s Serie A came top of the seasonal coefficient rankings, allowing Borussia Dortmund and Bologna access to the continent’s most prestigious competition in 2024-25. This season, it seems almost certain that the Premier League will grab one of those spots, meaning the division’s top five teams will all qualify for next season’s edition. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

Crossing is back on the menu in the Premier League

“You could argue that Emile Smith Rowe’s goal did not stand out in last weekend’s wider collection of finishes. Fulham ran out 2-1 winners against Nottingham Forest, with their opener coming from a well-worked sequence that saw Adama Traore cut inside onto his left foot before delivering a delightful ball for the onrushing Smith Rowe to head home. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

How Marco Asensio’s movement and positioning led to Aston Villa’s victory against Chelsea

“Being in the right place at the right time is a priceless skill. It is often the result of understanding space and knowing when to time your off-ball movement. In Aston Villa’s 2-1 victory against Chelsea on Saturday, Marco Asensio was twice in the right place at the right time and his goals earned Unai Emery’s side three valuable points. First, on the second phase of a set piece, Asensio was positioned towards the near post when Matty Cash tried to find Marcus Rashford towards the far one. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

The impact of being only player from your country to play in the Premier League

“Gunnar Nielsen’s Premier League career was brief. Extremely brief, in fact: it lasted 17 minutes. The goalkeeper was introduced as a late substitute for Manchester City against Arsenal in 2010 after Shay Given had aggravated a shoulder injury he picked up a week earlier when diving in vain for Paul Scholes’s late winner in the Manchester derby. But it was a big deal back home. Those 17 minutes represented the first — and only — time a player from the Faroe Islands had played in the Premier League. It was such a big deal that a local radio station couldn’t even wait until the game had finished to call his brother for some reaction. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

Josko Gvardiol has become one of Manchester City’s most consistent attacking outlets

“Realistically, Manchester City shouldn’t have found a way back into their game against Chelsea on Saturday evening. With Chelsea ahead after three minutes and new signing Abdukodir Khusanov struggling at centre-back, Enzo Maresca’s side should have piled on the pressure and extended their lead. Instead, they stood off, allowed City to work their way into the game, and the home side comfortably won 3-1. City’s main route of attack was, intriguingly, linked to Khusanov’s struggles. In a way, it seemed strange that Pep Guardiola threw him straight into the starting XI, even if John Stones wasn’t fit to start, because there was the option of using Josko Gvardiol there. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

Does the Premier League’s ‘Big Six’ still exist (on and off the pitch)?

“.Over halfway through the 2024-25 season, for fans of certain teams outside the traditional ‘Big Six’, the first item is all they need. Specifically, that is, a table of the current Premier League standings..Nottingham Forest are in third. Newcastle United and Bournemouth are within a point of Manchester City — who, until this weekend, were outside the top four in January for the first time in 15 years. Sixth-placed Chelseaalso look likely to be in the Champions League qualification battle. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

The stark reality of watching a Pep Guardiola midfield in 2025


“There was a time when Pep Guardiola used to fantasise about fielding a team made entirely of midfielders. … He pushed boundaries — or rather he turned the entire pitch into one vast midfield. His central defenders and even his goalkeepers (Victor Valdes at Barcelona, Manuel Neuer at Bayern Munich, Ederson at Manchester City) would pass the ball as precisely as other teams’ playmakers. Full-backs or central defenders would instinctively and seamlessly push up into midfield. Often he would go without a conventional centre-forward, preferring a ‘false nine’ who could drop back into midfield, flooding the middle of the pitch with nimble, intelligent technical players who enabled his team to dominate almost every game they played. …”
NY Times/The Athletic
NY Times/The Athletic – Manchester City 3 Chelsea 1: Is Sanchez’s position becoming untenable? How did Guardiola unpick Maresca’s plan?

Will Liverpool win this Premier League title – and, if so, when? Our experts’ views

“It is 76 days since Liverpool moved back to the top of the 2024-25 Premier League table with a 2-1 home win against Brighton & Hove Albion — a position they haven’t relinquished since. Arne Slot’s side are not always showing imperious form but have still only been beaten once in their 20 league matches so far and have a four-point advantage over second-placed Arsenal, with a game in hand, going into the weekend’s fixtures. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

How does this end? Amorim’s best Man Utd XI? Is 1-0 to the Arsenal a problem? – The Briefing

“Welcome to The Briefing, where every Monday during this season The Athletic will discuss three of the biggest questions to arise from the weekend’s Premier League football. This was the weekend when Manchester City recorded a convincing scoreline (if not performance) against West Ham, Chelsea dropped more points, Newcastle’s fine form continued and Southampton arguably reached a new low with their 5-0 home defeat to Brentford. Here we will ask if the remainder of the Premier League campaign is a confusing mess, whether Ruben Amorim has found his best team and whether Arsenal have a 1-0 problem. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

Ranking every team in England’s top four divisions based on their performance in 2024

“English football in 2024 served up a bit of everything: stunning strikes, comical own goals, baffling errors, refereeing controversies, promotions, relegations, trophies lifted, CVs sifted and much more besides. So as 2024 draws to a close, we have decided ignore those opposed to calendar-year stats and unify all 94 teams (yes, Sutton United and Forest Green Rovers, you may no longer be in the EFL but we haven’t forgotten your efforts between January and May), even if it is only for a few hours before yet more football gets under way on New Year’s Day. You can sort the main table by games played (which includes play-off games), wins, defeats, win percentage and points per game (the latter excludes play-off games, for obvious reasons). Click on a column header to sort by that category. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

Premier League half-season review: Tactics and trends that have shaped 2024-25 so far

“This week brings up the midway point of the 2024-25 Premier Leagueseason. It’s already been a memorable campaign, with Liverpool clear at the top, the two Manchester clubs in turmoil and the increasingly-familiar sight of the three promoted teams in the bottom three. But what have been the tactical and numerical trends that have captured our experts’ attention, and how do they see the second half of the campaign playing out? Ahmed Walid, Thom Harris and Anantaajith Raghuraman discuss their key takeaways. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

The four ‘seasons’ of the 2024-25 Premier League campaign so far


“As we ease into the dreamy relentlessness of football’s festive period, it’s easy to forget the staccato nature of the opening months of the season, short sprints of fixtures punctuated by the four words most Premier League fans hate hearing: ‘It’s another international break.’ Supporters may despair as their favourite players disappear around the world three times in three months but these mandated interruptions do allow the season to be divided into four neat sections, something many managers exploit by targeting a block of games almost as a hyper-focused mini-season. For those of us on the outside, splitting the campaign into smaller chunks can offer us a bit more insight than simply looking at the league table, especially as the campaign progresses. Welcome, then, to The Four Seasons of the Premier League So Far. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

The Transfer Radar 2025: The Athletic’s ultimate guide to players who could be on the move

“Welcome to The Transfer Radar. Each major tournament, The Athletic has built a scouting guide highlighting the players to watch. This winter, we are launching a new version of The Radar — one focused on transfers across 2025. We began with 25 players we expect to be of transfer interest to major clubs across Europe over the January and summer windows in 2025. As of December 19, we have added three more players we expect to be of interest. This is not to say that they will move, but based on the conversations our reporters have been having, they are players that are being talked about among recruitment departments. While most fans are focusing on the January window, clubs are already having conversations about next summer. …”
NY Times/The Athletic (Video)

Introducing the most dangerous pass in football

“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’. It’s the short, vertical ball from the goalkeeper to — typically, but not always — the midfield pivot, who is receiving under pressure, back to goal and close to their own penalty area. …”
NY Times/The Athletic (Video)

Champions League projections 2024-25: Each team’s probability of qualifying for knockouts

“The Champions League has a new format for 2024-25. Forget group tables, we now have a 36-team league stage before we get to the knockout stages in February. But who has the best chance of qualifying for the knockout stages, either directly or via the playoff round? Throughout the season, we will publish projections — powered by Opta data — to show how teams are expected to perform. These will update after each gameweek. When the league stage is over, there will be probabilities for reaching the quarter-finals, semi-finals and final. The competition’s expanded format might take a little time to get used to, but these projections can show you how it might all unfold. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

Champions League projections: All the talking points after matchday five

“Five games into the new-look Champions League and the 36-team table is finally starting to take shape. Sort of. Strong favourites to progress have emerged, with Arne Slot’s Liverpool sat top of the pile after an impressive 2-0 victory over Real Madrid made it five wins from five. Inter are yet to concede a goal, while Barcelona and Arsenal— with convincing results this week — have increased their chances of qualifying for the knockout stages, via the play-offs or otherwise, to at least 90 per cent. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

Man City loss feels seismic, Salah’s contract claim, is Mascherano right coach for Messi?

“… Hello! Manchester City have won fewer games than San Marino in the past month and Mohamed Salah could leave Liverpool. It’s all happening. City show weakness again. Another friend to coach Messi?. Galaxy shining bright. ’Keeper howler of the season? Every once in a while, the Premier League throws up a genuinely seismic result that feels like it symbolises the end of an era. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

The Premier League Owners: Who has invested the most?

“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 Premier League teams have spent millions to secure a seat at the top table but no two stories are the same. Some are in for billions, gambling on long-term prosperity. Others have already assured themselves of vast returns. To begin a series on the Premier League’s owners running across this week, The Athletic has calculated the total investments of those at the top of all 20 clubs. And, yes, we’ve even put them in descending order for you to argue over. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

Fear and loathing in Premier League academy football: Scouts in a pen, no team sheets and denying access

“At a Manchester City Under-16s game last month, 21 academy scouts were corralled into a tight square next to one of the corner flags, far from the rest of the spectators. They had not congregated together out of choice. This was the designated area, outlined by bright cones, other clubs’ talent spotters were frogmarched to before kick-off. A few years ago, it would have been a peculiar sight. Today, it is a scene recreated every weekend across most of the Premier League academy landscape. The motive? To keep rival scouts isolated from parents, so they cannot lure away your top players. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

Is Premier League title race already down to two teams?

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 Sunday’s 1-1 draw between Arsenal and Chelsea. They now lead City by five points – and the rest of the pack by nine points or more. Opta’s ‘supercomputer’ gives Mikel Arteta’s Arsenal just a 3.5% chance of the title, with Chelsea down on 0.2% and anybody else on 0%. …”
BBC

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

“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)

Why the Premier League table after 10 games is a reliable guide to how the season will end

“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. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

Liverpool’s patience out of possession under Slot is working – but Chelsea showed the approach isn’t flawless

“For long periods of their 2-1 victory over Chelsea on Sunday afternoon, Liverpool didn’t feel quite like Liverpool. It’s been two months since Arne Slot’s first competitive game in charge, but this was something new: his first Premier League match at Anfield against genuinely strong opposition. Previous home games were against Brentford, Nottingham Forest and Bournemouth — sides you expect Liverpool to dominate. There was no guarantee of that against Chelsea, who wanted to play out from the back and enjoy long spells of possession. Liverpool, for most of the last decade, would try to deny opponents that luxury. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

Premier League: 10 talking points from the weekend’s action

Wolves 1-2 Manchester City
“… 2 – Tight margins go against O’Neil again: The obvious topic of debate at Molineux centred on whether Bernardo Silva impeded José Sá’s ability to save John Stones’s 95th-minute header. The officials concluded Silva had no impact on the goal and, while hugely disappointed, the first thing Gary O’Neil did when he got into his manager’s office was to study how Stones was able to register an effort on goal. O’Neil acknowledged the minutiae make the difference in tight games, leading him to bemoan having to substitute the 6ft 4in Wolves goalscorer Jørgen Strand Larsen, owing to fatigue. …”
Guardian

How the best Premier League managers stay one step ahead: New ideas, adaptation, evolution

“In the future, looking back on current tactical innovations and unique styles of play will not provide a dopamine hit. By then, they will be normalised. What seemed novel 20 years ago is the minimum requirement to excel in football nowadays — just ask Jose Mourinho and Rafa Benitez. Their meticulous planning before Chelsea and Liverpool faced opponents was on another level by Premier League standards and helped them create defensive structures that opposition players hated. Mourinho also worked on attacking and defensive transitions in his first period at Chelsea — when he won the Premier League in 2005 and 2006 — which was not conventional at the time. ‘Mourinho placed more emphasis upon the transition than any previous Premier League coach,’ writes The Athletic’s Michael Cox in his book, The Mixer: The Story of Premier League Tactics. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

The Biggest Question Facing Every Premier League Team

“The most popular soccer league in the world returns on Friday at the Theatre of Dreams as Fulham visits Manchester United. If it feels like the soccer season is never-ending after the European Championships, Copa América, and Olympicinternational tournaments all summer, you’re correct. Just 89 days after Manchester City won a fourth straight Premier League title, the English top flight is back for the first of 38 matchweeks. While many in England remain on summer holiday, the clubs have been busy with preseason tours and final preparations for the grueling marathon season that will go into late May 2025. To preview the 2024-25 Premier League season, I ranked all 20 teams by posing the biggest question facing each club. …”
The Ringer
BBC: Who will finish in the Premier League’s top four?

2024-25 Premier League – Location-map, with 3 charts

“The map is a basic location-map, with an inset map of Greater London. Also shown are small labels which point out both the three promoted clubs (Leicester City, Ipswich Town, Southampton), and the three relegated clubs (Luton Town, Burnley, Sheffield United). And there are three charts… The Attendance chart, at top-centre of the map page, shows 4 things for each of the 20 current Premier League clubs…A) 2023-24 finish (with promotions noted). B) 2023-24 average attendance [from home league matches]. C) Stadium capacity [2023-24]. D) Percent-capacity [2023-24]. At the right-hand side of the map page are two more charts. The chart at the top-right shows Seasons-in-1st-Division for the 20 current Premier League clubs. …”
billsportsmaps
W – 2024–25 Premier League

The Transfer DealSheet: Latest on Man Utd, Arsenal, Liverpool, Real Madrid, Barcelona and more

“Welcome to the latest edition of the Transfer DealSheet, your weekly guide to what is happening in the summer window. Our team of dedicated writers, including Adam Leventhal and David Ornstein, will take you inside the market to explain the deals being worked on, the players who could arrive and the ones who are on their way out across the Premier League and beyond. In last week’s edition, we looked at Liverpool’s pursuit of a No 6 and the situation with Chelsea’s Englandmidfielder Conor Gallagher. The information found within this article has been gathered according to The Athletic’s sourcing guidelines. Unless stated, our reporters have spoken to more than one person briefed on each deal before offering the clubs involved the opportunity to comment. Those responses, where they were given, have been included in the Transfer DealSheet. …”
NY Times/The Athletic

2023–24 Premier League

“The 2023–24 Premier League was the 32nd season of the Premier League and the 125th season of top-flight English football overall. The season began on 11 August 2023, and concluded on 19 May 2024. Manchester City, the defending champions, won their fourth consecutive title, the first men’s team to do so. … All three of the newly promoted teams were relegated (Luton Town, Burnley, and Sheffield United), the first time this happened since the 1997–98 season; those three teams had a combined total of 66 points. Nottingham Forestavoided relegation with 32 points (including a 4 point deduction), a record low for a team to do so. …The new stoppage time rule was used in the league for the first time this season. In an effort to improve clamping down on time-wasting and to improve the accuracy of time added on, stoppage times were longer across matches. The new rule accounted for stoppages due to injuries, goal celebrations, yellow and red cards, and VAR reviews. …”
W – 2023–24 Premier League
Watch: How 2023/24’s FINAL DAY unfolded (Video)

How to win a Premier League penalty: A deep dive into the best masters of the dark arts


Arsenal are still level with Bournemouth after 41 minutes and are getting frustrated. They need a win to keep the pressure on Manchester City, who play Wolverhampton Wanderers later that day, in the battle for the Premier League title. Kai Havertz has made a career of finding pockets of space and does so again, gliding into the penalty area to meet Martin Odegaard’s through ball. He uses the outside of his left boot to flick the ball away from onrushing goalkeeper Mark Travers — before keeping that foot down on the turf, elongating it towards the floor like a ballerina performing an axel turn. Travers cannot avoid it and makes contact. …”
The Athletic (Video)

Echoes of errors: why has VAR sparked so much fury this season?


“Seven months ago Englandthe country came the closest yet to entering thermonuclear war over a refereeing decision. When the referee Simon Hooper mistakenly ruled out a Luis Díaz goal at Tottenham for offside and the video assistant referee Darren England failed to correct him, the initial response was heated and only bubbled up from there. … The next morning, Liverpool released a statement arguing ‘sporting integrity had been undermined’ the supporters’ group Spirit of Shankly said that ‘VAR and PGMOL are not fit for purpose’ and the club’s former striker John Aldridge alleged corruption. …”
Guardian

How long do you give a ‘project manager’?


“When asked at which point a club gives up on a ‘project’, a mixture of current and former directors at Premier League clubs tend to arrive at the same answer. ‘When the fans say so,’ says one of them, who would like to remain nameless because he does not really want to admit publicly that, in the past, he has helped pull the trigger because of the pressure he and his colleagues were under. …”
The Athletic

Martin Odegaard and Kai Havertz as a duo of No 10s is different… and devastating


“In modern football, you don’t really get classic strike partnerships any more. Few teams at the highest level play 4-4-2, or any other formation that features two out-and-out strikers. Today, attacking is about pushing multiple players into attack, surprising the opposition with a variety of threats. Arsenal are the best example of that. Eight sides in the Premier League this season have a single player on 15 or more goals. Arsenal are not among them, but Mikel Arteta’s team have still scored more goals than any other side. …”
The Athletic – Michael Cox

Football’s elite are tightening up – and Arsenal lead the pack


“Tho said football was supposed to be fun? Sunday’s meeting between Manchester City and Arsenal was billed as an epic showdown between sorcerer and apprentice that might decide the league title. It produced a total of three shots on target – which is to say as many as Brentford had against Manchester United between the 53rd and 55th minutes. Admire the tactical machinations if you like, the levels of concentration and the planning that went into it, the obviously refined level of the lack of action, but this was shit on a stick for the TikTok generation. ….”
Guardian – Jonathan Wilson

Manchester City 0 Arsenal 0: Defences on top as title rivals cancel each other out – The Briefing


Manchester City versus Arsenal was one of the most anticipated games of the Premier League season but its sheer importance in the title race — and how equally matched the two sides are — resulted in a cautious and goalless first half. The energy and aggression were dialled up after the break but chances remained at a premium. After we witnessed 99 touches in the penalty area in Brentford’s game with Manchester United yesterday, this was a very different sort of game. Technical, tactical, tense. …”
The Athletic

The Premier League, where scoring first doesn’t matter anymore


“It takes commitment to support Norwich City. There’s the flitting between the Premier League and the Championship. There’s your arch-rivals becoming very good at football. There’s competing in a financial world that feels increasingly distant from Carrow Road. And speaking of distance — the travel distances from East Anglia make every away day an odyssey. …”
The Athletic

Goal kicks: How does each Premier League club take them?


“An outfield player taking a goal kick used to be a rare treat, a sign that the goalkeeper had pulled a muscle and needed a willing team-mate to launch the ball towards the centre circle. But since a tweak of football’s laws in 2019, the once-humble goal kick has become an increasingly integral part of how a club chooses to build up play. Some teams choose to have a defender pass the ball laterally to the goalkeeper, some ask the goalkeeper to play short to team-mates in the box, while some still prefer to go long and direct. …”
The Athletic

Introducing the 8.5, the hybrid role that is shaping the Premier League title race


“This season’s battle for the Premier League title is now unquestionably a three-horse race. In May, Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City will become the first side in English football history to win four titles in a row. Or Jurgen Klopp will win his second Premier League title before departing Liverpool. Or Mikel Arteta will lead Arsenal to their first league title in two decades. Whichever outcome transpires, the victorious side will have depended on a player who has fulfilled an unusual role this season. …”
The Athletic – Michael Cox

How Chelsea stopped City initially – and the tactical tweak that earned Guardiola an equaliser


“When a team performs below their normal standards, questions are often asked about the manager’s decisions and the players’ output. Yet, it takes two sides to play a game of football. The opponent’s level could be one of the reasons a certain team aren’t as good as usual on a given day. ‘It’s in general, when you perform like this always there are many reasons, not just one,’ said Manchester City manager, Pep Guardiola, when he was asked about his team’s performance in the first half of their 1-1 home draw against Chelsea on Saturday. …”
The Athletic

How Football Works: Diagonals


“If you’re a football team who would like to get the ball past the other team and into the net, you have three basic routes to pick from: over, around or through their defence. Each has its drawbacks. Lobs over the top might as well be gift-wrapped for the goalkeeper. Sneaking around the sides sounds clever until you get trapped against the touchline. And zig-zagging through the middle is just plain hard, what with all those mean people trying to snatch the ball away. …”
The Athletic (Video)

How often do Premier League champions score last-minute winners? Less than you might think


Trent Alexander-Arnold smashing home a late winner against Fulham in front of the Kop. Declan Rice clambering above a defender to nod in against Luton Town. Or Rice, for that matter, striking late against Manchester United back in September. We see these goals and we think of Steve Bruce’s header against Sheffield Wednesday in 1993 or Federico Macheda’s curler against Aston Villa in 2009. We’re conditioned to think that late goals are a regular feature of title-winning champions. But is that really the case, or do we simply remember a few standout examples and exaggerate how frequently champions rely on late winners? Let’s look at the numbers… ”
The Athletic (Video)

Why are football stadiums so expensive to build?


Manchester United and Chelsea share a problem they cannot hope to run away from. Old Trafford and Stamford Bridge might be able to narrate storied chapters of the Premier League’s history, but neither can project a compelling future. At least not in their current states. The famous homes of Manchester United and Chelsea have become weights that threaten to hold back their owners. They are not fit for an elite long-term purpose. …”
The Athletic (Video)

Arsenal have accepted how they must play to win a Premier League title – Jonathan Wilson


“A sign of champions, the theory has it, is winning ugly. No side can be at their very best all the time and so, over the course of a season, there will be occasions when a team that is going to win the league has to gut it out, to keep going with their plans, to keep believing, whether that means withstanding pressure or burgling a late goal. Not all points are won with beauty; some have to be fought for or stolen. In a title race, character matters as much as ability. …”
Guardian – Jonathan Wilson

Chelsea 4-4 Manchester City: Old boys Palmer and Sterling key, City don’t like chaos, more VAR delays


“A late penalty from Cole Palmer earned Chelsea a 4-4 draw with Manchester City in a thrilling match at Stamford Bridge. Erling Haaland put the visitors ahead after winning a penalty before Thiago Silva equalised with a header from a corner less than five minutes later. Raheem Sterling tapped in against his former club, only for Manuel Akanji to level things again on the stroke of half-time with a free header. …”
The Athletic

Is the Premier League ready to embrace a substitution revolution?


Jürgen Klopp hugs Diogo Jota as he leaves the pitch during Sunday’s game between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest.
“José Mourinho wore many faces as a Premier League manager. Chameleon-like, shifting from rambunctious to cantankerous. If Chelsea’s 2015 Premier League title win had all the hallmarks of a Tom Wambsgans redemption arc, his 2004 to 2007 incarnation was defined by his Logan Roy lead character energy. Every game felt tinged with Mourinho razzmatazz – good or bad. No wonder, then, when Chelsea lost to neighbors Fulham for the first time in 27 years on 20 March 2006, Mourinho preserved his role as chief headline maker. …”
Guardian