“Goals from corners have been arriving at an unprecedented rate in the Premier League this season. The importance of these set pieces has been rising in recent years, and has reached its highest impact on the attacking game in the 2025-26 campaign. Since it began last August, teams have been focusing on a specific type of corner: an in-swinger towards a crowded six-yard box. This has decreased the diversity of corners in English football’s top flight but innovative routines which don’t solely depend on putting it into this new mixer do still exist. …”
NY Times/The Athletic (Video)
The 10 cleverest corners from this Premier League season so far – Arsenal, Man Utd and plenty of Fulham
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“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. …”
“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? …”
“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. …”
“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. …”
“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 football. This was the round where Arsenal answered a few critics with another 4-1 victory against Tottenham Hotspur, Liverpool boosted their Champions League prospects with a smash-and-grab win at Nottingham Forest, moving them level on points with Chelsea, who stuttered at home to Burnley. We will ask whether talk over Arsenal’s supposed fragile mentality is valid, question just how much trouble Spurs are in and ponder what on earth has happened to Crystal Palace. …”
“New Year, new managers. Chelsea kicked things off when they sacked Enzo Maresca on New Year’s Day, before Manchester United parted company with Ruben Amorim four days later. Now, after a pair of February firings this week, there have been four Premier League sackings already in 2026, the most ever seen across the first two months of a calendar year. Tottenham Hotspur reignited the sacking spree when they dismissed Thomas Frank on Wednesday, while Nottingham Forest relieved Sean Dyche of his duties less than 24 hours later, releasing a statement in the early hours of Thursday following their 0-0 draw at home to last-place-by-a-mile Wolverhampton Wanderers the previous evening. …”
Sandro Tonali of Newcastle complains to referee Chris Kavanagh during Saturday’s FA Cup game against Aston Villa
Tottenham Hotspur’s sporting director Johan Lange (left) and CEO Vinai Venkatesham, the men who will appoint a long-term successor to Thomas Frank
“A couple of weeks ago, two football stories which seemed unrelated were, in reality, very much connected. The first story was 
“Sean Dyche was right when he observed that Evangelos Marinakis was unlikely to sack him on the back of one poor performance by his Nottingham Forest side at Leeds United. But there is a reason Forest’s match tonight (Wednesday) against fellow relegation candidates Wolverhampton Wanderers feels as though it will carry an additional weight for their head coach. It is not just one game that has left Dyche’s position in the spotlight less than four months into his tenure as Forest’s third head coach of this season, but the cumulative effect of several recent displays. …”
Jorgen Strand Larsen, James Ward-Prowse and Tony Pulis
“And just like that, Leicester City found themselves embroiled in a battle against relegation to the third tier. Confirmation filtered through on Thursday evening that the Championship club were subject to a six-point deduction, handed down by an independent commission, for breach of the English Football League’s profit and sustainability rules (PSR). The sanction leaves a side who are currently without a manager, following the sacking of Marti Cifuentes last month, outside the second division’s bottom three on goal difference alone. …”
Dominic Solanke scores his spectacular second goal as Spurs fight back from two down to draw with Manchester City
“Newcastle and Paris Saint-Germain are both now in the Champions League knockout phase play-offs after a tense 1-1 draw at Parc des Princes. Both went into the game in the top eight teams — who go straight to the last 16 — but results elsewhere mean they will need two-legged play-offs to advance further. Vitinha put PSG ahead with a beautifully-placed finish after Ousmane Dembele had missed an early penalty given harshly against Lewis Miley for a handball. And though the hosts dominated the majority of the first half, Joe Willock headed in an equaliser just before the break with Newcastle’s first shot on target. …”
“What is it really like to be a football manager? How do you escape the pressure? What impact do results have on your family? How long are the hours? Where do your best ideas come from? Do players still get a rocket at half-time? Can you wear what you want on the touchline? And, most importantly of all, how do you choose from 17 different varieties of cider? To find out the answers to all those questions and more, The Athletic spent a month with a head coach in the most volatile and unpredictable league in English football: the Championship. Gerhard Struber, a 48-year-old Austrian, took over at Bristol City last summer after spells with Koln, Red Bull Salzburg, New York Red Bulls, and Barnsley. …”
“In the words of Jon Bon Jovi, we’re halfway there. Woah! As we enter a new year, the Premier League reaches the halfway mark, a perfect time to assess how each team has performed in their first 19 games of the season. We asked The Athletic’s writers to send in their report cards. Here, they grade each team and tell us what the biggest surprises and disappointments of the campaign have been so far. …”
“Bing-bong. Happy New Year, the winter transfer window is here! Congratulations to all who celebrate. To mark the re-opening of the market, we thought we’d revive an article which generated such an incredibly warm reaction in the comments section last time around; yes, ranking the impact made by all 155 Premier League summer signings! We did it in September, we did it in October, and if you didn’t think we were going to do it in January, well, you really don’t know us that well at all. Basically, it’s the 155 signings made by the 20 Premier League clubs in summer 2025, judged on their impact. …”
“It has long been accepted fact that football’s richest league resides in England. The Premier League was not immediately a financial behemoth when it was formed in 1992 but today, 33 years and billions of pounds later, there is no doubting where the money lies. That is borne out every few months when a new transfer window rolls around, and the English clubs splurge like no others. Wage bills, too, are dominated by Premier League sides. In 2023-24, the most recent season for which we have a full dataset, teams from England occupied nine of the top 20 spots in the list of European football’s highest payers. …”
“Welcome to The Briefing, where every Monday The Athletic discusses three of the biggest questions posed by the weekend’s 
Mohamed Salah, Unai Emery and Thomas Frank have already experienced highs and lows
“Emiliano Buendia crashed home a stoppage-time winner to stun leaders Arsenal and end their 18-match unbeaten run. Trailing at half-time to Matty Cash’s opener at Villa Park, Arsenal were far from their best but looked set to take a point thanks to substitute Leandro Trossard’s 52nd-minute equaliser. But Villa were not to be denied, with Buendia coming off the bench to hammer a shot beyond David Raya following an almighty scramble. …”
“The cold nights are drawing in, hopes and dreams from those optimistic, innocent, bright summer days are long gone. Reality has bitten. With the Premier League table still tighter than the proverbial camel’s backside in a sandstorm, with just six points separating fifth from 15th (this time last year the gap was 12 points), it’s hard to judge which clubs and which fanbases are happy with what they’ve seen so far. A week of wins can lift you from relegation concerns to a European push, while successive defeats can take you from the Champions League places to looking downwards to the Championship. It’s temperamental. Far more reliable than the actual league table, then, is The Athletic’sHappiness Table, in which we accurately summise each club’s xH (expected happiness) level, but without the xH bit because that’s a bit silly. …”
“Welcome to The Athletic’s 2026 Transfer DealSheet — covering the January and summer windows. Our team of dedicated writers will take you inside the market to explain the deals being worked on. The transfer window will reopen on January 1, 2026 — at which point The Transfer DealSheet will return to its weekly in-window format. 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. Their responses, when they were given, have been included. …”
“This was the weekend when 
“In an era where football fans implore their club to spend big money on new players, it’s notable that very few of the most expensive footballers in history have been an unqualified success at their new club. Eleven players have been transferred for £100million or more, and there are more flops than clear positives. Antoine Griezmann’s 2017 move from Atletico Madrid to Barcelona (
“Tottenham may have put in a more positive display against PSG than against Arsenal on Sunday, but they came away from Paris defeated in an eight-goal thriller despite twice taking the lead. Richarlison headed in during the first half after a great team move from Spurs before an incredible strike from Vitinha just before half-time drew the hosts level. Randal Kolo Muani, playing against his parent club, put Spurs back in front before Vitinha again drew the teams level with another lovely finish. Two poor goals to concede followed, though, as the early promise from Spurs evaporated. Kolo Muani made it 4-3 before Vitinha completed his hat-trick from the penalty spot after a handball. PSG then had Lucas Hernandez sent off in stoppage time. …”
“Liverpool’s season goes from bad to worse. A wretched 3-0 home defeat to Nottingham Forest, who were entrenched in the relegation zone ahead of kick-off, dealt a further blow to 
“Manchester City missed an opportunity to put pressure on Arsenal in the title race, falling to a 2-1 defeat to Newcastle United at St James’ Park. The result leaves Pep Guardiola’s team in third, a point behind Chelsea, and potentially seven points behind Arsenal, should Mikel Arteta’s side beat Tottenham Hotspur on Sunday. The game was decided in a dramatic seven second-half minutes. Both sides had missed an abundance of chances before Newcastle opened the scoring in the 64th minute. A smart interchange in midfield between Bruno Guimaraes and Harvey Barnes ended with the latter shooting low and hard past goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma. The lead only lasted five minutes, however, as Newcastle struggled to clear from a corner and Ruben Dias equalised, his shot squirming between the legs of Fabian Schar. …”
“The scene was a school in west London, the weather was overcast and, for what felt like the first day of a new term, the mood was horribly tense. It was the Premier League’s official launch event for the 2015-16 Premier League season. Eddie Howe led a contingent from Bournemouth, all of them wide-eyed with excitement on the eve of their first top-flight campaign. The Swansea City lot were happy to be there, too. The delegation from reigning champions Chelsea? Not so much. …”
“One of the common moans about English football is that everything feels homogenous these days. Teams play the same style of football. Stadiums are identikit bowls. Clubs play in away kits that don’t particularly feel like their colours. So among clubs becoming increasingly indistinguishable from one another, one small element of Premier League football is a complete free-for-all: the commentary used on the highlights packages for clubs’ respective YouTube channels. Here, there is absolutely no consensus whatsoever about the right thing to do. Should you use a standard feed of ‘neutral’ television commentary? Should you use a dedicated club commentator? Should you use the club’s dedicated radio commentary and overlay it on the pictures? Should you use local BBC radio commentary? …”
“The Premier League returns this week after the final international break of the calendar year. At the top, Arsenal are four points clear but have suffered further injuries, including to key defender Gabriel, before the north London derby against Tottenham on Sunday. Second-placed Manchester City visit Newcastle on Saturday evening, with Eddie Howe’s home side as close to rock-bottom Wolves in points terms as they are to Pep Guardiola’s team. …”
Tottenham fans have been underwhelmed by their team’s style of play this season
“There are two reasons you might encounter the four letters ‘doku’ on the back page of your newspaper. The first is when preceded by the letters ‘Su’. The second is when preceded by the word ‘Jeremy’. Sudoku, for those uninitiated, is the Japanese logic game that suddenly exploded in English-language media two decades ago. Players are given a 9×9 grid, which is also divided into nine squares. Some numbers are already written in. The player must complete the grid by entering the numbers 1-9, but each individual number cannot appear twice in any row, column or square. …”
“Illegal streaming of football is on the rise in the UK and most fans want the Saturday 3pm blackout lifted, a new podcast released by The Athletic has revealed. The Underground World of Illegal Streaming — a special episode of 
“There are few neater points of the Premier League season than when the 20 clubs are all 10 games in — 100 matches, 200 results, infinite opinions. At that point in 2025-26, there have been 22 penalties, 268 goals, 801 shots on target, 86,473 passes and one 15-year-old. Far too much to explain in its entirety, but plenty of information to boil down into a statistical vignette of the campaign so far. So let’s do precisely that. …”
“Newcastle United have travelled nearly 1,300 miles for a meagre return of three points, two goals and no wins from five Premier League away trips this season. Head coach Eddie Howe was brutally honest after defeat at the London Stadium, where West Ham United recovered from a fourth-minute Jacob Murphy goal to beat Newcastle 3-1. … This week has encapsulated Newcastle of late. A dominant 2-0 victory at home to Tottenham Hotspur in the Carabao Cup was followed by a defeat against a West Ham side who had not won at home since late February. …”
“Amid 
“On Tuesday, 
“In the aftermath of losing his first Premier League match as Nottingham Forest head coach at Bournemouth at the weekend, Sean Dyche claimed his new side were not yet in the physical condition he wanted. ‘I am not knocking any other manager,’ Dyche said after the 2-0 defeat. ‘But I have been in the Premier League for 11 years and I know where I want my team to be physically. I don’t think the players are where they need to be for my way of working.’ …”
“Long throws are the hot new thing. Well, sort of. They are not really that new, and whether they are hot or not is a matter for debate. They are certainly a thing, though. 
Scissors Kick 