Goalkeeper could soon have competition from David Raya but he produced fine saves to thwart Manchester CityIt didn’t take long for Joe Hart to realise the writing was on the wall for him at Manchester City under Pep Guardiola. “He said: ‘Of course you’ll be given the opportunity, but …’ As soon as there are any buts at the end you know there’s a decision,” the former England goalkeeper recalled last year. “It was a two-hour conversation that kind of ended with him saying: ‘I can’t see this working.’”Hart is by no means alone. Yaya Touré, Raheem Sterling, Gabriel Jesus and Oleksandr Zinchenko are some of the big names jettisoned by the City manager in his pursuit of perfection since...
Debuting superstar striker is upstaged by a teammate and an opponent during defeat to Liverpool in the Community ShieldOK. This might take a while. Just talk among yourselves. For Erling Haaland this was a debut not just to forget, but to shred, incinerate and bury at the bottom of the garden. Haaland looked limb-weary by the end of this clammy high-summer Community Shield final, a curtain-raiser for a stage that has scarcely been cleared of tables and men in brown coats.For much of the second half at the King Power Stadium Haaland skulked and mooched in the centre circle. With seconds left he produced a wonderfully wholehearted miss, clumping his shot off the top of the bar with all the...
Community Shield may be an irrelevance, but the FA Cup holders at least made the best of their day out at WembleyAs a fundraiser it is a worthy event, even in a half-full stadium. But the Community Shield as a contest and spectacle is mostly worthless, especially when one of the teams – in this case Manchester City – deploys a skeletal side because many of their players are making their way back from tournaments that matter to them. Even its symbolic value as a curtain raiser feels forced, like new socks on Father’s Day, something no one particularly wants but most accept out of politeness. A rethink of the format is in order. Or the teams could just make...
Mikel Arteta has a modern plan and is exhibiting the personality to put it into effect at the Emirates StadiumIt was only the Community Shield. It’s unlikely to be remembered in a month, never mind in a year or five or 10. Sports historians of decades to come will probably not be basing grand theses around some slightly tentative probing between two undercooked teams on a damp and blustery afternoon at Wembley. But it was another success for Mikel Arteta, further evidence that he might be building something exciting at Arsenal.Nobody at the Emirates Stadium should get carried away. This, fundamentally, does not matter – go on, without checking, what happened in the Community Shield last year? (Manchester City won...
Until the 18-year-old forward got on the ball, it seemed Arsenal were in for a long afternoon against Liverpool at WembleyArsenal’s David Luiz made two careless mistakes in the opening minutes of this game and got away with both of them. First he brought down Georginio Wijnaldum of Liverpool with a flailing attempt at a rugby tackle and saw Virgil van Dijk’s neat finish to an Andy Robertson free-kick correctly ruled out for offside. A couple of minutes later he needlessly passed the ball out of play to set up the position for Neco Williams to cross from the right, James Milner heading too high in the middle when he should probably have hit the target. Related: Aubameyang keeps his...