With players now quicker and stronger, the champions can further expose Pep Guardiola’s misfiring side, whose ability to stop the opposition passing is waningSunday’s meeting of Manchester City and Liverpool is not just between the past two Premier League champions and the two favourites to win the title this season or even Pep Guardiola and Jürgen Klopp, it is also a meeting of two different modes of pressing.The tactical centre of European football is shifting. While the four German sides lead or are level on points at the top of their Champions League groups, Spanish clubs are struggling. It is true Barcelona and Real Madrid have specific issues of politics and recruitment, but there is also something more fundamental that...
Defeat to Arsenal offered further evidence United only excel while playing on the break under the NorwegianLast time Manchester United started a league season this badly at home, they finished 18th. Football has changed a lot since 1972 and nobody is suggesting they might face a relegation scrap this season but even as the warm glow of Wednesday’s 5-0 win over RB Leipzig lingers, domestic expectations are perhaps being recalibrated. United are already nine points off the top.The obvious question, perhaps, is how United could have been so good on Wednesday, and yet so poor both against Chelsea last weekend and against Arsenal here. The answer perhaps lies in Isaiah Berlin’s division of the world into the foxes who know...
Defensive solidity plus a lethal forward pairing may be all it takes for Tottenham to be considered serious challengersThis has already been a deeply confusing season. Nothing makes much sense and as the impact of the virus and the compacted calendar continues to be felt, nothing is likely to any time soon. But still, particularly given how the opening weekend went, there can be few details weirder than Tottenham, who host Brighton on Sunday, would have gone into this weekend top of the Premier League had they not let slip a 3-0 lead against West Ham. Related: Lanzini's late gem completes stunning West Ham fightback at Tottenham The likelihood is still that Liverpool or City win the title but suddenly...
Solskjær’s players lacked spark and Lampard’s were cagey – but in a wild season, will such caution become more prevalent?Ole Gunnar Solskjær can do one big thing well, and that is sit his side deep and attack on the counter. Frank Lampard has one big thing he has struggled to do well, and that is set his side up to defend well against the counter. That’s why when these sides met at Old Trafford last season, Chelsea had 54% possession, won the shot count 18-10 and lost 4-0. Everything Lampard did on Saturday seemed aimed at avoiding a repeat. Related: Mendy denies Rashford as Manchester United and Chelsea fail to find spark Related: Frank Lampard makes case for the defence...
The goalkeeper should have been sent off early on in the Merseyside derby against Liverpool, went on to make some outstanding saves before getting away with a late blunderPerhaps the most remarkable aspect of Everton’s start to the season is not that they are top of the league, but that they are top of the league with Jordan Pickford in the sort of mood he’s been in for the past 18 months. He is a wrecking ball of pure energy, always up for it, a player apparently determined never to regret what he didn’t do. His performance against Liverpool was a characteristic maelstrom of reflex brilliance and damaging misjudgment: he nearly cost his team the game, yet he also made...