Ancelotti has Everton aiming high, Manchester United need more than Cavani and flying full-backs impressedHéctor Bellerín has had his doubters over the past year. There have been suggestions a touch of his old pace has gone after long-term injury, and when PSG bid for him last month there was an argument it could be a good time for Arsenal to cash in. But Bellerín set up both goals against Sheffield United, the first after a typically barnstorming burst to the line, and is looking a touch nearer to his old self. “After such a long time at the club he doubted what ambitions he had here, how he could evolve here,” Mikel Arteta said after Arsenal’s narrow win. “But he...
Liverpool are not so much sloppy as playing the popular high-risk game that late-period Alex Ferguson eschewedFootball has changed. Most disagreements between managers and pundits are tedious affairs, rooted in complex and broadly impenetrable codes of respect and of concern only to professional axe-grinders. But the slightly spiky exchange between Roy Keane and Jürgen Klopp after Liverpool’s 3-1 victory over Arsenal on Monday was fascinating, less for the soap opera element of a bullish Klopp interrogating an awkwardly smirking Keane, or for Keane’s dry “touchy … imagine if they’d lost” rejoinder, but for what it revealed about how the two men view the game, and what that says about its evolution.️ "Did Mr Keane say it was a sloppy performance?...
Jürgen Klopp has bought the Spaniard to ward off entropy and bring variety after running and pressing teams to deathAll great sides are haunted by entropy. Even in their most transcendent moments, it is there in the shadows, hissing its insistent question: “What next?”When Liverpool won the Champions League in Madrid the answer was clear: there was another peak still to be scaled, and they did it last season by winning their first league title in 30 years. But after two years in which they achieved the second- and fourth-highest ever points totals, how can they maintain that level? How can they avoid the trajectory of Manchester City who, after a pair of similarly brilliant seasons, suffered an 18-point drop-off?...
Spaniard’s display against Liverpool sums up his struggles but there is a pattern of goalkeepers saving less under LampardKepa Arrizabalaga’s time as Chelsea goalkeeper, you suspect, will be remembered for two incidents. First there’s him on the Wembley turf, defying Maurizio Sarri and refusing to be substituted before the penalty shootout in the Carabao Cup final in 2019. And then there’s him on Sunday, playing the ball straight to Sadio Mané to concede a second against Liverpool. Two moments 19 months apart in which the world’s most expensive goalkeeper went from self-belief that only he could get the job done to swigging awkwardly at his water bottle, apparently desperate to be anywhere but in his six-yard box having confirmed his...
Sadio Mané, Mo Salah and Roberto Firmino combined to stunning effect to remind us they remain the standard-settersLiverpool haven’t signed any quality attackers. Liverpool are overly reliant on their front three. Liverpool need a genuine centre-forward.All these statements, heard on and off through the last few weeks of the summer window, may be true. But neither are true enough to outrank another more palpable fact: the ongoing sharp-edged brilliance of Jürgen Klopp’s existing front three. Related: Kepa made a 'clear mistake' but we will support him, says Frank Lampard Continue reading...