Graham Potter pressure intensifies, Newcastle’s goalkeeping nightmare and civil war at LeedsStamford Bridge was not a happy place after Chelsea’s insipid defeat to Southampton. There was no holding back. Loud boos greeted the final whistle and the mood near the dugout was ugly. A fair few fans were bellowing abuse at Graham Potter and the worry for Chelsea’s head coach, who has been in the job only since September, will be that he has already lost the crowd. Chelsea supporters loved Thomas Tuchel and many do not see Potter as an upgrade on the German. There is talk of giving the Brighton manager time to build but he is not doing a good job of winning over the sceptics. Chelsea...
What makes an impact is basic footballing competence and the cautious progress made under Erik ten Hag would be destroyed in an instantAnd here’s one we made earlier. Please ignore the noises from the basement. We, the sovereign state of Qatar, are here to restore the lost soul of your prized social-sporting institutions. And it’s all going to be fine. There was an unavoidable significance this week in the coincidence of two apparently unrelated events. First the suggestion that Qatar really may have a serious interest in buying Manchester United, or at least enough interest to add its name to the list before Friday’s “soft” deadline. And second the deliciously more-ish scenes of chaos at Paris Saint-Germain as the current...
Manchester United manager deserves credit for unlocking striker’s full potential in a way his predecessors never couldThe clock had not quite struck 8pm local time when Marcus Rashford began to glide across the Camp Nou turf in pursuit of a pass from Fred. And Rashford really is a beautiful runner in full flow: all clean lines and clear air, a player who moves as if he will never get mud on his boots. Marcos Alonso, the man who had headed Barcelona 1-0 up barely a minute earlier, moved across to jack-knife his run.Well, of course Rashford scored. The ball was running away towards the goalline and the angle was tightening and Marc-André ter Stegen is one of the best goalkeepers...
João Félix is settling at Chelsea, Eddie Howe is staying positive despite the draws and James Maddison is Leicester’s leading manAs if more than 100 charges weren’t enough, Manchester City were given one more reason to come out fighting on Sunday. They had just been pushed down to third in the league by their not very noisy neighbours, United, in Sunday’s earlier match. City responded as only they can, by taking the lead while their opponents were still trying to figure out their formation. Was it a 3-2-2-3? Whatever it was, it was 3-0 by half-time. Villa had been overrun, Bernardo Silva was the new João Cancelo and City were second again. By Wednesday night, if they play like the...
Ugly atmosphere ended with Manchester United demonstrating ability to move the game on to their own termsDawn breaks in Leeds with a smell of menace. Police out by breakfast, a slow-moving filet of yellow hi-vis beating the streets, lining the alleyways, scanning the trains for trouble. In the stands, songs about Munich and Istanbul, Mason Greenwood and Jimmy Savile. On the pitch, skewering tackles, crunching limbs, collisions you can physically hear. The atmosphere is magnificent, even if it comes from the ugliest of places.Leeds have committed the most fouls in the Premier League this season, Manchester United are fourth in that list, and the two clubs have hated each other for decades. Perhaps this was the inevitable result: a kind...