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A side that once looked resilient has collapsed into historic futility, with Wolves now facing the grim task of avoiding the worst season English league football has ever seen

Saturday’s defeat at home to Brentford means Wolves have taken just two points for 17 games. No side in the entire history of English league football, in any division, has ever made a worse start than that. To reach 11 points, the record low for a Premier League season set by Derby County in 2007-08, would require a significant improvement.

How can this have happened? Wolves finished 16th last season, recovering after a dismal start. When Vitor Pereira took over on 19 December last year, they were second bottom on nine points from 16 games. They picked up 23 points from the final 22 games of the season and effectively ended any prospect of relegation with a run of six successive victories in the spring. How can a team go from averaging near enough a point a game to a tenth of that? The drop-off is extraordinary.

This is an extract from Soccer with Jonathan Wilson, a weekly look from the Guardian US at the game in Europe and beyond. Subscribe for free here. Have a question for Jonathan? Email soccerwithjw@theguardian.com, and he’ll answer the best in a future edition.

• Milan have option to buy German at end of season

• West Ham interested in Wolves’s Jørgen Strand Larsen

Milan have agreed to sign West Ham’s Niclas Füllkrug on loan with an option to buy at the end of the season. The Germany striker has toiled since moving to the London Stadium from Borussia Dortmund for £27.5m in the summer of 2024 and it is hoped that his exit will free up funds for Nuno Espírito Santo to boost his side’s fight against relegation by bringing in a new forward during next month’s transfer window.

West Ham are interested in Wolves’s Jørgen Strand Larsen but are reluctant to meet his valuation. It is believed that Wolves, who are bottom of the Premier League, want £40m for the Norwegian. West Ham’s budget is limited and they feel that the package for Strand Larsen, who has scored once in the league this season, is too expensive.

• Milan-Como was intended for Perth on 8 February

• Asian Football Confederation wanted to impose conditions

The proposal to play a Serie A match between Milan and Como in Perth, Australia, has been cancelled due to football sanctions and conditions imposed by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC).

The game was set to become the first major European domestic league fixture to be played outside its home country but will now not go ahead because of the financial risks and last-minute complications.

In a match mercifully on Spanish soil, Villarreal bombarded Barça but were undone by profligacy and ill-discipline

Marcelino García Toral came bounding down the steps like an excited schoolboy when the bell goes. He flew past the substitutes and staff, skidded left, and sprinted up the line all wide-eyed and excited, shaking his fists and beaming. He had gone 15 or 20 metres, maybe 25, when he realised – just a fraction later than everyone else – that something had gone wrong again. So Villarreal’s manager put the brakes on and his head down, and turned back towards the bench feeling almost as silly as this was getting. This, he already suspected, was going to be one of those days.

They had been playing 16 minutes and the goal Villarreal had scored, the goal Jules Koundé scored for them, wasn’t a goal at all. Just as the chance they made after 80 seconds wasn’t, Nicolas Pépé putting wide from a yard out. Just as Ayoze Pérez’s opportunity on six minutes wasn’t a goal, Tajon Buchanan’s effort on 13 wasn’t, and Raphinha’s on nine minutes was. One moment – a dash, a tumble and a penalty – and from nowhere Villarreal trailed Barcelona. Now they were level again only for a raised flag to halt the manager’s run as suddenly, the oh neatly summing up the afternoon when La Liga’s best teams met on the Mediterranean, not in Miami, and Barcelona beat Villarreal 2-0.

Patson Daka’s injury-time equaliser earned Zambia a 1-1 draw with Mali in Group A at the Africa Cup of Nations

She’s offered £36k under asking price. Surely she has no chance.

We are the business end of A Place in the Sun on 4Seven before the football starts. Will they make an offer on a property? The tension is palpable!.

Tuesday’s quarter-final will be the Eagles’ 29th game of the season and Gabriel Jesus is set to line up against them

Oliver Glasner could be forgiven for preferring to enjoy a rest with his family in Austria a few days before Christmas rather than preparing for Crystal Palace’s 29th game of the season – a Carabao Cup quarter-final against Arsenal on Tuesday night. However, any suggestion that Palace may have to prioritise given they remain in four competitions was unsurprisingly dismissed.

“No, I don’t think so,” said Glasner after his team’s 4-1 hammering by Leeds on Saturday. “If somebody tells me that we lose on purpose, the next day I’m not the manager any more.”

A fightback win over RB Leipzig before the Christmas break is just reward for coach who faced a thankless task

Leipzig might not be every Bundesliga fan’s idea of a weekend idyll but as the sun set on 2025, the venue for the final Saturday night Topspiel of the year might have been the scene of a minor Christmas miracle. It had already been a worthy showpiece to draw the curtains on pre-Christmas Bundesliga but the end result – achieved not without a smidgeon of controversy – left us with a satisfying tale to tell by an open fire over holiday season.

Bayer Leverkusen can enjoy their brief break with a rosy glow of satisfaction with their win against a direct competitor a clear measure of how far they have come; or, if you like, a measure of how far Kasper Hjulmand has taken them. Leverkusen sit third over the bridge to the new year which, if we were to return to the closure of the summer transfer window, looked a long way off.

• Italian replaces Rehanne Skinner at east London club

• ‘I want to build a team that is aggressive with the ball’

Rita Guarino​ has declared herself “really excited” about the project at West Ham after being confirmed as the club’s new head coach on Monday.

Guarino has signed a contract until 2027 with West Ham, as the Guardian reported on Sunday, replacing Rehanne Skinner, who was sacked on Thursday after two-and-a-half years in charge of the Women’s Super League side. Her first game in charge will be the trip to the champions Chelsea on 11 January, following the WSL’s winter break. The 54-year-old former Juventus head coach takes charge with her new side 11th in the table.

Whoever wins season’s Scudetto is likely to crawl over the line and Juve have entered the picture

“When you say things like that, it makes me want to bite you,” Luciano Spalletti told a Sky Sport Italia reporter asking about title ambitions. Treating interviewers like a slice of panettone aside, the most shocking thing about this assertion is that it’s not entirely implausible. Juventus have barely scraped a few good performances, but the overwhelming sense of inconsistency throughout Serie A means that’s no reason to rule them out for the top prize.

Spalletti can tuck into his Christmas dinner knowing Juventus beat Roma 2-1 to close within a point of fourth place, securing three competitive wins in a row, with Loïs Openda finally breaking his Serie A duck, and Bremer returning for his first start sincehis meniscus tear on 27 September. The quality in the squad was always present, so with a little confidence, momentum and players beginning to gel with their new coach, there’s plenty for fans to get their teeth into.

The Monaco player discusses his father, the midfielders he copies and whether he could join the Premier League

By Get French Football News

As I enter the room, Lamine Camara picks up a football that he won’t let go of until after the interview. It’s a simple visual metaphor for a dream he has never let slip. “I only wanted football; I was focused solely on that,” says the Monaco and Senegal midfielder. His determination and talent convinced Génération Foot, Metz and Monaco to sign him. Although the hardest person to convince was not a sporting director or manager, but his own father.

“He didn’t want me to play football but it’s because he hadn’t seen me play,” says Camara. “He didn’t know anything about football but people came up to him and said: ‘Your son knows how to play. You have to help him.’” Eventually, on “one beautiful day”, Camara earned his father’s blessing and pursued a career in the game. His small stature was another hurdle and it deterred local club Casa Sports from handing him a contract.

Ousmane Dembélé becomes our seventh winner as he beats Lamine Yamal into second and Vitinha into third on our list of the best players on the planet

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• Striker hurt by Van de Ven tackle when opening scoring

• MRI scan results to reveal length of spell on sidelines

Liverpool fear their record signing, Alexander Isak, has fractured his left leg and will face months on the sidelines.

The league champions are waiting on the results of an MRI scan after the £125m man was injured against Tottenham in Saturday’s Premier League game. The 26-year-old sustained the problem while scoring the opener against Spurs – his second league goal of an already injury-hit debut season – in the 2-1 win after the defender Micky van de Ven slid across and caught his leg as the striker planted it on the ground.

The telling moment was not Stuart Findlay’s header to open the scoring. It was not Lawrence Shankland battering the ball beyond Jack Butland. Instead, the latest indicator that this is a Hearts team of proper substance arrived as they conceded a 95th-­minute and ultimately immaterial goal to Youssef Chermiti.

Frankie Kent, who had misjudged a through ball, was enraged. The Hearts goalkeeper Alexander Schwolow soon threw his gloves on the turf in anger. Derek McInnes, the manager, later only half joked that neither player was as furious as he was. Even losing a clean sheet is a cause for concern at Tynecastle nowadays. A year ago, they were rumbling around in the lower echelons of the league.

• Quarter-final: Liverpool 1-9 Chelsea

• Rytting Kaneryd scores hat-trick as Blues run riot

Humiliated, humbled and, frankly, embarrassed, it was probably a relief for Liverpool when the clock reached 90:00 and the referee Grace Lowe immediately blew the final whistle without adding any stoppage time. It brought a sympathetically early end to a chastening afternoon for the Reds, dismantled by a Chelsea side who barely needed to break sweat.

It is not supposed to be this easy in a quarter-final between top-flight sides. The scoreboard read 9-1. “At least it wasn’t 10,” one home fan said while trudging back to the car. The truth is, it could have been worse, had Chelsea not rather bizarrely had two set-piece goals ruled out for soft-looking fouls in the box that no Liverpool player seemed to appeal for.

Mikel Arteta can toast his sixth anniversary as Arsenal manager from the Premier League summit and with the Christmas No 1 spot secured once again. Behind the headline positivity, however, must be a realisation that more convincing performances are required to hold on until the final reckoning.

Viktor Gyökeres’ emphatic first-half penalty sealed a slender yet merited win over an Everton team missing several important components. Arsenal were more efficient than impressive and rarely troubled throughout a scrappy contest. But this was a test of title-winning character as much as quality after three away games without a win in the league and having lost top spot for the first time since mid-October before kick-off. In that respect Arteta can be encouraged by a reaction that ensured Manchester City’s stay in first place would be brief and Arsenal would be top at Christmas for the third time in four years.

• Chelsea’s Chalobah challenged Gordon at 2-1 in 2-2 draw

• ‘It was a clear error and a clear penalty’

Eddie Howe accused Andy Madley of failing to award Newcastle a “stonewall” penalty as Chelsea recovered from two goals down to draw 2-2. Newcastle have now dropped 13 points from winning positions this season, but their manager blamed the match officials rather than lax defending for this latest setback.

With the score 2-1, Trevoh Chalobah’s 54th-minute challenge on Anthony Gordon propelled the Newcastle player into the hoardings, but Madley declined to award a penalty, a decision endorsed by the video assistant referee.

Max Rushden is joined by Barry Glendenning, Sanny Rudravajhala and George Elek as Manchester United and Bournemouth play out a thrilling 4-4 draw. On the podcast today; lots of fun to be had at Old Trafford as Manchester United and Bournemouth draw 4-4. But how to analyse a game that wild? Let’s hope the panel have some ideas. Elsewhere, Coventry City lead the Championship with a reinvigorated Middlesbrough led by Kim Hellberg in second. Plus, Cardiff City and Walsall lead the way in Leagues One and Two respectively and your questions answered.

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Friends Tarryn Allarakhia and Haji Mnoga will step out together in Morocco having shared a path in the English lower leagues

Like all good things, Tarryn Allarakhia and Haji Mnoga’s friendship began at a National League match between Wealdstone and Aldershot in 2023 when they were opponents. Since then they have moved to the north-west and are heading into a second Africa Cup of Nations as Tanzania internationals together.

This is the fourth time Tanzania, who sit 112th in Fifa’s rankings, have qualified for the tournament but they are yet to secure a victory. In Côte d’Ivoire in 2023, Allarakhia and Mnoga were part of a squad that secured draws against Zambia and DR Congo, but that was not enough to get them out of the group. Nigeria, the highest-ranked side in the group, will be their first opponents on Tuesday before clashes with Tunisia and Uganda in Morocco for the Taifa Stars.

Highs and lows for Alexander Isak, Wolves’ sobering survival chances and were Chelsea lucky at Newcastle?

• Premier League scoring charts

Can results be misleading? That is the question. Aston Villa’s winning streak continued against Manchester United, but so did the nagging doubts. They were the lesser team by several measures – fewer shots (12-15), less possession (43-57), fewer big chances (2-3). As usual, the victory was a slender one. But games are not won by stats. They are won by solid teamwork, shrewd management and individual talent – and Villa have all three. Morgan Rogers may be their only star, but he’s delivering like Father Christmas. Unai Emery is wily, battle-hardened, five years ahead of Ruben Amorim. If Rogers profited from Leny Yoro’s naivety, that was probably because Emery had spotted that Yoro is not a right-back, and told Rogers to start wide, cut in and torment him. Talent and management, working together. Tim de Lisle

Match report: Aston Villa 2-1 Manchester United

Match report: Everton 0-1 Arsenal

Match report: Manchester City 3-0 West Ham

Match report: Tottenham 1-2 Liverpool

Match report: Newcastle 2-2 Chelsea

Match report: Wolves 0-2 Brentford

Match report: Leeds 4-1 Crystal Palace

England forward’s brilliance is proving difficult to stop but Unai Emery will surely not be able to keep relying on him every time

It is only two months since Morgan Rogers was standing on the Stadium of Light pitch, looking confused as Unai Emery berated him for failing to anticipate a through-ball as Aston Villa failed to beat a team that played for an hour with 10 men. At that point, as Villa went six without a win, it wasn’t clear whether Rogers’ form was a symptom or a cause of Villa’s more general malaise.

There was a volcanic touchline reaction from Emery on Sunday as well, but this was rather more positive. As Rogers swept in his second of the game to restore Villa’s lead, Emery ripped off his thick padded coat, spread his arms and roared. Villa were on their way to a 10th successive win and, having failed to win any of their first six games of the season, are somehow only three points behind the leaders Arsenal.

The feeling among fans is anticlimatic as ‘businessmen have appropriated the ball that used to belong to the people’

Jonathan Zamora was seven years old the last time Mexico hosted the World Cup in 1986. “I witnessed perhaps one of the most sublime moments in the history of football,” he says, retelling a story that has become a pillar of his life.

Zamora, a Mexican football fan, does not remember how his father, Antonio, got tickets to the 1986 World Cup quarter-final between Argentina and England at the Azteca Stadium in Mexico City. But he does clearly remember the goals: first when Diego Maradona used his “hand of God” to push the ball past England goalkeeper Peter Shilton. And then the “goal of the century”, where the Argentinian went on a slalom run, dribbling past half the England team before scoring.

Former Manchester United player discusses culinary and cultural surprises, feeling more mature and how he learned Korean

Jesse Lingard says his Korean is decent, good enough to make himself understood when out for dinner and the shocks do not stop there. The former Manchester United and England midfielder was always going to throw himself into his K League adventure with FC Seoul and now that it is over after two years, a new chapter beckoning when the January transfer window opens, the 33-year-old certainly has the tales to tell.

It was the little things as much as anything else, the cultural quirks. And the bigger ones, of course – such as the time he watched an octopus squirm in front of him before eating it. “The food is different, obviously, and I tried live octopus,” Lingard says. “It was moving. I was scared at first but it was all right.”

Clubs including Bolton Wanderers and Bradford City hope to entice fans of top teams looking for festive football fix

The presents are open, the turkey’s devoured and the family bickering has momentarily paused. For hundreds of thousands of football fans that can mean only one thing: it’s time for the match.

But not this Boxing Day. With just one Premier League game being played instead of the usual festive footballing feast, fans are looking elsewhere for blessed respite, with teams lower down the football pyramid hoping to entice those who are desperate to get out of the house.

Morocco are the hosts and favourites for this year’s Afcon. How well do you remember previous tournaments?

• Which Premier League teams will be affected by Afcon?

Latest Liverpool alumnus to join Saudi Pro League will not have to worry about a lack of funds at Al-Qadsiah

The path from Liverpool to the east of Saudi Arabia is becoming increasingly well-worn, but Brendan Rodgers has a bigger job on his hands than Robbie Fowler, Steven Gerrard and Jordan Henderson. On Tuesday, the 52-year-old was confirmed as the new head coach of Al-Qadsiah, with the target in his new job simple: to turn the Big Four in Saudi Arabia into the Big Five.

If he had concerns about the lack of investment at Celtic, the club he left in October, then that shouldn’t be an issue at the Khobar-based Al-Qadsiah. In July, they splashed out a reported €65m (£57.15m) on the Italy striker Mateo Retegui. Few clubs around the world have an owner with pockets – or oil wells – as deep as those that belong to Aramco. The state-owned oil enterprise usually makes the top 10 lists of the world’s biggest companies.

• All 48 competing nations to get minimum of $10.5m

• Fifa Council approval comes amid ticket price row

Fifa has announced a 50% increase in World Cup prize money for next year’s tournament, with the champions set to take home $50m (£37.5m) as a reward for their success.

The news comes days after there was widespread public outrage over the price of seats at the tournament, to be held in the US, Mexico and Canada. Fifa this week announced a limited number of discount tickets for fans of participating countries.

The former Liverpool and Barcelona striker, who turns 39 in January, has been productive but was benched for the tail end of Miami’s title run

Inter Miami have re-signed striker Luis Suárez through the 2026 season, the MLS Cup champions announced Wednesday.

The legendary Uruguay international had 17 goals and 17 assists in 50 appearances for the team in 2025. However, Inter Miami became a buzzsaw after Suárez was dropped to the bench by head coach Javier Mascherano. Replaced by Mateo Silvetti after Miami’s 2-1 loss at Nashville SC in Round One, Miami won their next four games and outscored opponents 16-2 in route to the MLS Cup title.

Fifa has made big mistakes over 2026 tournament but it can afford to slash prices and even give some tickets away

Who is the World Cup for? Fifa appeared to share some of its thinking on this topic in the past week. On the one hand, there was the revelation that spectators are being asked to pay more than twice as much for match tickets than they were in Qatar. On the other, the news that prize money for competing teams is to rise by more than 50% on four years ago. Stakeholders are doing good! Fans? Not so good.

It hasn’t taken long for some of those watching to wonder whether things could be done differently. Tom Greatrex, the chair of the Football Supporters’ Association, which represents fans in England and Wales, argued that the ability to pay expanded prize money, itself a result of expanded revenue, showed “there is no need to charge extortionate ticket prices to the supporters who bring the vibrancy to the World Cup”. You could go so far as to say there was never a real need to do it in the first place.

If action is taken, the so-called ‘banter’ used to victimise women who take part in the sport will soon diminish

After six days in which a former player was held accountable in court for sexist comments and a current manager was charged by the Football Association with using sexist language, are we seeing a change in how that behaviour is tackled?

For years, talk of so-called “banter” has been used to silence complaints and it has been a struggle to convince football that sexism and misogyny even exist, but there are signs the sport is finally waking up.

Spurs have faced low moments in their history, and this is one of them. How will the club respond in the post-Daniel Levy era?

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Tottenham Hotspur, Thomas Frank said after Sunday’s 3-0 defeat to Nottingham Forest, are “not a quick fix”. That’s been true for probably 40 years, since they lurched into financial crisis amid boardroom shenanigans in the 1980s, becoming the first soccer club to list on the stock exchange and embarking on a disastrous programme of diversification (the highlight perhaps being becoming Hummel’s distributor in the UK, a role they performed so badly that Southampton took a page of their own programme to blame Spurs for the fact that their shirts were not being delivered).

Right now, Spurs would probably settle for even a little bit of a fix, a slow hint of progress, a flicker of hope, anything to break them out of the current grim spiral. They have won just one of their last seven league games. When they beat Everton on 26 October, they were third, five points behind the leaders. Sunday’s defeat leaves them 11th, 14 points behind Arsenal. Given that Spurs finished 17th last season, perhaps that is not so unexpected – and the compacted nature of the table means they are only four points off fifth and probable Champions League qualification. But, equally, 22 points represents their lowest Premier League tally after 16 games since 2008.

Forward made an emotional lap of honour at Anfield after a week that put his future at the club in doubt

Mohamed Salah and Liverpool have put politics to shame by showing what a long week truly looks like. It ended with the Egyptian doing a one-man lap of honour at Anfield, an attempt to rebuild trust with the supporters after creating a ceasefire, if not a complete truce, with Arne Slot.

Over the past seven days a lot has changed, but one thing remained the same, Salah started a Premier League game on the bench, not that he needed to wait long for a chance to do his talking on the pitch. He would finish with an assist after playing 75 minutes against Brighton in a game in which he desperately wanted to score. Maybe his parade was the beginning of the end, but it felt more like the start of the apology that should continue after the Africa Cup of Nations, giving both parties space to breathe.

Our cartoonist on exorbitant World Cup ticket prices and peace breaking out on Merseyside

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Women’s football is booming – but the bigger it’s got, the messier it’s become for players. Through it all, the hot tip for Sports Personality of the Year has kept a cool head

At the end of last year, Chloe Kelly was seriously considering stepping away from football. She was deeply unhappy at Manchester City, her team since 2020, where it seemed as if they wouldn’t let her play, nor let her leave. She wasn’t getting enough time on the pitch, so wasn’t sure that she would be selected for England, who were preparing to defend the title she had helped win in 2022 in the Euros tournament. She was 26, about to turn 27. She had been a professional footballer since she was 18, but her mother was starting to get concerned. She desperately wanted her daughter to be happy again. “I remember my mum coming up to see me and she was meant to go home, but she didn’t go home, because she was so worried,” recalls Kelly.

Less than a year later, and things are very different. At the time of writing, Kelly is favourite to win Sports Personality of the Year after a history-making comeback. At the end of January, she was loaned to Arsenal and in May she lifted the Champions League trophy with the team, very much the underdogs in the final against Barcelona, whom they defeated 1-0. At the end of July, she scored that penalty for England, securing them a second Euros title, against arch-rivals Spain. She was fifth in the Ballon D’or Féminin, and named in the Fifpro World 11 squad for the first time – a peer-voted list of the best footballers in the world. Against the odds, then, 2025 has turned out to be a great year. “For sure,” Kelly smiles. “To bounce back, that’s what makes it the best year of my career.”

German striker was given a sarcastic ovation by the Sunderland fans after his inadvertent match winner

On numerous occasions during the 75 minutes he spent on the pitch during the Wear-Tyne derby, Nick Woltemade cut an extremely isolated, peripheral and forlorn figure in the opposition box. A bad afternoon for Newcastle’s German striker got significantly worse shortly after half-time when he cut an even more isolated, peripheral and forlorn figure in his own team’s box after inadvertently heading a Nordi Mukiele cross past Aaron Ramsdale from six yards out.

Woltemade’s embarrassing own goal proved to be the unwitting match-winner in a contest that had until that point been high on full-blooded aggression but low on moments of real quality. As he made way for Yoane Wissa, it was no surprise the Sunderland fans granted the visibly deflated 23-year-old a sarcastic ovation. A fan favourite on Tyneside until the 46th minute of this match, Woltemade has now pulled off the unlikely feat of winning a permanent, bitterly ironic place in mackem hearts.

How each team qualified, who will be favourites to progress to the knockout stage and which games to look out for

The opening game in the Azteca will be a repeat of the opener in 2010 when South Africa drew 1-1 with Mexico in Soccer City, Soweto. Mexico have won one knockout game at the World Cup, beating Bulgaria last time they hosted, in 1986. Their manager, Javier Aguirre, was a forward in that side and will be targeting their third quarter-final as hosts. South Africa, coached by the veteran Belgian Hugo Broos, qualified for their first World Cup since hosting, finishing above Nigeria and Benin, despite having a game against Lesotho they appeared to have won awarded against them for fielding a suspended player.

Aitana Bonmatí has been voted the best female player on the planet by our panel of 127 experts ahead of Mariona Caldentey and Alessia Russo

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Give the one you love something special: a free subscription to Football Daily. The gift that never starts giving

Welcome to the fourth Football Daily Christmas Awards. This is the bit where, in our old guise, we would bang on about becoming so jaded that we’d lost count of how many years we’d been churning out this old tat. Hmm … So OK, here we are, refreshed and ready to go! Pour yourself a pint of wine, throw your boots up on the desk, decompress, de-depress, and enjoy!

With 11 games played our writers assess what has been good and not so good in England’s top flight as the league takes a winter break

This was a tough one, and an honourable mention has to be given to Martin Ho, who, despite only two summer signings, has taken Tottenham one point past last season’s 20-point total with half the season to play. However, Andrée Jeglertz arrived at Manchester City after managing Denmark at the Euros, where his team failed to pick up a point, and has had an instant impact. City look a different beast under the 53-year-old. The league leaders’ opening-day defeat by Chelsea is firmly in the past: they have won all 10 games since, have scored eight more goals than any other side and have built a six point lead at the top. Where previously City had struggled to kill off matches against title rivals, this season there has been a ruthlessness epitomised by their late winner in a 3-2 defeat of Arsenal, after they had twice given up the lead, and a comprehensive 3-0 win over Manchester United. SW

Crowds at women’s football in England are the envy of the world but there is a curious gap between number of tickets sold and attendances

When the stadium announcer reads out the attendance during England home games, the immediate question that follows relates to the drop-off between the number of tickets sold and the number of fans through the doors.

In 2025, on either side of a phenomenal European title defence in Switzerland, the Lionesses played eight home games, including three at Wembley. Across those fixtures, almost 48,000 bought tickets but stayed away.

Plus: which European champions were top at Christmas, players giving each other presents and other festive trivia

• Mail us with your questions and answers

“Just reading a book about Christmas No 1s,” begins Paul Savage. “The section about Wham!’s Last Christmas says Andrew Ridgeley was watching football at George Michael’s parents on a Sunday, when George got the melody and wandered off to record it upstairs. Greatness obviously awaited but I want to know: which match was it? It’s 1984, a Sunday and presumably on terrestrial TV. Was the second half worth Ridgeley not getting involved in the recording?”

Last Christmas by Wham! didn’t become a Christmas No 1 until 2023, having been kept off top spot by Band Aid’s Do They Know It’s Christmas in 1984. As Paul mentioned, George Michael wrote the song in his childhood bedroom while his parents and Andrew Ridgeley watched football on TV downstairs.

Max Rushden is joined by Barry Glendenning, Sanny Rudravajhala and George Elek as Manchester United and Bournemouth play out a thrilling 4-4 draw

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On the podcast today; lots of fun to be had at Old Trafford as Manchester United and Bournemouth draw 4-4. But how to analyse a game that wild? Let’s hope the panel have some ideas.

Faye Carruthers is joined by Suzy Wrack, Ameé Ruszkai and Tom Garry to review a dramatic final WSL weekend before the winter break. Plus, Zarah Al-Kudcy joins in part two to discuss Panini’s expansion into the women’s game

On today’s pod: a final WSL weekend before the winter break, packed with goals and drama. Manchester United and Tottenham share six in a chaotic draw at Leigh Sports Village, while Manchester City go six clear at the top after hitting Aston Villa for six, with Bunny Shaw scoring four in a record-breaking performance. The panel discuss the action from the weekend’s WSL games and ask why Bunny Shaw has never been shortlisted for a Ballon d’Or.

Plus: we’re joined by WSL Football’s Zarah Al-Kudcy to discuss Panini’s decision to include WSL 2 players in its sticker album for the first time, what that means for visibility and revenue, and how commercial growth could shape the future of England’s second tier.

From PSG’s Ibrahim Mbaye to Brazil’s next hope, we select some of the most talented players born in 2008. Check the progress of our classes of 2024 | 2023 | 2022 | 2021 | 2020 | 2019 … and go even further back. Here’s our Premier League class of 2025

We pick the best youngsters at each club born between 1 September 2008 and 31 August 2009, an age band known as first-year scholars. Check the progress of our classes of 2024 | 2023 | 2022 | 2021 | 2020 … and go even further back. Here’s our 2025 world picks

Every deal in the NWSL, WSL, Liga F, Frauen-Bundesliga, Première Ligue and Serie A Femminile as well as a club-by-club guide

• Men’s transfers summer 2025: all the moves