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• ‘It’s going to be the club’s and his decision,’ midfielder says

• Curtis Jones insists squad firmly behind Arne Slot

Dominik Szoboszlai has said the Liverpool dressing room will have no influence over Mohamed Salah’s next move because only the player and the club can decide how their standoff ends.

Salah missed Liverpool’s valuable Champions League win at Inter on Tuesday having been left out of Arne Slot’s squad in response to his highly critical interview at Leeds. The 33-year-old could also be absent when Liverpool host Brighton on Saturday. He is due to report for Africa Cup of Nations duty with Egypt on Monday.

Tributes were paid at the Valley to a familiar face who began watching games in 1968 and became an inspiration

The sudden death of the Charlton Athletic supporter Norman Barker has touched countless lives far beyond the club’s south-east London home. The Addicks’ Championship match against Portsmouth on Saturday was halted on 12 minutes after fans alerted the officials to a medical emergency in the North Stand. The players were taken down the tunnel and the game was later abandoned. Barker died in hospital soon after.

Barker – widely known in SE7 as “Headphones Norm” because he was always seen wearing a pair – began going to Charlton in 1968. It is clear from an interview he did in 2020 that it was love at first sight. That led him to follow the club into his 60s and become ever-present at Addicks games and a very familiar figure.

Los Blancos host Manchester City on Wednesday with head coach’s job on the line after one win in five league games

“This is a team, it is a club, and we all go together hand in hand,” Xabi Alonso insisted, protesting perhaps a little too much. “When you’re Real Madrid coach you’re ready,” he added on the morning before Manchester City return to the Santiago Bernabéu for the latest of a very modern classic against one of the many managers who made him.

“I’m looking forward to what’s coming and that starts tomorrow, [an opportunity] to turn round the anger. In our heads, there’s only City. In football, for better or worse, things change quickly.”

• Initial Kansas plan for US training base thrown into doubt

• FA exploring alternative options on the east coast

The Football Association has sent operational staff to the US this week to scout for World Cup training camps amid concerns that England may lose their preferred site to the Netherlands.

Thomas Tuchel had cleared an FA plan for England to be based in Kansas after a pre-tournament training camp in Fort Lauderdale, but after last week’s draw there are concerns that the Netherlands will be allocated their chosen facility at Sporting Kansas City, a high-performance centre used by US Soccer.

Glitzy draws, OJ-era chaos, grass laid over AstroTurf and a host nation that barely cared – the 1994 World Cup arrived amid suspicion and slapstick. Yet it became a watershed that would alter US sport and global football politics alike

“The United States was chosen,” the columnist George Vecsey wrote in the New York Times in 1994, “because of all the money to be made here, not because of any soccer prowess. Our country has been rented as a giant stadium and hotel and television studio.” Nobody could seriously doubt that. The USA had played in only two World Cups since the second world war and hadn’t had a national professional league for a decade. And that meant there was a great deal of skepticism from outsiders, even after Fifa made it clear there would be no wacky law changes to try to appeal to the domestic audience: Would anybody actually turn up to watch?

But there was also hostility in the United States. A piece in USA Today on the day of the draw told Americans they were right not to care about the World Cup, what it sneeringly described as the biggest sport in “Cameroon, Uruguay and Madagascar”. “Hating soccer,” wrote the columnist Tom Weir, “is more American than mom’s apple pie, driving a pickup or spending Saturday afternoon channel surfing with the remote control.”

Excerpted from The Power And The Glory by Jonathan Wilson, copyright © 2025 by Jonathan Wilson. Used with permission of Bold Type Books, an imprint of Basic Books Group, a division of Hachette Book Group, Inc.

Plus: players popping up randomly on TV, triple-doubles in names and which match featured the most Ballon d’Or winners?

• Mail us with your questions and answers

“While scanning the Champions League fixtures, I noticed that Pafos FC of Cyprus have a person’s face on their badge (Cypriot freedom fighter Evagoras Pallikarides),” writes Paul Savage. “Other than faces of legendary characters (Ajax), do any other badges have people on them?”

This was one of the more popular Knowledge questions of 2025. We received dozens of answers – thanks one and all – that referenced clubs all around the world. In no particular order, here they are.

In an exclusive interview, the former World Cup winner talks about taking Uzbekistan to the 2026 World Cup and a project close to his heart in Naples

Uzbekistan may have made history by qualifying for the World Cup for the first time in the country’s 34 years of independence in June after losing only once in 15 qualifiers. But they then had a problem: Timur Kapadze stepped down and they needed a head coach for next year’s tournament.

They turned to Fabio Cannavaro, Italy’s 2006 World Cup-winning captain and Ballon d’Or winner, who has had a rich and varied coaching career and was ready to take on the challenge of managing a nation still taking its first steps in international football.

• Egypt’s football body says Pride event would clash with values

• Iran raises objections to plans organised by local Seattle group

Egypt and Iran are calling on football’s governing body to intervene in the LGBTQ+ Pride celebration planned to coincide with their group stage match in Seattle at the 2026 World Cup.

Egypt’s Football Association (EFA) said on Tuesday it had sent a letter to Fifa urging them to prevent any LGBTQ+ Pride-related activities during the national team’s match against Iran next June.

Arsenal qualified for the Champions League knockout phase after a narrow but industrious victory at Meadow Park, with Beth Mead’s early finish enough to overcome Twente.

Arsenal are guaranteed to come inside the top 12 of the 18-team league phase and may still have a chance to reach the top four and go straight into the quarter-finals depending on results on Wednesday and if they can then win their last game in Belgium against Leuven next week.

In 2010 and 2022, the US faced heightened emotions from the lead-in to the tournament itself. As hosts next year, little will change

The draw is done. The schedule is set. For the US men’s national team, all that’s left, aside from playing the games, are the emotional highs and lows. After the draw, US head coach Mauricio Pochettino referenced a “competitive stress” factor triggered by the World Cup. He said the friendlies against Belgium and Portugal in March are intended to simulate that stress so that it doesn’t surprise his players when the spotlight of the World Cup arrives.

With the margins always thin at a World Cup, earning results that mitigate that pressure could prove to be the difference between the USMNT crashing out just when they capture the undivided attention of the nation, or enduring and soaring to a best-ever finish.

In an exclusive interview the younger Chawinga sister talks about missing her older sibling Tabitha, her hopes for Malawi and life at Kansas City Current

Kansas City Current’s Temwa Chawinga has doubled up as the NWSL’s top scorer and MVP for the second year in a row – only two years after Tabitha, her elder sister and mentor, was the Golden Boot winner with Internazionale in Italy’s Serie A Femminile. It is no exaggeration to describe the duo, from Malawi, as football’s equivalent of the Williams sisters, Venus and Serena.

“I hope Temwa and I get to meet them someday,” Tabitha says of the tennis legends. Now with French side OL Lyonnes, the 29-year-old insists that her younger sibling will have a more distinguished career despite setting an extremely high bar in the Swedish, Chinese and Italian leagues, in which Chawinga has won several Golden Boot and MVP awards.

The former England striker on stepping up to tackle racism, protecting his sons and Liverpool’s woes

Emile Heskey was about 14 years old when he was chased from Leicester City’s old Filbert Street stadium all the way into town by a man shouting racist abuse. He was a Leicester fan who had no idea he was abusing a player who would go on to help his club win promotion to the Premier League and two League Cups before a move to Liverpool for what, at the time, was the club’s record transfer fee.

“Fast forward three years that same guy would’ve been chanting my name in the stadium,” Heskey says now. “This is our reality.”

Son Heung-min was back at the club he served with such distinction for 10 years and the former Tottenham captain will perhaps conclude that finding meaning in much the new version of the Champions League has to offer before the knockout stages arrive is far from straightforward.

This was something of a non-event in terms of competitiveness, so much so that it would be a mistake to assume Tottenham are on their way to becoming a winning machine at home. They did not have to extend themselves to see off a moderate challenge from Slavia Prague and although Thomas Frank was pleased to send supporters away happy for the second time in four days he will know not to get carried away given this triumph came against opponents who looked as if they would have been better off in the Europa League.

• Bayern beat Sporting to move level with Arsenal at top

• Atlético come from behind to burst PSV’s bubble

Jules Koundé’s two quickfire headers helped Barcelona to fight back and edge past Eintracht Frankfurt 2-1 in the Champions League at Camp Nou on Tuesday, marking a much-needed win for the Catalan side.

After a draw against Club Brugge and a defeat by Chelsea, Barcelona found their stride to climb to 14th in the standings, level on 10 points with several teams, as they aim for a top-eight finish to secure direct qualification for the last 16. Frankfurt are 30th with four points from six matches.

There were no answers to Chelsea’s search for consistency here. Instead they supplied more evidence that they lack the resilience for a Champions League tilt that may now have to be tackled the hard way. This damaging late defeat completed a grim week on the road and had implications for the longer-term picture. They are staring down the barrel of a February playoff that could stretch Enzo Maresca’s side, active almost year-round, to the very limit.

Atalanta twice punished weak defending and, crucially, preyed on their opponents’ inability to overcome setbacks. It is a problem Chelsea cannot quite shrug off and, at this level, such recidivism comes at a cost. When Charles De Ketelaere, the game’s outstanding player, blasted in a deflected winner after being invited to take aim they could hardly claim not to have been warned.

• Complaint from FairSquare calls for investigation

• Infantino awarded Trump peace prize at World Cup draw

The Fifa president, Gianni Infantino, has been accused of breaching his organisation’s rules on political neutrality in relation to the US president, Donald Trump.

Infantino and Trump have formed a close bond in recent years, with the US one of the co-hosts for the men’s World Cup next year. Infantino even presented Trump with the inaugural Fifa peace prize at the World Cup draw in Washington DC last Friday.

• Lampard tells Coventry players to stay ‘level-headed’

• Boro win at Charlton; QPR move up to sixth

Frank Lampard insisted the title race was never over after his Coventry side were frustrated in a 1-1 draw at 10-man Preston as their Championship lead was reduced to five points.

After Andrew Hughes deflected Jack Rudoni’s shot into his own net, it seemed as if Coventry would bounce back strongly from their 3-0 defeat by Ipswich at the weekend.

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£69m forward happy he chose Newcastle before taking on Bayer Leverkusen in Champions League on Wednesday

As Nick Woltemade made his way out of Bayer Leverkusen’s media theatre on Tuesday night he noticed that a series of chairs had been dragged untidily out of position. Most footballers would simply have walked on by but the 6ft 6in Newcastle forward is a little different from the rest and he duly stopped and tucked them all back into position beneath a long desk.

Out on the pitch Woltemade’s highly-technical approach is nothing if not similarly neat and he has returned to his home country on a Champions League mission. Namely to show his compatriots that Eddie Howe has imbued his game with a dangerous new dimension. While the adhesive touches, deft flicks and clever link play that have always distinguished Woltemade’s performances remain, the Newcastle manager’s “physics” have enhanced the mix.

English manager says ‘it’s not the time to panic’ but Alsace club want a return on their €100m+ summer investment

By Get French Football News

As one of the few areas of France which celebrate Saint Nicholas Day, Alsace had festive processions and performances taking place across the region last Saturday. The travelling Strasbourg fans, though, were in no mood for a party on their way back from Toulouse after a third consecutive defeat.

“It’s not the time to panic,” Liam Rosenior insisted after his Strasbourg team failed to find a response to Emersonn’s early opener for Les Violets. “We have to stay consistent and keep working hard. I won’t change our style of play, because it’s brought us success.”

Manchester City show their resilience, Spurs eye the Champions League and Liverpool look to splash the cash

How much has Manchester City’s mentality evolved and strengthened? After they overcame a stubborn Leicester City side 3-0 on Sunday to claim a ninth straight win, it would appear the answer to that question is “significantly” compared to recent seasons, as they demonstrated a unity and a composure that has perhaps evaded many title hopefuls of old. December last year brought moments when Manchester City’s campaign began to unravel, through a combination of injuries and surprise defeats. On Sunday they looked like potential champions in the sense that they found a way to win what could very easily have become a frustrating game, against a back five in a low block. Andrée Jeglertz pointed to this professionalism and calmness at full time: “I’m very proud and pleased with the patience the players are showing, the trust, the belief. They are not starting to yell at each other, they just keep believing in each other and believing in what we are doing.” Tom Garry

HSV are back in the Bundesliga and remain a huge club even if they have adjusted expectations this season

Alexander Røssing-Lelesiit did not play for Hamburg in Sunday’s stellar win, and he will hope that his career has more decisive contributions than this one in store. As the final whistle went on a breathless Nordderby victory over Werder Bremen, the 18-year-old bobbed in front of the visitors’ bench and celebrated wildly, prompting some afters between the two squads in a game that bubbled excitedly without exploding into disorder.

Those from Bremen were less than impressed. Justin Njinmah, who had looked like saving a point for Werder when equalising at 2-2 less than 10 minutes after coming on as a substitute, named no names but complained that “some injured HSV players ran on to the field and thought they had to gesticulate and talk shit. That pisses me off. But I guess that’s part of a derby.”

Yes, this is a derby, and then some. Njinmah needed no reminding – he is from Hamburg after all – but there has been plenty of time to forget just how big this is. Sunday’s edition was the first top-flight Nordderby in 2,843 days, and it didn’t disappoint. If Werder’s goal to take the lead at the end of the first half, an ice-cold finish by Jens Stage, felt like it might have been transplanted from a different game, the blue touchpaper was really lit after the interval. Albert Sambi Lokonga levelled for Hamburg just after the hour, as the roof raised and the emotion started to flow.

Mohamed Salah’s row with Liverpool follows a long line of player-club spats – here are some of the most memorable

When players break dressing-room code by airing their grievances publicly, the result is almost always the same: a breakdown of trust and an unceremonious exit. After Mohamed Salah became the latest to express his dissatisfaction, we look at the others whose explosive comments sealed their fate.

Club legends in opposing dugouts, Turin giants as underdogs against the juggernaut Partenopei … it was a weird night at the Maradona

The man with the Napoli tattoo was met with hostile whistles on his return to the Stadio Maradona. Luciano Spalletti had the club’s emblem inked on to his arm, together with a Scudetto badge, after leading the Partenopei to their third Serie A title in 2023. The design made it appear as though someone had torn into his flesh, revealing his true essence, a connection more than just skin deep.

But then he accepted the manager’s job at Juventus. For many Napoli supporters this was the ultimate sin, joining the club they hate the most. From others there was a measure of understanding. Spalletti had been out of work for four months after being sacked by the Italian national team in the middle of an ailing World Cup qualifying campaign. The opportunity to succeed Igor Tudor in Turin at the end of October was a chance to get his career back on track.

Max Rushden is joined by Barry Glendenning, John Brewin and Seb Hutchinson to discuss Mohamed Salah’s explosive interview, Arsenal’s late defeat at Villa and the best of the weekend’s Premier League action

On today’s pod: Mohamed Salah goes nuclear after being left out at Elland Road, questioning his head coach, his role and seemingly everything around him, as Liverpool throw away another late lead in a chaotic 3-3 draw with Leeds. The panel discuss the fallout of Salah’s words and reflect on Liverpool’s dismal run of form.

Meanwhile, Arsenal slip up at Villa thanks to an injury-time scramble, while Rayan Cherki’s rabona (or rotunda) helps keep Manchester City in the title hunt. The panel discusses all the weekend’s action, including the battle for fourth, as Palace move up into the top four, Everton somehow rise to sixth, and Spurs finally win at home.

Plus: Brighton bans the Guardian from the Amex after a week of revelations, as John Brewin discusses not being at the game. Plus reflections on the World Cup draw, including England’s path, Scotland’s group of doom and Gianni and Trump’s unforgettable stagecraft.

• US drew Australia, Paraguay, Euro play-off team

• Pochettino: friendlies tell little about WC tests

• Manage wants ‘final’ mindset for every match

Mauricio Pochettino said that it is “neither an advantage nor a disadvantage” that the United States’ World Cup group consists of two – and perhaps three – teams that his team will have played in friendlies within a year or so before kickoff of their opening game.

The US were drawn with Australia, Paraguay and the winner of a European play-off involving Turkey, Romania, Kosovo and Slovakia. The US played Australia in a friendly in October, winning 2-1 in Commerce City, Colorado. They played Paraguay in another friendly in November – a game that marked Gio Reyna’s return to form with the national team in a 2-1 win. Turkey, should they make it through the play-off, would have a leg up on preparations, having beaten the US 2-1 in a pre-Gold Cup friendly in June 2025.

Inaugural prize expected to be handed to Donald Trump but ‘process’ for choosing future winners to be proposed by controversial tycoon’s committee

It was the timing that set off the first alarm bells. With Donald Trump brooding over missing out on the Nobel peace prize, and shortly before Gianni Infantino, the president of world football’s governing body, Fifa, was due to meet the US president in Miami, an announcement was made.

In a press release and a post on his personal Instagram account last month, Infantino said Fifa would launch its very own peace prize, to be awarded each year to “individuals who help unite people in peace through unwavering commitment and special actions”.

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.

England manager happy to ‘focus on what we can influence’ after a draw that will live long in the memory and not for the right reasons

At the end of an extraordinary day in the US capital and a World Cup draw that lurched between the ridiculous and the sublime (with a greater emphasis on the former, if the truth be told), Thomas Tuchel and England now know. Croatia in Toronto or Dallas. Ghana in Boston or Toronto. Panama in New Jersey or Philadelphia. And that is just the group games.

With the excitement running wild and, well, England being England, their determination to bring it home to the fore, it was not long before the permutations were being scrutinised. It could be Mexico at the Azteca in the last 16 – the scene of the Hand of God in 1986. It could be Brazil in Miami in the quarter-finals. Tuchel pulled a face as if to say: “Wow.” There had been a lot to process. And that is before we talk about the Honourable Donald J Trump and his Fifa peace prize glory.

Each nation’s World Cup is defined, for good or bad, by huge, indelible moments. With a favorable draw, the onus is now on the US to create them

Christian Pulisic vividly remembers watching it with his family. So does Tyler Adams, who saw it with his friends from soccer camp. Memories of Tim Howard catching an Algerian header in Pretoria, and hurling it upfield to ignite the counterattack that would lead to Landon Donovan’s instantly iconic goal. The goal that spared the United States men’s national team’s blushes at the 2010 World Cup, sneaking them out of the group stage at Algeria’s expense. One of the most iconic moments in US socer history.

Pulisic was a few months from turning 12. Adams had just turned 10. Matt Turner would be 16 the next day, and Howard’s heroics made him wonder if he ought to devote himself fully to becoming a goalkeeper.

Perhaps the data-soaked discourse of modern football actually does this Premier League centurion something of a disservice

Stack them up. Pile them high. Sort them and arrange them, parse them and categorise them, order them to your table like items in a Chinese restaurant. Personal favourites? Give me the No 33 against Arsenal, the one with the flowing hair. I’ll also take a No 81 against Chelsea, when he spots a hapless Robert Sánchez out of goal, and lobs him deliciously from the edge of the area.

Give me a No 98 against Bournemouth, in which he deliberately slants his run around the keeper, slots it in from a tight angle, tries to clamber atop the advertising hoardings in triumph, loses his balance, collapses in peals of giggles. And maybe chuck in a No 53 against Brentford, in which Kristoffer Ajer somehow manages to fall over without being touched, spooked into incoherence by his very presence.

Our cartoonist on the trouble at Anfield after Egyptian’s stinging response to being dropped by Arne Slot

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• And his latest book, Chaos in the Box: get it now

That he stayed after relegation in 1978 and lifted the FA Cup with the team still in Division Two typified his commitment

Some players embody a club but few have ever embodied their side more than Billy Bonds, who died on Sunday at the age of 79. He was not a one-club man but by the time he finally retired, at the age of 41, in 1988, he felt like one, having racked up a record 799 appearances for West Ham. Just as significantly, he had lifted the FA Cup twice as captain.

There was applause at the London Stadium on Sunday as a montage was shown on the big screens. It featured a number of spectacular long-range strikes because it’s easier to show somebody scoring goals than preventing them, and still harder to somehow sum up leadership.

For a man who insists football isn’t political, the Fifa boss is putting a lot of effort into courting the most divisive politician on Earth

Gianni Infantino was 18 years old the first time he ran for office. It was a presidential election at FC Brig-Glis, the local amateur football club in the small Swiss town where he grew up. Running against two older men, and with no discernible footballing record of his own, the little red-haired kid with freckles was, unsurprisingly, the rank outsider in the race.

But he had a vision. He had a ferocious work ethic, boundless enthusiasm, well-established networks in the town’s Italian immigrant community. And even at this tender age, he had a flair for an eye-catching scheme. To the shock of many veterans at the club, Infantino surged to victory: partly on the back of his pledge to attract new sponsors and revenue streams, and partly on something more tangible. Infantino promised that if he won, his mother Maria would wash all the players’ kits, every week, for as long as he was president.

Leaders wary of the topsy-turvy nature of a competitive fifth tier which is an obstacle course as well as a marathon

There is arguably no tougher feat in modern football than gaining automatic promotion from the National League. Even Wrexham, with all their Hollywood money, took three seasons to crack the code of the solitary automatic spot. There is an illustrious list of former Football League clubs queueing up at the summit of the fifth tier with an eye on the promised land, all upwardly mobile and thriving after battling through various crises. All but two– one up automatically, one through the playoffs – will end the season disappointed.

Rochdale believe they can be the chosen ones. Saved from liquidation last year by a £2m takeover by local family the Ogdens, the club are now thriving on the pitch under Jimmy McNulty and hoping for a return to the EFL, where they enjoyed a 102-year unbroken stay between 1921 and 2023.

Liverpool have dropped to 12th in the table – matching the lowest finish by reigning Premier League champions

By WhoScored

Six defeats in 12 top-flight games is not just a wobble. It’s one of the worst starts ever made by defending Premier League champions. The last team to begin their title defence this badly was Leicester City in 2016-17. They finished 12th that season – where Liverpool are now – with Claudio Ranieri sacked midway through the campaign. The same fate befell José Mourinho at Chelsea in the 2015-16 season. They started with seven defeats in 12 games, a collapse so severe that Mourinho was shown the door a week before Christmas. For Liverpool and Arne Slot, the warning signs could not be clearer.

The transformation from champions to chaos has been stark. Just six months ago, Slot was heralded as a record breaker, the man who had taken on the unenviable task of replacing club legend Jürgen Klopp and done it with apparent ease. Under his guidance, Liverpool clinched the title with four games to spare, an achievement only three other teams have managed. Slot became the third-youngest manager to win the Premier League, the fifth to win it in his first season in England and, most importantly, he brought the title to Anfield for just the second time in 35 years.

Handing the Egyptian a contract extension while also bringing about a new identity has backfired terribly

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There is perhaps nothing in a career as hard as the leaving of it. Unless something utterly remarkable happens, Mohamed Salah has played his last game for Liverpool. Left out of the starting lineup for each of the last three matches, he trained on Monday after his extraordinary post-match tirade following the 3-3 draw with Leeds but he has not been selected for the Champions League against Inter on Tuesday. He may or may not be with the team for Saturday’s game at Anfield against Brighton (“I don’t know if I am going to play or not but I am going to enjoy it,” he said). After that, he will be in Morocco for the Africa Cup of Nations with the Egypt national team and the transfer window will have opened by the time the tournament is over.

How has it come to this? Salah is one of Liverpool’s all-time greats. He lies behind only Ian Rush and Roger Hunt in their all-time goalscoring charts. Across all clubs, only Alan Shearer, Harry Kane and Wayne Rooney have scored more Premier League goals. He played a key role in two Premier League titles and a Champions League. He’s won the Premier League Golden Boot four times and been named player of the year three times by both his fellow players and soccer writers – including last year. He’s only 33 and there has been no obvious sign yet of him fading with age. This is not the end anybody would have wanted.

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Won’t somebody think of the journalists? Having been forced to rewrite their on-the-whistle match reports at the speed of light due to a late equaliser, the members of the Fourth Estate covering the six-goal thriller between Leeds and Liverpool were already in a bad mood. As they took in the post-match managerial press conferences, filed the last of their follow-up copy and packed away their laptops, they had no idea their misery was about to get worse. A profession that regularly decries the pointlessness of post-match “flash” interviews, they will have been further incensed to learn that for only the third occasion in his time at the club, Mohamed Salah had elected to stop to talk to a hopeful hack. The ensuing scorched earth soliloquy was delivered with a calm composure that belied its incendiary nature and anyone who squinted could actually see the soul of a nearby Liverpool media-handler ascend from his body as he eavesdropped with mounting horror on each passing rapier thrust.

I was sorry to read this but as I’m back from my little antipodean sojourn and have reclaimed my Amex season tickets I’m happy to file a report from Brighton’s home matches if necessary. However, there’s no real need as the story rarely changes; intricate passing football, 68% possession, the away team goes 1-0 up, Hürzeler gets a yellow card, on 80 minutes everyone in the East stand goes home, Brighton get a 94th-minute equaliser exquisitely curled in from 25 yards, final whistle. Save yourselves all the trouble” – Tony Crawford.

As a concerned Liverpool fan, I really hope the club are able to sort out the dilemma with their disgruntled Egyptian talisman before the European trip this week. If they don’t, they’re risking some major Salah situation iteration alliteration: Seriously sticky San Siro Slot-Salah standoff” – Peter Oh.

Congratulations to the franchise known as Inter Miami, which sensibly doesn’t have a ‘history’ section on its website given that it had never kicked a ball before 2020, for winning the Philip F Anschutz trophy, which has an even greater history, going back all the way to 2008. Looking at what the franchise refers to as its ‘roster’, they seem to have combined some of the greatest names in world football from 10-15 years ago, like Leo Messi, Jordi Alba and Luis Suárez, with some of the greatest names in world football, like Baltasar Rodríguez, Israel Boatwright and Maximiliano Falcón” – Noble Francis.

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Unbeaten in Europe and with eight wins in eight games domestically, the club are aiming high after name change

When the Olympique Lyonnais women’s team officially became OL Lyonnes on 19 May, they came with a new mantra: “New story, same legend”. The eight-time European champions, now owned by Michele Kang and part of Kynisca – a multi-club ownership group dedicated to women’s sports that also already includes the Washington Spirit – are a “new project” with the aim of “developing as a women’s club with our own model”. As Kang put it: “The women’s team cannot just be a little sister to the men’s section.”

The OL Lyonnes era kicked off on 7 September, coinciding with the Lyon’s 1,000th match in the French women’s top division, against Marseille. Kang was present, alongside Mikel Zubizarreta, Kynisca’s global sporting director, who was poached from Barcelona Femení last year. On the pitch, new recruits snatched from other European clubs this summer – Jule Brand, Lily Yohannes, Ashley Lawrence, Ingrid Engen, Korbin Shrader and Marie-Antoinette Katoto – discovered what it will be like to play at the Groupama Stadium, where the men’s team plays, for the entire season.

Sports Interactive has included the women’s game after its tireless effort of collating a comprehensive database

Within minutes I am in the deep end as the Arsenal manager before the start of the 2025-26 season, sizing up a transfer budget that does not match my ambitions for the club. I am immediately at odds with the board when I launch a rogue bid to sign Aitana Bonmatí, which is immediately rejected.

I manage to recruit Alex Greenwood to shore things up in the wake of Leah Williamson’s injury and my late bid for Patri Guijarro, who wants to be part of my project, falls through at the last minute with the budget once again the problem. I demand answers from the board as to why they will not release more funds when the player-in-question wants to join, pointing out that our scouting report says she’s a necessary replacement for Lia Wälti.

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With the Sky Sports Monday Night Football cameras rolling at Molineux, Wolves fans seized the additional publicity surrounding their latest inevitable loss to stage a protest against their club’s ownership. When the match against Manchester United kicked off, they massed on the concourse, a sea of old gold and black leaving the stands conspicuously empty for the opening 10 minutes. In a moment of seemingly cosmic irony – or perhaps a cruel act of counter-defiance – referee Michael Salisbury didn’t blow his final whistle until the clock had ticked over into the 10th minute of added time. By then, the game was long over as a contest and Wolves had succumbed to another defeat, a depressing staple of their season. Fans who stayed home and watched the broadcast will have seen the affable James Maddison tell David Jones and Jamie Carragher about enjoying “the little wins” (fathering twins, getting back on the grass and growing a ducktail mullet) during his recovery from serious knee-knack. They must have been wondering if they will ever get to see Wolves register a win again.

Please! No mo’ of the low Slot-Salah show from Peter Oh (yesterday’s Football Daily letters). All his alliteration gave me a pain in the assonance. We all know, though, it’s about the dough” – Justin Kavanagh.

Surprised how negative the English commentary is about Salah. Do I really have to listen to journos and old players rant on and on about team loyalty? Last year turned out to be the final year of Kloppball, not the first year of Slotball. If a manager can’t figure out how to get along with Salah, nor get his very expensive signings to perform in a way that justifies his mistreatment of the Egyptian, he’s not up to it” – Richard McGahey.

After all the much-deserved plaudits he’s received in recent weeks, a final doff of the cap to Martin O’Neill. He rejoined Celtic after they’d just lost to Hearts, by far the best team in the Scottish Premiership (I know, I know), and then signed off with a win, promptly before they had to play against, and inevitably lose to, Hearts again. As O’Neill clearly knows, the secret to great management, like comedy, is timing” – Noble Francis.

Back in those heady days when Trevor Francis and Chris Waddle graced Sheffield Wednesday with their presence, I was working for the club’s official sponsor (the amounts involved would make everyone laugh today). This gave me access – I’m not saying I’m proud about it – to tickets for the FA Cup semi-final between Wednesday and Sheffield United played at the grand old Wembley stadium. On the big day, we all forgot that both teams had fans working for the company until the Unitedites mixed among us jumped in the air to celebrate the first goal! Fighting was avoided, and the game ended better for Wednesday (perhaps Noble Francis was also there?), although we lost to Arsenal in both cup finals that year (and didn’t get into Europe!). Anyway, I was reminded about the experience a couple of days ago when my eldest son, Santander born and bred, went to watch Racing play away at Cádiz and could only get a ticket to sit with the home fans. With a certain amount of luck and perhaps even some help from the ref, Racing scored in the 93rd minute to win 3-2. And yet after the game, as my son and his friends walked back to their lodgings in their green, white and black scarves, no less than five Cádiz fans approached to CONGRATULATE THEM on the win!” – Matthew Kipwell.

Arsenal feel effects of defensive injuries, Liverpool rue Konaté’s mistakes and Brentford struggle on the road

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When the team sheets landed at Villa Park, Arsenal’s matchday squad again appeared imperious. Their bench included a £64m striker in Viktor Gyökeres, a trio of tricky wingers in Leandro Trossard, Noni Madueke and Gabriel Martinelli and arguably England’s most exciting teenagers in Myles Lewis-Skelly and Ethan Nwaneri. But Arsenal arrived top-heavy, the only centre-back among the substitutes the 16-year-old Marli Salmon. By the time Emiliano Buendía clinched victory for Aston Villa with almost the final kick, it was clear Arsenal lacked the defensive solidity behind their pace-setting start; this defeat was only the fourth time since the start of 2022-23 that Mikel Arteta’s side began a league game without Gabriel Magalhães or William Saliba – and it showed. Cristhian Mosquera, potentially sidelined until the new year, was also absent. The good news for all parties – which probably extends to second-placed Manchester City – is that Arsenal and Villa will duke it out again on 30 December in the reverse fixture. Ben Fisher

Max Rushden is joined by Barry Glendenning, Jonathan Wilson and Jacob Steinberg as Chelsea lose 3-1 away at Leeds, Sunderland earn a draw at Anfield and Arsenal secure another straightforward win

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On the podcast today: another almost perfect night for Arsenal as title rivals Chelsea lose away at Leeds. The big man and big man strike partnership could turn Daniel Farke’s fortunes around.

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

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