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In 1934 and 1978, Fifa’s big event was given over to authoritarian aims. There’s no more doubt that 2026 will be the same

By 1934, it was entirely evident what Benito Mussolini was up to. Italy’s dictator had already consolidated power, colonized Libya and annexed the city of Rijeka. He nevertheless got to stage the second-ever World Cup, managing it with a heavy hand and even supplanting the Jules Rimet trophy with a far larger one. Hosting and winning that World Cup didn’t sate his expansionist appetites. By the end of decade, Mussolini would take Ethiopia, annex Albania and back Francisco Franco in the Spanish civil war.

It was equally well established in 1978 in Argentina that General Jorge Rafaél Videla’s military junta, which had taken over two years earlier, was maintaining its grip on power through systematic detention, torture and murder. Still, protestations from other nations were ignored and the World Cup kicked off.

Leander Schaerlaeckens’ book on the United States men’s national soccer team, The Long Game, is out on May 12. You can preorder it here. He teaches at Marist University.

• A league champion with Leeds, midfielder won 59 caps

• As Wales manager just missed out on 1994 World Cup

Terry Yorath, the former Wales captain and manager, has died at the age of 75 following a short illness.

As part of Don Revie’s formidable Leeds team in the 1970s, the midfielder whose life would later be deeply affected by personal tragedy became the first Welshman to play in a European Cup final. Although the Yorkshire club lost that final to Bayern Munich, Yorath was an influential, combative, mainstay of the 1974 first division champions.

Coote, 43, had previously pleaded guilty to making an indecent moving image of a child

The former Premier League referee David Coote has been given a suspended sentence after he was found to have a sexual video of a 15-year-old boy in school uniform on his laptop.

Judge Shant said Coote, 43, had a “spectacular fall from grace” after police charged him with making a category A video, the most serious kind, of a 15-year-old schoolboy. The charge refers to activities such as downloading, sharing or saving photos or videos containing abuse.

‘She has everything to be a world-class striker – fast, two great feet, good with the head and strong,’ says the coach who set the forward’s career rolling

Since they were promoted to the Women’s Super League in 2019, no Manchester United player has managed to score more than 10 league goals in a single season. In Lea Schüller they have signed someone who has surpassed that mark seven seasons in a row in Germany’s Frauen Bundesliga, so it is easy to understand why United are so enamoured with their new striker.

With a formidable 54 goals in 82 internationals, the Germany forward arrives at Carrington with a prolific record and the match-winner profile the club have been craving. At 28 years old she could spend the best years of her career at United, where she has signed a contract until June 2029.

Supporters serenaded Solskjær, Carrick and Fletcher among others at Burnley and staged a brief anti-Ratcliffe protest

“Jim can’t fix this,” the sign said. Bright red letters nestled on a white background, a stark contrast in an away end at Turf Moor full of dark-coated figures in front of which they were held aloft. It was small, a couple of square metres of material, maybe. But the message to Sir Jim Ratcliffe was powerful. Remember your lane, Jim? Yeah, stick in it, pal.

As Darren Fletcher, in Manchester United blazer and red tie, strolled along the touchline, flanked by tracksuited his former teammate and friend Jonny Evans, the flag flew. And then it was gone. The protest was done.

On Saturday, Jonathan David’s lazy penalty cost Juventus a win. By Tuesday, he was the best player on the pitch

Four years have passed since Andrea Agnelli, still the chairman of the European Club Association and president of Juventus back then, floated the idea of selling 15-minute viewing subscriptions for football games. A response to research showing that younger generations – “tomorrow’s spenders” – had shorter attention spans.

Agnelli’s judgement has been called into question a few times since, between the failed launch of a European Super League and his suspension from Italian football following an investigation into financial irregularities at Juventus. But perhaps he was right about the need to serve modern audiences a faster fix of sporting theatre.

• Reference to ‘lies’ deleted from his social media post

• ‘It should be other people coming out to speak,’ he writes

Cristian Romero has taken an apparent swipe at Tottenham’s board for staying silent amid the team’s struggles. The captain posted a strongly worded message after Wednesday’s 3-2 defeat at Bournemouth that initially appeared to accuse the hierarchy of telling “lies” before being edited to remove that incendiary reference.

What remained on Romero’s Instagram post, though, was what an apparent call for the Spurs directors to speak up. The players were again subjected to abuse by some of their fans after a latest loss that leaves Tottenham with five points from their past six matches, three of which have ended in defeat.

• League One club asked for greater share of gate receipts

• Manchester City not changing their standard club policy

Manchester City will not offer Exeter extra money from Saturday’s third-round FA Cup tie. The financially troubled League One club this week revealed they had asked the Premier League club for a greater proportion of the gate receipts as a “statement of solidarity”.

Exeter, whose supporters’ trust is the club’s majority shareholder, will take 8,000 fans to a sold-out Etihad Stadium to face the seven-time FA Cup winners. Each club gets 45% of gate receipts, with the other 10% taken by the Football Association, in line with competition rules. It is estimated ticket sales will generate between £250,000 and £400,000 for Exeter.

Today’s rumours are riding the District line

Antoine Semenyo’s farewell goal for Bournemouth, before his move to Manchester City, sets off a chain reaction over who succeeds him. Ethan Nwaneri, who has struggled for game time at Arsenal, is wanted by a few suitors.

Bournemouth are very interested in a loan move for someone who was the next big thing not too long ago. And still can be, though the word is he still wishes to stay a Gunner and play his part in a title-winning team.

Tottenham totem shone under Bill Nicholson’s tough love, inspiring League and Uefa Cup triumphs, but struggled with the stresses of fame

The Martin Chivers route from record signing to Tottenham legend was anything but simple. White Hart Lane needed time to learn to love him and Bill Nicholson, who paid Southampton £125,000 in 1968, never understood either the player or the man until years later. Yet it says everything for the curative power of time that the pair walked out arm-in-arm when it came to Billy Nick’s second testimonial against Fiorentina in 2001.

Chivers arrived at Spurs with a headline-grabbing century-plus goals for Southampton. Initially he appeared weighed-down by the fee and the expectation. This was a time when English football was only slowly coming to terms with a “new football” which was abandoning the archetypal battering-ram centre-forward expected to be toe-to-toe with an equally robust centre-half. Chivers stood 6ft 1in yet a firm touch and game intelligence enhanced a deceptive physical strength and eventually contributed to his “Rolls-Royce” aura.

• He was admitted to hospital with abdominal symptoms

• Keegan, 74, ‘grateful for intervention and ongoing care’

The former England manager Kevin Keegan has been diagnosed with cancer.

Keegan, who also played for England, Scunthorpe, Liverpool, Hamburg, Southampton and Newcastle before later managing Newcastle (twice) as well as Fulham, Manchester City and the national side, was recently admitted to hospital for evaluation of ongoing abdominal symptoms.

All the latest Premier League, La Liga, Bundesliga, Ligue 1 and Serie A deals and a club-by-club guide

• Women’s transfer interactive – all the January deals

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

• Men’s transfer interactive – all the January deals

• WSL2 side beat off competition for winger’s signature

• She started career at City and has been on loan at Everton

The England winger Katie Robinson is poised to complete a shock move from Aston Villa to Bristol City, the Guardian understands, as the Women’s Super League 2 club make a significant signal of their ambition.

The 23-year-old, who made her England debut in 2022, has – according to sources – completed a medical to return to the club where she started her career before establishing herself at Brighton. Robinson has five caps and was the youngest member of England’s squad at the 2023 World Cup, where they reached the final. Bristol City have fought off competition for her signature.

Few things in life can be more awkward than sitting next to your new boss while 3,000 malcontents bellow abuse at him. On the bright side, at least this was a crash course in the modern Chelsea for Liam Rosenior.

The new head coach saw poor defending undermine flashes of defiance, witnessed his erratic side collect their eighth red card of the season, and heard the away end at Craven Cottage spend much of the second half aim mutinous chants in the direction of Behdad Eghbali, the club’s co-controlling owner.

Pep Guardiola believes team spirit will help Manchester City get through a difficult period, but more than camaraderie alone will be required on this evidence. City endured a third consecutive draw to leave the leaders Arsenal, who have a game in hand, five points ahead and currently without a title challenger.

An Erling Haaland penalty gave City a platform they were unable to build on, failing to convert a plethora of chances in the second half. City let Brighton come back into the match and deservedly depart with a point thanks to Kaoru Mitoma.

Tactical anarchy reigned supreme on a night of chaotic, bewildering, thrilling drama played out amid freezing conditions.

Not that the on-pitch temperature ever seemed to drop below boiling point as a renascent Leeds led three times yet departed with their seven‑match unbeaten run at an end and Yorkshire hearts broken by Harvey Barnes’s stoppage -time winner.

In this winter of managerial discontent, Keith Andrews and Régis Le Bris are proving capable frontmen for stable, carefully structured football operations. The Irishman’s exemplary rookie season as a head coach continued with Brentford’s commanding win against Le Bris’s Sunderland. The visitors’ west London trip will undoubtedly be remembered for Enzo Le Fée’s failed attempt to dupe Caoimhín Kelleher from the penalty spot. Within minutes of that, the finishing of Igor Thiago took the game beyond reach.

Aside from their goalless New Year’s Day reunion with Thomas Frank, Brentford have been turning on the style. Bees fans dream of European travel next season. “I know I’m out here, the one speaking all the time, and the face, but it’s not all about me,” Andrews said. “It’s about the people that we have in the club, the talented individuals, staff, players and how hard we’ve worked – and how much we’ve stuck together because at different football clubs, I think I may well have struggled.”

Even with Aston Villa enjoying their best season for years, Unai Emery cannot get one over Oliver Glasner. The Crystal Palace manager has been struggling with a threadbare squad that still has not recorded a victory for several weeks but stretched his unbeaten record against Emery to seven matches after a game which both sides felt they could have won.

A late Victor Lindelöf header that struck a post was the closest anyone came in the end as neither Adam Wharton nor Morgan Rogers could quite inspire their sides to victory in front of the England manager, Thomas Tuchel, watching on in the stands. But despite losing Emiliano Martínez to injury at half-time, it was Villa who ended the evening more frustrated as they missed an opportunity to move into second place in the table despite bombarding the Palace goal in the final 10 minutes.

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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The Frenchman, who has been named the best male footballer in the world by the Guardian, has benefitted from PSG’s focus on the team rather than individuals

What makes a good player great, and a great player the best? This question has been occupying me since 2014, when the Guardian first asked me to contribute to its inaugural Next Generation feature. My job was to look for a France-based talent born in 1997 who could go on to have a stellar career.

After a great deal of research, I narrowed it down from my shortlist of five by asking questions not about the players’ football ability, but about other attributes: resilience, adaptability, decision-making, creativity, work ethic, response to feedback and willingness to learn. Qualities we cannot see, and are harder to measure.

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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The margin may have got smaller but the brilliant Spanish midfielder makes it a hat-trick of No 1 finishes

They say the best things come in threes, and Aitana Bonmatí has written herself into the Guardian’s top 100 history as the first player to finish at the top of the tree for a third consecutive year.

Last year the majestic midfielder emulated her Barcelona and Spain teammate Alexia Putellas by winning for a second year running, but the 27-year-old has now gone one better, establishing herself once again at the top of the women’s game.

Max Rushden is joined by Barry Glendenning, Lars Sivertsen and Jonathan Liew as Manchester City draw their third game in a row and Manchester United slip up at Burnley too

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Seven of the eight nations have won the tournament before while Mali take on the role of stubborn outsiders

A comfortable 3-0 victory for the defending champions, Côte d’Ivoire, over Burkina Faso on Tuesday evening completes the highest-powered set of quarter-finalists the Cup of Nations has ever known. Seven of the last eight are former champions; between them they have won 22 Cups of Nations. It is the first time all eight quarter-finalists are in the top 10 African sides in the Fifa rankings.

It’s been a strangely predictable tournament so far, at least after Ghana failed to qualify; the nearest to a surprise in the last 16 was Mali’s win over Tunisia and Cameroon’s victory over South Africa. After the lengthy preamble in a format lacking in jeopardy, the tournament needs the giants to deliver the appropriate payoff.

Tottenham and England footballer instrumental in helping Spurs to Uefa Cup and League Cup glory in the 1970s

The footballer Martin Chivers, who has died aged 80, made his name as a forward for Tottenham Hotspur and England during the early 1970s. Instrumental in helping Spurs to a Uefa Cup final win and two victories in the League Cup, he experienced rather less glory on the international stage, despite a fine ratio of 13 goals in 24 appearances, mainly because England failed to qualify for the World Cup during his time with them.

At 6ft 1in (1.85 metres) and 13st (82kg), with natural strength, a significant turn of foot, smooth in his movement and excellent in the air, Chivers was a superb finisher whose ratio for Spurs was also impressive, at not far off a goal every other game. He lies fourth on the club’s all-time list of scorers behind Harry Kane, Jimmy Greaves and Bobby Smith, with 174 in 367 matches.

Leader of resurgent WSL side on what he demands of players, his relationship with the hierarchy and the change that has surprised him

Tottenham have as many points in the Women’s Super League this term, at the halfway stage, as they accumulated in the entirety of last season. That sentence will offer some satisfaction to their supporters but the head coach, Martin Ho, demonstrates how serious his intentions are when he says: “We’re not even 15% of the way to where I want us to be.”

Ho, appointed in July, uses a specific word four times across the course of the conversation: “Standards.” The former Manchester United assistant coach inherited a team that had finished second from bottom and has Spurs two points off a European place, but he wants them to challenge themselves further.

The 41-year-old is at home with young players and, crucially, he is familiar with the demands of Chelsea’s owners

By Get French Football News

Liam Rosenior looks up at the towering Strasbourg Kop. He shouts and pleads as he points to his players, demanding the fans applaud them. Met with hostility, boos and jeers in the stands, he cuts a lone figure, one at pains to sow unity at a divided club. Strasbourg had just won the game, beating Le Havre 1-0 earlier this season, but the club’s fans were in no mood to celebrate.

Behind an image are a thousand words, or three banners in this case. One called for the club president Marc Keller to leave Strasbourg; another criticised the bizarre Ishé Samuels-Smith back-and-forth transfer; and the one to which Rosenior took particular exception concerned his captain, Emmanuel Emegha. It read: “Emegha, pawn of BlueCo, after changing shirts, hand back your armband.” Emegha had agreed a deal to join Chelsea a few days earlier, once again confirming to Strasbourg fans that they were subservient to “big brother” Chelsea in the multi-club hierarchy.

In Manchester United’s brave new world coaches are more like Deliveroo drivers: not really responsible for the food, but still to blame if it arrives cold

Turns out he could survive losing against Grimsby. Survive losing a crucial European final against one of the worst Tottenham teams in living memory. He could survive losing at home against West Ham and Wolves, finishing 15th, the tactical inflexibility, laying waste to some of the club’s best homegrown talent, the 32% win rate, calling his team the worst in Manchester United history. But there was one adversary with whom Ruben Amorim would not be allowed to dance. You come at Jason Wilcox, and you best not miss.

Unfortunately, like many a Premiership right-back in Blackburn’s title-winning 1994‑95 season, Amorim came at Jason Wilcox and appears to have missed. Even the most distracted of readers will notice the irony here: a coach who often railed at his players for losing one-on-one duels crumbling in the face of the white heat and animal charisma of one of the Premier League’s most feared sporting directors.

CFG have ditched Mumbai City and losing the glamour will hurt the game in the world’s most populated nation

The world’s biggest multiclub network shrank from 13 to 12 in the last week of 2025 but few blame the City Football Group for walking away from Mumbai City and India after six years. The reason for divesting their shares which gave them 65% ownership was addressed, not that anyone needed enlightening in a statement. “CFG has made this decision after a comprehensive commercial review and in light of the ongoing uncertainty surrounding the future of the Indian Super League (ISL).”

Uncertainty is an underestimation. The 2025-26 ISL season was supposed to kick off in September. However, with a 15-year Masters Right Agreement between the All India Football Federation (AIFF) and its commercial partner ending in December and no new agreement or partner in place, it never started. Most assumed that it would be a short-lived delay but here we are, in 2026, and there is still no football. A meeting took place in Delhi on Tuesday and produced a start date of 14 February, just six weeks short of a year since Mumbai’s last ISL game. How it works, if it works, remains to be seen.

Paris FC put up a good fight at the Parc des Princes on Sunday but this derby does not yet feel like a rivalry

By Get French Football News

The first of two Paris derbies in the space of eight days gave Paris Saint-Germain a chance to make a statement against their upstart neighbours. The tifo display in the Parc des Princes – which read “Paris c’est nous” – could be read as both a nod to the clubs’ shared history and a reminder of the one-sided nature of the derby.

For a few years, they were the same club. Paris Saint-Germain are the result of a merger between Stade Saint-Germain and Paris FC in 1970, which the latter split from a few years later. PSG were soon winning trophies but Paris FC went through decades of obscurity before emerging as Ligue 2 regulars in the years before they were taken over by the Arnault family and Red Bull.

• Wicky is the fifth permanent head coach in team history

• Swiss arrives after stints with Chicago and Young Boys

Sporting Kansas City named Raphaël Wicky as the fifth permanent head coach in franchise history on Monday.

Wicky, 48, coached the Chicago Fire from 2020-21 before managing BSC Young Boys in his native Switzerland from 2022-24. He signed a contract through the 2027-28 MLS season with an option for the 2028-29 campaign.

• Last 16: Morocco 1-0 Tanzania (Brahim 64)

• Cameroon await in last eight after beating South Africa

Brahim Díaz scored his fourth goal for Morocco at the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations to put the hosts into the quarter-finals with a nervous 1-0 victory over Tanzania in Rabat.

Morocco dominated possession but Tanzania had opportunities to cause a huge shock, and it took a fine strike from Brahim to book a place in the last eight.

Our cartoonist reflects on what Socceroos, Matildas and A-League fans are crossing their fingers for this year

Price tag for winger’s move to Manchester City would make headlines in any other country but not in England

Antoine Semenyo, it seems likely, will soon join Manchester City from Bournemouth for a fee of £65m. Given how well Rayan Cherki and Phil Foden have played from the right this season, it is not immediately obvious why City need him, but the modern game is the modern game, the rammed calendar makes large and flexible squads essential and Pep Guardiola may have some esoteric plan for the Ghanaian anyway. But perhaps what is most striking about the deal is the fee – or, more precisely, how little attention it has drawn.

English football has become inured to big transfers. The fee feels about right. Semenyo is 25. He has four and a half years left on his contract. He is quick, skilful, intelligent and works hard. He is disciplined, but has the capacity to do the unexpected. Of course a player of his ability costs that much. Yet £65m would make him the third-most expensive player in Bundesliga history. He would be the seventh-most expensive in Serie A history, the 14th-most expensive in La Liga history. Only nine non-English clubs have paid a fee higher than that. Even in Premier League terms, Semenyo sneaks into the top 25.

Coach stopped toeing the line at Stamford Bridge with one eye on the Manchester City job, frustrating his employers

It was late on New Year’s Eve when Chelsea’s patience ran out. They knew that Enzo Maresca was attempting to engineer an exit from the club and now they were ready to call his bluff. Midnight was approaching and the fireworks at Stamford Bridge were about to erupt.

A baffling story soon had a familiar, predictable ending. Maresca, who is not the first manager to run out of friends at Chelsea, had taken the provocations too far. There was surprise when he told staff that he did not want to conduct his post-match press conference after the disappointing 2-2 draw with Bournemouth on Tuesday night. The official explanation was that Maresca was too unwell to talk in public, despite having just spent the evening coaching on the Stamford Bridge touchline, but the friction was palpable and it was never going to sit well with the Chelsea hierarchy when it took less than 24 hours for reports to emerge that the sickness line was a red herring and their head coach had actually decided not to meet the media because he needed time to consider his options. It was further confirmation that this was someone who wanted to be sacked. Maresca dared Chelsea to act and will have been the least surprised person in the world to find himself unemployed less than a day into 2026.

Football provided direction, belonging, purpose and validation. Letting go of that has meant confronting the void left behind

Accepting retirement from professional football has felt like stepping into a landscape shaped by loss and uncertainty. Even when the decision is rational, even when the body is signalling that it’s time, there is something profoundly emotional about acknowledging that an era of your life has ended.

To me, it felt very much like grief. The shock, sadness, anger, confusion and numbness mirror the emotional responses that accompany any major loss I’ve experienced. But instead of mourning the loss of a loved one, you are mourning the loss of a part of you – a big part. For years football provided direction, belonging, inspiration, purpose and validation. A sense of being part of something bigger.

Set pieces on the rise, fans transformed to customers and conspiracies seen in every decision – is football losing its fun?

English football has always mirrored the passions, conflicts, identities and inequalities of the age. After the golden 1960s, the decay of the 1970s and ensuing disasters of the 1980s came the cap-sleeved, rebounding self-confidence of the 1990s. The 21st century so far has taken in globalisation and wanton commercialism. After that rabid, often reckless push for continued growth, society and the game alight on the uncertainties that encapsulated 2025.

To catch the 20 Premier League clubs in live action this season, and this writer completed the full set on Tuesday witnessing Arsenal’s second-half demolition of Aston Villa, has been a study in that uncertainty. From the grumbling of fans, to the ever-fragile egos of managers, to players slugging through the gristle of 90 minutes of hard-pressing slog, a leading question comes to mind: is anyone actually still enjoying this?

Our cartoonist looks back at the big stories and memorable moments as we wave farewell to another year in football

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The man widely expected to be the next Chelsea head coach once opined on a wide variety of topics in his Guardian column

Coaching may be Liam Rosenior’s forte but, during his days as a Brighton defender, the man widely expected to be Chelsea’s new manager was also a pretty useful Guardian columnist. His eagerly awaited dispatches were invariably packed with thought‑provoking opinions on an assortment of topics, ranging from dead balls to Donald Trump. Below are excerpts from a cross-section of Rosenior’s thoughts during his three years with us, alongside a sense of what they tell us about the 41‑year‑old and how he could carry out his duties at Stamford Bridge. It is important to remember, of course, that Rosenior’s views may have changed in the intervening period.

England defender publicly confronted racist abuse at the Euros and ended 2025 a title winner with club and country

The Guardian Footballer of the Year is an award given to a player who has done something remarkable, whether by overcoming adversity, helping others or setting a sporting example by acting with exceptional honesty.

Jess Carter has spent her life grappling with when to hold back and when to speak up; wrestling with being naturally herself, embodying the characteristics her parents instilled in her of being open, honest, vocal and confident, and subduing herself because, while society values those traits, in a black woman they can be viewed negatively.

With the club game hurtling along a Premier League-trodden path, women’s football is at a crossroads

Where will women’s football in England be in a decade’s time? How can we possibly begin to imagine the scale of the interest, attendances and participation then? How will the game on the pitch have developed, with each generation training and playing in better and better environments and at younger ages? It’s near impossible to make even educated guesses.

Women’s football in England is at a crossroads. The Women’s Super League and Women’s Super League 2 are now run independently of the Football Association, leading to increased outside investment, the rise of multi-club ownership groups, and the million-pound transfer barrier being broken twice in one summer. Minimum standards in the WSL and WSL2 have also been extended or raised and, while there is always talk of maintaining the connection between players and supporters, the women’s game is hurtling along a Premier League-trodden path at a fierce pace.

We look at 10 players likely to create headlines next month, including the ‘new Kevin De Bruyne’

• Men’s transfer interactive: January 2026 edition

While Semenyo would doubtless prefer to be in Morocco at the moment, one of the advantages to Ghana’s failure to qualify for the Africa Cup of Nations has been that the 25-year-old is in the same country as all the clubs who have expressed an interest in signing him. With a contract at Bournemouth containing a £65m release clause that becomes active for the first two weeks of January, Manchester City appear to have won the race for the player who has scored 20 Premier League goals since the start of last season. Chelsea and Tottenham have now moved on to other targets but could Liverpool or Manchester United attempt to steal a late march on their rivals? They need to get a move on if so.

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While precisely nobody else thought to say so at the time, when those West Ham fans who were howling for the head of Tin Pot-winning saviour David Moyes two years ago, Football Daily wondered if – whisper it – they should be careful what they wished for. While the turgid meat-and-potatoes fare served up by Moyes’s Irons was undeniably unpleasant on the eye, arguably the sole benefit of the club’s relocation to the London Stadium was that those fans were now seated in a different postcode from the pitch, meaning they couldn’t actually see what was happening anyway.

The year 2026 isn’t even a week old and already it has torpedoed the Premier League ambitions of Ruben Amorim and Enzo Maresca. And, as if his first name wasn’t a big enough clue, Nancy joined the long list of things in Glasgow that are taken away after being deep fried at Celtic. On top of that, poor Gianni Infantino will have to create a new Fifa award celebrating armed exploration for South American oil. Roll on February” – Mark McFadden.

Re: yesterday’s Football Daily. I’m probably missing some clever point about football financing here, but why on earth would Chelsea give Liam Rosenior a contract to 2032? Including interim managers/coaches/whatever else they insist on calling themselves (because, let’s face it, who knows who’s actually interim, and who isn’t, any more), Chelsea have had eight different managers in the previous seven years. Surely they are just setting themselves up for a massive payout when they change managers again in (statistically) no more than 12 months’ time?” – Phil Taverner.

No idea how many (mainly Scottish) pedants will point out that Noble Francis’s claim – that Celtic ‘don’t have to play Hearts again [this season], obviously’ (yesterday’s Football Daily letters) – is false. Because, in fact, Celtic have to play Hearts again in the league at least once (scheduled for 25 January). In addition, since both Hearts and Celtic are almost certain to be in the top half of the Premiership after the split at 33 games, then probably Celtic still have to play Hearts again twice in the current league season. Also, they could end up playing each other at some point in the Scottish Cup” – Dylan Drummond (and 1,056 other mainly Scottish pedants).

This is an extract from our daily football email … Football Daily. To get the full version, just visit this page and follow the instructions.

Once they seemed an unstoppable force but a huge gap between the Nordic leagues and Europe’s elite has emerged in the past 20 years

For a brief period in the early 2000s, Scandinavian clubs seemed unstoppable in European women’s football. Umeå lifted the Uefa Women’s Cup in 2003 and again in 2004, using a blend of technical skill and tactical intelligence. The Swedish side were a powerhouse and attracted top talent from around the world, including Marta, widely regarded as the greatest ever female player.

That dominance feels very distant. In 2025, a Norwegian, Swedish or Danish club winning the Women’s Champions League is almost unthinkable. Vålerenga were the only Scandinavian team to reach the Champions League league stage this season and they did not qualify for the knockout phase.

The head coach (or should that be manager?) fired cryptic shots at his Old Trafford bosses, then was fired himself

• Amorim sacked after power struggle over transfers

Discontent at Manchester United these days is only ever deferred. Ruben Amorim’s departure from the club on Monday was long anticipated and came, in the end, with a weary sigh. He had made a half-hearted protest about the recruitment structure after Sunday’s draw at Leeds, but it felt even at the time like barely more than a gesture. And so another manager, the seventh since Sir Alex Ferguson left in 2013, falls victim to the United meat-grinder.

Everybody at United, fundamentally, is unhappy. And not unhappy in the sense that Alex Ferguson used to be unhappy, when the club was essentially fuelled by his volcanic rages, but enervated, frustrated by the realisation that this is not how things used to be, that this was once the biggest football club in the country and now they keep failing to get the win they need to lift them to fifth.

Max Rushden is joined by Barry Glendenning, Lars Sivertsen and Jonathan Liew as Manchester City draw their third game in a row and Manchester United slip up at Burnley too

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On the podcast today: a seven-goal thriller at St James’ Park. Heading into injury time, Leeds led 3-2 and the opening question on today’s podcast looked like it would have been about Eddie Howe’s future.

Plus: goals (not) on film and was Liverpool’s substitution chain at Spurs the longest in football?

• Mail us with your questions and answers

“After St Mirren beat Celtic in the Scottish League Cup, I wondered where it actually is,” writes Dan J. “The answer is (as everyone bar me knew) Paisley, right next to Glasgow airport. Which got me wondering, which team is closest to an airport? I reckon Glentoran, next to Belfast City, and Eastleigh, virtually in Southampton airport, are in with a shout. And Charlton if you are happy to swim part of the way. Any closer ones?”

We had so many answers to this question, so thank you to one and all. Let’s start with a ground that is but a thunderclap away from the nearest airport. “The Icelandic football club Valur is near Rekjavík airport, which is mostly a domestic airport, but also has some international flights,” writes Kári Tulinius. “The distance from the fence around the airport to Valur’s fence is about 150 metres. From training pitch to the nearest piece of airport tarmac is 230m, and from corner flag to the end of the runway is 380m. All of these distances were measured with Google Maps.”

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

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