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For Xabi Alonso, the slide towards the abyss has looked sudden from the outside. Everything was fine at the beginning of November, the results excellent. Since when precious little has gone his way. The Real Madrid manager desperately needed something here. When this latest game eluded him, it was easy to fear the worst. Time is not a commodity afforded to men in his position.

Alonso has now won only twice in eight matches in all competitions and if his pain was deep, there was simply satisfaction for Pep Guardiola. The Manchester City manager had arrived in Madrid – the scene of so much emotion for him over the years – needing a response to the home defeat to Bayer Leverkusen in his club’s previous Champions League game.

This was an evening of milestones for Arsenal and Gabriel Martinelli, although there was no smile broader than Noni Madueke’s. The England forward was subjected to a ridiculous online petition that opposed his move across London from Chelsea in the summer. But on a rare appearance on the right flank as Bukayo Saka was given a welcome rest, Madueke scored a fantastic individual goal before adding a second after half-time to set up a comfortable victory for Mikel Arteta’s side.

It means Arsenal have become only the fifth English team to win their opening six matches of a Champions League or European Cup campaign and now need only a point to rubber stamp their progress directly to the last-16, even if in reality it is already a formality thanks to their superior goal difference.

Eighty-eight minutes had passed and Newcastle fans were already in party mode when Alejandro Grimaldo collected Ibrahim Maza’s pass and concluded a move he had initiated courtesy of a glorious run and dummy.

As the Spain left wing-back’s shot slid beneath Aaron Ramsdale’s body and his Bayer Leverkusen teammates celebrated an arguably deserved equaliser, North Rhine-Westphalia suddenly felt a much colder place for Eddie Howe’s players.

• Ajax win 4-2 at Qarabag; Juventus edge out Pafos

• Copenhagen stun Villarreal; Bodo/Glimt hold Dortmund

Benfica’s Richard Ríos scored one goal and set up another to seal a vital 2-0 victory over Napoli on Wednesday, boosting the Portuguese side’s hopes of reaching the Champions League knockout stage.

The result reignited Benfica’s European campaign, clinching a second consecutive win after a poor start and lifting them to six points and up to 25th place, just one point outside the playoff spots. Napoli slipped to 23rd on seven points.

Millie Bright had dismissed any suggestions that Chelsea were in crisis after a first league defeat in 34 games, and six goals in a comprehensive victory against Roma in their penultimate game of the Champions League group phase put those thoughts to bed.

An own goal broke the fight of Roma early on, with further goals by Wieke Kaptein, Johanna Rytting Kaneryd, Sjoeke Nüsken, Maika Hamano and Lucy Bronze.

Manchester United endured a second consecutive Champions League defeat as they were second best against the French giants OL Lyonnes, whose attacking midfielder Melchie Dumornay capped off a fine display with two sumptuous late goals.

Dumornay’s superb efforts produced a margin of victory that was no less than Lyonnes deserved, on a night when United failed to lay a glove on their opponents.

• Organisers confirm ‘Pride Match’ activities will take place

• Seattle to host Egypt v Iran in Group G next summer

Plans to celebrate LGBTQ+ rights and freedoms in Seattle during the World Cup next summer will continue despite objections from the Egyptian and Iranian football federations over the “Pride Match” due to take place in the city.

Seattle organisers have confirmed that they are “moving forward as planned” with Pride activities in the city when Egypt face Iran in Group G on 26 June. Rainbow flags will also be allowed into the stadium by Fifa.

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

• Curtis Jones insists squad is 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 forward could also be absent when Brighton visit Anfield on Saturday. He is due to report for Africa Cup of Nations duty with Egypt on Monday.

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While Chelsea didn’t completely torpedo their chances of finishing in the top eight of Bigger Cup group stage by losing against Atalanta, they performed a precise, surgical strike on their own chances of waltzing straight into the round of 16. Of course, the good news is that in the short one-year history of the new and not-necessarily-improved Bigger Cup, achieving a top-eight finish isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. The recently revamped competition’s first champion – Paris Saint-Germain – finished 15th in the “league phase” after Uefa jazzed things up, introducing what appears to be a Super League by stealth. And besides, if any club has sufficient personnel to deal with the added hassle of an extra playoff round, it’s surely the one with so many players on its books that their squad list has to be written on a toilet roll, with a librarian employed to keep track of all their loans.

Well, no wonder Wolves are in such a sad state (yesterday’s Football Daily). As any longtime reader of this email will know, the only good pre-match protests involve marching from a pub that the supporters planned to be at anyway, to the stadium that they were inevitably going to. Just showing up 10 minutes late? That’s how long it takes fans to get to their seats anyway” – Mike Wilner.

I see that Noble Francis not only got Tuesday’s letter o’ the day, but also a name check in Matthew Kipwell’s letter. On a night where both Sheffield teams (again) surrendered points after leading, I am led to ponder: with the two correspondents mentioned, plus Jon Millard, myself (occasionally) and, no doubt, others, could Sheffield be proving that the frequency of representation in your letters section is inversely proportional to the value of anything our teams are achieving on the field?” – Trevor Townson.

Before Sunday’s Wear–Tyne derby and inspired by Matthew’s experience, I recalled a trip to Roker Park for a derby between Sunderland and Newcastle. No Newcastle fans were allowed in, but a friend got me a ticket in the paddocks and, not wanting to miss out on a bit of history, I went along incognito. When Peter Beardsley equalised, one of the ‘luxury boxes’ erupted in delight. As the Sunderland fans worked themselves into an indignant frenzy trying to storm the boxes, one of them turned to me and said ‘It’s just ‘cos they’re rich. If there was a Mag in here right now, they’d rip him limb from limb.’ I’ve never been as emotionless, or terrified, at any game before or since!” – Ben Graham.

The past six months have proven difficult for West Brom supporters. The old regime had been consigned to history, clearing the way for better times. The new manager arrived with a track record that held the promise of a brighter future. Instead, season ticket holders are (still) unable to identify a philosophy or tactical approach. Knowledgeable football people are surprised by team selections and then dismayed by substitutions made during the game. The manager is a quietly spoken, dignified, courteous, calm man who wears a pained expression when asked to explain himself that belies a clear and obvious lack of confidence and authority. For a Labour voter, this is all too much” – David Royce.

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.

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.

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.

• Kansas City plan for US training base in doubt

• FA exploring alternative options on 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 the draw last week there are concerns that the Netherlands will be allocated their chosen facility at ­Sporting ­Kansas City, a ­high-performance centre used by US Soccer.

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.

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.

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.

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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 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.”

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

Max Rushden is joined by Barry Glendenning, Nicky Bandini and Lars Sivertsen as a Salah-less Liverpool win in Inter, Chelsea lose to Atalanta and Spurs beat Slavia Prague. On the podcast today: Liverpool win in Milan against Inter. They needed a result, any result – and they got it thanks to Alessandro Bastoni pulling Florian Wirtz’s shirt. Elsewhere, Chelsea lose in Bergamo – since we asked if anyone should start taking them seriously they’ve given us a categoric response. A second comfortable home win for Spurs in a few days – sounds odd to say that. It was only Slavia Prague, but again Xavi Simmons ran the show. Plus, Manchester United win 4-1 against Wolves, there’s some EFL and your questions answered.

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.

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.

Ever since the club’s very beginning, David Beckham and Jorge Mas have had moments like this Saturday in mind

Back on 27 February 2020, days before Inter Miami’s first-ever fixture in MLS, I stood next to the club’s managing owner, Jorge Mas, and co-owner David Beckham as part of an MLS press junket in New York City. I was there for Sports Illustrated and my show Planet Fútbol TV, which I co-hosted with my friend, the late, great Grant Wahl. We were adamant that the Inter Miami story was riveting, not just because of Beckham’s influence in MLS, but also because his new club was about to introduce the unique culture of Miami and south Florida – the Latin American capital of the world – to the league.

The conversation in 2020 was my second meeting with Mas and my first with Beckham. I remember the sense of excitement from both men, knowing that this Inter Miami project – seven years in the making before their debut in the league – was about to come to fruition after a long, arduous journey. From legal battles with Internazionale over the trademark of the word “Inter” to political and structural problems as they tried to make a stadium, Miami Freedom Park, a reality. Now, the club was finally starting life in MLS.

• 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.

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.

Friday’s ceremony in Washington DC was cringe-inducing and craven enough to make football fans nostalgic for the reign of Sepp Blatter

Well, that was awful, wasn’t it? Donald Trump’s heroic victory over a field of one to claim the inaugural Fifa peace prize, on-stage banter so dead it was already fossilized, Gianni Infantino doing crowd work, and Wayne Gretzky struggling through the pronunciation of “Macedonia” and “Curaçao” in the draw’s linguistic group of death: even with the benefit of a few days’ distance it’s impossible to overstate how impressively bad the draw for the 2026 World Cup, held last Friday at the Trump-purged Kennedy Center in Washington DC, was.

“This is America, so we have to put on a show!” roared Fifa president Infantino, resembling a Sphinx cat in a borrowed suit, at the beginning of the ceremony. And put on a show Fifa did – just not one that anyone wanted to watch, least of all a desperately bored-looking Trump, who sat through Andrea Bocelli’s Nessun Dorma with the granitic joylessness that has become his default expression at each of the sporting events he’s ruined with his presence this year. Just let the man get back to the White House; he’s the president of the United States, for god’s sake, he has bathrooms to redesign.

So long as the Premier League invests in its players and Fifa pays it lip service, the continent’s flagship tournament will always struggle to fit in

Perhaps attitudes are not quite as parochial as they once were, but it remains true that, in England at least, the Africa Cup of Nations is discussed less as a tournament in its own right than in terms of what it means for the Premier League.

There will be the usual harrumphing about why the tournament is played in the middle of our season, but the Confederation of African Football has tried to satisfy European clubs only to be thwarted by Fifa and the increasing demands of the calendar.

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.

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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.

Clashes between rival factions are the culmination of a long-running feud involving claims of racism

It should have been a night for Crystal Palace supporters to savour. About 1,500 officially made the trip to Strasbourg for their second away match of the Conference League group stage last week, although plenty more had gathered in the pretty Alsatian city famous for its expansive Christmas market.

Yet while most were enjoying being part of Palace’s first European campaign after May’s FA Cup win, “a tiny minority” – as the club’s statement the following day described them – had different ideas. Footage of bottles and chairs being thrown as two rival groups of supporters of the same club clashed before the game in one of the city’s squares went viral on X. “Palace fans fighting each other in Strasbourg,” read the message, not surprisingly sparking widespread confusion.

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.

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

• Latest Premier League table | Top scorers

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

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

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