Category: Football (Soccer)

Goals from Jack Rudoni, Sidiki Cherif, Ellis Simms and Stephen Mfuni – Cherif’s and Mfuni’s blinders – gave Coventry their first Premier League home win in 25 years

So where is our game? Coventry will want to use their wide attackers to get them up the pitch. Down their left in particular, I’d expect to see Dasilva and Mason-Clark ganging up on Miley, who isn’t a full-back, with Rudoni and Yirkenkyi making late runs to give them presence in the box. I also wonder if Cherif will look to run off Botman, who isn’t the quickest, with Thomas-Asante and Van Ewijk looking to supply him with crosses.

Email! “I say this is a perfect fixture,” writes Mary Waltz. “To get back to semi normal football. We have had a week to focus on the City problem but let’s get real. Whatever happens to them it will probably months before the lawyers get all their billable hours in and we don’t know what the final outcome will be. I for one am tired of speculating when it is pointless until the powers that be make up their minds. Let’s play ball.”

It’s not just that the club’s recent charges themselves are unprecedented – it’s the language used to describe them too

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The language of football is a fine and highly nuanced dialect. The majority of people involved in the game speak it with a high degree of sophistication. Minor deviations from the familiar, almost imperceptible to outsiders, can set off alarm bells: what’s really going on there? Why isn’t he happy? What’s she hinting at? But it’s an argot developed to talk about football, and when applied to other subjects, it can sound extremely jarring.

Erling Haaland is one of the brighter, more engaging players. There’s an appealing quirkiness to him that suggests he has a higher-than-usual level of self-awareness. He doesn’t mind stepping outside the norms, being a bit different. But consider his assessment of Manchester City’s 3-0 win at Liverpool on Sunday.

Manchester City unrepentant in victory, Spurs make progress of a sort and Noni Madueke meets the moment

The manner of Manchester City’s victory at Liverpool was an article of both vindication and vilification. Those gleefully wielding inflatable bananas in the Anfield away end could thumb their noses. Why not enjoy the dances of defiance until the music stops? The same went for City players, asked to perform under the darkest of clouds, able to focus, at last, on football, rather than legal argument and uncertain futures. Beyond City, the sight of a club found guilty of 100-plus charges laying waste to such rivals as Liverpool was deeply uncomfortable. The Premier League season and product are badly damaged until the matter is somehow resolved. What happened at Anfield should double the haste for a resolution. Chants of “cheat” whenever City players, the game already won, slipped the ball around, are bound to be repeated at other stadiums. Enzo Maresca has described his club’s plight as “noise” but his team’s victory did absolutely nothing to turn the volume down. John Brewin

Match report: Liverpool 0-3 Manchester City

Match report: Crystal Palace 3-1 Nottingham Forest

Match report: Hull City 2-2 Everton

Football felt secondary on the first weekend of action since club were found guilty of breaking financial rules

The Cimbri are heading menacingly south, but in Rome life goes on. The asteroid is definitely coming this way, but people go to work, eat, drink, plan as usual. The White Walkers are approaching the Wall, but the squabbles between the great houses go on. Everyone in the Premier League knows the crisis is approaching, thinks – hopes, fears? – it may be apocalyptic, but until it arrives, what can you do but carry on?

After any break, there’s always an awkward moment while everybody resets. What was the cliffhanger we left the soap opera on? What new plotline had just been seeded? This is one of the reasons international weeks are so disruptive. It’s not just that the Premier League story slows for a while, it’s that we are reminded that these entities are not eternal but alliances of convenience between paid employees who have a life outside the soap opera.

It is fair to say Oliver Glasner has had more enjoyable afternoons. The Nottingham Forest head coach arrived in south London dressed like a bouncer from All Bar One in a black bomber jacket, as if he was anticipating trouble, but was instead given a rapturous reception by the home fans who used to worship him.

The generosity towards their former manager seemed to have extended to Palace’s players as Dan Ndoye was handed a goal in the third minute. Pierre Sage’s side were awful in the opening 40 minutes. Yet Forest could not find a way to beat Walter Benítez again as Liam Delap missed a golden chance to extend their lead and the Argentina goalkeeper’s heroics inspired a thrilling comeback that secured Sage’s first home victory in the Premier League since taking over from Glasner in the summer.