Time to wrap it up. The love-in of the day was Klopp and Guardiola, waxing lyrical about each other. The quote of the day was Pep on Trent: “Alexander-Arnold is like an exhibition”. The stat of the day was the one about total league points over the past four seasons: Man City top with 338, Liverpool second with 337, Chelsea a distant third with 264. One more incentive for Liverpool to knock the champions off their perch on Sunday.
Do keep an eye on the match previews, where Everton-Man U has just landed. Thanks for your company and I’ll be back soon with the first Premier League match of the weekend, Newcastle v Wolves, which kicks off at 8pm.
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Not content with writing most of the posts on this blog, John Brewin has now delivered The Fiver.
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Dyche: Burnley have a strong jaw
Fridays in football are all about jaw-jaw. Just ask Sean Dyche.
“We’ve shown we have a strong jaw over many seasons in the Premier League,” he said at his presser. “We’ve shown we can handle situations, we’ve shown we can deliver. But just because you show it, doesn’t guarantee the next one – you have to keep showing it. You have to keep maintaining high standards in training and high focus when you go out on the pitch. That’s the demands of the job. We’ve got a pretty rounded group here, so they understand it, and these are helpful things, but they don’t guarantee anything – you have to go out and deliver.
“These are tough games, the ‘hard yards’ as Eddie Jones terms it when I speak to him.” Interesting choice of oracle there, Sean. “He always says it’s the hard yards, and that’s important over a season – doing the hard graft, the miles, the details, putting in the mental effort, players giving up a lot at this time of the season to zone in and give everything to the cause.
“We do have experience of that, of tough times and how to handle that, but it doesn’t define the whole season just because you’ve got experience. It’s about going out there and delivering performances every time the whistle blows. It was a tight one the other night [against Everton]. We got on the right side of it, showed a really solid mentality, and that’s got to be the same for the remaining nine games.”
If you’re not a great one for puns, look away now. “Arsenal fans,” says Peter Oh, “are probably resigning themselves to the fact that this season anyway, the Partey is over.”
Rodgers will ring the changes
Patrick Vieira made it clear he wasn’t planning to rotate his players for Palace’s game at Leicester, but Brendan Rodgers is leaning the other way.
“It’s the accumulation of games,” Rodgers said. “This month alone, we’ve got eight games to fit in and I’ve said to the players the same team won’t play every game. You can do, but you’re not going to get the same intensity and the energy that you would like. The attitude of the players would always be first-class, but the game is about energy, intensity, urgency, so for that, naturally, we would have to make changes.”
Jamie Vardy is still out, Rodgers added, but Nampalys Mendy and Caglar Soyuncu are back in contention and Ayoze Perez will be assessed after illness.
Atletico Madrid charged over fans' "Nazi salutes"
Breaking news from the Champions League. “Atletico Madrid have been charged with discriminatory behaviour,” PA reports, “in relation to the conduct of their supporters at Tuesday night’s Champions League match against Manchester City.
“Supporters of the Spanish club were caught on camera appearing to perform Nazi salutes during the quarter-final first-leg tie at the Etihad Stadium. UEFA announced on Friday that disciplinary proceedings had been instigated against Atletico. The club have been charged with discriminatory behaviour and with the throwing of objects. UEFA’s Control, Ethics and Disciplinary Body (CEDB) will decide on the matter in due course.”
"Alexander-Arnold is like an exhibition"
More from Pep Guardiola, who gave one of his more interesting press conferences today. The line we’ve put at the top of this page – Klopp is my biggest rival – may well hog the back pages tonight, but over on the BBC site there are some more detailed quotes, with Pep giving a boss’s-eye view of the way Liverpool have developed. (The square brackets are ours, not the Beeb’s.)
“We know we are going to defend parts of the game and sit back. Not because we want but [it’s] almost impossible [not to] for what they do. They make the pitch wider and higher, quality in the middle. Four, five years ago they were more direct, not too much between the lines.
“Now they have a good build-up with Alisson, Matip, Thiago drops [back?]. Threats in behind – Alexander-Arnold is like an exhibition, deep runners in behind. Set pieces, every corner is a threat.”
Like an exhibition! Something for Gareth Southgate to think about.
Even the middle of the table is interesting at the moment. Palace and Leicester, who meet at the King Power Stadium on Sunday, are locked together on 37 points (though Leicester have two games in hand), and both are in form with three wins from the past five games.
Patrick Vieira has just been asked whether Palace are distracted by their FA Cup semi-final date with Chelsea on Easter Sunday – as if that question hadn’t already been answered by a resounding win over Arsenal.
“No, it is not in my thinking and not in the players’ thinking,” Vieira said. “It will not have an impact on the starting XI I am going to choose. We have time to think about the FA Cup. The main focus is about Leicester and putting (out) the best squad to win the game.”
If it’s Friday, the match previews must be making their presence felt. Click here for Villa-Spurs, Southampton-Chelsea and Watford-Leeds.
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Thomas Tuchel's team talk
Thomas Tuchel has been talking about talking. And if I understand him right, he seems to have been talking about giving the Chelsea squad a good talking-to. Other interpretations are available.
“It was not a discussion type of meeting yesterday,” he says. “It was more that I gave my point of view and that’s sometimes also necessary. We always take the players’ view into account, but over the last two games we felt it was maybe necessary to give our point of view.
“It was behind closed doors, in an atmosphere where everybody can take criticism. We don’t point fingers, we don’t look for people who are guilty, we are in this together. But we needed to point out some things in our game where we were not happy, but it was about the game.
“We are aware of the problems and we don’t like them. I don’t know if we are concerned, but this is very untypical for us. We looked into it and we talked to the team about it, to try to figure out how to improve and to stop this direction of travel as soon as possible.
“It’s not like us at all to defend like this and that’s why we didn’t see it coming. It wasn’t the case before the national break and it’s not so easy because it doesn’t fit into a pattern.”
Thanks Tom and afternoon everyone. Don’t you love the sharp end of the season? Everybody will drop points, Alex Ferguson used to say. City, Chelsea and Arsenal have already proved him right, and this weekend it will surely be someone else’s turn.
More on Ferguson’s old team, from PA: “Rangnick revealed that Cristiano Ronaldo was available after missing last week’s draw with Leicester through illness, but several others are still out. Luke Shaw is expected to be sidelined for two to three weeks as he has an operation to remove metal bolts from his leg, while Edinson Cavani, Raphael Varane and Scott McTominay are still injured.” If sport was run like school, Cavani’s attendance record would be abysmal.
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And on those bombshells, I’ll hand you over to Tim de Lisle who’ll pre-match chat you through the afternoon.
Partey may not play again this season, says Arteta
A bit of Arsenal presser chat, courtesy of PA Media:
Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta has offered no assurances that Thomas Partey will play again this season after suffering a “significant” thigh injury. The Ghana midfielder was injured during Monday’s 3-0 Premier League defeat at Crystal Palace, with Kieran Tierney missing the game at Selhurst Park due to a knee issue.
Tierney has since undergone surgery and is expected to be missing for the run-in as Arsenal aim to recover with victory over Brighton on Saturday. But their quest for a top-four finish has been dented further with Partey’s latest setback - and Arteta admits it could keep the former Atletico Madrid man on the sidelines for some time.
“It is a little bit ambiguous but he has a significant injury and we’ll have to keep assessing him but he will be out for some weeks,” he said. Asked if Partey could play again this campaign, Arteta added: “It could be but it could not be the case – because it is an area where he had a previous injury as well and he felt it straight away and he is not fit.”
Tierney went under the knife after picking up a knee injury while on international duty with Scotland - with Arteta casting doubt on whether the left-back will return in time to feature in their World Cup play-off fixture with Ukraine in June.
“I don’t know yet, he just had a surgery yesterday,” added the Spaniard. “So it is very early to understand how everything is going to develop, he’s going to be out for the period that we estimate but to know what condition he will be after that period, I think it’s too soon to to be able to say something.
“I think the player has to do the maximum that he can to be in the best possible condition as quick as possible. I’m sure Kieran will do that and once he’s there, let’s see if he’s able to compete and with what kind of risk or not but I’m sure he will do that. Our responsibility is to look after them when we have them here.
“Once they go to a national team in this cases it is the job and responsibility of Steve Clarke to decide a team that he believes is the best to win games and we have to try to have good communications with national teams, which we have, but these things happen.
“We lost two big players, really important players for us in the team for sure. But we’re not going to have them so we cannot be crying for that because they’re not going to be available for us. So we have to find other solutions and we have to still be as good and as competitive as we have been.”
And over on Merseyside, Frank Lampard’s been talking:
“It was a disappointing result against Burnley, the manner of it – we were in the position to win the game and we let it go away from us. We have to lift ourselves and sometimes a game coming quickly is a good thing for that.
Asked about speculation over his position, Lampard replied: “In my relatively short managerial career, I’m used to that – I probably spent 18 months at Chelsea with the same, always two or three games from the sack. I’ve got no problem with that here, we’re a huge club. But in football terms we’ve got no right not to be fighting a battle with relegation, regardless of our history.
“I don’t want to talk about the last five or six years here, I just want to talk about now. I came here to a great club. If we get caught up in that hysteria [over the relegation battle] then we’re caght up in it. We’ve got a job to do, everyone’s working hard but we just need those results.
In times of tension players can make mistakes and they can happen more, it’s something we have to contest against. [At Burnley] we prepared well for the game, we went 2-1 up but then mistakes affect the result but you can’t start leaning on every individual in a bad way. Players know when they make mistakes.”
Lampard added that Seamus Coleman is now in contention to feature against Manchester United, Fabian Delph is in the squad, while Jerry Mina would hopefully be ready to return against Leicester on 20 April.
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Pep Guardiola: 'Klopp's the biggest rival I've ever had'
Pep Guardiola speaks, looking ahead to the big one, having brushed off questions about new revelations on Manchester City’s finances.
“It will be massive, and an important three points [are at stale] but if we win there will still be seven games remaining, 21 points to play for, and a lot of things involving the Champions League and FA Cups.
Asked about Jurgen Klopp’s description of him as the world’s best coach, he said: “I’m not [the best in the world]. I’d like to tell you I am but I’m not. I’ve had success because I work with my staff, my teams and I’ve had money, incredible talented players. I became a manager to be on the pitch preparing teams, feeling emotion during the games … That is how I do the job, it’s not to do with being nominated good or bad.
[On Liverpool] “In the time I’ve been here both teams are the top two in the last five years. It’s been an incredible and marvellous contender. I said many times my opinion about Liverpool, how admired they are, Jurgen has been as a manager the biggest rival I’ve ever had in my career and I think what both teams propose, the way they play, is good for the football – we are ready for the challenge.
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Thanks John, and I’ll start by pitching you into some Ralf Rangnick content. The Manchester United interim whatnot, speaking before tomorrow’s trip to Everton, was keeping schtum about the growing Erik ten Hag speculation:
“I think this press conference is for tomorrow’s game. I don’t tend to speak about any new possible manager.
“What I know about all the managers the club has spoken to so far are top managers, top coaches, and if this includes Erik ten Hag it is also true of him.
That’s all I can say about that at this stage. For me it’s about preparing for tomorrow’s game.
“Tomorrow definitely the most important part will be character and energy, commitment to winning the game in that atmosphere which will probably be pretty similar to the one at Leeds.
“We are well aware of the importance of that game for both sides, for them it has high importance and for us as well. Game plan and tactics is one thing but what is most important is mentality, attitude and physicality and this will probably decide it.”
Team new-wise, Rangnick will have Cristiano Ronaldo available again but several others are still out. Luke Shaw is expected to be sidelined for two to three weeks as he has an operation to remove metal bolts from his leg, while Edinson Cavani, Raphael Varane and Scott McTominay are still injured.
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Right, that’s me done for the moment. Tom Davies will be taking the chair for the next while.
It seems Kylian Mbappé will captain PSG in this weekend’s match with Clermont, the latest attempt to keep him at the club? Seems they are laying it on pretty thick.
Per Reuters.
“He is a clear example of how when we arrived [15 months ago] his form wasn’t as everyone expected but thanks to his hard work, dedication and confidence he has turned the situation around,” Mauricio Pochettino told a news conference. “We just gave him the platform and the space to grow and improve.”
“When he is here you can ask him and he’ll give a better answer. We want the best for the club and the best for Kylian and we think the best for all parties is that he stays with us. There are negotiations that need to serve all parties to reach an agreement.”
Aside from the big one, what remains for City and Liverpool?
Manchester City
- April 10 - Liverpool (H)
- TBC - Wolves (A)
- April 20 - Brighton (H)
- April 23 - Watford (H)
- April 30 - Leeds (A)
- May 7 - Newcastle (H)
- May 15 - West Ham (A)
- May 22 - Aston Villa (H)
Liverpool
- April 10 - Man City (A)
- TBC - Aston Villa (A)
- April 19 - Man Utd (H)
- April 24 - Everton (H)
- April 30 - Newcastle (A)
- May 7 - Tottenham (H)
- May 15 - Southampton (A)
- May 22 - Wolves (H)
Pretty bleak outlook for Dean Smith and Norwich. They must beat Burnley on Sunday to have any chance of staying up. And he knows that.
We are running out of games, we know that. We would like to be higher in the table and we would like our form to be better, but it is about doing the right things and working hard. We are getting into last chance saloon now, but that is an opportunity and hopefully the players grasp that opportunity.
In old Premiership money this would have been a “frivolous appeal” but now seems to have to fallen into the category of “worth a try”. Lucky old Bayern though.
Per Reuters.
The German Football Association (DFB) rejected Freiburg’s appeal following a substitution mixup by Bayern Munich in their Bundesliga match last week, protecting the Bavarians’ nine-point lead going into the final six matches.
The Court ruled it was not Bayern’s fault that they played with 12 players for several seconds late in the game, but that of the match officials.
Bayern won the game 4-1 but in the 86th minute due to a mixup between club officials and the fourth official during a double substitution, the wrong number for Kingsley Coman was shown on the substitution board. The winger did not leave the pitch until about 16 seconds later.
Under German FA rules if a team is found to have introduced a non-eligible player then the opponents are awarded the game by a 2-0 scoreline.
Poor Thomas Tuchel should have known that Brentford battering was coming.
The manager of the month award seems to be a poisoned chalice and the LMA’s manager of the year award – which is voted for by fellow managers rather than fans – is no different. Over the past 12 years, half of the managers who have won the award have left the club within a couple of years.
Roy Hodgson was voted manager of the year in 2010 for his great work as Fulham boss. He moved to Liverpool that summer and was sacked after six torturous months in charge. Brendan Rodgers was recognised by his peers in 2014 after his Liverpool team pushed Manchester City all the way in the title race. The glow did not last too long. He was sacked a year later. Antonio Conte, who was voted manager of the year in 2017 after he had won the Premier League with Chelsea in his first season at the club, was also given the sack a year after winning the award.
Suzy Wrack has written up the news of Brian Sorensen’s appointment by Everton.
And after all that fraternity between bosses, here comes Jesse Marsch to spoil it, and say the Premier League bosses are too nicey nicey. This ain’t the NFL, rookie. Leeds play Watford and looks like he’d rather not accept a glass from Roy Hodgson’s wine selection. More fool him, Roy is quite the connoisseur.
I would say congenial, maybe too congenial for me. But I appreciate that the manager, the respect - I call it a shared misery - and the respect for that shared misery is pretty strong here in England.
We had Adrian Heath in the US, he coached at Orlando and then he coached in Minnesota and he was always really good after the match to say ‘come and have a beer’.
And I hesitantly did it, and found it incredibly rewarding. I want to acknowledge the work that other people do. I do respect and appreciate the work that other people do in this business.
It’s hard for me to sometimes be friendly with competitors because in my mind I want to not like them. But when I wind up liking them, I think usually the respect grows. But I like the motivation, when I am driven to want to beat someone.
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Ed Aarons spoke to the Watford and Ivory Coast defender, Hassane Kamara.
It has certainly been a whirlwind nine months for Kamara, who made his international debut last year after excelling for Nice before moving to Watford at the start of January. Despite a change of manager when Claudio Ranieri was shown the door a few weeks later and replaced by Roy Hodgson, a series of committed performances in 12 Premier League starts so far have already made him a fans’ favourite at Vicarage Road, with Kamara ranked among the league’s best tacklers since his arrival.
“It’s me,” he says. “Every time I do something it’s at 100%. I’ve fought all my life to play football and now I have a chance to play in this league and I want to make the most of it. Since I was young I wanted this challenge – that’s why I play footballI. But it’s my job and I have to stay focused.”
Sign up for our free women’s football newsletter, into its second edition now.
In the spirit of Klopp/Guardiola’s love-in, Ralph Hasenhüttl has given his backing to Thomas Tuchel, an act of fraternity between two gegenpressing guys. Crisis club Chelsea play Southampton on Saturday with defeats to Brentford and Real Madrid ringing in their ears.
The most important thing is always how you react as a manager and how you are able to lean the focus in the right direction. It is up to you to find the right words and I am sure Thomas does this in a fantastic way, because he has these qualities.
This is the most important thing, because in the end, I don’t think it changes a lot - they (players) go in the morning to the (training sessions), they do their job on the pitch, they want to win games and if it is possible every game. They are part of the Champions League still, they are part of the FA Cup, and in a top position in the Premier League, so I have heard of more difficult situations to be honest, that is the reason why I think it doesn’t affect them massively.
More on Everton Women’s appointment of Brian Sorensen, per PA Media.
A club statement read: “Everton have reached an agreement for Brian Sorensen to become the club’s new Women’s manager ahead of the 2022/23 season, with the Dane signing an initial two-year contract with the Blues.
“Sorensen will take up his position with Everton this summer, from Fortuna Hjorring where, during two stints at the Danish club, he has won two league titles, a domestic cup and established Fortuna as regulars in the knockout stages of the Champions League.”
Sorensen, 41, has also had spells with Danish sides IK Skovbakken and FC Nordsjaelland.
He said: “I’m extremely excited to join Everton. It is one of the historic clubs in women’s football and our backgrounds fit nicely, with common values, work ethic and ambitions. Having studied the squad in depth during this process, I feel there is massive potential, with players capable of making an impact on the biggest stages.”
Reuters have supplied these handy stats via Nielsen’s Gracenote.
- Victory for City would improve their chances of retaining the title to 86% while an away win for Liverpool would give them a 68% chance of reclaiming it.A draw would give City the advantage in the title race (63% chance of winning to Liverpool’s 37%).
- Liverpool have scored more goals (77) than City (70) for the first time since Pep Guardiola’s first campaign in 2016-17.
- It is Liverpool’s second-most potent attack in the club’s history after the 2013/14 squad under Brendan Rodgers (82 goals at this stage of the season) which lost the title to City by two points.
- Liverpool are creating more opportunities and needing fewer shots to score compared to City.
- Liverpool have had 557 attempts on goal this season, the highest since Juergen Klopp took over in 2015 and a near 30% increase from last season.
- Opponents average 12 shots per goal this season when centre back Virgil van Dijk plays for Liverpool, compared to 6.7 shots without him when he was injured last season.
- Liverpool were also conceding around twice as many goals prior to signing Van Dijk
- The index estimates City have a 61% chance of winning the title while Liverpool have a 39% chance.
Welcome to the future/whatever happened to Crawley?
Robert Lewandowski (33) is the top scorer in the Champions League this season and he has already scored more than 30 goals in the Bundesliga; Ciro Immobile (32) is the joint-top scorer in Serie A; Karim Benzema (34) is top of the pile in La Liga; and Wissam Ben Yedder (31) is the top scorer in Ligue 1. How do these veteran forwards continue to thrive in the twilights of their careers?
Big news from the Women’s Super League, where Everton have a new manager.
🤝 | We have reached an agreement for Brian Sorensen to become our new manager ahead of the 2022/23 season, with the Dane signing an initial two-year contract. #EFC 🔵
— Everton Women (@EvertonWomen) April 8, 2022
Both clubs have been in the news. A transfer for Liverpool and some serious questions to answer for City, though they may say such questions have already been answered.
'Pep is the best coach in the world'
Jürgen Klopp speaks to his Friday press conference.
I’m expecting a good game. I know very often that doesn’t happen. But it should be an interesting watch, because both teams really go for it.
I cannot decide what people think, but we can just go through the possible results.
If we win we are two points ahead, we lose we’re four points behind. If it’s a draw, one point behind - that is it. Does anyone think that’s done and dusted? A very important game. I like it, if we were fourteen or fifteen points behind it will still be a good game. We’ve qualified for a good game with the season we’ve played so far.
The consistency both teams have shown over the period is crazy. We know it’s tough. What has changed in the four years is everybody else thinks it’s tough.
In sport, I think what helps the most is a strong opponent. In the long term, especially. I think Nadal and Federer enjoyed the rivalry they had. That’s how it is in sport. I wouldn’t say I’m thankful City is that good, but it didn’t harm our development.
Pep is the best coach in the world and we all would agree on that. If anybody doubts him, I have no idea how that could happen.
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Perhaps it is the greatest rivalry of all, after all.
This is ridiculous… one point separates Man City and Liverpool over the last four years https://t.co/F0uESLaYAU Visualised with @f_l_o_u_r_i_s_h
— Ossian Shine 🇮🇪 🇪🇺 (@ossianshine) April 7, 2022
Jürgen Klopp’s press conference is imminent, but before that, a short look at the weekend’s games, starting with Newcastle v Wolves, with Eddie Howe’s team having lost their lass three. Everton v Man Utd sees Frank Lampard try and arrest that slide as United look towards their new era under Erik ten Hag. Southampton v Chelsea is a slippery one for Thomas Tuchel after those defeats to Brentford and Real Madrid. Arsenal v Brighton sees Graham Potter’s goal-shy team attempt to compound the Gunners’ Monday night nightmare at Selhurst Park. Then comes Aston Villa v Tottenham, a big game in the race for the top four in Saturday’s evening kick-off.
Sunday sees Leicester v Crystal Palace, a battle between two teams close together in the table who will feel very differently about how the season has gone. Brentford v West Ham could be the latest instalment of the Christian Eriksen fairytale. Norwich v Burnley could see Burnley climb out of the bottom three for the first time since August if Everton have already slipped up. And then to the Etihad and Manchester City v Liverpool it is.
Preamble
It’s all about the big one, the game we have been waiting for all season. But before we go in deep on Burnley v Norwich, there’s the small matter of Manchester City v Liverpool. Some are calling it the greatest rivalry ever in English football. Others look back to Manchester United v Arsenal and Paisley’s Liverpool v Clough’s Forest.
No matter, Sunday’s game is the one we are looking towards, with phoney war press conferences and social media stings along the way, plus team news from the Premier League and other breaking news from the world of football.
