Vesper

would be nice if Bayern were picked off too, and PSG

David Squires on … Diego Maradona Our cartoonist looks back at the life and times of the World Cup-winning Argentina legend in murals https://www.theguardian.com/football/ng-interactive/2020/dec/01/david-squires-on-diego-maradona-murals

The Fiver Something of a fiasco at Parkhead Scenes after Ross County’s win on Sunday. Photograph: Mark Runnacles/Getty Images Scott Murray LENNON O NO There’ll be no Scottish League Cup for the Queen’s Celtic this season, a domestic trophy slipping from their grasp for the first time since 2016, and the way some folk are carrying on you’d think the club are, as a result, heading the way of Renton or Third Lanark. Sunday’s abject defeat to Ross County led to a mass tantrum outside Parkhead later that evening, culminating in Socratic dialogue with the local polis, and now several members of the fanbase have lost their sense of smell and everything tastes of nothing. It’s fair to say the protest wasn’t the brightest idea. The reason everyone’s lost the head isn’t really about the League Cup That Got Away at all: Celtic have also been dispatched from Europe in short order, they’re on their worst run of form since 1958, and worst of all Pope’s Newc O’Rangers have an 11-point lead at the top of the Premiership table. That’s jeopardised the dream of winning a 10th title in a row, which seems to be a big thing for the fans, though exactly why we’re not sure, given one of the signature achievements of the legendary Jock Stein would be superseded, and by definition diminished, by a collective featuring Shane Duffy and the 63-year-old Scott Brown. But each to their own. Anyway, the protest appears to have had the opposite of its intended effect. The assembled rabble were calling, between dry coughs and the sharing of droplets, for the dismissal of Neil Lennon. However while his sacking was reportedly in the pipeline, the folk in charge of the Parkhead biscuit tin took one look outside at the unfolding pandemic-infused huff and resolved not to “bow to yobs”, gifting Lennon a stay of execution. Something of a fiasco, then, although perhaps fans will come to consider this chain of events a blessing in disguise, given the two favourites to take over are Martin O’Neill, fresh from leading Nottingham Forest to ninth place in the Championship, and former Middlesbrough boss Wee Gordon Strachan. The Fiver accordingly advises everyone to calm down, not least because there’s a fair chance that lot across town will touch cloth again in the new year anyway. LIVE ON BIG WEBSITE Join Scott Murray from 8pm GMT for hot MBM coverage of Liverpool 2-1 Ajax, while Ben Fisher will be on hand for Porto 1-1 Manchester City. QUOTE OF THE DAY “My mother worked at a clothes and shoes shop close to our house. The boots I used were borrowed through her, somewhat in secret” – flying Ajax winger Antony tells Eryck Gomes how he owes his career to a pair of pilfered boots, among other things FIVER LETTERS “Re: the greatest GOAT of all time and Marten Allen’s missive on his old captain’s For Your FYI (yesterday’s Fiver letters). I am constantly baffled by people asking you to ‘please RSVP’ to an invitation. OK sure, I’ll respond to your invitation, and I’ll add in a short summary on card in the shape of a round circle as to why I have the sad misfortune of having to attend or not. But I digress. This does remind me of that old joke about the ‘department of redundancy department’, although that sounds too much like most government departments” – Leon-Ben Lamprecht. “Re: JJ Zucal (yesterday’s Fiver letters). ‘I should have read The Fiver’ are six words I absolutely thought I would never read … 2020 just keeps on delivering” – Paul Arnold. “May I be the first of the 1,057 to point out that Marine have won seven games to get to the FA Cup third round, not just four as you suggest” – Alan Murphy (and 1,056 others). “I chanced upon this fascinating piece in Big Paper at the weekend on the five common logical fallacies used by conspiracy theorists (special pleading, fake authority, illusory correlations, false equivalence and thought-terminating cliches) and couldn’t help notice the similarity between them and what a certain Premier League manager says” – Noble Francis. Send your letters to [email protected]. And you can always tweet The Fiver via @guardian_sport. Today’s winner of our letter o’the day prize is … Leon-Ben Lamprecht, who wins a copy of The Got, Not Got Football Gift Book – Every Fan’s Catalogue of Desires, by Derek Hammond and Gary Silke (postage available to UK only, sorry – Fiver Postal Ed]. NEWS, BITS AND BOBS An outbreak of Covid-19 has forced Newcastle’s entire squad to self-isolate, meaning Friday’s match against Aston Villa will either be postponed or take place with a Magpies team consisting of the cast of Jossy’s Giants plus Ant & Dec, live I’m a Celebrity duties or not. It’s the Lilywhites v the Lilywhites after eighth-tier Marine landed Spurs in the FA Cup. “It’s an unbelievable draw,” whooped boss Neil Young. “We will plan as best we can. Usually with José [Mourinho]’s teams, he puts pretty strong sides out.” France’s Stéphanie Frappart will become the first female official to take charge of a men’s Big Cup game when Juventus host Dynamo Kyiv on Wednesday. Ligue Un, done. Next up, men’s Big Cup. Photograph: Damien Meyer/AFP/Getty Images Ole Gunnar Solskjær says Edinson Cavani’s head will be on their game with PSG and not stuck in the place it presumably was when he did that Instachat post. “The best players can put their problems or the other thoughts away for a while and then perform,” blabbed Solskjær. Frank Lampard’s Chelsea manager Frank Lampard reckons Wayne Rooney’s Derby should become Plain Old John Terry’s Derby. Phew. “I think it’s a great opportunity, if true,” cooed FLCMFL. “And [POJT] will be a hungry, ambitious manager.” Andy Robertson hates VAR. “A lot of people I have spoken to are not enjoying football as much as they once did,” sighed the Liverpool left-back. “It is important to remember the key values that made us fall in love with it.” And all hail the Moyesiah! West Ham are up to fifth in the Premier League after beating Aston Villa 2-1. STILL WANT MORE? Does Maradona’s greatness really have to stand in opposition to something else, asks Jonathan Liew, while Sid Lowe reckons Lionel Messi’s Newell’s shirt tribute to Diego was personal, pure and symbolic. Suzy Wrack picks her WSL team of the season so far. After a decade of decline, Ipswich have lost five of their past eight League One games and Nick Ames can hear alarm bells ringing. Po’ Ambitious Paul! Tough times at Portman Road. Photograph: Richard Calver/MDI/REX/Shutterstock Football needs to catch up and get its house in order over concussion, writes Sean Ingle. Oh, and if it’s your thing … you can follow Big Website on Big Social FaceSpace. And INSTACHAT, TOO! ‘MAKE WORK YOUR FAVOURITE, OK’

THE CHELSEA ADVENT CALENDAR Dreaming of a Blue Christmas? We’re opening our doors and giving fans from around the world the chance to win 24 incredible prizes over 24 days from 1 to 24 December in our Chelsea Advent Calendar. Don’t miss out, see what’s behind the door today… https://www.chelseafc.com/en/landing-pages/competitions/advent-calendar

Youssoufa Moukoko (and others his age or a little older), is the end of the first half of the Gen-Zer (1997 to 2004 born) crop. The next group will be the last half of the Gen-Zers (2005-2012 born) Insane group of five 16 to 20 year olds Dortmund has. Moukoko (16), Giovanni Reyna (18 years old), Jude Bellingham (17), Jadon Sancho and Erling Håland (both 20)

Why Youssoufa Moukoko is ready for Dortmund debut at just 16 https://theathletic.com/2205211/2020/11/20/moukoko-dortmund-wonderkid-debut/ Beware: the biggest story of the German football weekend might yet become a non-event. Borussia Dortmund club officials have warned that Youssoufa Moukoko, the wonderkid who only turned 16 yesterday, might not make a record-breaking professional debut away to Hertha Berlin tonight after all. “We will try not to fuel the flames of the hype any further,” said sporting director Michael Zorc. But this particular wildfire is pretty much out of control already and unlikely to die down any time soon. Even if coach Lucien Favre were to decide to leave the forward out of his squad for the trip to the capital, the excitement and intrigue surrounding Moukoko will only keep building. There’s simply never been a talent this precocious at such a young age in German football, excelling against much older players every step of the way. In 88 games at under-17 (making his debut at age 12; he scored twice) and under-19 level for Dortmund, he has scored 141 goals. Watching him toy with defenders in those matches was almost unsettling, and keeping him at that level would have been pointless, if not detrimental. “Players need to have space to develop,” Dortmund youth co-ordinator Lars Ricken, a former teen prodigy at the club himself, said. “Everyone should become the best footballer they can be here at our club.” Moukoko was promoted to the seniors in the summer but couldn’t play for them in a competitive game until this week due to Bundesliga regulations. There is not much doubt he’s ready though. Assistant coach Otto Addo, who has kept a close eye on the youngster’s progress, says Moukoko has had “few problems” adjusting to training with Favre’s squad of grown men. “Nothing’s really changed for him because he’s always been very hard-working,” the former Dortmund midfielder tells The Athletic. “Youssoufa is the kind of guy who always trains with 100 per cent intensity anyway. Passes get to him quicker and with more precision (than at youth level), so in a way, playing with the pros has even made things a little easier for him.” That’s probably true in more than one sense. As long as the Cameroon-born son of a German father was humiliating defenders that were two and three years older than him at youth level, suspicions about his age were all but inevitable. Following his move from St. Pauli at the age of 11 — he had moved to Hamburg to be with his father a year earlier — he was soon scoring for fun in Dortmund Under-16s, prompting a media investigation into his background. The club pointed to his birth certificate issued by the German embassy in Cameroon and refused to get drawn into the speculation, while the FA stopped calling him up to their youth teams altogether for three years, keen to avoid the hype, as Germany Under-21s coach Stefan Kuntz put it. Now he’s eligible for the senior side, however, this slightly sordid topic is no longer relevant. Dortmund officials joke they would have been happy for Moukoko to be older — that way, he could have featured in the Bundesliga much earlier. Everyone describes him as shy, polite, completely unfazed by all the attention and very driven. It’s not uncommon to find him hitting the weights at 7am twice a week, an hour before the gym at the training ground is officially open. It’s that attitude, as well as his irrepressible talent, that has seen him being treated with instant respect by the first-teamers. “They accepted him straightaway because they saw what he could do,” Addo says. “Our team have a high level of football intelligence, they’re very welcoming and supportive of young players.” It will have helped, no doubt, that some of the regulars, like Giovanni Reyna (18 years old), Jude Bellingham (17), Jadon Sancho and Erling Haaland (both 20) are not that much older than him, but he’s also found more seasoned pros very approachable. “It’s not like he’s only hanging out with Gio and Erling and so on,” Addo says. “I often see Marco Reus and Mats Hummels talking to him, giving him advice about some details. Roman Burki and Marwin Hitz, too, have told him the best way to press goalkeepers, for example. They have explained to him how he can engage the keeper at the right angle, cutting off passes to a specific defender at the same time. It’s little things like that. Everyone’s incredibly helpful. But it’s not just about him: all the other young players are getting the same treatment here.” Much of that is down to Favre. The Swiss coach hasn’t been an unqualified success since being appointed in May 2018 but his ability to develop individual players is not in doubt. Every time a high-potential youngster has come close to a first-team debut, Dortmund have cautioned against grand expectation, yet, without fail, they proved so good so quickly that Favre was prepared to look past their age and make them mainstays in the first XI. Thus, much of the fascination with Moukoko is firmly rooted in recent history: people trust Favre’s Dortmund to turn out the next school-age star performer because of their strong track record in doing just that. Listening to Addo extolling the player’s strengths, you can’t help but feel confident the pattern will repeat itself. “Youssoufa is a very good finisher, with both feet, and he stays calm in front of goal, taking an extra touch if necessary,” the 45-year-old Addo says. “His deep runs are also very good. He’s got great timing and he’s very switched on. He has got a sense of how things happen on the pitch and where a high ball might land.” Like many players before him, the striker is benefitting from Favre’s fabled attention to detail in training. “He loves working on players’ technique, especially with young players,” says Addo. “He often takes Youssoufa aside to do special sessions: crossing and shooting the ball with Marco Reus.” Asked to come up with aspects of Moukoko’s game that still need improving, Addo needs to think for a moment. “He runs a lot, sometimes maybe too much, because he’s so eager to get involved. He can get better, too, when it comes to tackles and duels. But that’s only natural. He will learn.” It’s because Dortmund are so sure of Moukoko’s quality that they are unmoved by the public’s clamour for instant fireworks this weekend. “We believe in his potential but it’s really important not to rush things,” Addo says, with extra emphasis. “He might play his first game on Saturday, or next week or maybe in two months. He has all the time in the world.”

By saving Low now, the German FA has put itself firmly in the firing line https://theathletic.com/2231668/2020/12/01/joachim-low-germany-football/ The timing came as a surprise, the substance less so. On Monday afternoon, four days earlier than initially announced, the German FA (DFB) presidential board declared its “unanimous” support for national team manager Joachim Low. The decision to stick with the 60-year-old was moved forward to avoid a long build-up of media speculation this week but it had been widely expected. Oliver Bierhoff, the national team and academy director, was never likely to break with Low after more than 14 years jointly in charge. His confidential talks with influential team members and high-ranking Bundesliga officials had uncovered plenty of concern about Low’s vague coaching and uninspiring leadership but no real lust for blood. Inside the divided, strife-riven five-men presidential committee responsible for appointing — and sacking — the national team manager, the Low-sceptics were outnumbered and essentially powerless to go up against Fritz Keller and Bierhoff. Low succeeded in convincing the committee that the 6-0 defeat Spain was an accident and not representative of his work since the 2018 World Cup. “The performance of the national team and the coach cannot and must not be judged off the back of one single match,” the DFB’s press release read. His argument followed the same line that Bierhoff had put forward not long after the horror show in Sevilla: setbacks are to expected, this is a process, things are broadly on track. The topic of a possible recall for Mats Hummels, Thomas Muller and Jerome Boateng was also brought up, but again, the FA bought into his view that all three would only come into consideration in an emergency. The press release implicitly referred to the trio twice. It mentioned the board’s “unequivocal” backing of Low’s “efforts to rebuild the national team, which have been ongoing since March 2019” — specifically, the month that the three World Cup winners were told they had no future with the national team as part of Low’s plans for a younger Germany side. It also emphasised that “the head coach has been given approval for his assessment that future tournaments — namely, the 2022 World Cup in Qatar and Euro 2024 on home soil — should already play a role in current considerations in terms of sporting approach and personnel”. Translation: Low is right to trust young players now. But mixed in with this support is also some not-so-subtle and very self-serving backtracking on behalf of the German FA. First, it listed some positives (Germany “qualifying for the Euros, remaining in League A of the Nations League, and being placed in the first pot for World Cup qualification”) that aren’t actual achievements but the bare necessities for any Germany manager. The demands of him for next year’s competition appear also incredibly modest. Instead of insisting on Germany reaching at least the semi-finals as Keller had done a few months ago, expectation has now been downgraded to “positive results” and “an inspiring performance at Euro 2021”. The line about Low’s plans taking future tournaments into account almost sounds like a preemptive excuse for another poor tournament. It’s a transparent attempt by the FA officials to shield themselves from the fallout of another debacle with Low at the helm. But it won’t wash. Even observers who broadly agreed with the German FA’s “Remain” vote have made the salient point that Keller’s and Bierhoff’s necks will be on the line if their trust will appear misguided in six months. Neither public nor media will take the magnanimous view that the Euros should best be seen as preparation for the next World Cup. Another manager might have been afforded such a free hit. But Low will lose the last remnants of the nation’s confidence if he oversees a second catastrophe. Whether he should move on regardless of the outcome was a subject not explicitly mentioned. Many believe that would be the right call but in time-old tradition, officials decided on a wait-and-see strategy. The final reckoning will only come after the Euros. By that time, the best man available for the job, Ralf Rangnick, is unlikely to be still available. But there’s a suspicion that Bierhoff is playing for time, in any case. The DFB is worried that Rangnick’s approach will prove too radical in its attention to detail at all relevant levels for their tastes. They would prefer Hansi Flick or Jurgen Klopp to take over in time for the immensely important Euro 2024 on home soil. Klopp, according to the slightly wishful thinking in Frankfurt, might have won so much with Liverpool by then that they will release him before his existing deal (until 2024) expires. It’s an unlikely scenario, though. The German has always fulfilled his contracts and also informed those close to him that he’s intent on taking a sabbatical once his mission at Anfield is over. Getting Flick isn’t straightforward either as long as he’s successful in Munich. But even the best coaches don’t tend to last longer than two or three years in Bavaria, which may make bring him into play for 2024. In the mean-time, under-21s coach Stefan Kuntz could hold the fort as an interim manager, but all of those considerations will become more or less irrelevant if Germany go home early next summer. The ensuing earthquake would consume not just Low but also his enablers in the federation. By saving Low now, FA bosses have put themselves firmly in the firing line.

Why Dominik Szoboszlai is special – and wanted across Europe https://theathletic.com/2223536/2020/11/27/dominik-szoboszlai-profile-analysis-arsenal/ You have done well to hide from Red Bull Salzburg midfielder Dominik Szoboszlai (sob-oss-lie) in the past couple of months if you are reading this and do not know who he is. The Austrian club’s track record of developing excellent young talent is well known, and Szoboszlai is the next cab off the rank. With a €25 million (£22 million) release clause in his contract that expires in the middle of next month, he is likely to be the next player, after Takumi Minamino and Erling Haaland did so this year, to leave Salzburg for a big European club in a January transfer window. Arsenal are said to be keen on Szoboszlai but are balancing up whether, having only turned 20 last month, he is the right option for the team now, or if a more proven option is required. Additionally, Arsenal have concerns about his ball retention — very important given how sparse attacking third possessions are under Mikel Arteta — and his defensive capabilities. Given his versatility, he could fit into several positions in Arteta’s plans, especially as a “free eight” in a 4-3-3, similar to the role played by Kevin De Bruyne at Manchester City, or on the left wing in a 3-4-3. AC Milan are another side interested in Szoboszlai, a player who meets the profile of the sort of young, undervalued talent in Europe that the club has increasingly turned to in recent transfer windows. He is seen as a potential successor to Hakan Calhanoglu in the No 10 position of Stefan Pioli’s 4-2-3-1, with the Turkey international yet to sign an extension to a contract that expires in the summer. The path from Salzburg to sister club RB Leipzig is a well-trodden one, with Naby Keita, Dayot Upamecano, Konrad Laimer and most recently Hwang Hee-chan making the move within the past four years. The Athletic understands the German club are quietly confident Szoboszlai will be the next on that list, seeing him as a long-term replacement for Swedish attacker Emil Forsberg. There is good reason for that line-up of high-level suitors. The Hungarian’s highlight reel of spectacular goals from long-distance and directly from free kicks seems to grow month on month. First up, in September, there was this peach against Turkey in the Nations League. Then came this thunderbolt against Lokomotiv Moscow in the Champions League last month. And finally, Szoboszlai carried the ball a good 50 metres before slotting home in added time against Iceland to secure his country’s place at the European Championship next summer. That last goal is perhaps the best example to show that Szoboszlai should not just be defined by his ability to kick a football well. The finish was impressive, but even more so when considering the long carry that leads to the shot took place in the 92nd minute of a game he’d started. Sometimes, players blessed with technical excellence are not always the best movers on the pitch and do not have engines that can sustain them for a full 90 minutes. Christian Eriksen, for example, is a player considered technically elite, but he is fairly slow, and does not spring to mind as someone who could last going box-to-box for a whole match. Seemingly, Szoboszlai is the exception to that rule, matching elite technical ability with the same levels of stamina and speed, enabling him to complete these high intensity runs late in games. “Certainly his greatest gift is his right foot, he can put the ball where he wants to,” Jesse Marsch, his Salzburg head coach, tells The Athletic. “But he can run all day and he’s fast, and what’s interesting is when you have a player that’s so gifted with his right foot, what I try to do is still not let him just rely on what he can do with his right foot but also to use his athleticism to be aggressive with and without the ball. And certainly running off the ball to be dangerous. “Even last night (a 3-1 loss away to Bayern Munich in the Champions League on Wednesday) he got himself in a few dangerous spots, he should score a goal in the first half, but he’s running more in the deep, he’s being more aggressive to find ways to score goals other than just getting the ball on his right foot. That, for me, is important for him.” That chance for Szoboszlai is likely to be the best he will get all season in the Champions League. With Bayern’s back line all at sea, he receives a pass from Mergim Berisha and is in, one on one with goalkeeper Manuel Neuer. The ball is slightly bouncing, but Szoboszlai has time to settle himself. When it comes to hitting the shot, he is under no pressure… …but blazes it over. When trying to think of a similar player to Szoboszlai, it is tempting to consider Gareth Bale in his early years at Tottenham Hotspur as one option, given his stamina, speed and technical prowess. One club recruitment analyst disagreed when presented with that idea, noting the similarities between Calhanoglu under Roger Schmidt at Bayer Leverkusen, where he was tasked with cutting inside when in possession and pressing a lot when without it. When it was put to Marsch, he had a different answer again. “I describe him as a modern-day David Beckham,” Marsch says. “Beckham had a real ability to hook a ball and he could also chop it when he needed to, but Szoboszlai can hit the ball a lot of different ways too, and he’s got power. He can really hit the ball. He can do these things with his right foot but can also play a little more intensively and he can work harder against the ball and he can be a threat in the box still. “He’s very fit; so whatever the physical demands you put on him, he can meet those demands because he’s fit, he’s strong, he’s fast, he’s athletic.” So, just how good can Szoboszlai be? “It will come down to his determination to not just want to be a passer,” says Marsch, “not just want to have the ball on his right foot and try to score goals and make passes that way. For me, based on how I think about football, it will be about his commitment to play intensively, to run, to be difficult to keep track of in a game for defenders; (when his team is) in possession, not just what he does with the ball but what he’s doing off the ball. “The more he can tilt himself to being active and intensive and sprinting, he has potential to be one of the top No 10s in the world, there’s no question. The combination of his vision, his technical ability, his athletic ability and his personality means there aren’t many players that can dominate games from that position the way that he can. “If you watched him play for Hungary in the last international window, he was dominant. Dominant. Against Serbia (in a Nations League game three days after his Iceland heroics), he was easily the best player on the pitch. And there are incredible players for both teams. I believe he was so determined to get to the Euros because he knows this can be a big stage for him to showcase himself. “We use him usually as a left-sided No 10, but he can play as a middle 10, he can play as a right 10 and he can play as a No 8. When I first came here, I give him a hard time about this. We did a TV interview and the interviewer asked him, ‘Are you an 8 or a 10?’, and he said he was an 8, and I said to him, ‘Are you crazy? You’re a 10’. “Hungary used him last game (against Serbia) as a second striker, like a nine and a half, almost. This is a little bit of trying to change his mindset a little bit. Not just to be a passer but to be a goalscorer. Normally he operates a little bit between the lines, and then we still try to demand of him to run in the deep spaces so he can be a threat in the box.” Smarterscout is a website which gives detailed analytics on players all over the world, producing a score between 0-99 — a bit like the player ratings in the FIFA video games but powered by real data and advanced analytics. Looking at their data in the pizza chart below, we can get a flavour for the sorts of things Szoboszlai does when playing on the left. His expected goals (xG) from shot creation, which considers all of his contributions to creating goalscoring chances, shows he is elite at a Premier League level in terms of helping his team to score. He has put up great numbers in terms of ball progression too, helping advance his team upfield with his passing, carrying and receiving between the lines. He was not overly efficient when in possession last season, leading to a ball retention rating just above average. That has been echoed in the Champions League so far this season, according to Statsbomb data on fbref.com, as Szoboszlai has created 23 shots with his live and dead passes, his dribbles, forcing rebounds through his own shots or winning fouls. That is the second-highest total in the competition, just behind Lionel Messi (it is unlikely anyone will catch Messi this season, who has already created 34 shots in just three games for Barcelona) and the third-highest per 90 minutes when compared to those with at least two games played. It is somewhat ironic that, given everything we have learnt from expected goals and the perils of shooting from long range, Szoboszlai should be so revered for his ability from distance. In his case though, his shooting profile is a mix of efforts from outside the penalty area combined with his smart movement, which means he gets his fair share of chances within the box also, and is reflected in his smarterscout rating of 98 out of 99 for receptions inside the area. While on the ball he is technically excellent, Szoboszlai does have some weaknesses in his game. He is a pretty poor dribbler one-on-one, rating just two out of 99 in terms of dribbling skill according to smarterscout, which is echoed by his 18.8 per cent take-on completion rate in the Champions League over the last three seasons being the third lowest of all wide midfielders and wingers. Additionally, he is a weak tackler. His smarterscout rating in terms of tackling ability is 13/99, and against the same sample of Champions League players mentioned above his true tackle win rate — suggesting how many times a player wins their duels cleanly — is the lowest of the lot at just 23 per cent. Overall, the distinct lack of red “slices” in Szoboszlai’s pizza chart shows a player who is fairly absent from a defensive standpoint. That is surprising, given he plays for a high-pressing Salzburg side predicated on winning the ball back with great intensity, as quickly as possible. “Without the ball, we want him in our pressing schemes to be one of the first to go out and put pressure, but he’s pretty tall (6ft 1in/186cm) and so when he gets close to defenders to close down the space and win balls it’s not so easy for him to slow down and he’s not the most agile guy,” Marsch explains. That was the case in the 6-2 Champions League loss to Bayern at the start of this month in the reverse fixture. In the 72nd minute, Szoboszlai is slightly behind Thomas Muller when the German receives the ball from full-back Benjamin Pavard. Szoboszlai closes Muller down, but is too aggressive with his running and the Bayern man is able to cut back inside. Szoboszlai’s speed does allow him to block Muller’s pass though, winning the ball for Salzburg, who had a shot just 11 seconds later. “But he has the ability to be explosive against the ball,” Marsch continues, “to put pressure on the opponent, and I’m challenging him to win more balls. He’s got a lot better since I started working with him.” To get a bit more context around Szoboszlai’s efforts when defending, The Athletic enlisted the help of 11Hacks, a football analytics company based in Prague, Czech Republic that offers a wide variety of tools (which it calls “hacks”) designed to help football clubs when it comes to scouting, player analysis or opposition analysis. What sets 11Hacks apart is it backs up this numbers-based approach with tactical knowledge, thanks to the team of video scouts and coaches on its staff. The 11Hacks report on Szoboszlai notes these defensive deficiencies, pointing to a couple of situations in the home game against Bayern, such as the Muller example above. Another example occurs in the 11th minute of that match. Here, Szoboszlai (highlighted) is not tracking any runners, or blocking a passing lane. The switch of play goes over his head, towards Lucas Hernandez. Szoboszlai is aware of the danger, and spotting the potential space that Hernandez will have if he can get around his defender, sprints across to cover. Hernandez completes his one-two with Kingsley Coman, and has a wide-open corridor in which to attack the Salzburg penalty area. Szoboszlai kicks up a gear, and closes the Frenchman down. What follows is a fairly clumsy challenge by Szoboszlai, which is initially called as a penalty. After consulting the VAR screen on the touchline, the referee gives the foul in the opposite direction — but nonetheless, it was a reckless and needless challenge. Defensive issues aside, a final question mark around Szoboszlai’s game is his relative lack of minutes played. Especially this season, where he has appeared in all eight games in the Austrian Bundesliga, but completed just two of them and started another on the bench. Marsch’s selfless nature and, at times, willingness to put the ambitions of his players ahead of his own, shines through when answering why. “It’s for the European matches; and with all our guys we also have to be a little bit careful because when they go with the national team, especially when they are playing in big games, their national teams will play them 90 minutes because they know they’re athletic and fit and can run. “You have to understand, Dominik is the hope of Hungarian football. He’s the next Puskas. So, I understand the responsibility he has to his national team and I don’t want to deprive him of the opportunity to help his national team emerge and be successful. Not all managers in Europe respect the national team situation, but from working with the (US) national team I’ve seen just so many players blossom into superstars because of the pride they have in representing their country. That’s been a big reason why we haven’t always played him 90 minutes.” Szoboszlai is lucky to have a coach like Marsch looking out for him, who without a doubt has had a positive impact on his development as a player. 11Hacks’ analysis and Marsch’s comments touch on Szoboszlai’s elite technical ability, the former noting his “world-class ball-striking technique”. Technique can be a nebulous term, but for Szoboszlai it points to the way he can strike a ball with power and excellent accuracy. In open-play situations, it refers to the weight he puts on passes, and his ability to complete Trent Alexander-Arnold-esque cross-field switches too. It is tough to find stats to reliably measure technique in all its forms, and even his xG from league games last season points to a player largely finishing on par. Does this not suggest that he is not as good a finisher as people think? Does the fact he has only scored two goals from 35 free-kick attempts for Salzburg not suggest that those goals were flukes? No. Shots are quite rare events in a match, and those direct from free kicks are even rarer. A player’s ball-striking technique can impact how good you are at everything else with the ball, not just shooting. Consider Hakim Ziyech, another player with elite technical ability, whose deep, in-swinging crosses are some of the most distinctive passes you will see. He has great shooting technique, but that technique also extends to everything else he does. Also with that two out of 35 free kicks stat, ideally you would have xG here to understand how far away from the goal these attempts were. If the attempt against Turkey shown above is anything to go by, Szoboszlai is not afraid of trying his luck from over 40 metres away. His free-kick conversion rate of 5.7 per cent is not that dissimilar to Eriksen (7.8 per cent) or De Bruyne (8.6 per cent) when considering their attempts in the Premier League over the past five seasons. Overall, Szoboszlai is a 20-year-old attacker with elite technique when it comes to shooting and passing, a good engine and the capability of making well-timed runs into space and the penalty area. He is left wanting a little from a defensive perspective, but that is not to say that side of his game cannot be improved over time. Speaking to Marsch, it is clear that there is an eagerness from Szoboszlai to learn. “He’s awesome,” Marsch says. “He’s got a smile on his face, he comes with energy. He had a reputation for being a little bit arrogant when I first came, when he was really young, but honestly, I haven’t seen that at all. He works hard, he cares about the team, he’s a good guy in the group. He speaks Hungarian, he speaks German, he speaks English. He’s also very close with Erling Haaland, and the two of them really enjoyed playing with each other, spending time with each other, and a lot of Erling’s energy, enthusiasm, determination and humbleness also wore off on Dominik in a really good way. “I love his personality because he wants to learn, he wants to work hard, he wants to improve, he wants to be the best. We played him every game but one last season, when he was 18 and 19, in the Champions League because I could see he wasn’t afraid of the moments. He wanted to be in those moments. That’s the special personality he has.” It is not just Szoboszlai’s personality that is special. With just a €25 million release clause, there is a lot of value to be had at that price for the buying club.

Tore Andre Flo: ‘Rangers was a rollercoaster – the price tag made life difficult’ https://theathletic.com/2229154/2020/11/30/tore-andre-flo-rangers-record-signing/ Tore Andre Flo is talking about the moment he sliced through the ball like a sword, managing to redirect the ball past Rab Douglas with an instinctive finish. Despite the ball being behind him after Jorg Albertz’s header cannoned down off the bar, he was able to somehow contort his long limbs and make it look like a tap-in. “It was just a reaction,” the former Norway striker tells The Athletic. “The ball came to my side and I just flicked up my leg. I got a good connection even though it was with a strange part of my foot. “To score against Celtic in my first game was the most special goal I scored.” He had only signed for Rangers three days earlier, on November 23, 2000, but his debut goal against Celtic had put Dick Advocaat’s side back in front and set them on their way to an emphatic 5-1 victory. It was the sort of calmness and technique in front of goal that had seen Rangers part with £12 million to make him the most expensive transfer in Scottish history, a record that still stands. This week 20 years ago, he must have felt destined for glory. Instead, even though he scored 38 goals in 73 games, is it fair to say this was as good as it got for him in Scotland? “I can’t really remember any moments I felt greater than that, but it was a bit of a rollercoaster,” he says. Rangers had won 11 out of 12 league titles but were trailing Celtic by 16 points, who had been strengthened by the appointment of Martin O’Neill. “We looked at the game as a potential turning point,” says Flo. “I could feel it when I came that something needed to happen as I had seen the 6-2 (defeat at Celtic Park) earlier in the season. “I got a great pass from Jorg Albertz after two minutes. I chipped it but it just bounced wide of the post. You try to think you will get more of those chances. That day it turned out we got quite a few but we couldn’t keep it up to make it a real (title) chase that season.” And that is the crux of his high water mark at Rangers as it proved to be a pyrrhic victory; Celtic romped to their first treble in over 30 years. For Flo, it would be his only goal against Celtic and one without significance. He soon found out that honeymoon periods do not last very long in Glasgow, at least certainly not with such a big price tag. Advocaat, after winning five of the six trophies on offer since taking over from Walter Smith in 1998, had been allowed to spend another £20 million-plus in the summer of 2000. Flo was brought in to complement the growing Dutch contingent, which included Ronald de Boer and Fernando Ricksen. Try as much as you like to separate the fee from the player but one way or another, the subject boomerangs its way back into the conversation. It is bound up in everything; used as a caveat to his goal record or a stick to beat him with where he fell short. But, two decades on, has he accepted this is just the way it is, or does it hurt that this perception of him failing to hit the heights expected of him is set in stone? “That price tag definitely made life more difficult for me but that’s how football is,” says Flo. “There was a lot of talk about the money during the transfer but I couldn’t worry or think about that as I was coming from a club that was doing really well and I was doing well at Chelsea so that pushed up the price. “I was aware that it was a high amount but in England, it was happening all the time and it was going up and up. It wasn’t crazy but since then, it’s gone way up in England and the other way in Scotland, so I wasn’t aware of it as much at the time as it turned out to be.” Time has not helped Flo in that regard. The club’s financial collapse in 2012 saw Sir David Murray’s extravagant spending come to be recognised as reckless egotism at play. His transfer, against a backdrop of debts approaching £50 million and a £35 million loss in 2002, is widely viewed as Murray’s final and most bold roll of the dice at European success before he began downsizing. At the time, Murray had been publicly courting a major signing to join the forward line and had even publicly said they were ready to spend £10 million on the right player. The Belgium striker Emile Mpenza and Spain’s Diego Tristan had been reportedly targeted before Flo. “If you looked at the teams, then there were many big signings for Rangers and Celtic,” says Flo. “He (Murray) wanted to go for it and put Rangers on the map. All of our aims at the time were to go far in the Champions League. We wanted to establish ourselves as the No 1 side in Scotland. “The whole thing was strange as, coming from England, it was the way things were going and it has ever since. It’s been different in Scotland but at the time, they were talking a lot about Celtic and Rangers going into the Premier League, so I think people thought that was possible within a short time.” Perhaps if a player had been signed for more money in the intervening period, it would have made the fee seem less exorbitant and his contributions better appreciated. Ryan Kent, who Rangers signed for £7.5 million from Liverpool last summer, also came in for criticism last season due to his lack of goals. “My advice to him would be to ignore that and enjoy what is happening on the pitch as it’s a great club to be playing for. Keep your shoulders down and relax and don’t think about that.” Pondering what statistics would have deemed him a success is a futile task now but just what would it have taken? Would an average of a goal a game have been prolific enough to justify the money? Would fewer goals but more against Celtic and in Europe have left a bigger impression? Or did he simply feel that nothing he could do was ever good enough? “No, it all came down to that price. If I came for a third of the price everybody would look and say I had a really good two years but because of the price tag expectations were extremely high. I had two great seasons up there and really loved it. I scored 38 goals and did well in a lot of games. “I could definitely feel that the expectations were a lot higher than when I played for Chelsea. I could feel that through the media but from the supporters, I really felt very welcomed. The media kept going with it and going with it. “It maybe did (become bigger as time went on) as the media always mentioned it. It made it difficult for me as it was always about the fee rather than about how I played. I think if we won the league, I would have been viewed differently.” He picked up two trophies, scoring the opener in the 2002 League Cup final versus Ayr United, and managed three goals across two legs against Maribor in a Champions League qualifier. He also played well in France as Rangers put out a star-studded Paris Saint-Germain team on penalties in the last 32 of the UEFA Cup. There were clearly plenty of impressive performances but there was also the sense that when they needed a big goal, it never quite came from Flo. “I felt I should have done better in a couple of those games. Fenerbache away (third round of Champions League qualifying) I had such a sore foot. I shouldn’t have played as it held me back but I wanted to show what I could do but wasn’t able to do it well enough.” Despite his impressive scoring record, his lack of big goals saw critics focus on the supposed weaknesses of his game. While Celtic had brought in Chris Sutton and John Hartson to aid a direct style of play, there was a misconception that Flo, standing at 6ft 4in, was naturally the same type of player. “I wasn’t, and it definitely wasn’t the way Chelsea were playing. It wasn’t the football I came from. If I stayed longer, I think I’d have learned more about how the Scottish game was played as I think I had the build to be more of a physical player but my football up until then had been about being technical. “I wouldn’t say that I was used wrong either. Advocaat wanted to play good football but there was something with the mixture of physicality and the nicer football that I didn’t always take to. I didn’t find my way in every game but I wouldn’t blame anyone but myself for that.” Flo, with his languid style and gangly gait, did not exactly extinguish Scandinavian stereotypes. He glided across the ground elegantly and never looked rushed or panicked. He was cool but Glasgow is the antithesis of having ice veins. In a place where fire tends to be met with fire, was it just a cultural clash that the laid-back body language and the sometimes aloof appearance just did not capture the hearts of some fans? “There might be something in that. I’m naturally quite a calm guy but sometimes on the pitch, I could probably have done better if I had been more aggressive in the way I was playing. “At some clubs, you are really successful doing it this way and at others, it isn’t. If I knew what I know now about how football works and how media works, I think I would have been much more relaxed and had more energy on the pitch to do whatever I could do there, rather than using up my energy thinking about other things.” He pauses for thought when he is asked what he means. “You can feel the pressure and that can take some of your energy away sometimes. You are a bit disappointed that the price tag is more focused on what I actually did on the pitch so that can take the energy away. “The confidence went a bit up and down. As a striker, you always play better if you are loaded with confidence.” It is hard to escape the sense that ironically he came to feel devalued by the transfer fee casting a shadow over everything he did. He may have been just a number at Chelsea among the likes of Gianfranco Zola and Eidur Gudjohnsen but the eight-figure fee left him feeling suffocated by the coverage at times and exposed by it at others. “It’s tricky this as when people are talking about me for Chelsea it’s always really, really positive and then when it’s about Rangers, when my scoring record was even better, it’s negative. “The difference is that, when I played at Chelsea, if it went really well it was all positive and when I played medium, someone else took the positive headlines and left me out of it. But when you are the most expensive player, if you play a medium game the headlines are still put negatively.” The common prognosis is that Advocaat, after winning five of the six trophies in his first two seasons, changed too much of the squad too quickly. Just a month before Flo arrived, Lorenzo Amoruso had been stripped of the captaincy after a falling-out with the manager — Barry Ferguson took over the armband — but Flo was oblivious, suggesting it was not as detrimental as suggested at the time. “I’m not sure I was even aware of that. There was a lot of different nationalities but I was used to that coming from Chelsea as I played in the first game in the Premier League to be only foreign players. I thought the atmosphere was really good. “There were a lot of Dutch players but I found them easy to be around. We were together a lot of the time off the pitch as we lived in the same area so we met more often than most of the other clubs I’ve been with. There was nothing wrong with the dressing room. “We had a very good team and we did well for big periods in both seasons but when Celtic were winning all the time, it wasn’t good enough.” Rangers went from a team who romped to a title to a team bullied in the one-off matches. Rangers faced their rivals 10 times during Flo’s 18 months but there were just three victories as Celtic won back-to-back league titles by a margin of 15 points and then 18 points. “They were very, very physical. Difficult to play against. In every challenge, you had to give everything to just get on the ball. (Being) physical was their strength as they really went into the challenges. I remember Bobo Balde,” sighs Flo. “He was very tough to play against. There were many one-v-one challenges with him and you could really feel it when he came into you. With Celtic being a physically stronger team than we were, we tried to play a nicer kind of football but they overpowered us at times, which was annoying. “The atmosphere in that game was just unbelievable. I’ve said to many people within football that they don’t really know anything about atmosphere until you play in a game like that. I don’t think anything can prepare you for it. I’d heard players talking about it before but when you’re out there it’s so loud you can’t hear any of your team-mates talk. “But if you look at the football we were capable of playing, we could be very very good but we couldn’t quite cope with their physicality.” Alex McLeish took over from Advocaat in December 2001, just over a year after Flo had signed. Rangers were trailing by 12 points after 17 games and the Dutchman moved upstairs to become director of football and allow McLeish to make the move from Hibernian. McLeish inspired a turnaround and claimed both domestic cups that season but Flo had to make do with coming off the bench in the League Cup semi-final against Celtic, the UEFA Cup second-leg against Feyenoord (which they lost 4-3 on aggregate) and in the dramatic 3-2 Scottish Cup final win over Celtic, in which Peter Lovenkrands was the hero. The cup double was the precursor to the treble the following season but Flo moved to Sunderland at the start of that season, with Rangers selling him for £5 million less than they bought him. “I sometimes do wish I’d stayed because they got the team back on track and won the league the next season. That would have changed a lot of people’s view of my time there.” The conversation gravitates back to the £12 million elephant in the room for the final time, without intention. Detecting a slight sense of fatigue, it felt necessary to acknowledge the hypocrisy of asking about the media banging on about the price tag while he is asked to do the same 20 years later. “I understand,” he says, laughing. He is now in a position where he can digest these experiences and help the young players at Chelsea, many of whom have been bought for significant sums, deal with the scrutiny they face in his role as loans manager. Where Rangers are concerned, though, he is enjoying their rise while others carry the pressure. “I’m really proud that I was able to spend two years at such a club. I always say that it’s one of the biggest and best clubs in the world. There have been problems in recent years but when it gets back on its feet like it is now it’s one of the best around.”

Why Chelsea are scoring less in big games but there’s no reason to panic https://theathletic.com/2229105/2020/11/30/chelsea-big-games-scoring-frank-lampard/ After playing out a tight and tense goalless draw against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge that might have quantum-leaped straight from his mid-2000s heyday, Jose Mourinho saw an opportunity for some suitably low-key mischief. “We came here to win and we didn’t,” he said, insisting that his Tottenham Hotspur players weren’t happy. “We didn’t because the opponent was defensively very good. They didn’t take risks.” In reality, of course, it was Mourinho’s aversion to risk that set the tone for the entire game. Moussa Sissoko spent much of his time as an additional right-sided defender, focusing the majority of his energy on helping Serge Aurier to negate the incisive runs of Timo Werner from Chelsea’s left flank. His central midfield partner, Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg, dropped so deep at times in long spells out of possession that he became an additional centre-back. Moussa Sissoko’s touch map against Chelsea Despite some promising moments in transition and a late opportunity for Giovani Lo Celso, Tottenham had just one shot on target in the match and their expected goals (xG) rating for the game was 0.19. Crystal Palace in October (an xG of 0.15) are the only team to present less of an attacking threat against Chelsea this season. But behind the Mourinho mischief lay a kernel of truth. Chelsea were noticeably more cautious than in recent weeks, probing in possession but wary of Tottenham’s counter-attacking threat and even more willing to send in a barrage of crosses — they registered 22 for the match from open play, 11 in each half — without committing large numbers to attack the penalty area. They might have won anyway had Tammy Abraham converted one of the better deliveries but their xG rating of 0.83 underlined the wariness in the back of Frank Lampard’s mind. There seems to have been a broader shift in Lampard’s approach to these bigger matches. Last season, his tenure began with a 4-0 humbling by Manchester United at Old Trafford in which Chelsea played much better than the scoreline suggested but were clinically punished on the break. All in all, they kept just one clean sheet in 10 Premier League matches against other members of the “big six” in 2019-20 (2-0 away to Tottenham), and one clean sheet in eight Champions League games against Valencia, Ajax, Lille and Bayern Munich (1-0 away to Ajax). This season, Chelsea have already kept out Sevilla and Tottenham at Stamford Bridge, and held United to a 0-0 draw at Old Trafford. Their only defeat of the season — a 2-0 loss at home to Liverpool in September — was conditioned by a red card for Andreas Christensen and a Kepa Arrizabalaga howler. The arrivals of Edouard Mendy and Thiago Silva have ensured there is no longer a sense of blind panic whenever a talented team advances on Lampard’s defence with scoring intent. That constitutes real progress. Consistent defensive stability is essential if this young, new-look Chelsea team is to seriously contend for major silverware this season. But the flipside of the coin cannot be ignored: Lampard’s team also failed to score against Liverpool, Sevilla, United and Tottenham and, in truth, rarely even looked capable of doing so. It would be wrong to claim that each game followed the same pattern. Liverpool’s win at Stamford Bridge was the product of unique circumstances while Chelsea were forced to defend without the ball for long stretches against Sevilla and United. All three were played before Lampard shifted to the 4-3-3 system that has given this team a slick and sustainable identity. They enjoyed 60.3 per cent possession against Tottenham, playing the majority of the game in the opposition half and stifling their opponents’ counter-attacking hopes almost entirely after half-time, led by the boundless N’Golo Kante. Chelsea’s average positions against Tottenham Lampard’s attacking philosophy, however, was similar on each occasion: rather than making a tactical commitment to consistently push into the opposition penalty area in significant numbers, he prioritised balance and tasked his talented attackers with attempting to produce moments of individual magic or forcing the mistake that would win the match for Chelsea. It’s an approach that looks far more viable now — following the spectacular spending spree that brought Werner, Hakim Ziyech and Kai Havertz to Stamford Bridge — than it would have been last season. Chelsea still had good moments against Tottenham, working the ball into their attackers in the right positions only to be undermined by poor execution before Hugo Lloris could be tested. Abraham failed to connect properly with two brilliant Reece James crosses (Olivier Giroud was an interested onlooker from the bench), Werner was nullified apart from a superb offside goal and Ziyech endured his most wayward passing game since arriving in England. On another day, even Mourinho’s extreme caution might not have been enough to ensure a Chelsea clean sheet. Greater precision in the final third should be a natural consequence of this Chelsea group growing in familiarity as the season progresses and maybe that alone will be enough to solve their scoring issues in big games. If not, Lampard might be required to make further tactical tweaks to give his team the right balance between defence and attack. Most encouraging for Chelsea fans should be the fact that Lampard is navigating this season like a manager fully aware of the potential stakes. Injuries have made Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool juggernaut look mortal again, and Manchester City look a long way from the aura of invincibility they projected under Pep Guardiola two years ago. It’s unlikely that this season’s Premier League title winners will need to trouble the 100-point barrier — a reality that should stir the ambitions of any team in the top-four conversation. The margin for error may be larger than previous seasons, but there are more high-pressure matches between aspiring title contenders. Every mistake matters more and, for the most part, not losing is more important than winning. Although getting the better of the “xG battle” — as Chelsea twice did in defeat to Liverpool last season — is an encouraging broader signal of a team’s development under a manager, it is no guarantee of Premier League points. A cagey draw with a dangerous opponent is no bad thing providing that business is taken care of against inferior ones and Chelsea have dispatched Burnley, Sheffield United and Newcastle United with promising ease in recent weeks. In this of all seasons, such a combination can easily be the blueprint to contend for a title. Lampard knows that and so too does Mourinho, regardless of what he says publicly.

Lampard vs Mourinho: the simmering rivalry at the top https://theathletic.com/2226840/2020/11/29/chelsea-tottenham-lampard-mourinho/ There was a period when Frank Lampard took great satisfaction in winning games for Jose Mourinho. Now there are few people he wants to beat more. Chelsea’s goalless draw with Tottenham won’t live long in the memory. It was not a great way to celebrate Roman Abramovich’s 1,000th game as owner of the west London club, nor the kind of quality you would expect from two teams who started the afternoon knowing they had a chance to end it top of the Premier League after 10 matches. It was left to Lampard and Mourinho to provide the intrigue, the interest. This is a growing rivalry in the Premier League between two men, who used to regard themselves the strongest of allies when they won five major trophies together as player and manager for Chelsea between 2004-07. Lampard secured a Premier League double over Mourinho’s Spurs last season, but this encounter seemed to hold even greater importance for the Englishman. The Athletic kept a close eye on the 42-year-old before, during and after the London derby to see how he fared. The prologue To outsiders, it is perhaps one of the sport’s biggest surprises that the pair have demonstrated any kind of tension toward each other since Lampard came into management. Their touchline exchange during Tottenham’s EFL Cup victory in September brought the situation to light once again at an early stage in the season. But the seeds of the new dynamic were sown before Lampard even collected his coaching badges. Mourinho was the man in charge when Lampard’s 13-year career as a Chelsea player came to an end in 2014. Throughout the course of that last campaign, the club’s all-time leading scorer increasingly became a peripheral figure. He ended up starting just 20 Premier League games. There was no grand farewell in front of the home fans to recognise his vast contribution. The “will he? won’t he?” saga over whether Chelsea would offer a contract extension wasn’t resolved until after the campaign was over. Chelsea let him go and, after initially joining New York City on loan, Lampard ended up at Chelsea’s main rivals for the title the following year — Manchester City. Sources have told The Athletic that this was the scenario where the issues began. It is understood Mourinho wasn’t happy Lampard made the move. The Portuguese quickly made a decision to hand Lampard’s prized No 8 shirt, the one he scored all 211 goals in, to Oscar as a show that he’d moved on. When Chelsea fans continued to sing Lampard’s name, including after he scored against them in a 1-1 draw at Etihad Stadium, Mourinho was heard questioning those around him why the supporters continued to show such affection for a player who had ended up going to Manchester City. Lampard continued to prey on Mourinho’s mind. When Chelsea lost 5-3 at Tottenham on New Year’s Day in 2015, City only trailed them on alphabetical order having been level on points, goal difference and even goals scored. Up to that stage, Chelsea had played a more expansive game. But insiders have told The Athletic that one of the reasons Mourinho took a more pragmatic approach in the second half of that season was because he was so worried Lampard would fire Manchester City to the championship instead. The prospect troubled him constantly, although in the end Chelsea moved clear to secure his third, and last, Premier League trophy. Still, all seemed well between them when Lampard took his first post at Derby and led the Championship club to victory, albeit on penalties, against Mourinho’s Manchester United in 2018. But when Lampard took the Chelsea job a year later, Mourinho bared his teeth. A humbling 4-0 loss at Manchester United was seized upon by Mourinho, who was sitting in the Sky Sports studio working as a pundit. The line-up and tactics were questioned, much to the younger man’s surprise. Then of course Mourinho replaced Mauricio Pochettino as head coach of Chelsea’s fierce rivals Tottenham. As one agent explains: “Jose does not find it easy to keep a relationship with a competitor unless it suits him.” This became all the more evident when Chelsea beat Spurs home and away, two results which helped them secure a top-four finish ahead of the north London outfit. A measure of Mourinho’s desire to beat his old club and former player came in the Amazon documentary, where he regularly mentioned Chelsea’s name. And while Lampard stressed their bond was still good ahead of this contest, he bristled in the pre-match press conference about Mourinho’s suggestion he was under pressure to deliver silverware this season. It set things up for another fascinating duel between the pair. Pre-match No one had seen Lampard like this. Usually little of note takes place during training drills before the kick-off, but it was a different story this time around. The Chelsea coach has been seen on the pitch ahead of matches before, yet his body language and demeanour this time were completely different. It was almost like he was fighting the urge not to kick a ball himself, to actually be part of the derby. He paced the turf struggling to contain his nervous energy. Occasionally Lampard broke off to have an in-depth chat with one of his players, Ben Chilwell and Mateo Kovacic were two of those offered words of advice. As one exercise took place, he’d break out in encouraging applause, even if nothing particularly special had occurred. Then he’d walk off again before remembering to clap once more. Occasionally his gaze would wander to what was going on at the other end of the pitch, where the Tottenham players were gathered. Mourinho was nowhere to be seen, but Lampard’s stare was intense, as if he was trying to glean some kind of insight into what the visitors were planning. As Chelsea’s session finished, Lampard was one of the last men off the field, shouting more words of encouragement to the men in blue. Early stages Unlike the league fixtures against Mourinho last season, Lampard didn’t switch to three at the back and opted for the more attacking 4-3-3 system which has worked so well of late. When Mourinho strolled out on to his old stomping ground, he soon walked over to Chelsea’s dugout, fist-bumping assistants Jody Morris and Joe Edwards. Noticeably Lampard had yet to emerge from the tunnel and when he did, there was a more brief and curt exchange between the two. There was a sign of respect, yes, but little warmth. Again Lampard exuded the same body language from the warm-up. Even before referee Paul Tierney had blown his whistle, the former England international was patrolling his technical area anxiously as if the game was already under way. As the two sides jabbed at each other tentatively, Lampard was barking instructions at his men, pointing where to pass, where the dangers lie, annoyed when they weren’t pressing the visitors enough. With Chelsea labouring as an attacking force, a tame effort from Hakim Ziyech their only shot on target in the first half, Lampard did his best to keep calm. But when decisions to award Tottenham a free kick for fouls by Thiago Silva and N’Golo Kante went against his team, he made his displeasure known to fourth official Mike Dean. Mourinho was running down the touchline, toward the away dressing room outside the ground, before the half-time whistle blew. It was an insight into how positive he was feeling about proceedings. Second half Once again Lampard was out after Mourinho, clearly taking advantage of every minute to speak to his players. Despite being level at 0-0, Chelsea had posed little attacking threat. Something had to improve. And so Chelsea did. Out of the two managers, Lampard’s half-time team talk appeared to have the greater effect, as his team increasingly pushed Mourinho’s side back toward their own goal. Two crosses from Reece James and one from Timo Werner weren’t converted by Tammy Abraham. Rather than show signs of frustration, Lampard expressed words of encouragement. The constant appealing and complaining over every 50-50 challenge from the away dug-out started to rankle. Sergio Reguilon made the most of a challenge to get Reece James booked. Lampard wasn’t pleased. A break in play for an injury with 15 minutes to go was seized upon by Lampard, using the opportunity to talk to Abraham and James once more. Once the chat was completed, some old skills were shown as he backheeled some water bottles back toward his bench. Christian Pulisic, Olivier Giroud and Kai Havertz were all introduced in the last 16 minutes as Lampard pushed for the win, but perhaps it was too little too late. Mourinho, who masterminded many defensive performances in two spells as Chelsea manager, had repeated the trick against them. The brief handshake at the final whistle was polite, however it was the post-match duties which brought their relationship back under the microscope. Post-match The two questions which irked Lampard the most during the media press conference had one thing in common: Mourinho. Tottenham’s manager had gone first and unsurprisingly took the opportunity to spin things in his favour. His players were disappointed at failing to win (despite having only one shot on target). Mourinho also attempted to play down their title hopes — “we’re not a horse, we’re a pony” — even though they’d moved back into first place. On top of that, he once again put Chelsea on a pedestal as the more serious challenger just as he had while speaking to the media on Friday. The look of angst from Lampard spoke volumes when Mourinho’s thoughts were put to him: “It’s Jose’s call to say it as he sees it from his end, but from the outside they are top of the league, it’s very close at the top. If we’re contenders then they have to be contenders.” But what about his comments that you’ll be happy to be just two points behind Spurs at this stage? Cue more signs of annoyance. “I suppose it’s irrelevant what the feeling is after the game from Jose’s point of view for us,” Lampard replied tersely. “We just have to focus on ourselves. I don’t know what to say about that to be honest.” Lampard knows Mourinho’s ploys of using a press conference to irk opposition coaches from their four years of working together and this response came across as his way of saying that he won’t fall for it. These two sides next meet on February 3. The sparring between the two men at the helm will again be fascinating to watch.

Chelsea fans have been giving their reaction to the news emerging over the weekend that Fikayo Tomori could be a January target for Newcastle. The Northern Echo claims that the Magpies could move for Tomori in January, with Steve Bruce set to utilise the loan market as he looks to strengthen his squad at St James’ Park.

Chelsea eyeing up RB Leipzig’s Matthew Bondswell as Ben Chilwell understudy https://metro.co.uk/2020/11/30/chelsea-eyeing-up-rb-leipzigs-matthew-bondswell-as-ben-chilwell-understudy-13679700/ Chelsea are considering a move for RB Leipzig left-back Matthew Bondswell, with the teenager a potential understudy to Ben Chilwell. The 18-year-old is treading a unique path having left Nottingham Forest in 2018 for Leipzig and currently on loan with second-tier Dutch side FC Dordecht for this season. He may have little first team experience, and none at the top level, but he has been capped for England at every level from Under-15 to Under-18. He has done enough to catch the eye of Chelsea, but they are not alone in wishing to snap up the full-back. The Telegraph reports that West Ham and Sporting Lisbon are also keen on the youngster and there could be something of a tussle for his services in January. Chelsea have Chilwell as their first choice left-back after his move from Leicester over the summer and the England international has been impressive since arriving at Stamford Bridge. Blues boss Frank Lampard also has Marcos Alonso and Emerson Palmieri at his disposal, but neither are expected to have long futures at the club after falling out of favour under the current manager. Emerson is likely to return to Italy either in January or next summer, while Alonso has also been linked with a return to Italy, with Inter Milan, but also a switch across London to Crystal Palace.

Thiago Silva wiping his nose with a Spurs jersey This guy is already proper Chels.

they are so obsessed with offside that they miss the foul

Watkins is a great striker, but he is horrific at pens missed 4 of hid last 5 no more pens for him

http://hockeynews.site/events/2020/wevilla/

Villa got robbed it was not offside, it was a pen that is why his arm was pushed forward

was speaking of the interview he just gave live btw

Rice oozes leadership and class I fucking love his attitude

super game too

great win for West ham

chalked off after minutes of line drawing crazy, lol