The English Football Thread

[Vesper 31,181]

Sheffield Wednesday in crisis: Protests, anger and uncertainty about what comes next

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6545418/2025/08/11/sheffield-wednesday-crisis-fans-leicester/

It is 4.30pm and as a new season begins inside the King Power Stadium, more than 2,000 Sheffield Wednesday fans can be found making a stand on the other side of locked turnstiles.

“I don’t care about Dejphon (Chansiri),” they sing. “He don’t care about me. All I care about is Sheffield Wednesday.”

A sold-out end is almost empty at kick-off and remains so until the opening five minutes have been played. Some do not make it inside to see Nathaniel Chalobah give the visitors an unexpected lead against Leicester City in the 26th minute, such is the backlog to gain entry.

Not that it mattered. At the end of a chaotic summer, a draining close season of late wages, upheaval and anxiety, a protest against club owner Chansiri illustrated the growing desperation for change.

“The whole protest movement, it’s something that goes against what you’re about as a fan,” says Otto Brookes, a Wednesday supporter handing out leaflets calling for Chansiri to sell up.

“You want to support your team and the players to feel supported, especially in these circumstances. But there comes a point where you have to say if you keep funding the person in charge of the club, there’s not going to be anything left.”

And that was the nagging concern on a day when Wednesday fans chose to draw a line in the sand. There had been low-scale protests against Chansiri last season but supporters have spent the summer mobilising against the Thai businessman.

What You Should Read Next

How Sheffield Wednesday descended into chaos under Dejphon Chansiri’s ownership

Unpaid wages, a highly regarded manager on way out and very real fears for the future. A once proud club is on the brink

The Sheffield Wednesday Supporters’ Trust has urged fans to boycott official merchandise and stay out of their seats for the opening of the new Championship season at Leicester City.

The vast majority obliged and, with concourses at full capacity, turnstiles were closed down by stewards 50 minutes before kick-off. That left the bulk of a 3,500 away support making their feelings abundantly clear.

“Dejphon Chansiri, get out of our club,” was sung on repeat and a loud cheer greeted the arrival of a plane trailing a banner that read, “Dejphon Chansiri out” in the clear blue skies above the King Power.

One banner depicted Chansiri as Derek ‘Del Boy’ Trotter from the sitcom Only Fools and Horses. “This time next year, we’ll be bankrupt,” it said. Another had United States President Donald Trump wearing a “Make Wednesday Great Again” baseball cap.

The mood was defiant as fans queued to gain entry long into the first half but it did not mask another unedifying chapter of Chansiri’s reign.

“It’s hard to enjoy anything,” says Neil Atkinson, a lifelong supporter among those to see Wednesday’s season begin from outside Leicester’s home.

 

Neil Atkinson was among the fans protesting on Sunday (Phil Buckingham/The Athletic)

“How can you when your club is falling apart? The club means a lot to people. Most of the things I do in life are based around football. There are old people here and it’s all they know. Football is what gets them through, regardless of results. We’ve all known hard times before but this is ridiculous. This is way past hard times.”

And his feelings towards Chansiri, the man who has owned Wednesday since 2015? “They get worse every day,” he says. “The guy came in and spent a lot of money but he’s never learned from his mistakes. Do the right thing and go.”

---

“It’s been a summer of chaos, hasn’t it?” says Brookes, summing up Wednesday’s preparations for the new campaign. “It’s gone so far past worrying about what players we’re signing or what the starting XI is going to be, because it’s now about the survival of the club.”

Few teams have known a pre-season anything like the one that drew to its close at the weekend. Catastrophic would be too kind.

Hillsborough has been where hope has withered ever since a stripped-back squad reported back at the end of June.

Renovated pitches at the club’s training ground at Middlewood Road were initially not ready and the players who remained, with the bulk in salary arrears, were forced to train on artificial surfaces until beginning a week-long training camp at England’s St George’s Park base.

Adding to the farce was the absence of a senior coaching team. Danny Rohl, head coach for the previous 18 months, had already signalled his intention to leave and only briefly returned in order to agree his eventual exit on July 29.

A decision to name his one-time assistant, Henrik Pedersen, as his successor was announced two days later but by then, more key personnel had moved on. Attacking figureheads Josh Windass and Michael Smith were allowed to leave as free agents in a summer exodus that has also seen Pol Valentin, Callum Paterson and Akin Famewo depart. The July sale of Djeidi Gassama, who joined Rangers for £2.2million ($3m), was a rare case of transfer money being recouped in Chansiri’s reign.

Captain Barry Bannan’s decision to commit his future to the club he joined in 2015 offered a glimmer of hope to supporters but that confirmation arrived on a day players had chosen to boycott a proposed friendly at Burnley.

Wednesday, who did not play a single pre-season friendly in public and visibly tired in the closing stages of their season opener, had been scheduled to visit the Premier League side’s training ground eight days before the Leicester match but the collective decision was made not to fulfil the fixture.

That prompted a statement from the players, who have seen salaries arrive late in four of the past five months. Full settlements only came on Friday, 48 hours before the Leicester game.

“We stand together in support with all our colleagues employed by the club who have been affected,” read the statement. “Players and staff are now feeling real, practical impacts in their professional and personal lives and we are extremely concerned at the lack of clarity regarding what is happening and when this will be resolved.”

That invited a temporary question mark over the Leicester game going ahead but dialogue between the club, Professional Footballers’ Association and EFL last week soon allayed those fears. Players stressed there would be “no downing of tools”, despite just 15 senior professionals remaining.

The EFL has kept a close eye on Wednesday this summer but has limited powers. It stresses that Chansiri has not met the threshold for disqualification under its owners and directors test, though pressure was placed upon the club to settle debts before the season got underway.

 

Sheffield Wednesday fans make their feelings known (Phil Buckingham/The Athletic)

Both the Premier League’s solidarity payment (£2.7m) and the monthly EFL basic payment (£460,000) were handed to Championship clubs last week, enabling Wednesday to pay all outstanding salaries to players and staff, as well as a small number of transfer payments to other clubs.

That lifted the EFL embargo that Wednesday have spent the summer working under but restrictions remain. No fees, for either loans or permanent transfers, can be paid by Wednesday until the summer of 2027 after surpassing 30 days of late payments since July 1.

The EFL has made it clear that the crisis must be curtailed. It outlined a wish to see a “strong, stable and competitive Sheffield Wednesday” in a statement issued 48 hours before the Championship season began, either through Chansiri addressing funding problems or “make good on his commitment to sell to a well-funded party, for fair market value”.

Those final words were telling. A statement from Chansiri on June 26, his only communication to fans all summer, revealed that a £40m basic offer for his shareholding from a U.S.-based consortium had been rejected since the end of last season.

The EFL has since been given no indication that Chansiri is close to selling but there is growing anger towards the governing body over the possibility it might yet make Wednesday’s challenge all the harder. A points deduction is among the punishments available for the late payment of wages, a step that could bring another deficit to overcome.

“F*** the EFL,” was the blunt chant from the away fans in the closing stages, once Bannan had been dismissed for a second yellow card.

 

Barry Bannan leaves the field following his red card (Malcolm Couzens/Getty Images)

---

Even in a 2-1 loss, the trip to Leicester amounted to an afternoon of escapism for Wednesday’s supporters. There was sympathetic ovation from Leicester fans once the protest ended after five minutes and stoic defending was eventually undone by second-half goals from Leicester defenders Jannik Vestergaard and Wout Faes.

It was enough to feel pride in their club, but it only provided a pause to the worry.

Saturday brings a first game of the season to Hillsborough when Stoke City visit but it remains unclear how many supporters will get to see it after Sheffield City Council closed the North Stand, which bears Chansiri’s name in the seating pattern, last month.

Concerns around the stand’s structural integrity must be addressed in the coming days or there will be a need to rehouse thousands of season ticket holders. The North Stand accounts for roughly 9,000 of Hillsborough’s 39,000 seats and Atkinson is among those who cannot say if he will be able to attend Stoke’s visit.

“I have a season ticket in that stand and I’ve had no email or confirmation about where I’ll be sitting next week,” he says. “It’s six days from now and we still don’t know. It’s the lack of communication and transparency that’s really poor. If you’re in hard times, at least communicate with people.”

Pedersen is at least trying that. The Dane is a likeable, calming figure leading Wednesday through their prolonged crisis. Sunday’s bench included seven players aged 21 or under but it was not until the 87th minute that a threadbare Wednesday team went under against an opponent relegated from the Premier League last season.

Pedersen admitted afterwards that “five or six” Wednesday players had travelled separately from the main squad on the eve of the game, staying in a nearby hotel to aid preparations. He did not know if those players had been left to foot the bill themselves. The majority had made the one-hour coach journey to Leicester on the morning of the game to save costs.

“I am sitting here with a very proud feeling,” Pedersen told reporters in his post-match press conference. “It has been some tough, tough weeks.”

And every indication is that there will be many more to come for Wednesday until Chansiri finally grants the wishes of a beleaguered fanbase.

[Fulham Broadway 17,810]

Good to see the FA enforcing the Fit and Proper Persons test, and not the ''We'll sell to the Highest bidder even though you're obviously a crook''.

All 92 English professional clubs that make up the PL (20 clubs) and EFL (the remaining 72 clubs) are registered as private or public limited companies and their officers are therefore subject to Companies Act compliance and general fiduciary responsibilities.

Over the past 25 years all have undergone changes in ownership and/or directorship, often on multiple occasions.  More recently this has been in favour of individuals or corporate entities, foreign or domestic, with little shared passion, understanding of the history of the clubs whose stewardship they've assumed or even with experience let alone proven know-how of running a football club. Whereas this has brought about real improvements for some clubs (Chelsea, Man City & Wolves) it has more often than not created significant problems for most others.

The combined attraction of financial gain, brand enhancement or exposure, “sportswashing” and/or self-aggrandizement has continued to fuel the desire to acquire or invest in English clubs especially those in the PL or those otherwise with tradition and an established fan-base that might provide the means by which a prospective owner can justify his/her/its ends.

[Vesper 31,181]

Premier League tactical trends to watch in 2025-26: Flying full-backs, counter-attacks, and the ‘Lavolpiana’

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6542301/2025/08/12/premier-league-tactical-trends-2025-26/

Tactically, the Premier League is in a real state of flux.

After four consecutive title-winning years with a distinct, possession and territory-based style, Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City were reduced to a third-place finish on 71 points in 2024-25 — their worst since Guardiola’s debut campaign of 2016-17.

Meanwhile Liverpool cruised to the title in their first season post-Jurgen Klopp, with Arne Slot’s side developing a reputation for their flexibility and adaptability. They had 25 wins and only lost twice across the first 34 matches, by which point the trophy was theirs.

Nottingham Forest showed European football can be earned with a throwback, defend-first and counter-attack strategy, while for the second season running all three promoted teams were relegated.

So what might we expect from 2025-26?

---

Flying full-backs, not inverted ones

Last season, the chasing pack of European clubs seemed to realise, en masse, that they did not need to copy City, Chelsea, and Arsenal by rolling a full-back into midfield. In fact, those clubs had even more success with flying full-backs running beyond a winger.

Per SkillCorner, Milos Kerkez was the only player in the division to make 100+ overlaps and 100+ underlaps, which suited the directness of Bournemouth’s in-possession approach — and with him joining Liverpool this summer, makes him a younger iteration of Andy Robertson.

“He’s a player that, because of his physical condition, arrives so many times to the last third with the ball under control to put good crosses,” said Bournemouth head coach Andoni Iraola of Kerkez last season.

Likewise, the arrival of Jeremie Frimpong from Bayer Leverkusen, a wing-back in their Bundesliga-winning team of 2023-24, means Slot can deploy maximal width and beyond-the-ball full-backs on both sides.

 

(Carl Recine/Getty Images)

Newcastle United’s full-back pairing of Lewis Hall and Tino Livramento were particularly frequent underlappers; Antonee Robinson put up 10 assists for Fulham last year, completing the most crosses of any player in the division, consistently running beyond from left-back.

Other honourable mentions include Daniel Munoz (Crystal Palace), Aaron Wan-Bissaka (West Ham United), Michael Kayode (Brentford) and Lucas Digne (Aston Villa).

As per SkillCorner, the frequency of full-backs overlapping has decreased in recent seasons, down nearly 14 per cent in 2024-25 compared to the 2018-19 campaign. Meanwhile, underlaps are on the rise — up by more than a third over the same period.

This might seem strange considering the prevalence of inverted wingers, who play on the opposite side to their dominant foot, and like to cut inside, which would suit a supporting overlap.

However, many coaches want their wingers to start with high and wide positions regardless, and by enticing opposition full-backs out one-v-one, an underlap can often unlock a defence.

---

The ‘Lavolpiana’ — dropping a pivot in

Premier League midfield battles are changing. We see that at goal kicks, when teams will often build-up with six players close to their own goal and position four up on halfway, leaving a hole in central midfield because opponents press man-to-man so often.

In settled possession, 4-4-2 mid-blocks are increasingly common, to man-mark in central midfield. Consequently, short passing routes through the centre of the pitch have a lot more risk than reward (unless a team has a pivot with the press resistance of Rodri or Ryan Gravenberch).

As per Footovision, an advanced data provider, the proportion of line-breaking passes played centrally during build-up dropped by five percentage points from 2023-24 to 2024-25 in the Premier League.

Expect to see more of the Lavolpiana tactic, named after Argentine coach Ricardo La Volpe. This is where a central midfielder drops deeper, playing between the two centre-backs, and breaks lines with longer-range passes.

Here is Newcastle’s Sandro Tonali playing that role, allowing right-back Kieran Trippier to push forward and create a two-v-one against Ipswich Town’s left-back.

If any midfielder was made for the role, it is Youri Tielemans at Aston Villa. He ranked ninth in Europe’s top-five leagues last season for through balls (24).

With Rodri injured for most of last season, Bernardo Silva used the tactic on an as-needed basis against particularly stubborn mid-blocks. Mateo Kovacic has operated similarly for Guardiola, with this being a consistent feature of his sides.

And here is Carlos Baleba doing that in the build-up for Brighton & Hove Albion’s opener away at Manchester United.

“We had a good balance between defence and controlling the game in possession,” Brighton head coach Fabian Hurzeler said afterwards.

Coaches tend to value this build-up tweak not just for the way it opens passing lanes — as opponents are reluctant to commit a player too high to press the midfielder — but also because it provides extra cover as rest defence versus counter-attacks.

What You Should Read Next

What last season’s Premier League data can tell us about 2025-26

Outfielders taking goal kicks, long throws and rising to the rhythm – just some of the growing trends in England's top flight

---

Back to basics set pieces

There is an irony that even as clubs focus on and invest ever more deeply in set pieces, the tactics are trending towards yesteryear.

Last term, 60 per cent of all corners were inswingers, up from 41 per cent in 2018-19. Short corners have remained pretty consistent (roughly one in five) while outswingers have really fallen out of fashion.

Teams largely copied the approaches of Arsenal and Aston Villa, two of the earlier Premier League clubs to hire formal set-piece coaches, who tended to pack the six-yard box and drop inswingers onto the opposition goalkeeper. Everton, too, consistently caused teams problems with these delivery types under Sean Dyche.

“It is special in the Premier League because you can block, push, foul and there is no whistle,” Crystal Palace head coach Oliver Glasner said of corners last season, indirectly offering an explanation of why more teams are prioritising inswingers — because they are allowed to.

“This gives you more opportunities in attacking set plays but it causes more trouble when defending set plays”.

 

Premier League corners: a reliably busy scene (Stu Forster/Getty Images)

Likewise, teams are increasingly launching the ball upfield from kick-off, and long throws have been on a steady rise across the past four years too: there were 279 throws into the penalty area in 2020-21 (and only three goals from throw-ins that season). Last season, it was 501 and 20 goals from throw-ins.

Thomas Frank’s Brentford were — as in previous seasons — league leaders here, with 103 penalty-box throws and six goals from throw-ins. Frank, now being Tottenham Hotspur head coach, might give the tactic more popularity if his new side continue to use it.

---

The potential re-rise of the 3-4-2-1

Chelsea in 2016-17 were the last team to win the Premier League playing a variation of a 3-4-3. City morphed into this shape plenty in attacking during 2022-23 (when John Stones would move from centre-back into midfield), but generally there has been a homogeneity of 4-3-3 among the league’s best.

However, the 3-4-2-1 is starting to creep its way back in. It is the first-choice shape of Ruben Amorim at Manchester United, and Glasner at Crystal Palace — the pair having success with it at their respective former clubs Sporting CP and Eintracht Frankfurt.

 

Amorim and Glasner, 3-4-2-1 enthusiasts both (Michael Regan/Getty Images)

Here is how it looked for United and Palace in settled possession, able to commit a wing-back onto the last line and with dual No 10s that can pin opposition full-backs, while playing close to their No 9.

It was a similar story with Wolverhampton Wanderers and Vitor Pereira. When he arrived in December 2024, the club were 19th on nine points after 16 matches.

His predecessor Gary O’Neil had switched between a back three and four, but Pereira went purely with a 3-4-2-1 for the rest of the season and Wolves took 33 points from their remaining 22 games. They survived comfortably, finishing 16th.

It might be a blueprint for more teams, particularly promoted sides needing a solid defensive foundation. With so many teams defending in a back four, a wing-back system can be a relatively straightforward way of overloading opponents and creating a front five.

In total, there were 120 instances of the 3-4-2-1 or 3-2-4-1 (different ways of labelling the same thing) in 2024-25, with its frequency trending upwards since 2019-20, where it was only 25 times.

---

A focus on attacking transitions

The Premier League took the German Bundesliga’s crown last season: England’s top tier is, statistically, the most counter-attacking among Europe’s major leagues.

Fast break shots have been on a five-year rise, as has the expected goals (xG, or chance quality) from those scenarios.

After 54 fast break goals in 2021-22, the past three campaigns have seen 87, 83, and, most recently, 112 goals.

More teams trying to play expansively, and in the opposition half, are increasing counter-attacking opportunities. Add to this that there is a particularly high frequency of strikers and wingers with the physical and technical capacity to exploit disjointed and underloaded defences.

Liverpool, Tottenham Hotspur and Arsenal were the top teams at scoring from fast breaks last season — it is no longer an underdog tactic — while Brighton, Tottenham, Leicester City, Nottingham Forest and Brentford were a quintet of clubs who conceded at least eight goals from those scenarios.

“Everyone is talking about what we’re doing with the ball, scoring goals, but when you look at our counter-press, how we win the ball back, it’s so hard for opponents,” Arsenal captain Martin Odegaard said in March 2024.

“I’ve been on the other side before. Trying to defend deep and escaping that when you are being pressed is so difficult.”

Expect to see even more aggressive counter-pressing next season, perhaps more tactical fouls, and coaches with a focus on rest defence — the positioning of players and spacing between them when a team has possession, ready to counter-press should a turnover occur.

[Vesper 31,181]

Sunderland are back and buoyant with bold signings, intense demand for seats and 100,000 shirts sold

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6545745/2025/08/12/sunderland-premier-league-return/

On the corridor wall outside David Bruce’s office in Black Cat House, there is a framed piece of paper that has fundamentally changed Sunderland’s world.

It is their Premier League share certificate, awarded to the club’s owner Kyril Louis-Dreyfus at the AGM dinner in early June, displayed for all to see. Sunderland’s, if you were wondering, was the 128th certificate issued.

“You need to look at that,” an enthusiastic Bruce, Sunderland’s chief business officer and lifelong supporter, tells The Athletic. “It shows what we’re all part of. My job is to help keep it on that wall.”

Not since 2017, when meekly surrendering to relegation from the Premier League under David Moyes, have Sunderland held a ticket to the party that begins again with the visit of West Ham United this weekend. “I’ve never experienced a buzz like this,” adds Bruce. “It’s palpable.”

Tickets for Saturday’s opening game all went within a day of going on sale. Season cards, too, are long gone. Kit sales have never been higher and the club shop, two floors below that share certificate, has a snaking queue of supporters wishing to add Premier League badges to the sleeves of new shirts.

Eight years were spent awaiting this moment. There was the ignominy of falling into League One and then the long, arduous road back that climaxed with promotion via the Championship play-off final in May. Those dramatic victories over Coventry City and Sheffield United are already the stuff of Wearside legend.

There is the very real danger of the Premier League’s formidable strength quickly putting an end to Sunderland’s rise in the coming months but this is a very different club to the one that parted with English football’s elite.

The ambition now is to be sustainable and strategic after a string of wasteful, aimless years began a ruinous slide captured on the Netflix documentary Sunderland Til I Die. Even with this summer’s spending — £121m ($163m) and counting — it is stressed there will be no deviation from the plans that have brought them this far.

“Kyril has a very clear vision,” says Bruce. “It’s been, ‘How do we build a football club that’s sustainable?’. Doing the right things on and off the pitch, building a club that people can really buy into.

“A lot has been written about what’s been done on the pitch, young talent and creating a platform for them, but a big part of what Kyril has pushed on the business side is to understand how we build a club that reconnects with the people.”

It has been no small task.

“The feelings the fans had towards the club and the players that played here (in 2016-17) would suggest there was a real separation,” he adds. “For this part of the world to have that is really quite upsetting. What you’ve got now is something that fans recognise as being theirs.”

---

West Ham’s visit on Saturday promises to be a spectacle but it will not beat the delirium felt when the Stadium of Light last hosted a competitive match. Dan Ballard’s extra-time header to sink Coventry in the Championship play-off semi-final second leg was the cue for feral celebrations and the platform for more of the same as Sheffield United were then beaten at Wembley.

That stroked finish from Tommy Watson, now a Brighton & Hove Albion player, was as big as any in Sunderland’s modern history; cathartic and the sudden catalyst for what could be transformative change.

Returning to the Premier League was always Louis-Dreyfus’ stated aim when taking a controlling stake in Sunderland from Stewart Donald in February 2021. The son of Robert Louis-Dreyfus, the late former owner of Marseille, made it clear at the start of 2021-22 that a five-year plan could guide Sunderland from the backwaters of League One and up to the Premier League. It took just four.

There were missteps along the way, like defeat by Lincoln City in the League One play-offs and the disastrous appointment of Michael Beale, but Louis-Dreyfus, still only 27, has turned Sunderland into a club feeling good about itself once more.

“Kyril is a very progressive young guy,” says Bruce, who was convinced to step down from his position as chief marketing officer at Major League Soccer to return to his home city last year.

 

David Bruce will play a key role in driving Sunderland’s off-field growth (Sunderland AFC)

“He sees the world differently to many owners, who probably grew up consuming sports on radio and in newspapers. Kyril has grown up with the mobile phone and social media.

“He’s very thoughtful, he’s very thorough. There’s a lot of noise around this club with a lot of scale but he’s good at hearing the feeling and staying resolute towards good plans.

“In football it’s very easy to get drawn into the emotions and move away from plans because things happen in real time to move you off course. You have to listen to some of that but you also have to stay the course with plans you believe in. For such a young person to have that steadiness is a real quality.”

Sunderland’s methods in coming this far have barely altered in the past four years, even when irritating a string of head coaches.

New arrivals have typically been under 23 with the potential to develop into assets. Jobe Bellingham went from being a £1.5m signing from Birmingham City to a £32m player sold to Borussia Dortmund this summer. The year before it was Jack Clarke, sold to Ipswich Town for £15m and the year before that, Ross Stewart, who Southampton paid £9m to sign.

Reinvestment has regularly been smart, such as moves for Ballard, Dennis Cirkin, Romaine Mundle and Eliezer Mayenda, which have complemented the emergence of academy graduates that include Anthony Patterson, Chris Rigg, Dan Neil and Watson.

Wages have been controlled along the way. Figures from the 2023-24 season, the last available club accounts, showed salary costs to be 81 per cent of turnover, way below the Championship average.

Sustainability has always been the buzzword and it stretches to the business outlook of a club that was the ninth-best supported in England last season, with an average home crowd of just under 40,000.

“For us to be successful, a modern football club at the highest level, it’s the ability to take advantage of the scale and reach you have,” says Bruce. “You have to build your revenue streams. If you sit here and you don’t grow revenue streams, then your football club stagnates. It does not grow and others go past you very quickly. You can’t become the club your fans want you to be, and from the business side we’re very cognisant of that.”

What You Should Read Next

Sunderland have spent over £100m on transfers. This is how they could do it – and why they need to

Sunderland have been the seventh highest spenders in the Premier League this summer. And yet, it might just be necessary

Sunderland, inevitably, will enjoy record revenues in this coming season. There is a guarantee to earn at least £110m from the Premier League pot (almost three times the club’s turnover in 2023-24), as well as matchday and commercial income climbing to new highs.

Kit sales, in particular, have seen enormous growth. A partnership with Hummel, the Danish manufacturer that formerly supplied the club’s kits between 1988 and 1994, led to output trebling last season.

“We’ve moved from about 33,000, 34,000 shirts two seasons ago (when with Nike) to circa 100,000 shirts in our first season with Hummel,” says Bruce. “That puts you top 10 in the country. What we’re seeing is unprecedented here. There were 500 people here when we launched our home shirt last month, before the store even opened.”

There has also been increased demand for tickets. North of 30,000 season cards were sold before the Wembley victory and the limits were reached within 48 hours of being placed on sale in June. With corporate hospitality offerings taking season-ticket holders to 41,000 and Michelin star chef Tommy Banks now overseeing high-end food on site, it is the first time since the capacity of the Stadium of Light was increased in 2000 that supply cannot meet demand.

The summer weeks have only served to heighten the anticipation.

Former West Ham defender Arthur Masuaku became Sunderland’s 10th signing over the weekend, with the capture of Switzerland international Granit Xhaka underlining ambitions to buck a trend that has seen the last six promoted clubs all suffer relegation inside a year. Twice the club transfer record was broken, first to turn Enzo Le Fee’s loan from Roma into a £19m deal and then when signing Habib Diarra from Strasbourg for £30m.

 

Granit Xhaka was a Bundesliga winner with Bayer Leverkusen in May 2024 (Daniela Porcelli/Sunderland AFC via Getty Images)

Sunderland’s net spend, offset by the exits of Bellingham and Watson, currently stands in the region of £85m, with an expectation for further signings to arrive before the transfer deadline.

“There’s headroom based on how the club has been run in the last few years,” explains Bruce. “We’ve been sensible with how we’ve spent based on the revenue afforded to us as a football club and we’ll always have that in mind. We can’t spend beyond our means and we haven’t since Kyril took over. We make X, we spend Y. It’s as simple as that, so if we can build revenues, that gives us greater opportunity to spend on the football side.”

Sunderland will be disadvantaged when only allowed to lose £61m over their next three-year assessment period but the Premier League’s profit and sustainability rules, says Bruce, are not a concern.

“Our approach in the window has been well measured,” he says. “We spent a lot of time as an executive team on what our revenues are going to look like and where we’ve come from in the last couple of years.

“What can we spend? What’s the anchor point on wages and what’s the money we can spend in the market? We’re doing it with a view to being a sustainable football club but with every chance of staying in the league. We feel confident. Like what happened in the last parts of last season, where people came together, the feeling around the club can give us a very good chance.”

Sunderland have hope again.

[Vesper 31,181]

[Vesper 31,181]

The thing we’ll all be saying in May is…

Kay: What next for Marcus Rashford/Jack Grealish/Raheem Sterling as he heads back to Manchester United/Manchester City/Chelsea after his loan spell?

Crafton: The tickets for the World Cup are HOW MUCH?

Spiers: Will Manchester City’s 115 charges case be resolved this week?

Miller: I wish I hadn’t fallen for the Arsenal thing, again…

Hughes: Time to put your feet up, Pep.

James: Fair play to you, Ange Postecoglou, for keeping Leeds up.

Akinwolere: Chelsea have got their eye on another 10 players to bolster the squad ahead of next season, with more outgoings still to come.

Jones: With Premier League Golden Boot winner Harry Maguire up front, nothing can stop England. It’s coming home.

[Vesper 31,181]

Chelsea to give share of Club World Cup player bonuses to family of Diogo Jota, Andre Silva

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6551143/2025/08/14/diogo-jota-family-Chelsea-donation/

Chelsea will use a portion of Club World Cup bonuses paid to players to make a financial donation to the family of Diogo Jota and Andre Silva.

The west London club were crowned champions of FIFA’s newly-expanded tournament in July, defeating Paris Saint-Germain 3-0 in the final at the MetLife Stadium in New Jersey. Their success in the tournament earned the club an estimated $114.6million (£84.4m).

Chelsea have subsequently allocated a $15.5m (£11.4m) fund to be distributed equally between the players who represented Enzo Maresca’s side during the tournament, with a decision made jointly between club and players that an equal payment will also be made to Jota’s family.

The overall value of each portion tallies more than $500k before it’s subjected to currency conversion costs from US dollars into UK pound sterling, alongside relevant employer costs, taxes and social security costs.

Liverpool forward Jota and his brother Andre Silva, a footballer at Portuguese club Penafiel, both died in a car accident in the Spanish province of Zamora on July 3, 10 days prior to Chelsea’s Club World Cup final victory.

Liverpool recently unveiled plans for a memorial sculpture at their Anfield stadium as the focal point for a permanent tribute to Jota, who scored 65 goals in 182 appearances for the club.

The club’s players will wear a ‘Forever 20’ emblem on their shirts and stadium jackets for the duration of the 2025-26 season while the LFC Foundation, the club’s official charity, will launch a grassroots football programme in the Portugal international’s name.

A special fan mosaic and a minute’s silence is planned for Arne Slot’s side’s first game of the Premier League season against Bournemouth at Anfield on Friday.

Liverpool announced last month that they were permanently retiring the No. 20 shirt at all levels of the club in memory of Jota, who joined the club from Wolverhampton Wanderers in 2020.

[NikkiCFC 8,529]

Come on 🍒 

Let's see how their defense looks without Kerkez, Huijsen, Zabarnyi and Kepa.

Petrovic should be good and expensive CB from Lille.

[Pizy 19,383]

Don’t know if it’s even worth bothering to watch this match. Premier League gave Liverpool a free cupcake of an opening fixture to slaughter.

Probably be long over by half time. 

[Vesper 31,181]

[Fulham Broadway 17,810]

Diakite could register at an agency and moonlight as a Caecedo lookeylikey. 

[DDA 10,285]

5 minutes ago, Fulham Broadway said:

Diakite could register at an agency and moonlight as a Caecedo lookeylikey. 

I had to rewind to see if i wasn’t tripping out. Dead ringer.

[Pizy 19,383]

Ekitike looks really dangerous. Gonna be weird if he starts super well and then Isak comes in. I don’t see how you play those two together. Ekitike would be wasted out on the left.

[DDA 10,285]

4 minutes ago, Pizy said:

Ekitike looks really dangerous. Gonna be weird if he starts super well and then Isak comes in. I don’t see how you play those two together. Ekitike would be wasted out on the left.

He looks class. Typical 

[Fulham Broadway 17,810]

Liverpool fans up to their usual standard racially abusing Semenyo.

[Vesper 31,181]

2 nil

game over more than likely

[whats happening 1,668]

looks like ekitike is not as bad as yall are saying before he went to pool

[Vesper 31,181]

 2 1

Semenyo

[Vesper 31,181]

do not rate Konate

have not ever since he went to Pool

[Vesper 31,181]

weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

2 2

Semenyo on a hat trick