The league table is finally taking shape as the top teams separate themselves from the pack while the league's cellar dwellers cling to every point that will hopefully save their seasons. There were several struggling teams that earned massive wins while some top teams slipped up, making for another thoroughly entertaining matchweek.
Major League Soccer delivered another Sunday matinee on Apple TV+, following last weekend's thrilling El Tráfico, with Atlanta United opening the roof on Mercedes-Benz Stadium to welcome the Chicago Fire in a match that finished 2-1 in favor of the Five Stripes.
Early Thursday morning, Amazon Prime Video Sport released a video on social media highlighting the difficulties and intricacies involved in being a top-flight match official. The clip showed Benoît Millot, a French referee taking control of a Ligue 1 match between Olympique Lyonnais and FC Nantes, and gave fans a great insight into what match officials go through over 90 minutes.
This is what referees really say to footballers during a game... ️
Premier League relegation is a simple concept: Your team was not good enough this season so they, and two other teams, have to drop down to the tier below (the Championship) and will play their games there next season. Conversely, the Championship will promote three teams to the Premier League to take their places (let’s not get into the playoffs). This toing and froing happens all the way down the league structure.
Major League Soccer is bound by parity and married to the chaos that comes with it. With late goals, monumental upsets and high-scoring affairs, Matchday 8 was one for the books.
The spicy rivalry between the USMNT and México is having a remarkable round in the 2022-23 Eredivisie as strikers Ricardo Pepi and Santiago Giménez battle neck and neck among the division's top scorers. After 29 games, both have netted 11 goals and are just three behind Xavi Simmons (PSV) and Anastasios Douvikas (FC Utrecht), who currently lead the race with 14 each.
Although the realities of their teams are extremely different, Pepi and Giménez are not giving space to each other with both finding the net again this weekend.
(S3E5 spoilers below)
As writers on the series, Jason Sudeikis (Ted), Brett Goldstein (Roy) and Brendan Hunt (Coach Beard) have always stressed that Ted Lasso isn't a show about soccer, it's a show about these characters who just so happen to be involved in the running of a professional soccer club.
Based off what we've seen from the Concacaf W Championship and SheBelieves Cup, a USWNT World Cup roster prediction seems like a pretty straightforward exercise — Vlatko Andonovski hasn't been tinkering away with his squads.
However, the dramatic recall of Julie Ertz showed us that certain veterans can't be ruled out with three months of club ball still to be played. There are proven stars returning from longterm injuries who'll be watched closely by the staff, and let's just hope that Mallory Swanson is the only late addition to the casualty list.
With many experts having predicted that the winner of the 2022-23 UEFA Champions League will emerge from the blockbuster quarterfinal tie between Manchester City and Bayern Munich, City's 3-0 beatdown of Bayern in Tuesday's first leg at the Etihad is quite the statement from the Sky Blues.
There's still a lot of thinking yet to come from Pep Guardiola, but this City team can kill you a myriad of ways (unlike Chelsea and Real Madrid), is UCL battle hardened (unlike Benfica, Inter, Milan and Napoli) and has Erling Haaland (unlike Bayern).
MLS Matchweek 7 proved severely dichotomous to the league’s image. Fans were treated to the best that MLS offers with individual brilliance, age-defying heroes, local rivalries and close games. However, it was an alleged incident that occurred between San Jose and New York that left an extremely sour taste in fans' mouths.