With the start of the 2017-18 European season only days away, we take a look at all three promoted clubs in Europe's top four divisions (EPL, La Liga, Serie A and Bundesliga).
Newcastle United
Jonathan dos Santos is officially an LA Galaxy player. The 28-year-old joins his brother Gio in California after sealing a move from Villarreal. He will immediately become either the best midfielder in MLS or very very close.
Welcome to Hollywood, @jona2santos! pic.twitter.com/kJQf3OydJl
— LA Galaxy (@LAGalaxy) July 28, 2017
While Neymar hasn’t entirely exited Barcelona, he has shown himself the door at Thursday’s training session in Miami. With Barca slated to play Real Madrid Saturday in a friendly, Neymar’s bust-up with new signing Nelson Semedo is exactly what the tabloids craved.
Brothers: you can’t live with them and you can’t live without them. After years of what may have been some separation anxiety plying their trades thousands of miles away from each other, Jonathan and Giovani dos Santos may play on the same club team again.
The hype for the 2017-18 La Liga season has been decidedly low-key, and for good reason. Is there really any stopping Real Madrid? The club’s loss of Alvaro Morata hasn’t exceptionally weakened them, and capturing Kylian Mbappe would mean that we’re about 20 years away from parity being restored to European competition.
El Clasico is one of the most important fixtures on the European club season calendar. The two biggest clubs in Spain, and among the biggest in the world, rarely fail to put on a good show. Some of you may remember this from the last time they played El Clasico:
It's safe to say that Zinedine Zidane is aging remarkably well. The 45-year-old quickly transitioned from a Champions League winning player to a Champions League winning coach, and he looks as if he hasn’t aged a day in-between. He's got the kind of sideline presence that'll make your mom stop and stare at the television before saying something about how Americans are sure as s**t a lot fatter than Europeans.