Managers

It was a surreal moment on Saturday when Gareth Bale entered Real Madrid’s 3-1 victory over Real Sociedad in the 67th minute to a torrent of boos and jeers from the Santiago Bernabéu. Los Blancos supporters are a notoriously demanding bunch — even Cristiano Ronaldo received his share of whistles inside the legendary stadium — but nothing comes close to the reception that Bale was given upon replacing 18-year-old Brazilian phenom Rodrygo.

Sheffield United and Manchester United played out a sensational 3-3 draw at Bramall Lane on Sunday evening with the Red Devils overturning a two-goal deficit and looking certain of three points themselves before Oli McBurnie’s late equalizer in the 90th minute.

Sheffield’s early period of dominance could’ve been more pronounced on the scoreboard but for the brilliance of David de Gea, who recorded five saves on the night, including this incredible double save to keep things at 0-0 in the 11th minute.

In the 1885-86 Scottish Cup, Arbroath defeated Bon Accord 36-0. In the 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup, the USWNT beat Thailand 13-0. In the 2019 NCAA Women's College Cup, Stanford beat Prairie View A&M 15-0. Throughout the course of history, the trend of scoring an excessive amount of goals has continued to receive backlash from all levels.

Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola has escaped any sanctions from the Football Association for turning himself into the Meme Lord during Sunday’s 3-1 defeat to Liverpool. 

One look at the Bundesliga table — with Borussia Mönchengladbach currently on top — tells you that it’s been a wild season so far in Germany. But that adjective doesn’t come close to describing the scenes that unfolded at the end of today’s match between SC Freiburg and Eintracht Frankfurt at the Schwarzwald-Stadion.

Swaths of empty seats around the Camp Nou on Tuesday for Slavia Prague's visit in the Champions League reflected the current malaise surrounding Barcelona, one amplified by this past weekend’s 3-1 defeat to Levante in LaLiga. That match both increased the pressure on manager Ernesto Valverde and condemned Luis Suárez to a three-week spell on the sidelines with a new calf injury.

Granada is top of the LaLiga table. No, not the country. Granada CF, the football team from Granada, Spain. The same Granada that appointed Tony Adams in 2017 and was relegated.

Things are heating up in the Champions League (read: Real Madrid bottom of Group A) and there’s no surer sign of the increase in dramatics than managers getting booked. In a first for the Champions League, coaches can now be on the receiving end of both yellow and red cards from the match official, and although Match Day 1 of the competition came and went without history being made, Match Day 2 brought the moment we’d all been waiting for.

It’s been an eventful week for building from the back. It began with Mexico’s beatdown of Gregg Berhalter’s longterm vision for the USMNT in East Rutherford, a result which led to a cry for abandoning the philosophy.

Things reached a crescendo yesterday with Arsenal — the masterful architects of their own downfall in recent times. Sokratis Papastathopoulos showed exactly why 2-0 is the most dangerous lead in football by passing the ball straight to Gerard Deulofeu in his own area.