Europe

Replacing Zlatan Ibrahimovic and his 2015-16 tally of 44 goals for Paris St-Germain was always going to be impossible, but the club couldn’t have foreseen the transition being this painful. The numbers indicating the decline of PSG’s attack are staggering: last season, they scored 102 league goals. This year, they’re on pace for 76.

While the defense has already surrendered 15 goals at the halfway point of the season as compared to 19 throughout the entirety of 2015-16, it’s the lack of offensive firepower that is clearly troubling owners Qatar Sports Investments.

This is, without a doubt, the strangest sending off we’ve ever seen. FC Porto came up against Moreirense in a must-win match in the Portuguese Taca da Liga cup competition on Tuesday night. With Moreirense leading 1-0 in the 79th minute, the referee inexplicably ended any hope Porto had of advancing to the semifinals by giving Danilo Pereira his second yellow card of the match and sending him off. 

His offense? Being ran into by the referee. It’s a shockingly ridiculous decision that calls into question the integrity of everything. This guy is tripping off the power. 

Replacing a stadium that’s been around since 1898 was always going to be a difficult task for Tottenham’s ownership group, but ENIC International and chairman Daniel Levy appear to have gotten what is, for now, known as the Northumberland Development Project just right.

White Hart Lane, home to Tottenham Hotspur since 1899, was limited to a capacity of just over 36,000, and Spurs began exploring options for a new ground as far back as 2006.

For almost everyone involved with Arsenal FC, Tuesday’s spectacular 3-3 draw with Bournemouth, after being 3-0 down in the 70th minute, must’ve felt like a victory. Everyone apart from Alexis Sanchez, that is. 

Alexis Sánchez didn't seem too delighted with the result at full time. [@andremar655] pic.twitter.com/44misj4BEI

First grade is a time of personal discovery. At six years of age, it's a time when children learn simple things like raising their hands, not interrupting the speaker and respecting the feelings of others. It’s a time of collaboration, sharing and complex learning in different subject areas.

Unless your Cristiano Ronaldo Jr, whose elementary experience is, according to his father, like braving the comment section of any soccer website — the one place where you'll never find co-operation, manners and mutual respect.

‘Member John Obi Mikel? The 29-year-old defensive midfielder has been on the books at Chelsea for 11 years now, but he’s yet to make an appearance in the 2016-17 season. In the previous three seasons, Mikel made a respectable 67 appearances for the Blues, but the length of those appearances averaged only 52 minutes.

Seeing Mikel appear next to the fourth official became the equivalent of popping a bottle of champagne for Chelsea supporters — if Mikel was coming on, victory was all but assured.

Being a professional referee in the Premier League is an extremely tough job. The old adage “Who would ever want to be a referee?” rings particularly true in the EPL. They get more abuse than we as fans care to admit, and every single one of us has been guilty of being on the wrong side of a decision before viewing the instant replay.

The Barcelona and Real Madrid attacking trios of MSN and BBC took to Instagram to show us how they celebrated the New Year. From all of us at The18, we wish you nothing but the best for 2017!

Barcelona's MSN

Lionel Messi