With just a few weeks remaining in the 2017-18 Premier League season, we are quickly winding down towards one of the most anticlimactic final days of all-time. If Tottenham collapse, Chelsea might yet play themselves into the top four, and Southampton could still manage to avoid the drop — just look at what Newcastle have accomplished over the last four games.
This was meant to be a blockbuster weekend. There was so much going on in Serie A. The Rome derby. Inter versus Atalanta. Milan versus Napoli. All the fallout from the midweek European ties. The build up to next weekend’s potential title decider in Turin.
Instead, it all kind of fizzled out. All of the most interesting fixtures ended in goalless draws, extinguishing any chance of a title race and offering us no progress in the race for the Champions League. A damp squib of a weekend, all build up and no pay off.
Wolverhampton Wanderers were in League One almost four years ago. Fast forward to today, and they are on the verge of securing a return to the Premier League. How did a club, which was relegated from the Premier League (2011-12 season) and the Championship (2012-13 season) in consecutive years, manage to steady the ship and get itself back on track?
Two words: Jorge. Mendes. Yes, the Jorge Mendes, who is the agent of Cristiano Ronaldo and Jose Mourinho. It is quite a murky situation in terms of what Mendes’ role at Wolves actually is.
What’s a Luddite’s favorite band? Rage Against The Machine. What’s a Luddite’s favorite football league? The English Premier League.
The 20 English Premier League clubs decided against adding a VAR next season in a league vote on Friday. Instead, the league issued a statement saying it would continue testing Premier League VAR.
Cristiano Ronaldo is probably, no, scratch that, he is the most hated player in soccer right now. I challenge you to name me someone more polarising, I dare you. But, what makes him so easy to dislike?
Well, for starters, the guy has a body that looks as if the Greek god Zeus hand carved it himself. I mean, seriously, I know most of us are out of shape, but there’s no need for Ronaldo to continually take his shirt off in celebration to remind us all of how ridiculously jacked he is. It's not fair.
Liverpool and AS Roma have made this the most exciting Champions League in recent years (at least as far as the semifinals are concerned). Here's why a Liverpool versus AS Roma UCL final would be the best thing that could possibly happen to us.
There's a good reason powerhouses Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and Juventus always feature in the most definitive rounds of Europe's most important competition, and yet, even though these teams never cease to amaze us, there's something refreshing and exciting about teams like Liverpool and Roma making it so far.
We just couldn’t help ourselves. With just over 60 days to go until the release of the most anticipated book since Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, we had to celebrate Bruce Arena’s magnum opus, What’s Wrong with US?: A Coach’s Blunt Take on the State of American Soccer After a Lifetime on the Touchline (so blunt), by revisiting the former USMNT manager’s favorite dilemma — the MLS cohort versus their "hotshot" European counterparts.
Please slow down, all of you. Be patient. Lower your expectations for a bit. You will be happier in the long run, I promise.
Americans spend a lot of time talking about how we are going to unearth the next Messi and be rocketed to soccer-superpowerdom. The reality is, even if the next Messi existed and was eligible for the USMNT and was convinced to play for the USA, the team would probably not be a soccer superpower.