If you’re an American, there’s absolutely every chance that you missed Wednesday’s Carabao Cup Round of 16 fixtures . . . unless you called in sick, which would be grounds for an ESPN 30 for 30 documentary starring you.
The Carabao Cup inspires hatred from many soccer fans who would rather be watching the Champions League at midweek and Premier League coaches who don’t care enough to play any of their regulars. Your dad would probably call it the “Don’t Carabao Haircuts Cup” because of all the shaggy haired teens taking the field in EPL uniforms.
But the Carabao Cup has some redeeming qualities — they were all seen Wednesday in the ridiculous match between Arsenal and Liverpool
Manchester United looked like a different team when it traveled to Norwich this past weekend. Despite the club’s lack of good penalty takers, the Red Devils put three goals away on a Norwich side that is struggling but is better than what the league table shows.
United has been missing Paul Pogba and Nemanja Matic for quite some time, and United’s midfield looked weak recently with the pairing of Scott McTominay and Fred with Andreas Pereira ahead of them. Anthony Martial has also been out for some time but returned to start the match.
UEFA has, once again, failed to punish racism.
After a slew of racially charged incidents took the spotlight this season, UEFA president Aleksander Čeferin promised tougher punishments for despicable, racist fan behavior. Bulgaria was already serving a partial stadium ban for previous racist incidents and still managed to hurl monkey chants at the England team during Euro qualifiers just a few weeks ago.
It’s a mutiny, folks. It's a mutiny.
Arsenal blew a two-goal lead to Crystal Palace on Sunday at the Emirates Stadium, settling for a 2-2 draw despite early goals from centerback pairing Sokratis and David Luiz. While manager Unai Emery has come under intense criticism for Arsenal’s recent displays and for his standoff with the increasingly beloved Mesut Özil, supporter fury today was aimed at club captain Granit Xhaka.
Another start, another full 90, another match without a significant contribution from Newcastle United’s Miguel Almirón. After arriving from Atlanta United for a club-record fee of $27 million last January, it’s now 20 Premier League appearances for the 25-year-old Paraguayan without a single goal or assist.
An hour into Christian Pulisic’s first Premier League start since August, Chelsea fans in the away end at Turf Moor were chanting “USA! USA! USA!” That’s what happens when you become the second American to score an EPL hat trick.
Christian Pulisic hadn’t started a Premier League match since August and many stateside started to wonder why Frank Lampard hates America. Well, Lampard has seen the light shining sea to shining sea and was rewarded with a brilliant Pulisic goal vs Burnley on Saturday. The 21-year-old American added a second as Chelsea led 2-0 at halftime.
Leicester City broke the Premier League record for largest road win with its 9-0 butchering of Southampton on Friday.
After one Leicester goal, Saints midfielder Ryan Bertrand was sent off with a red card. But how many goals do we excuse for being down one?
Jaime Vardy’s Foxes wasted no time scoring in the first 10 minutes just before the red card was issued. From there on, Leicester would toy with the Saints.
The use of Video Assistant Referee finally arrived in England this season, with the Premier League finally joining the rest of the world in embracing video replay. But why does VAR suck so much in the Premier League?
This past weekend saw a number of high-profile VAR decisions in the EPL, almost all of which seemed to be wrong. Why does the VAR in England seem to get things so wrong when the rest of the world has introduced replay with far fewer complaints?