Title is Leverkusen’s to lose as Alonso shows he is far from a one-trick pony | Andy Brassell

Spaniard’s side have opened up a 10-point lead and, remarkably, appear to have wrapped up the title race before spring

The race for the Bundesliga being over before spring has sprung? Of course. Plus ça change, wake me up when it’s summer and all the rest. This time, though, it’s not Bayern Munich calling time at the inn but of all teams, Bayer Leverkusen.

Sunday’s win just down the road at Köln for Leverkusen did what Harry Kane’s stoppage-time winner for Bayern prevented against Leipzig in the previous weekend. Still-unbeaten Leverkusen now have a 10-point cushion over the perpetual champions at the top with only 10 games left. Granit Xhaka, a hugely influential presence for the (we can say it, even if they can’t) champions-elect all season, warned afterwards of his experience of a big lead being reeled in by the division’s superpower at Arsenal last season. “I explain to them what happened,” he told ESPN’s Archie Rhind-Tutt of his discourse to his teammates, “but you can’t explain with words. You have to feel it.” Continue reading...

Komentar

Posting Komentar

Postingan populer dari blog ini

Wiegman’s Lionesses rekindle lost energy to fire spectacular comeback | Jonathan Liew

Gambar
Nations League victory against the Dutch arrives at the last despite a lack of clarity and brittleness creeping into the team They’ll always have Paris. Throughout this Nations League campaign this has been an England team fighting its own sense of entropy, still giving everything, still trying the same plans and processes in the hope that eventually something would click. And at 9.34pm on a briskly cold Wembley night, it finally did. Ella Toone’s injury-time goal earned England three points and kept their faintly glowing Olympic dream alive. But somehow it also did so much more. It breathed life into a team and a cycle, and a moment that for so much of the evening had felt like it was drawing to its natural conclusion provided a rousing encore to a cast preparing for its final curtain. There will be new challenges and new frontiers to conquer soon enough, a fresh set of European Championship qualifiers in the spring, but for now this iteration of the Lionesses still has tricks up
Baca selengkapnya

US owners understand profit but do they appreciate clubs’ tradition and values?

Gambar
Half of the Premier teams are part- or fully-owned by Americans or US companies. Fans’ suspicions are understandable * Sign up to Jonathan’s weekly newsletter here It’s just over a year since Gary Neville declared US owners of English soccer clubs “a clear and present danger to the pyramid and fabric of the game”. The comment provoked a furore but the former England full-back turned high-profile pundit was unrepentant, insisting that if profit is the priority, there are vital aspects of the roles of soccer clubs that risk being lost. The issue, clearly, is not restricted to US owners. It’s unlikely that anybody who is not a fan who takes over a club is going to be acting primarily in the best interests of the community it represents. But given half the 20 Premier League clubs (and seven of the 24 Championship clubs) are part- or fully-owned by Americans or US companies, and given the prevalence of private equity companies whose sole interest is short-term profit, it’s perhaps
Baca selengkapnya

‘Emotional’ Leah Williamson to make first England start in almost a year

Gambar
* Euro 2022-winning captain missed World Cup with ACL injury * Defender brings ‘flexibility in defence’, says Sarina Wiegman Sarina Wiegman has confirmed Leah Williamson will start for England against the Republic of Ireland on Tuesday night in their second Euro 2025 qualifying group game. Williamson, the Euro 2022-winning captain, said she would be emotional at the Aviva Stadium when she steps out with England for the first time in almost a year, after she was sidelined with an anterior cruciate ligament injury last April. Continue reading...
Baca selengkapnya