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pool football fixtures this weekend
pool football fixtures this weekend - win
The WSL and Championship kick off this weekend, so here's a brief summary of all the PL's women's teams. Whether your club is one of the 13/20 in the top 2 divisions or far below, they're here!
This weekend the top two women's leagues in England, the Women's Super League and Women's Championship kick off. To mark that occasion I decided to do a mini write up on every PL's related women's club for those of you that are curious about your own club's women's team or all the clubs' sides. After following Spurs for about a decade, I decided a few years ago that I didn't have enough whiplash from near successes and wanted to add their women's team to the mix, which at the time was in the 3rd division. The ensuing years have been mostly upds as they've gone from the (mostly) amateur game (National League), to the semi-pro/pro 2nd division (Championship), to finally their first ever season in the fully professional Women's Super League. While the results were great, it also has been really rewarding to get to know names that were servants to the club that they and I love but fans likely will never had heard of or will hear of. Case in point is the recently retired Jenna Schicalli who was born and raised a Spurs fan, recently ending her last stint with the team from 2009-2020 in which she helped captain the team through multiple promotions, including the two I just spoke of. It's interesting to hear the perspective of players that are playing simply for the love of the game and club, since often times they have to have another job to supplement the little income they get outside of the top flight. Following the ups and downs of the women's team has been rewarding for me, getting at times either double the joy from victories across the club or double the pain from defeats on the same weekend. But either way it was more football for me, and that's part of why I love the women's game. Maybe you will be in the same place as me and maybe not, but I figured at the very least this sort of post may pique your curiosity to see where your women's side sits in the pyramid in comparison to the men's side in the PL. Are they also in the top flight? Not far out in the Championship? Or down in the regional leagues? I'll be trying to provide a brief summary for where each team is at, and due to a lack of info and familiarity some teams (especially the lower league teams) won't have the most info but I'll do my best! It should be noted that the 3rd tier and below had their seasons cancelled with no pro/rel, whereas the WSL and Championship had their seasons canceled but PPG was still used to decide pro/rel and Champions League places. So that's why some teams were promoted and relegated while other first or last finishers didn't move at all.
FAQ
What competitions are going on this season?
Leagues - Women's Super League, Championship, and the National League, and all the way down to the regional tiers (5th-7th)
FA Cup(s) (19/20 & 20/21) The 19/20 FA Cup was postponed during the quarterfinals in March, they'll be played out in the next couple of months while the early stages of the 20/21 FA Cup are also being played
League Cup - The primary League Cup in the vein of the men's competition and is competed between teams in the professional and semi-professional leagues, the Women's Super League and Championship respectively. The national and regional leagues below also have their own similar competitions going, much like the men's game.
Champions League - Chelsea and Manchester City will be competing from the Round of 32 onward this season. Note that the format of the women's CL will be changing next season to more closely align with the men's competition, and England will have 3 spots in the competition as opposed to the current 2.
How can I watch the leagues? (Inside and outside the UK)
If you're in the UK WSL matches will be broadcast on BT Sport and BBC iPlayeRed Button. The rest will be free to view with an account on the FA Player website. Currently only one Championship match a week will be streamed, though all WSL and Championship matches will be available to be viewed on demand in the FA Player website. Outside the UK, the answer is similar to the answer I just provided, substituting BT Sport and BBC for other TV broadcasters in select nations. If your country/region doesn't have a TV deal, all WSL matches and will be available live for free on the FA Player! When it comes to the lower leagues, some teams have streamed matches but it's largely absent from the women's game outside of the top league(s).
Where can I talk about the leagues?
/FAWSL has been restarted and is gaining traction as a place to discuss all the relevant clubs and matches. There are women's club subreddits for some of the large teams, but it seems that most PL club subreddits are open to women's team news being posted there as well.
Arsenal
Current League: WSL (1st tier) | 19/20 finish: 3rd/12 As much as I hate to say it, one of the titans of the English women's game. Arsenal are ever-present around the CL spots (fitting for the only English team to actually win the competition), though last year they finished just outside a CL spot in 3rd place on PPG as the WSL season was decided early. They'll only have domestic competition to focus on this year, and that may end up being to their benefit. Having arguably the best women's player in the world in Vivianne Miedema doesn't hurt either, with the 24 year old still improving year after year. Opening fixture: Arsenal vs Reading - 6th September 12:30 BST – Watch live for free on the FA Player FA Cup 2019/20: Arsenal vs Tottenham Hotspur on 26th/27th September - Watch live on BBC iPlayer and BBC Red Button
Aston Villa
Current League: WSL | 19/20 finish: 1st/11 in Championship on PPG (Promoted) The lone promoted side in this year's league, taking Liverpool's place. Villa will be aiming to stay in the WSL and will likely achieve that with (relative) ease, looking at the improvement from this off-season on their already strong Championship squad. Opening fixtures: Aston Villa 0-2 Manchester City - 5th September 14:30 BST - Watch live on BT Sport (UK), or free on the FA Player (International) Reading vs Aston Villa - 13th September 14:00 BST - Watch live for free on the FA Player
Brighton & Hove Albion
Current League: WSL | 19/20 finish: 9th/12 in WSL; 19/20 FA Cup quarterfinal vs Birmingham City on 26/27 September Brighton are still relatively fresh blood in the WSL, only joining in 18/19 as one of two promotions during the restructuring of the top two leagues. They finished 9th/11 in their first season after promotion from WSL 2 (now Championship) and last season didn't get a chance to prove they had improved, finishing 9th/12. They likely don't have anything to fear in regards to relegation, with their seasoned squad having a lot of professional experience by now, but with how other teams around them have been improving you likely won't see them climb much higher up the table. Opening fixture: Brighton & Hove Albion vs Birmingham City - 6th September 14:00 BST - Watch live for free on the FA Player* FA Cup 2019/20: Brighton & Hove Albion vs Birmingham City - 26th/27th September
Burnley
Current League: FA Women's National League North (Premier Division) [3rd tier] | 19/20 finish: 5th/12 Following back to back promotions from the 5th tier in 17/18 and 4th tier in 18/19, Burnely found themselves playing just a single step below the semi-professional game. They finished a surprising 5th with a few matches in hand on some of the teams above them, but there likely would have been no catching league leaders Sunderland who had yet to lose a match in 14 played. Opening fixture: Sunderland AFC Ladies v Burnley FC Women on Sunday 20th September
Chelsea
Current League: WSL | 19/20 finish: 1st/12 in WSL (Champs), 19/20 League Cup Champs One of the standard bearers for women's club football in England, Chelsea won their first league title since 2017-18 (not the longest wait, eh?) Chelsea will be aiming to once again win the league as well as to reach their first ever Champions League final. Chelsea have reached the semi-finals in their last two attempts (17/18 & 18/19) but were knocked out by Wolfsburg and Lyon, two of the most dominant sides in women's Champions League history. Adding Danish women's national team captain Pernille Harder this summer for a world record transfer fee in women's football probably will help give them a slight boost in the league and CL. That's in addition to Sam Kerr who Chelsea added in the second half of 2019. The Australian at age 26 is already the all time leading scorer in two leagues, NWSL in the United States and W-League in Australia. Opening fixture: Manchester United vs Chelsea - 6th September 14:30 BST - Watch live on BT Sport (UK), or free on the FA Player* (International) FA Cup 2019/20: Everton vs Chelsea on 26th/27th September
Crystal Palace
Current League: Championship | 19/20 finish: 9th/11 Palace joined the WSL 2 (now Championship) in 2018/19 during the restructuring of the 1st and 2nd women's divisions, gaining their spot through an application. They had finished 3rd in their league so they weren't slouches, but they still have yet to break through to midtable of the Championship. They finished 10th/11 in their first foray in the 2nd division, below all four of the other newly promoted sides including Sheffield United who were actually a division below them in 17/18. They didn't get to prove themselves much better than that in 19/20, only finishing one place higher when the season was cut short this past spring. All that said, they have added players with WSL and Championship experience and should hopefully finish at least mid-table in this upcoming Championship season. Opening fixture: Charlton Athletic vs Crystal Palace - 6th September 14:00 BST - Watch replay for free on the FA Player*
Everton
Current League: WSL | 19/20 finish: 6th/12; 19/20 FA Cup quarter-final vs Chelsea 26/27 September Everton finished midtable last year but their 10 additions between spring (3) and summer (7) may have them either on the outskirts of a Champions League spot if everything clicks or stalling or falling in the table due to needing time to click. French forward Valerie Gauvin is likely the new addition to watch in their squad. Opening fixture: Bristol City vs Everton - 6th September 14:00 BST - Watch live for free on the FA Player* FA Cup 2019/20: Everton vs Chelsea on 26th/27th September
Fulham
Current League: London and South East Women's Regional Football League (5th) | 19/20 finish: 5th/10 The lowest division representative in this list, Fulham have a storied history, one with the highest of highs and lowest of lows. Highlights include in 2000 they were the first full-time professional women's side and a 2003 FA Cup victory. Sadly the team was dissolved twice in four years (2006 & 2010), not reforming until 2014 as Fulham FC Foundation ladies. Fulham have been in the 5th tier since 14/15, winning promotion from the 6th tier the previous season. They finished a surprising 4th/10 in their first season in the top flight, but haven't been able to finish past 5th, routinely in the lower half of the table though not needing to stave off relegation. The team has been receiving more and more attention and from the main club notably becoming Fulham FC Women in 2018 with reinvestment in the team, and that may lead to improved results this upcoming season and hopefully promotion in the near future. Opening fixture: Denham United vs Fulham FC on Sunday 13th September
Leeds United
Current league: National League Division One North (4th tier) | 19/20 finish: 2nd/12 Leeds United were among the top sides fighting for promotion, the closest challenger to Barnsley when the season was called off. It is expected that they should be able to repeat that effort this season. The club has yet to reach the semi-professional game, and finally exiting the 4th tier would be a huge step in achieving progress to that goal. Opening fixture: Norton & Stockton vs Leeds United on 20 September
Leicester City
Current League: Championship | 19/20 finish: 6th Leicester City was brought into the fold of the main club, going from a partner to being integrated as one of only a few fully professional clubs in the Championship. They'll likely be fighting with Liverpool and Sheffield for the one promotion spot, and one shouldn't doubt their capabilities in winning it all. They're the lone 2nd division team left in the 2019/20 FA Cup, though with just about the toughest draw, facing the defending champs Manchester City. Opening fixture: Leicester City vs Blackburn Rovers - Sunday 6th September 14:00 BST - Watch replay for free on the FA Player* FA Cup 2019/20: Leicester City vs Manchester City 26th/27th September
Liverpool
Current League: Championship | 19/20 finish: 12th/12 in WSL (Relegated) Lot of criticism has been swirling around this team, some just and unjust, but even the main club could understand that the men winning the league and the women being relegated in the same season wasn't the best look. Sure, the fact that they went on PPG in a season that didn't complete didn't give them a fair shake, but they'll have to prove this season that they truly belong in the WSL. In Leicester City and Sheffield United they have very strong opponents in the fight for promotion. Opening fixture: Liverpool vs Durham on Sunday 6th September 14:00 BST - Watch for free on the FA Player*
Manchester City
Current League: WSL | 19/20 finish: 2nd/12 in WSL Perennial 2nd place finishers in recent years, outside of a league win in 2016, City have finished 2nd every season since 2015. Losing this past season on PPG has to be one of the more bitter pills to swallow, but after a 2-0 loss to Chelsea for the newly revived Women's Community Shield this past weekend, City will be hoping that their new recruits including Sam Mewis and Rose Lavelle, 2019 World Cup winners with the United States, will help push them past the hurdle of 2nd place as well as give them a boost in Europe. Similar to Chelsea, they have yet to reach a Champions League final, only making it to the Round of 32 and Round of 16 in the last two seasons, getting knocked out by Atletico Madrid both years. Opening fixture: Aston Villa 0-2 Manchester City - 5th September 14:30 BST - Watch live on BT Sport (UK), or free on the FA Player* (International) Manchester City vs Brighton & Hove Albion - 13th September 14:00 BST - Watch live for free on the FA Player* FA Cup 2019/20: Leicester City vs Manchester City 26th/27th September
Manchester United
Current League: WSL | 19/20 finish: 4th/12 in WSL on PPG The best of the rest outside of the top 3, which is pretty good for a team in only its 3rd season of existence. They easily won the Championship in 18/19 with only 1 draw and 1 loss and their first year in the WSL saw them continue their impressive form. This year they're aiming to challenge for the Champions League, though it should be said that last year there was a clear gap between them and a CL spot with 4th placed United getting 1.64 PPG while Arsenal in 3rd had 2.40. The Red Devils hope that the additions of World Champions Tobin Heath and Cristen Press will propel them to a Champions League spot this year, finally breaking into the top 3 of the WSL after a long wait of...3 years. Opening fixture: Manchester United vs Chelsea - 6th September 14:30 BST - Watch live on BT Sport (UK), or free on the FA Player* (International)
Newcastle United
Current League: National League Division One North (4th tier) | 19/20 finish: 6th/12 Newcastle had been in the 3rd division as recently as 2016/17 when they were relegated after gaining only 7 points in 20 matches. They have yet to truly challenge for promotion back into the 3rd tier, finishing 5th, 9th, and 6th in their seasons after relegation. Most recently the team entered into a partnership with Northumbria University to provide Strength and Conditioning, Performance Analysis and Physiotherapy as well as management of the club itself. Opening fixture: Durham Cestria vs Newcastle United on Sunday 20th September
Sheffield United
Current League: Championship | 19/20 finish: 2nd/11 Sheffield finished under Aston Villa in PPG and it's a wonder where the two teams would have finished in a full season. That said, their solid base has been improved upon roster wise, but the loss of manager Carla Ward to WSL side Birmingham City may be the largest challenge to the club. They took their time in replacing her, and it'll be up to former Liverpool Women and Newcastle United U23 manager Neil Redfearn to keep up with Leicester and Liverpool. Opening fixture: London City Lionesses vs Sheffield United - Sunday 6th September 14:00 BST - Watch replay for free on the FA Player*
Southampton
Current League: National League Division One South West (4th tier) | 19/20 finish: 1st/11 After back to back promotions from the 6th tier in 17/18 and 5th tier in 18/19, Southampton FC Women were looking to establish themselves in their first season in the 4th division. They ended up fighting with similarly named Southampton Women's F.C. for promotion to the 3rd tier, but with only 11 and 12 matches played respectively, it's a wonder who would have been the side to clinch the league. Southampton's official women's side should expect to be the favorites going into this season, but time will tell for how things add up. Opening fixture: Poole Town vs Southampton FC on Sunday 20th September
Tottenham Hotspur
Current League: WSL | 19/20 finish: 7th/12; Spurs are a contrast to Manchester United, both being promoted to the WSL the same year but under quite different circumstances. After years in the lower tiers Spurs were able to get a bit more investment to add to some of their longterm players. After each subsequent season they've retooled their squad with each season, exemplified by the fact that Josie Green is the only remaining player on the squad that played with the team in the amateur game. Speaking of that time, Spurs' results truly bloomed in 2016/17 when they won four trophies, including promotion to the 2nd division. They finished 7th place in 2017/18, their first semi-professional season, the highlight being securing their first ever victories over top flight sides in cup competitions. The 2018/19 saw them rocket up the table, finishing 2nd and in a promotion spot under the juggernauts of Manchester United. Their first WSL season followed a similar pattern to their first WSL 2 season, once again finishing 7th and they're still waiting to play in their furthest advanced round in the FA Cup, a quarter-final with Arsenal. I'm dreading Spurs' match vs Arsenal in the FA Cup later this month, but I am happy when I look back on prior results and see all the progress that has been made. Spurs had an infamous 10-0 loss to Arsenal in the Round of 16 back in 2016/17 when they were an amateur side, but when facing them in league play this past season 2 1/2 years later, they only lost 2-0. They're still looking for that first win over a top half side in the WSL, but with a season of WSL under the squad and management's belt, they should be able to achieve an upper mid-table finish and hopefully be an increasingly challenging fixture against the top sides. Opening fixture: Tottenham Hotspur vs West Ham - 6th September 14:00 BST - Watch live for free on the FA Player* FA Cup 2019/20: Arsenal vs Tottenham Hotspur on 26th/27th September - Watch live on BBC iPlayer and BBC Red Button
West Bromwich Albion
Current League: National League Premier Division North (3rd tier) | 19/20 finish: 7th/12 West Brom have had a brief yo-yo situation as of late, finishing 6th in their division 16/17, relegated from the 3rd tier in 17/18, winning back promotion 18/19, and seeming to settle back into midtable in 19/20. At this point it seems they should be focusing on stability and remaining in the 3rd division. Opening fixture: West Bromwich Albion vs Nottingham Forest on Sunday 20th September
West Ham United
Current league: WSL | 19/20 finish: 8th/12 West Ham are another team that's relatively new to the WSL, making the surprising jump from the 3rd tier amateur game all the way to the professional game in 2018/19, bypassing the Championship when the FA was restructuring the leagues. They settled right into midtable in their first WSL season with a 7th place finish, the highlight being a surprising FA Cup final appearance in what ended up a 3-0 loss to Man City. The next season saw them stay in just about the same place, finishing 8th on PPG. As the team has brought in more players on a permanent or temporary loan basis, West Ham will be looking to finish in the upper midtable and challenge fellow midtable sides as well as the CL contenders more evenly. Opening fixture: Tottenham Hotspur vs West Ham - Sunday 6th September 14:00 BST - Watch live for free on the FA Player*
Wolverhampton Wanderers
Current League: National League Division One Midlands (4th tier) | 19/20 finish: 1st/12 One of the victims of the lower leagues getting cancelled with no pro/rel, Wolverhampton were running away with their league on 14 wins, 1 loss, and an incredible +73 goal differntial when the season was cancelled. Wolves will hope to repeat their dominance but this time with a complete season and the reward of promotion to the 3rd tier, just a league below the Championship. Opening fixture: Leafield Athletic vs Wolverhampton Wanderers on Sunday 20th September Hope that was interesting to folks, let me know if I got anything wrong or you have any questions. There will be match threads on /FAWSL for some of the matches today, hope you join in on the discussion if your team is playing!
Warning ! Super long vomit of details and pain. There are so many books and blogs I’ve read. So many podcasts and online classes! Historical context : I met my now husband at work. He was going through an awful divorce. She would take his car and steal his wallet when he was at work. She hired a private detective and had him followed. She was mean and nasty to him and abusive to their children. One day I drove him to the DMV to get a new license and bought him some clothes because she had taken everything. He had 2 small children with her and he suffered greatly knowing he was going to lose them to her even though he thought she was bipolar. I didn’t want to get involved with him. His life was a complete mess. We were friends and colleagues for over a year. We worked closely together and did very well in business as a team. I confided in him and he told me about his life. He made me laugh and made me feel safe. One day, at a work event, he hadn’t shown up as expected and I felt a pang in my heart that perhaps he wouldn’t show. When he finally did, 2 hours later, I felt so happy to see him walking up. I knew at that moment I loved him. We had sex that night. He still wasn’t legally divorced. His divorce took 3 long years to finalize. His ex dragged him through the mud and emasculated him. He smoked pot daily and took anti anxiety and anti depression medication. He told me of many traumatic events in his past. The first being he was run over by a car when he was six. The second was a plane landing on the highway behind him and exploding, killing a family in a minivan behind him. The third, his ex got pregnant after 6 weeks of casual dating and having the baby and then him asking for a paternity test and discovering it was his son. Despite the trauma and drama, he loved me and I loved him. I struggled with the fact that though he said he didn’t love his ex, he married her to raise his son, thinking he would make it work. He had a second child with her 3 years after the first. He claimed that he didn’t love her still but he was married and she was his wife so sex with her was his only option and the second baby just happened. 6 years into the marriage, it became intolerable. She called the police and had him arrested for spousal abuse. She filed for divorce and made him go through court ordered anger management and drug tests before letting him see his children. He claimed it was all an exaggeration and I believed him. He was under a lot of stress and would be angry from time to time, but I saw no evidence that he was an abusive or hateful man. He loved his children and everyone thought he was the nicest man they knew. People would tell me I was so lucky to meet such a nice man. We dated while he finalized his divorce for 2 years. At first, I kept it causal (in my head at least). Though he expressed that he loved me very early on, the thought of going “all in” with him made me a little uncomfortable since he was still not officially divorced and he’d been through so much. I thought he’d need some time to heal and I could be there for him until he was ready. I didn’t date anyone else but I was 38 and had lived as a single lady for a long time before meeting him. I still texted here and there with other men. One guy in particular and I had always had an on again off again relationship. We were quite perfect for each other yet were never in the right place at the right time to make it work. We’d been meeting in each other’s places once every 3 months or so to see each other and exchanged texts on a regular basis. After being intimate with my now hubs, we were on a business trip and he looked through my phone when I got out of the car to go in a store and found a text to Mr. out of town where I’d said “I want to snuggle.” He felt completely betrayed by it and was very angry with me for saying that to another man when he had said he loved me and we’d been intimate. Honestly, I was shocked by his feelings. How could he feel so strongly about this when we’d not discussed how our relationship was defined and he was still legally married? I apologized profusely and said I had no idea he felt so strongly about an exclusive relationship with me and said I’d break it off with any others even if a “textual” relationship and I did. I told all of my casual dating friends I had from the past that I was now in a relationship and tied up any loose ends. I didn’t delete them from my phone or social media, but I did not contact them again, nor did I hide the fact that I was now in a relationship and was unavailable. He finally got a divorce and he and I had been living between his place and mine fairly permanently together. The only time we were apart was on the weekends he had with his kids. We both felt it was important that he have that time with them and they didn’t need to meet me yet. His boy was 6 and his girl was 3 when we met. They went through a lot in the divorce and we didn’t think they needed a new woman in the picture just yet. I did feel jealous when his kids needed him when we were together and he’d have to drop everything and cancel or abandon plans to rescue them from some ridiculous chaos his ex had invented. She was always texting him when we were together about something to stir up trouble. One night, he was staying at my house and around 1 am, she calls to say their cat had been found dead by the road and he needed to come and bury it. (He suspects she killed the cat) But he left in the pouring rain to go and bury the cat. There was always something she needed or wanted to fight about. She posted pictures of me on Facebook and called me a whore. She had us followed and photographed as “evidence” of an affair that he was openly honest with her about. (She has a carousel of men living with her with the kids at the same time) It was tough for me to share him with another woman and their children, but I was kind and tolerant and of course, never wanted to be between him and his kids. I tried my best to be understanding and supportive of him in the most difficult situation. Once they were divorced, he assumed ownership of the house they’d owned together. This was the house she’d grown up in. (His ex FIL “made him a deal” on the house and sold it to him for their life together) He said he didn’t want the house, but he needed to live there for a while since he’d lost so much in the divorce and the alimony and child support was equal to just about as much as he made in salary a month. He also wanted the house to maintain some kind of normalcy for the kids. He asked me to give up my lovely house in the city and move in with him officially in the suburbs while he saved some money and fixed the house up for sale. I didn’t like the idea of living in their house. It made my skin crawl to think of living in their life. He insisted that it was all he could offer and we could make it ours until we found a new place that was all for us. I begrudgingly agreed because it was the most logical division fiscally for him. I painted the walls and changed the fixtures and bought some new furniture and it was ok. Though I missed my friends in the city and felt as though I’d compromised what I wanted to help him. I wanted to be with him and I loved him, so I felt it was a supportive decision. By then I’d met his kids. They were emotionally damaged and he was the over protective “Disney dad” He bought them too much stuff and didn’t establish any expectations of them. I grew up in a rather strict household, so I struggled with the lack of structure and spoiling. I also had no clue how hard being a stepmom could be and felt awkwardly out of place and foreign. I felt like I was expected to love them right away and to “fall in” with a family that wasn’t mine. We still did ok until he proposed. He took me to Barcelona and surprised me with a proposal out of a fairy tale. It was more than a girl could ever dream of but I remember feeling a little numb as I said yes. As if, I was saying goodbye to a life that would never be free of other people’s interference. I wasn’t saying yes to OUR life together. I was saying yes to THIERS too. The ex, his kids, his parents and there was SO MUCH of all them that made me second fiddle to any decision or dream we might pursue. I loved him and said yes anyway. I had been unmarried for 39 years and felt comfortable jumping in to a new way of living with all the messiness it brought because I felt like I could handle it. Once he gave me the ring, that is when it started to happen. One day while talking our dogs for a walk, he got upset with me for being indecisive about setting a wedding date and spending money on the wedding. He screamed at me so loud that I remember it echoing across the mountain... “I gave you the ring. Now it’s time for you to ante up!!” (It is a BEAUTIFUL ring!) I didn’t want to rush into picking a date and planning a wedding. His mother pressured for a date constantly. We found our dream home. I had been sick with shingles. We needed to fix up his old house for sale. I’d started a new job and so had he. It was a lot of change to manage and I wanted to take our time. If we were talking about forever, what did it matter? I ended up paying for all the repairs on his old house. I planned the wedding almost all on my own. All of his money went to his ex and his kids and I became increasingly stressed and resentful. I cashed in my 401k, took out a short term personal loan and he sold the house to put down a down payment on our new home. I continued to plan and pay for our wedding while he worked and laid by the pool and read a book. My job was incredibly demanding and I worked a lot. He didn’t seem very interested in helping me. I bought all the furniture to fill our new house and his mother demanded I make our wedding something her family could enjoy. It was very expensive and yet, I paid for it without too much complaining. Though I did often ask my husband to help me plan, or to help me manage his mother’s interference. I did express my need for him to help me with the expense of the move and the new house and the wedding, but it became more of a requirement to “align” with him and less of a discussion. He would always complain of being stuck in the middle in an impossible situation and did little to protect me or help me at all. He became more and more volatile. He’d lose his mind in traffic and drive dangerously. One night, we got really drunk tailgating at a college football game and I was bumbling happily around trying to find our car after and he got angry and pushed me to the ground, tearing my coat saying I was being argumentative and I should just listen to him. The police saw him push me down and intervened. They asked me to tell them if he’d been violent and I lied so he wouldn’t get in trouble. Once we were back together and on our way home, he kept yelling at me that I had just stupidly tripped and he couldn’t believe that I would put him at risk like that. Many many other small things became a long list of confusing outbursts and anger. One day, I was chatting on Skype with one of my long distance best friends (who happened to be a gay man) about how I was so stressed out with all the planning and chaos that seemed to surround him that if it weren’t for the dogs and the new house and the pool I’d yet to swim in, I’d love to just live simply in a little apartment again. I went on after saying that to say that clarify that I was just venting and that I loved him and was looking forward to the wedding. He went through my phone and found this conversation and it has become the “single biggest betrayal of his life.” Even what his ex wife did couldn’t measure up to this horrendous confession!! The day before our rehearsal dinner, I was so stressed and so behind that I felt like I was going to collapse. The rehearsal dinner was held in our backyard and family was coming that day to stay at our house, and I had no idea how I was going to pay for the rehearsal dinner or have the house clean and ready. I needed help. My best friend called and sensed my stress and took the day off of work to come and help me. We cleaned the house and arranged the remaining items for 11 hours straight hours before my parents arrived. My hubs had a “work meeting” in the city and ended up having too much to drink with a lady customer at a bar. As we do the same thing for work, I understood that sometimes you have to spend time with customers to build the relationship and though I was completely disappointed that he wouldn’t make me and our wedding a priority, I asked him to do just one thing for me if he was going to be out - Pick up my best friends dress on his way home. He begins texting me about 5pm reeally drunk that he was a failure and a loser and that nothing mattered. He finally comes home around 730pm (the meeting was at noon) and says nothing, goes straight to bed and passes out. We didn’t even know he was home until my friend began vacuuming in our bedroom and saw him splayed out across the bed. When my parents arrived 30 mins later, I lied and said he had a horrible headaches and wasn’t able to come out and greet them. The next day, I confided in him that I had no idea how we would pay the caterer the remainder of the bill. He insisted that my family pay for it. That my parents were worthless and that they should pay for something. I was 39 and made 3 times as much as they ever did and did not want to ask them in retirement to pay. I ended up asking to borrow $2500 from my aunt so we could pay. We owed more because his parents had invited 10 extra people to the dinner even though I’d told them I couldn’t afford any more changes and we wanted to keep it to wedding party and immediate family only. They showed up anyway! We got married and it was a beautiful day, but I cried out of sheer exhaustion when we got home. My husband was angry with me. “Really!!? Crying in our wedding night!?” We left for our Hawaiian honeymoon a week later and it was beautiful! Until the last night... he got upset with me because I misunderstood his “instruction” to secure a beach umbrella while he went back to the room to get something forgotten. He yelled at me, said I had a dumb blank stare and I wouldn’t listen. He yelled at the poor man that was to dig a hole to set out our umbrella. He was mean. I ended up crying, feeling so betrayed in our room and him speaking to me harshly - so much that the guests next to us called the hotel to report a disturbance. When we returned home and time passed, it got worse from there. He became very suspicious of me. Delusional and jealous. He claimed I was a liar and cheater. He’s called me a whore. Said my p*** was rotten. He’s accused me of giving him an std. He’s slammed a paint can down in our bathroom splattering paint all over the floor, walls, carpets and cabinets. He didn’t help me clean it up nor did he apologize for it. He blamed me for “blocking him in the bathroom - you know you can’t do that to me” Any time I would go out of town on business, he would start a fight with me. He would need to know every where I would be and who I would be with and constantly text me the entire time. Any time I would plan time with friends or family he would find a way to sabotage it or claim I was abandoning him or betraying him. He isolated me from friends and family. He said I was a horrible wife and that our wedding was a farce. Nearly every time we fight he finds a way to work divorce into it. I don’t get many presents on Christmas or birthdays. Special occasions like anniversaries or birthdays or Valentines are usually somehow overshadowed by his parents or his kids’ needs or wants and often by his ex wife’s bs. He claims sex is a fundamental need and he’s starving for attention and affection. Hes told me if I don’t have sex with him “he’ll need to find someone else to fuck to feel loved” I could go on and and on and on. He’s said that I’m a self sabotaging avoidant. I found us a marriage counselor and he went with me for a while but I felt it wasn’t helpful because I was afraid of what he’d say when we left. He was so fake in our sessions and always talked about the deficit he felt in our marriage. That we were “hanging by a thread” and he was “desperately searching for water in a desert” He claims I am secretive and I give intimacy to others that I refuse to give him and it makes him crazy. He ended up not going with me to counseling and I continued to see the therapist alone. He helped me come up with strategies to try and fix how we communicated. I tried almost everything I could think of, yet his jealousy and rage only increased. Fast forward to this year, our 4th year of marriage. His son moved in with us over the summer. His ex and new husband was verbally and emotionally abusing him and asked the court to allow him to live with us. He’s 15 and depressed and he came with a 1 year old golden doodle that I told them both I did not want to live with us. The dog came anyway. Hubs spends all of his time with his son and the dog and continues to neglect our relationship. He’d planned to buy the house next door with/for his parents without even discussing it with me. He leaves me alone for days without much word. Leaves the house without telling me where he’s going for hours, days. He puts everything before me and what I might need or want and continues to tell me I’m a liar and a cheater. After being completely ignored on my birthday... not even a “happy birthday,” I felt suicidal. I’d become addled, startled by any noise, I trembled constantly, I had so much neck and back pain that I was convinced I had MS or cancer or maybe brain injury (I was in a horrible accident in 2019). I couldn’t think or make a decision, I could barely make sentences and I had lost all confidence and it was all effecting my work and well being. I don’t talk to any of my friends and never call my family. I am ashamed and exhausted and terribly sad that I cannot make an impactful change. 2 days after my birthday I googled how to best kill myself with the most absolute calmness and intent for over 5 hours. I went outside feeling alone and sat on the porch and cried thinking about how awful my suicide would make my parents and friends feel but I just needed the pain to stop. A hummingbird flew up to me and buzzed around me for almost 10 mins very closely and I felt it was a sign from my angels or God or something. So I went inside and wrote my husband and parents a letter saying I needed help. That I was feeling so sad and overwhelmed that I was contemplating suicide and though I didn’t necessarily want to do it, I saw no good way out of the chaos and pain. He had already told me we were done and that he wanted me to leave. He’d said he wanted a divorce a week earlier. My parents came to get me. They drove 10 hours over night. My hubs became enraged claiming that my father was coming to kill him and that if they showed up at the house “it wouldn’t go well for them” He was doing this in front of his son. I hid in our room for days before and after I asked for help because I didn’t want his son to see me. I was so ashamed of being the way we were in front of him. I didn’t want him to see such ugliness and my weakness. He called his parents on speaker phone and announced that I was suicidal and that my father was coming to get him. They called me after and asked if I was ok and if they should come over. I said yes. I could use their help to tame him and assured them that I would never let anyone hurt each other. That night he said he was having a panic attack and asked me to call 911. 12 emergency responders piled around him and found nothing wrong with him. An hour before my parents arrived, Hubs acquiesced at the last min and left the house so that my parents could help me load up the car with what I could of my clothes and art supplies and my dog and we left. I’ve been gone for 38 days. I’ve texted and emailed with him nearly every day. Some days he’s sorry and admits that he’s been a fool and angry and will get help. Some days he says he’s going to kill himself. Some days he’s angry and says I’m selfish and I’ve abandoned him and the kids when they need it most. I feel better. I feel safe. The pain is mostly gone from my body and I no longer tremble. I’ve had dr visits and tests and nothing was found other than severe stress. He’s been to the doctor since I’ve been gone. He says he has irreversible damage to his C4-8 and osteoarthritis that causes severe pain and that he’s got central apnea. I think he is possibly mentally ill. The part where I’m confused is... I MISS HIM. I feel like I have abandoned him when he needs me the most. If he is truly in pain and hasn’t slept in years and has PTSD, shouldn’t I stand by him and help him get better? I’ve tried to offer weekends to get together to ease back into it or to “date” to see if we can work back towards being together. He’s since filed for divorce and said that I’ve abandoned him. He only wanted me to leave for a week, “like a vacation” and that if I am to be his wife then I should be with him. No in between. I can’t make myself go back there. It was too hard to leave and it nearly killed me. Is there anything I can do? I do love him. I did withdraw from him. I did stop talking or at times, yell and scream and fight back. I did spend time focusing on work too much or talk to friends about how I was feeling more than him. How am I supposed to love without fear when he’s scary and mean? They say you get what you put in to a relationship. If I came into the relationship “half in” and established mistrust in the beginning and then withdrew when he became angry, did I cause a lot of the problem? I’ve apologized and tried to show accountability for any mistakes I made, but I think I’ll be waiting for him to be responsible for what he’s said and done until I die. I am better but I still feel stuck and hesitant to end everything and walk away for good. Is it all me? Am I Tyler Durden?
Ligue 1 is coming back this Friday, so with some French users of this sub, we have decided to make a preview of the season for everyone to get to know Ligue 1 better ! We used u/Boolouloubi ‘s post from last season, so big shoutout to him for the beautiful presentation of this post that is absolutely not mine !
1. GLOBAL PRESENTATION 2018/2019 winner : Paris Saint-Germain Qualification/Relegation: [1] Winne UEFA Champions League Group stage [2] UEFA Champions League Group stage [3] UEFA Champions League Third qualifying round [4] UEFA Europa League Group stage [18] Relegation Play-off [19-20] Relegation For the rest it's pretty classic. 20 teams, each team face every other teams 2 times. 3 points for a win, 1 for a draw and 0 for a defeat. Rules for classifications are: 1) Points; 2) Goal difference; 3) Points in head to head games; 4) Head-to-head goal difference; 5) Goal scored in direct confrontations; 6) Goal scored away in direct confrontations; 7) Goal scored; 8) Goal scored away; 9) Most goal scored in one game; 10) Fairplay ranking. As you can see, Ligue 1 places a lot of importance on direct confrontations.
Amiens is now entering its 3rd season In the top flight, and has lost its best asset : their coach Christophe Pelissier. To replace him, they chose Luka Elsner, the son of a former OGC Nice player, who speaks perfectly French and coached the Belgian second division team Union Saint Gilloise last season. He apparently wants to play an offensive playing style that might be interesting to see against the usually defensive Ligue 1 teams. The team has played in a 4-3-3 during the preparation, but the coach aims to play a 4-2-3-1 once Amiens will buy some offensive players, most likely financed by the 10m€ they will get from the sale of Ndombélé to Tottenham.
Jeff Reine-Adélaïde (possible departure to Monaco), Rachid Alioui
Angers has scored the most goals since their promotion last season, with 44 goals scored, and they have managed to gain one place up in the ranking compared to their previous season. They lost their best player, Flavien Tait, to Rennes but they can count on new talents coming up this season. The French Youth player Jeff Reine-Adélaïde might leave to Monaco for what would be the biggest sale made by Angers (18m€). That’s a lot of people leaving, and for the moment they count on Rachid Alioui (coming for free from Nimes Olympiques) to score some goals. Angers usually plays a rather defensive 4-1-4-1 system with two wingers and two box-to-box, and they are more famous for their physicality than their technicality. Some people like to compare them with Burnley.
Samuel Kalu, Nicolas de Préville, Laurent Koscielny, Benoît Costil
After being purchased by an American investment fund, Bordeaux has decided to have a meme year, that started with their former coach going full drama in a press conference (honestly watch it), one of their player being out because of a complication following a beard implant, Kalu got his mom kidnapped in Nigeria, and the new owner thinking they will make the club profitable by selling more sandwiches. The arrival of Koscielny will bring some much-needed professionalism into the club, which is according to me their main issue, they have the talent but they do not look much concerned by the game. Fun fact : last time Marseille beat Bordeaux in Bordeaux, Star Wars didn’t exist
There always need to be several Brittany teams in Ligue 1. With the relegation of Guingamp, Brest has stepped up and gained promotion with a well-deserved second place of Ligue 2. Brest has changed coach this summer, and they picked Dall’Oglio, former coach of Dijon, who had brought some success to Dijon thanks to an offensive playing style. Used to a lot of possession in Ligue 2, Brest will probably have to adapt to the higher level of Ligue 1 and will have to take more individual risks and play more directly. Grandsir is expected to bring this creativity on the wing, while Charbonnier will need to keep the good form he had last season with 30 goals in 42 games. The mercato led by the sports coordinator, Gregory Lorenzi, seems to have succeeded so far. Between youth (Perraud, Diallo, Grandsir), experience (Baal) and reinforcement at a lower cost (Bain). But as always, the justice of the peace will be the field. During his previous move to Ligue 1 in 2010, Brest had only survived three years in the elite. Knowing the difficulty of climbing back up after a downhill run, the Finisterian club must now be sustainable at the highest level, and follow the example of a club like Angers that has grown and made its place over the seasons.
Dijon gave up on their offensive playstyle this season, but they still managed to be the second worst defense. After winning all their first games, they started to lose every game and they sacked the coach that has brought them success. They replaced him with the newly sacked Guingamp’s coach Antoine Kombouare and they saved their ass at the 70th minute of the second leg of the playoff against Lens at the end of the season, which was a bit miraculous as they only got into the playoff because Caen managed to lose at home against Bordeaux (a team that barely ever won away last season) on the last day of the season. With the departure of the two good players that are Sliti and Saïd, I don’t think the future is very bright for the Burgundy team. They will most likely try to improve their defense and maybe adopt a defensive playing style (arrival of Bruno Ecuele Manga from Cardiff).
From 17th to 2nd, Lille perfectly embodies why Ligue 1 is an interesting league. Except PSG, all teams have relatively similar level, and they all try to improve by developing talents, and when it works, a club can quickly become stronger than the rest. That’s what Lille did, and seeing the quick development of Nicolas Pépé was one of the highlights of last season. A lot happened to Lille in the transfer market, they lost a lot of important player : Pépé to Arsenal, but also their back-up striker Leao to AC Milan, without forgetting the less shiny but very important Thiago Mendes to Olympique Lyonnais, and their fullback Youssouf Koné to Lyon as well. However, it would be wrong to think that Lille got stolen of all their jewels, they kept their playmaker Ikoné, as well as Bamba (the three of them with Pépé formed the Bip-bip, one of the best offensive line of Ligue 1, known for their pace and deadly transition football). The team has also reinforced, with the arrival of the experienced midfielder André from Rennes, as well as the two young talents Yusuf Yazici from Trabzonspor and Victor Osimhen from Charleroi. The young American Timothy Weah has also arrived from PSG and will most likely take Leao’s job as the back-up striker. Lille has also bought a lot of different players to replace the departure, and with 70m€ spent this summer on 10 players, Lille seems to be strong enough to keep a European ticket at the end of the season.
Révolution à Lyon ! To replace the tactically inept jellyfish that was Pep Genesio, Lyon has hired a foreign coach for the second time of their history, and the first time under Aulas’ reign ! Sylvinho was chosen by the newly appointed Director of Sport Antônio Augusto Ribeiro Reis Junior more famous under the name Juninho. Juninho is a Lyon legend, he brought Lyon his most successful run with 7 Ligue 1 titles in a row, 100 goals and 44 free kicks. Their preparation was somewhat bad, with only one victory against Arsenal, so we can’t say much about their upcoming season, but Sylvinho will favor a 4-3-3 or 4-2-3-1 depending on the situation. This is favored by the departure of Nabil Fekir, that required to be played in a central position as an offensive 10, and required the team to be made around him. Lyon will have to find new systems and adapt to the departure of the essential Ndombélé, Mendy, and Fékir. For the moment, their midfield looks a bit weak, and a new arrival is to be expected.
For the 4th year of the Champion’s project, which aimed to bring Marseille back to CL, Marseille has managed to not get into a European competition. The season was quite a nightmare for Marseille, with jealousy between the players because of wage differences (Strootman is one of the best paid, yet can’t even make the main squad), Payet disappointed by his injury that made him miss the World Cup. Marseille only managed to get one point in the EL pool after making the finale the previous year. Now the club has issues with FFP due to a lot of spending, no value players to sell, and high wages for old players. Hopefully, André Villas-Boas will manage to do something with the squad he has. The players are good enough, but he will need to be a good man-manager to make them give their best. Hopefully the arrival of the much-awaited center forward they have been lacking for years might improve their results. However, the choice to take a 29 years old, recently injured, Boca Junior player that has never played in Europe can be a bit surprising, but who knows, maybe Benedetto will save the club.
2nd (1997-1998), but my FC Metz fan friend tells me it’s “1st ex-aequo”
Seasons in Ligue 1
60
Key players
Habib Diallo
For the third time in five years, Metz will start the L1 season as a promoted player. This year, however, the people of Lorraine seem to be well equipped to maintain their position: the staff has put their faith in continuity and the players of the big 2018-2019 season are all there. While Metz has recruited young players, he has not made any major strikes and his attack may lack an experienced striker. The Moselle club will logically fight for its survival but the 2018-2019 season of the two promoted (Reims 8th and Nîmes 9th) should give it some ideas.
Monaco sold too many important players and had a disastrous season, from 2nd to 17th. They fired Jardim and had a short spell with Henry, but Henry couldn’t do miracle and they rehired Jardim. They saved themselves at the end of the season. I can see them improving this season, but I doubt they will get a European ticket. Leonardo Jardim varied the systems on Saturday for the last ASM preparatory match against Sampdoria (1-0). In the second half, Monaco restarted in a 4-3-3-3 with Benjamin Henrichs in a sentinel position with Cesc Fabregas on his right and Alexandre Golovine on his left; in front, Falcao was alone, and the wings were occupied by Gelson Martins on the right and Rony Lopes on the left. However, it is with the first half play scheme, a 4-4-2, as in the season of its last title (2016-2017), that the majority of the Rock team should play. The problem for the moment is that Falcao is on the departure, as he confirmed this weekend, and that we already had to find a second striker to support him in front. The ASM has offensive ammunition in its overabundance of players, but not necessarily those that give hope of a return to the podium, the objective set by the management. Although it has not yet been made official by the club, the arrival of Henry Onyekuru (22 years old) has already been completed. The Nigerian was playing in Galatasaray last season. It will replace the eleven Rony Lopes, which is expected to be sold for between €25 million and €30 million.
Long in the fight for a place in the European Cup qualifying round, Montpellier finished last season in sixth place in Ligue 1. The club had not known such a ranking since its title of French champion won in 2012 after several exercises completed in the midtable This shows how convincing the MSHC season has been, driven by a very effective attacking duo Laborde - Delort (27 goals between them), and a rather promising first season for attacking midfielder Florent Mollet (6 goals, 5 assists). The challenge for Montpellier will be to repeat its performance from last season and get involved in the fight for the European Cup. The MHSC was strengthened during the mercato by the services of Téji Savanier, best Ligue 1 setter last season with Nîmes and Jordan Ferri, an experienced Olympique Lyonnais midfielder who is used to playing in the European Cup every year. The main black spot: the start in the goals of Benjamin Lecomte, a masterpiece from Montpellier for two seasons. Monaco had to pay 13 million euros to recruit the Montpellier goalkeeper who has not yet been replaced.
While Nantes is just coming out of a challenging season in terms of sports and tragedy (Sala’s death), its bumpy preparation is causing some concern. In addition to executives who have left or are leaving, there isn’t good prospect for this season. The new coach Christian Gourcuff has just arrived so we can’t say much on how the team will play this season.
The OGC Nice had a transitional season last season, finishing 7th in the championship. With a new coach in the person of Patrick Vieira, the Eaglets have had a mixed season with some serious offensive breaches. Nice finished as the 18th Ligue 1 attack just ahead of the last two in the Caen and Guingamp league. Mario Balotelli's failed first half of the season and his departure for OM did not make the coach's task any easier. Despite this, the Nice game was rather pleasant to follow based on strong possession. Nice was able to rest on a strong defensive base with a very high level season from Walter Benitez. The Aiglons finished with the second defence of the championship tied with the PSG. Despite a lacklustre season and worrying preparation, last season showed some reasons for satisfaction. The buyout of the club, which should be formalized in the coming days, will give the Eagles club more resources. Even if the project has some grey areas, Jim Ratcliffe is known for his ambition, such as the takeover of Sky and the success of his team at the 2019 Tour de France. With a mercato taking time to emerge, Nice should recruit some reinforcements with the end of the transfer period. Despite strong competition, Patrick Vieira's men will certainly want to play first place and why not qualify for the Europa League. This record takeover can take OGC Nice into a new dimension. Player to follow: Walter Benitez Despite his omission from the list of the UNFP Trophies for the best goalkeeper in Ligue 1, the Argentinean goalkeeper has had a very successful season. Walter Benitez can even boast the highest percentage of saves among goalkeepers who played more than one elite game last season. With a team that is struggling to see an eleven-man squad break free, the Argentinean keeper is a leading figure in a relatively young team. If the Nice attacking problems persist this season, Vieira will be able to count on her goalkeeper to score points.
Just promoted after 25 seasons in Ligue 2, the Crocs have succeeded in their season by now, and in what way, ranking in the first part of the draw (9th). With 57 goals scored, the second best total of a promoted player since 2000 behind Monaco, the Gardois managed to win against the likes of OM (3-1) and hold their ground against Bordeaux, Monaco or Saint-Etienne. Better still, all these performances were achieved with the smallest Ligue 1 budget (€20 million). Although the budget for the coming season should amount to 25 million euros, the performance is not guaranteed due to the large number of departures. First of all, that of Laurent Boissier, sports director, for personal reasons. On the players' side, it was a hecatombe with no less than 11 transfers or end of contract. In the lead was the departure of Téji Savanier, best assister in Ligue 1 and in the typical team last season. Denis Bouanga (€4.5M), Sada Thioub (€3.5M) and Umut Bozok have also packed their bags. With only five arrivals so far and a new loan from goalkeeper Paul Bernardoni, coach Bernard Blaquart will have a lot to do on the first day with a trip to the Parc des Princes (August 11). The coach will have to rely on Ripart, Briançon and Paquiez who have just extended until 2023 for the first and 2022 for the last two. And Lucas Dias, Kelyan Guessoum, Théo Sainte-Luce and Lucas Buades, who have just signed their first professional contracts, should be used. While ambitions are currently measured, a continuation in Ligue 1 would be necessary since the club has presented its project for a new stadium, which should see the light of day in 2024. Croco captain Antonin Bobichon has had a good season and will have to continue. With seven goals and two assists, the decisive midfielder must continue to take on his role as leader and even more so in a decimated group. He will be able to be helped by the child and darling of the Costières, Renaud Ripart. Others will also want to prove, like Pablo Martinez, that they have returned to his academy club after two seasons in Strasbourg.
With a regularity of wins and draws more than impressive, Reims made it to European places for most of the season. Unfortunately for the Grand-Est club, the victory of Strasbourg in the League Cup, then that of Rennes in the French Cup, will make the 5th place non-qualifying for the Europa League play-offs. 4th place being out of their reach, a no-stakes end of the championship will finally bring them down to a solid 8th place, well representative of their season. Indeed, the Reds and Whites were above all a more than solid defence, with an impressive total of 14 "clean sheets" for the 2018-2019 edition. For Ligue 1, aspiring to Europe will be a complicated task... The Rémoise ambition will be much more realistic, i.e. to play firmly in the middle of the championship table. There is no big start to report on the mercato side, unlike other clubs who will fight for the maintenance. Reims with a group almost similar to last year, the soft-belly will surely be the credo of the whole next season. The player to follow: Rémi Oudin The academy striker and already undisputed starter, Rémi Oudin, shone brightly last year with Stade de Reims. Only 22 years old, he was the best Remois with a total of 10 goals and 4 assists in all competitions. As Reims did not shine offensively last season, the young Frenchman brought spectacle with often spectacular goals.
Stade Rennais is simply emerging from one of the best seasons, if not the best in its history. The Red and Black first managed to get out of the Europa League pools for the first time in five appearances, while at the same time getting fans who were waiting for it to happen. After a life-to-death match in Jablonec (1-0) and a home win over Astana (2-0) to confirm the group's second place, the Rennes qualified in the Round of 16 of the C3 at Betis Seville (3-1 after the 3-3 draw in the first leg) in an evening that the Bretillians should not forget shortly before defeating the Arsenal Gunners at home (3-1 and then losing and eliminating 0-3 in the return). But the 2018-2019 season at Stade Rennais definitely took a historic turn on 27 April. That evening, in a red-filled Stade de France, the Bretons put an end to a 36-year drought (if you count the Division 2 title in 1983) by winning their third French Cup against PSG. Otherwise, it was necessary to go back to 1971 to find a record of the last major trophy won by the Rennes, also a French Cup. Julien Stéphan knows that it is in the league that he will have to confirm his good first half season as a professional coach. To do so, it will have to deal with a workforce that is slow to strengthen despite the definitive purchase of M'Baye Niang (€15 million) and the arrivals of Romain Salin, Flavien Tait and Jérémy Morel. Julien Stéphan is waiting for reinforcements at each line since, like the symbol of a team that has performed, the Stade Rennais is attacked for several of its players. Former Captain Benjamin André has already left the ship to join Lille and the Champions League as well as Ismaïla Sarr (Watford) and Ramy Bensebaini (Borussia Mönchengladbach?) could do the same. The start of the championship will be crucial for the Rennes team, which is well handicapped in preparation for the absence due to CAN (Ramy Bensebaini, Hamari Traoré, Souleyman Doumbia, M'Baye Niang and Ismaïla Sarr) or the Euro Espoirs (Romain Del Castillo).
In 18 months, the Greens have regained a standing they had left. Jean-Louis Gasset has a lot to do with it. While the club of Le Forez is adrift in mid-season 2017/2018, Laurent Blanc's former assistant arrives as a fireman and straightens the club until it caresses a European hope at the end of the season. With a fine fourth place, Europe will make its return to the Cauldron. But it will be without Gasset, who didn't want to return. After many weeks of negotiations and hesitation, it was finally his assistant, Ghislain Printant, who replaced him. ASSE aspires to continuity. The aim of this season will be to repeat last year's performance and to secure a new qualifying spot for Europe in the spring. In Europe too, we will have to shine, because the Greens will have to play on two sides. And historically Saint-Étienne has a history that its supporters demand to honour. On paper, it was unclear for a long time. There are the players who had linked their destiny to Gasset and who could finally remain, like M'Vila, the call options not yet exercised when they should have been, like Kolodziejczak... And there were also departures, Cabella in the lead, well replaced by Boudebouz. Saliba was also sold, but Arsenal left it to the Greens on loan for the season. The turn was scary. For the moment, it seems to be well managed. The season will tell us the rest.
Kenny Lala, Jonas Martin, Adrien Thomasson, Ludovic Ajorque
Maintained at the last minute in the top flight in 2017-2018, RC Strasbourg has emerged from a much more successful 2018-2019 season. The club has built an ambitious team thanks to its summer mercato, the starting eleven being mainly composed of summer recruits. The Strasburgers finished in a fine 11th place in the championship with 49 points, three points behind the Top 10. Strasbourg, the sixth best attack in Ligue 1 with 58 goals, was able to count on Lebo Mothiba, the club's top scorer with 10 league goals. Racing has also added a trophy to its roster, winning the third League Cup in its history - after 1997 and 2005 - by beating Lille, Marseille and Lyon in particular. Above all, this title, synonymous with reaching the second preliminary round of the Europa League, allows the Meinau to return to the European stage, 13 years after leaving it (2005-2006 season). Strasbourg is starting its third consecutive season in Ligue 1, after nearly 10 years of hardship, including a bankruptcy and a round in CFA2. After having passed this obstacle course, the Alsatians are determined to remain in the elite. This year, the Strasbourg mercato was rather calm, compared to previous summer periods (more than twenty arrivals in two years since the rise). The group will therefore work in continuity. But Racing will also be keen to enjoy the European adventure, even if most players will discover the Europa League. Their ability to cope with the repetition of matches is therefore unknown. In August, for example, if they qualify for the C3 play-offs, Thierry Laurey's men will play eight matches, one every 3.5 days. A real marathon to manage for organizations. In fact, to be up to speed, the Alsatians took over almost a week before all the other L1 clubs.
If there is one thing that persists on the pink city side, it is the relative indifference of media opinion around the TFC. Hidden in the shadow of the Stade Toulousain, winner of the Brennus Shield in 2019, the Violets will try to do better than last season, finishing in a pitiful 16th place. Close to relegation in the 2017-2018 season, the club coached by Alain Casanova will try to climb back up with a mercato who promises to be ambitious. Exit Christopher Jullien, transferred to Celtic Glasgow, Yannick Cahuzac or Steven Fortes, the TFC will find new men, starting with Efthymios Koulouris, the top scorer in the last Greek league will be one of the attractions of the upcoming Ligue 1 season. Another newcomer, experienced midfielder William Vainqueur, who has worked for FC Nantes, OM and Monaco, will have the difficult task of strengthening the midfield. More complete post about TFC by u/THZHDY
Hey guys, It’s officially here! From now until the end of January we have 10 game weeks of amazing football to look forward to. So since we’re at the beginning of this wonderful journey, I thought I’d write an extra-long Monday After! I’ll be looking at every team, splitting them up based on upcoming fixtures, in-form budget assets and most importantly the strategies we should be looking at implementing during the busy season. You can use this to help build or refine your plan of action for your team, transferring out the dead weight and bringing in the big guns. There was a lot of price movement last night so hopefully you’ve all got a plan already in motion, and I’ll be focusing in on these value changes as well as players that are getting a lot of attention from the top 10k managers. Here’s my team and OR in case you’re wondering. With Sterling captained and 9 of my starting XI returning points I’ve managed to climb into a very respectable top 3k. Chuffed with that! Only Mane and Richarlison missed out but I’m sure I’ll live. I’ve got a lot of options going into December and I’ll be sharing my thoughts throughout the week on my twitter, as well as answering any FPL questions you guys might have. So let’s get into it! This is a big read so remember to take breaks and drink lots of water. Enjoy! Teams To Look At Tottenham – It’s crazy how in my last article Spurs players were a must have and then after Arsenal bashed them about for 90 minutes the doubt started creeping back in. Hopefully we can chalk it up to derby day and move ahead with our plans to bring them in. They have the 2nd best run over the holiday season and a great chance to build up form and momentum. Kane (12.3) is the obvious candidate and it seemed like everyone and their granny was going to get him in until Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang (11.0) made mincemeat out of Spurs. Kane is the most nailed player on the planet, which is hard to come by with premium assets. He’s a great captain choice for the next 3 games when Liverpool, City and Arsenal all face tougher opposition. Erikson (9.2) is a good shout too, but feels like a punt more than a consistent contributor to your team. 5 assists so far coming from the 8 games he’s started isn’t bad though, so if there was ever a time to own him it would be now. Ali (8.9) is a bit cheaper, and a bit more explosive than Erikson. 4 returns in 7 starts isn’t bad, but his minutes are just a bit riskier than his Danish partner. I’ll point out that Erikson has had a lot of returns from free kicks he’s nabbed off the injured Trippier (6.1) who’s due back soon. Last but not least we have little Sonny (8.3). He just runs and runs all game, yet has to put up with being rotated with Lamela. When he’s on the pitch you can just see how much more he brings to the table, but Poch is seriously guarding his minutes. An expensive risk, but with 3 returns this season all in his last game, if he can keep his place every week he would be the best choice. But he doesn’t, so he’s not. Last thing to note is Spurs defence. Tottenham have 5 cleansheets this season, which isn’t that great considering the price of all their defenders. They’re also a rotation risk, every last one of them, so tread carefully! Maybe your money is better off spent elsewhere. Like on Kane! Chelsea – Once again we’re faced with the decision: Do we get rid of Hazard (11.0), or do we keep him and hope he turns it around. 6 points against Fulham isn’t what you hope for as the Blues’ talisman, and as a team they’ve looked shaky in the last few games. Alonso (7.1) is still returning dependably, so you shouldn’t have any worries there. The argument for holding Hazard is getting harder to justify, but there’s a few areas he shines in that other premium assets don’t. When he scores, he usually gets those bonus points, and when he’s fit he plays. No rotation risk. No Champions League. No one else is getting his spot in the starting XI. With really great fixtures in the next two months (Man City, Arsenal and Leicester being the only dodgy games before GW26) you could definitely get away with seeing how it plays out. It’s clear that ‘Hazard Out’ is gaining traction so you won’t be alone if you decide to go for a more in-form player right now, it’s a tricky decision! The only sure starter other than Alonso and Hazard worth getting is Rüdiger (6.0). Technically David Luiz (5.6) has the same amount of cleansheets and minutes but he’s just so shite I wouldn’t bring him in out of principle. West Ham – Working through the best fixture run in the league at the moment, the Hammers got off to a great start with a 3-0 win against Newcastle this weekend. Felipe Anderson (7.1) bagged another goal in the last seconds of the game, which is now 4 returns in 4, and Arnie (7.1) managed to return some points with his assist. Both are a great choice for the foreseeable future and should continue their good form. Just as long as Arnie can keep from breaking Chicharito (6.2) both started and played for the full 90 minutes for the first time this season, returning an impressive 13 points with 2 goals and max bonus. He might be worth keeping an eye on for more starts, and would be a great alternative to Arnie should he finally succumb to his injuries. Although this was only their second cleansheet of the season, it’s hard not to jump at the chance to own some of West Ham’s defensive assets, especially since they are so cheap! Fabianksi (4.5) was awarded a bonus point and Balbuena (4.4) wasn’t far behind. A word of caution though; Cresswell (5.1) was dynamite at the back for most of the game until taken off with a Hamstring injury. That means they’ll be playing Masuaku (4.3) again, who isn’t great defensively. Pellegrini wasn’t too informative about the situation either, but they should be good for a few clean sheets regardless. Arsenal – With some great fixtures coming up, and a thrilling North London Derby performance, I wouldn’t kick Aubameyang (11.0) out of FPL bed. Minor risk of moving back to the wing once Lacazette (9.6) gets back into the team, but Auba will still get plenty of minutes and score plenty of goals during the holiday season. Arsenal also have no Champions League to worry about so he’s a safer option than Liverpool and City assets. Other than the forwards, Gunners are to be avoided. They ‘ve kept less cleansheets than Huddersfield and rival City with midfield rotation. You could potentially argue that including Ramsey (7.3) is a good idea and I wouldn’t stop you, but I’d look at you differently and never truly trust you ever again. His minutes are dogshit and his relationship with the new gaffer doesn’t seem great either. Only Kolasinac (4.9) looks like a decent punt out with the forwards. I wrote about him in detail last week: he gets quite far up the pitch and puts in a decent number of crosses. He’d be in my team GW16 onwards if he kept his place when Monreal (5.4) returns from injury, but it’s unlikely. Will keep an eye out though! Liverpool – The Reds are a bit funny at the minute. I don’t mean ‘comedy’ funny, I mean ‘can’t seem to score as much as City so we doubt their whole attack’ funny. It’s weird because looking at their history this season they actually do put teams to the sword. The problem lies with the reliability of the individual players. Sometimes it’s a Mane (9.9) goal. Sometimes it’s Firmino (9.2). Salah (13.0) usually manages to get a goal every other game, but we come to the same argument again and again. Is his points return worth his value? 11 returns in 14 games is really good, but with Liverpool we expect more. Winning 2-0 seems disappointing when your 13m captain returns a single goal. It’s no mystery why he’s getting dropped for more explosive players. Defence is a whole different story though. Liverpool’s defence is fucking kick ass hot right now and don’t look like slowing down. Robertson (6.6) and TAA (5.3) are flying and well worth the value, even as a double up if you can manage it. Allison (5.7) and van Dijk (6.0) are the other options, but won’t return much attacking returns (Dijk won’t miss-hit his shots off the bar every week right?). In short, Liverpool attack = iffy. Liverpool defence = Essential. Just make sure you hold onto your assets until they play Burnley. Man City – These guys are on another level. Totally untouchable. But with great power comes great rotation risk. Aguero (11.4) owners were burned with this on the weekend, but they won’t mind too much because they’ll have been eyeing up Kane anyway. Aguero’s away record is hard to ignore now, and with Champions League and Pep’s glowing remarks about Jesus’ (10.1) minutes, he might just be too hot to handle. Sterling (11.5) and Sane (9.3) on the other hand are pretty fucking amazing. They’re both returning huge and getting huge amounts of minutes. So surely they will be rotated over the next few weeks. Same with David Silva (8.7) who seems integral to the way City play. They’ll all be rested for a few games, but not owning them is out of the question so we’ll have to take the 0 points on the chin. Right now the defence is very volatile. They’ll definitely keep cleansheets, but only Ederson (5.8) and Laporte (6.1) are sure starters, and don’t offer much more than Cleansheets. The bonus will always end up in midfield, so it might be a good idea to just ignore City defence for now and instead focus on getting a few midfielders in. I’m not even going to bother talking about their fixtures. City is fixture proof until further notice. Watford – What a rollercoaster of a team! Remember we were all raving about Watford at the start of the season with Holebas (4.7) doing the business at the back and Pereyra (6.3) at the front. Then they went on a bit of a losing streak and we just lost interest. The Success (4.6) train was a thing of beauty, allowing us a cheap starting striker who might nick some goals here and there, but has so far just been bench fodder, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing if you’re wanting to switch up your value distribution with a 4-4-2 or 3-5-2. Deulofeu (5.4) was brought back into the XI in GW8 which was awesome because he was a cheaper, alternative way into the squad. But since Gerard started Watford have won just 2 games and he’s only returned twice. Not what we’re really looking for in our 4th midfielder. It would be great if Watford could get back to their original form because their players are well priced if they could just find some consistency. There’s not much competition in the 5m-6m price bracket, so here’s hoping the Hornets can use the good fixtures they have from GW 17-24 (only CHE and bou look like difficult matchups) to turn it all around. If you’re going to take a punt, plan for after the Everton game. If you’re an owner, I’d give them another few weeks before kicking them to the curb. What I’m trying to say is that Watford right now are a big fat maybe. Everton –Man City and Tottenham are the only difficult fixtures in 10 for the Toffees, who proved in GW14 that their defence ain’t nuthin’ to fuck wit’. Most of their options at the back look good, with Digne (4.9) leading the pack. He was all set for max bonus points against Liverpool until a freak goal cut it short, which is good for non-owners because his price would have skyrocketed! You have other options at the back but I’d stick with Digne for now. Of course we also have Richarlison (7.0) and Sigurdsson (7.4). Both are great options and both will return, but I can’t help but put Siggy ahead. He’s turned into the heart and soul of the team, smashing every eye test coming his way. If you have Rich I’d stick with him. The same with Sigurdsson owners. If you have none though, you might actually get more value out of choosing the Icelander. Regardless of who you get, just make sure you have one for the next 2 months. Leicester – Leicester are another team that is hard to assess right now. They’re main man Vardy (8.9) is very expensive but relies on penalties to keep the points flowing. He’s also a rotation risk, which is crazy for someone who cost the same as Deli Alli! Pereira (5.1) has been working really hard at the back for the injured Amartey (4.4) and managed some impressive hauls recently. If you can find a good rotation partner, he’d be one to keep and even bring in, but the rest of their team may be too expensive for bench rotation. Maddison (6.8) was once a favourite but now only has 5.5% ownership so you won’t be missing if you ship him and he gets the odd assist. He’s still an important part of the team so if you’re happy with him, you could do worse. With the current strategies involving more premium midfields he just might be too expensive to keep around though. You know what? They’re all risky, the lot of them. Be careful, lads. Huddersfield – The Terries haven’t proved that they can be consistent yet this season. With just 3 cleansheets and only 9 goals in 14 GWs, it’s hard to justify bringing in anyone from this team. However they did have one of the worst opening 10 games of any team in the premier league this season, which is about to get completely flipped for their next 10, playing BHA, NEW, SOU, ful, BUR, and car, mixed with three ‘big 6’ teams and Bournemouth from GW15-23. Now I’m not saying go out and grab a Huddersfield, I’d actually warn you against it, but if you really need some cheap options at the back, Schindler (4.3) can be rotated well with Wolves, Arsenal and Spurs defenders. Other than that, everyone else seems like a punt too far. Cardiff – Since GW9 they’ve won 3 out of 6 games, hitting a little bit of form. Most of Cardiff’s goals come from a frantic dance in the box during set pieces, so it’s hard to pinpoint an attacking asset, but Paterson (5.3) has returned 4 times in the last 6 games playing OOP up front, but there are some better options at his price range. Camarasa (4.6) is the surest budget midfielder in the game, and at his price with the fixture spread, you could do worse than have him on your bench. You also have Hoilett (5.0) who I just want to say scored an absolute worldy at the weekend, who might start building confidence finally. Really though that’s all Cardiff seem good for at the moment; bench warmers and punts. They’re not the pushovers they were at the start of the season and the fixtures aren’t bad but we can’t expect massive hauls from them so I’d suggest dodging Cardiff players for your starting XI. Teams To Be Wary Of Brighton – Brighton is a weird one at the minute and I’m not sure how to assess them. Old Man Murray (6.7) with 7 goals so far seems to be the focus of their attacks, but it’s Dunk (4.5) and Duffy (4.7) who steal our FPL attention. These wonderful humans are just devastating with those heads of theirs, scoring 5 goals between them. I’m not sure how long they’ll be able to keep it up though, as we are half way through their 5 good fixtures and after the next two games they play: Chelsea, Man Unt, Arsenal, and Liverpool at some point in the next 7 games. Along with those difficult fixtures, they’ll have a rest playing Bournemouth, Everton and West Ham. Not the best. If it’s not obvious, it’s nearly time to part ways with our head strong friends. Don’t worry! We get to keep them just a little while longer; and It’s not goodbye, it’s see you later (GW24). Bournemouth – Wilson (6.8) scored against Man City and is the first attacking player to do so this season. They’ve had a bad fixture run on the horizon for a while now and they played admirably against the bigger teams. We won’t be looking into their defence, obviously, but you could get away with benching your assets if you have them. A lot of managers actually did get away with it this weekend, which was fun. However, I wouldn’t bring any of them in, and would argue that the value could be better spent elsewhere for right now. The Cherries have one of the harder fixture runs in the league just now, so don’t expect returns to trickle like they have been. If you need the value for a big transfer, I’d go for it. Southampton – A manager leaving is always a mixed bag. Sometimes the team falls off for a bit and picks back up. Sometimes they become complete gods of men and jump up the table. There’s also a chance they continue their trajectory straight into a wall of shit. So we aren’t quite sure what’ll happen, but if we were to set realistic goals for the Saints, they should only hope to win maybe 2 of the next 10 games. It’s pretty hopeless. Whoever’s hired to whip these boys into shape is going to have a fucking horrible Christmas. I don’t even want to go through the players because their fixtures are that bad and they’ve shown no consistency apart from Ings (5.4) who died for an assist back in GW12. Even drawing against Man Utd isn’t impressive. It’s actually a sackable offense. So if you still have any Saints assets, please respectively get them to fuck. Wolves – Wolves make me sad. They were doing so well and were so fun to watch but they’ve taken a wrong turn into a dark alley full of 20-somethings in hoodies. It’s scary out there at the Molineux right now, and the fixtures don’t look great either. Doherty (4.9) was lucky to get a goal in a game they were completely dominated in by fucking Cardiff. Fucking Cardiff! And before that it was Huddersfield. Jimenez (6.0) keeps returning assists and is pretty cheap so I wouldn’t get rid of him just yet, but Wolves need to get their mojo back and quick because there are very little points up for grabs over the holidays if they keep playing like this. Their saving grace will be victories in between the big teams, but I’m not holding my breath anymore. Wolves make me sad. Crystal Palace –They’ve passed their difficult schedule! It’s clear sailing from here on out. Come on guys, it’s Palaces’ time to shine! This is the type of shit you’d expect to be hearing after playing four top 6 teams in a row. I’d like to be telling you guys it’s all green fields and cool crisp rivers, but in truth it’s going to be a tough couple of months for the Eagles. A few okay home games are mixed in with a lot of iffy away games plus Man City and Chelsea. We probably all have Wan-B (4.2) but if you don’t you’d get away with not owning him. Cheap bench options are easiest to come by in defence this season, and really that’s all Palace are offering right now. I’d love to be able to promote Zaha (6.7) as he looked really good at the weekend but I just wish the fixtures could back him up a bit, and with the many many other options out there I wouldn’t jump on any of their attacking options right now. It’s a shame because they could have done with a boost. Keep Wanny – B and hibernate until February. Fulham – With their new manager, and new outlook on defending, as in actually doing it, Fulham might be worth considering. However I mentioned last week that all the decent players you’d think to bring in are a bit overpriced: Shurrle (5.9), Sessegnon (6.0) and Seri (5.3). New kid on the block Cairney (4.8) and OOP Chambers (4.2) actually played well too, but it’s early doors and the jury’s still out on that one. Only Mitrovic (6.6) looks like decent bang for your buck, but we definitely need to see more from Raneiri’s men. We can’t just jump in at the deep end and hope we don’t drown, which is a strong possibility. At least wait until GW18 and then reassess. I would love to have a wee Sessegnon on my team, but for that price I could just put the money into my defence for any number of great options: TAA (5.3), Rudigar (6.0), Pereira (5.0), Digne (4.9) etc. Hold fast! Burnley – Do Burnley really need me to add anything at this point? They are tremendously shite this season. I’m not sure what’s happened because they have the capacity to do the damage, like 4-0 against Bournemouth, 2-1 away to Cardiff, and with the likes of Gudmundsson (5.9) returning 7 times in 13 games you’d think they’d be worth looking into. But every team they face gets a massive attacking stat boost with a million shots. Not only that, they have extremely difficult fixtures coming up to fuck them over even more. After GW19 it gets better but that’s a long way off. They’re a complete mess at the moment so avoid like your life depended on it. We’ll reassess nearer January. Man United – Unfortunately for United, they have really good fixtures mixed with some really rubbish fixtures, mixed with some really bad players, really great players and a fucked up dressing room. Lots of managers jumped on Martial (7.7) who was very cheap and returning every week. This form can definitely continue with the fixtures, but the players themselves seem very disjointed. No one has really passed the eye test, and it’s no secret that Mourinho is struggling behind the scenes. When picking what player to bring in, you can’t just look at that individual, but the team as a whole. Now that might be obvious, and there are exceptions to the rules. Martial is capable of winning games on his own, but it takes a team to keep that going. Until they shape up it’s a no from me. If you still have Martial you’ll probably be jerking more than when you hit puberty, and I wouldn’t blame you. GW18 is a long way off (CAR, hud, BOU, new) so if you’re keeping him now you need to be okay with low returns for the next 3 GWs. Newcastle – We’re halfway through Newcastle’s good run of fixtures and they haven’t really shown a reason to bring any of them in. We were dying for Kenedy (4.9) and Yedlin (4.5) to be the new Fraser and Doherty, but haven’t lived up to the budget hype. Rondon (5.7) managed to scrape some returns together but they’ve dried up too. Avoiding Newcastle is pretty easy so I’d recommend doing that. If you want to take a punt on the above players, make sure you get out before the Liverpool game. After GW18 it’s not pretty. Plans And Strategies To Adopt Looking through the main strategies at the moment there are a few that keep popping up I thought would be good to highlight. I’ve been adopting some of these recently and it’s been paying off. There are also some headline plans in the air right now I want to discuss in detail. Hopefully it’s helpful! 4.5m + 4.0m GK – At the start of the season many people went for either a 5.5m + 4.0m goalkeeper situation or a 4.5m + 4.5m and looked to rotate. Recently I’ve noticed a few veterans who’ve put a plan of a 4.5m + 4.0m keeper into action. There are a few keepers at the minute like Fabianksi who have good enough fixtures you can leave them in the starting XI for a while and not have to worry about it. It also adds a higher ceiling that you wouldn’t have with a premium keeper. Fore example: Having Allison and Zabaleta might be less rotation risky, but the potential returns, especially bonus points, you can get from having Fabianksi and TAA is much higher, with the same cleansheet risk. It also saves you 0.2m. Worth a thought if you have some funds still wrapped up in your keepers. Ditching Aguero – Aguero has not been playing very well away this season. He’s a rotation risk and he’s injured at the moment. We’ve decided to get rid. Awesome! The main two options we’ve been seeing are Kane and Aubameyang. On the one hand, Kane is Kane. I don’t need to explain him. On the other hand, there isn’t actually a decent way into Arsenal if you don’t get a striker. The midfield rotation is a huge killer, and very inconsistent, whereas Spurs have 3 decent choices other than Kane that can sit beside your Hazards and your Sterlings. This may be something to consider before making your choice. You could also just tell me to go fuck myself and grab Kane and Aubameyang, which is cool too. Both are decent players worth captaining, both on Penalties, both play for decent sides with decent fixtures, but it’s Aubameyang or nothing it looks like. Kane has friends in midfield you could play. This is my findings so far. No Liverpool Attack – For those that have Salah, you’re probably thinking of ditching for a city mid. For those with Mane, you’ve probably already ditched for a City mid. Look at the top 3 guys in the Reddit league right now. 2 of the 3 have neither Salah nor Mane. Of course if you keep going down the league you'll find one of them more often than not, but it’s a good indication of the possibilities when you use the funds elsewhere. Of course it might be difficult to get them back if they do start murdering teams, but I think that fear is keeping a lot of us from ditching. I’m not advocating for this strategy, and I certainly don't want you to get rid of your 'Pool defence. I’ve got Mane and Robbo in my team. But it is an interesting concept that we might want to look into. Double or Triple City Mid – If we were to sell all of our Liverpool attacking assets, who would we replace them with? Another plan I’ve seen knocking about is getting rid of Aguero and moving in for 2 or 3 City midfielders. It’s a fun way to get around the rotation blanks and City aren’t running out of bad options in their midfield department. With the amount of goals they can score per game, it’s not a crazy idea to grab a couple and hope for starts. Sterling is even captain worthy. It’s something you’d definitely need to start building towards now, but I think we’ll be seeing a lot of Man City mids mixed into teams in the next month or two. Bench Building – I’ve noticed that there are a lot of managers who have a Peltier or a Bacuna who sits on their 3rd bench spot permanently. Running through the top guys in the Reddit league I’ve only spotted maybe one or two managers who do this too. The majority have a bench that actually play every game. I’m guilty of the former, but I’ve put a plan in place to remedy it quick. It’s not difficult to fall into the trap, but if we can only make a transfer happen by having a fucking nobody on the bench, then that transfer should probably be considered too expensive. There are also plenty of budget players out there who get game time, so really there is no excuse. Sort that shit out! I actually say this most weeks but no one has called me out on my own bench yet. I’m sorting it though, guys. Trust me! And that's a wrap! If you made it this far, thanks very much for reading! A lot to get through this week, and I hope I’ve hit most talking points. I’ll maybe run through GW15-16 a little bit on Thursday, but until then, good luck! With so many value changes happening every day now, don’t forget to use your price change website of choice to keep on top of everything. If I’ve missed something you want my take on, let me know either here or twitter. Other than that, enjoy the games! Cheers.
[Sunday Afternoon Long Read] The Greatest Moment Ever - Liverpool vs Arsenal, 26th May 1989 - from Fever Pitch, by Nick Hornby
The Greatest Moment Ever LIVERPOOL v ARSENAL 26.5.89 In all the time I have been watching football, twenty-three seasons, only seven teams have won the First Division Championship: Leeds United, Everton, Arsenal, Derby County, Nottingham Forest, Aston Villa and, a staggering eleven times, Liverpool. Five different teams came top in my first five years, so it seemed to me then that the League was something that came your way every once in a while, even though you might have to wait for it; but as the seventies came and went, and then the eighties, it began to dawn on me that Arsenal might never win the League again in my lifetime. That isn’t as melodramatic as it sounds. Wolves fans celebrating their third championship in six years in 1959 could hardly have anticipated that their team would spend much of the next thirty years in the Second and Third Divisions; Manchester City supporters in their mid-forties when the Blues last won the League in 1968 are in their early seventies now. Like all fans, the overwhelming majority of the games I have seen have been League games. And as most of the time Arsenal have had no real interest in the First Division title after Christmas, nor ever really come close to going down, I would estimate that around half of these games are meaningless, at least in the way that sportswriters talk about meaningless games. There are no chewed nails and chewed knuckles and screwed-up faces; your ear doesn’t become sore from being pressed up hard against a radio, trying to hear how Liverpool are getting on; you are not, in truth, thrown into agonies of despair or eye-popping fits of ecstasy by the result. Any meanings such games throw up are the ones that you, rather than the First Division table, bring to them. And after maybe ten years of this, the Championship becomes something you either believe in or you don’t, like God. You concede that it’s possible, of course, and you try to respect the views of those who have managed to remain credulous. Between approximately 1975 and 1989 I didn’t believe. I hoped, at the beginning of each season; and a couple of times—the middle of the 86/87 season, for example, when we were top for eight or nine weeks—I was almost lured out of my agnostic’s cave. But in my heart of hearts I knew that it would never happen, just as I knew that they were not, as I used to think when I was young, going to find a cure for death before I got old. In 1989, eighteen years after the last time Arsenal had won the League, I reluctantly and foolishly allowed myself to believe it was indeed possible that Arsenal could win the Championship. They were top of the First Division between January and May; on the last full weekend of the Hillsborough-elongated season they were five points clear of Liverpool with three games left to play. Liverpool had a game in hand, but the accepted wisdom was that Hillsborough and its attendant strains would make it impossible for them to keep winning, and two of Arsenal’s three games were at home to weaker teams. The other was against Liverpool, away, a game that would conclude the First Division season. No sooner had I become a born-again member of the Church of the Latterday Championship Believers, however, than Arsenal ground to a catastrophic halt. They lost, dismally, at home to Derby; and in the final game at Highbury, against Wimbledon, they twice threw away the lead to draw 2-2 against a team they had destroyed 5-1 on the opening day of the season. It was after the Derby game that I raged into an argument with my partner about a cup of tea, but after the Wimbledon game I had no rage left, just a numbing disappointment. For the first time I understood the women in soap operas who have been crushed by love affairs before, and can’t allow themselves to fall for somebody again: I had never before seen all that as a matter of choice, but now I too had left myself nakedly exposed when I could have remained hard and cynical. I wouldn’t allow it to happen again, never, ever, and I had been a fool, I knew that now, just as I knew it would take me years to recover from the terrible disappointment of getting so close and failing. It wasn’t quite all over. Liverpool had two games left, against West Ham and against us, both at Anfield. Because the two teams were so close, the mathematics of it all were peculiarly complicated: whatever score Liverpool beat West Ham by, Arsenal had to halve. If Liverpool won 2-0, we would have to win 1-0, and so on. In the event Liverpool won 5-1, which meant that we needed a two-goal victory; “YOU HAVEN’T GOT A PRAYER, ARSENAL”, was the back-page headline of the Daily Mirror. I didn’t go to Anfield. The fixture was originally scheduled for earlier in the season, when the result wouldn’t have been so crucial, and by the time it was clear that this game would decide the Championship, the tickets had long gone. In the morning I walked down to Highbury to buy a new team shirt, just because I felt I had to do something, and though admittedly wearing a shirt in front of a television set would not, on the face of it, appear to offer the team an awful lot of encouragement, I knew it would make me feel better. Even at noon, some eight hours before the evening kick-off, there were already scores of coaches and cars around the ground, and on the way home I wished everyone I passed good luck; their positiveness (“Three-one”, “Two-nil, no trouble”, even a breezy “Four-one”) on this beautiful May morning made me sad for them, as if these chirpy and bravely confident young men and women were off to the Somme to lose their lives, rather than to Anfield to lose, at worst, their faith. I went to work in the afternoon, and felt sick with nerves despite myself; afterwards I went straight round to an Arsenal-supporting friend’s house, just a street away from the North Bank, to watch the game. Everything about the night was memorable, right from the moment when the teams came on to the pitch and the Arsenal players ran over to the Kop and presented individuals in the crowd with bunches of flowers. And as the game progressed, and it became obvious that Arsenal were going to go down fighting, it occurred to me just how well I knew my team, their faces and their mannerisms, and how fond I was of each individual member of it. Merson’s gap-toothed smile and tatty soul-boy haircut, Adams’s manful and endearing attempts to come to terms with his own inadequacies, Rocastle’s pumped-up elegance, Smith’s lovable diligence … I could find it in me to forgive them for coming so close and blowing it: they were young, and they’d had a fantastic season and as a supporter you cannot really ask for more than that. I got excited when we scored right at the beginning of the second half, and I got excited again about ten minutes from time, when Thomas had a clear chance and hit it straight at Grobbelaar, but Liverpool seemed to be growing stronger and to be creating chances at the end, and finally, with the clock in the corner of the TV screen showing that the ninety minutes had passed, I got ready to muster a brave smile for a brave team. “If Arsenal are to lose the Championship, having had such a lead at one time, it’s somewhat poetic justice that they have got a result on the last day, even though they’re not to win it,” said co-commentator David Pleat as Kevin Richardson received treatment for an injury with the Kop already celebrating. “They will see that as scant consolation, I should think, David,” replied Brian Moore. Scant consolation indeed, for all of us. Richardson finally got up, ninety-two minutes gone now, and even managed a penalty-area tackle on John Barnes; then Lukic bowled the ball out to Dixon, Dixon on, inevitably, to Smith, a brilliant Smith flick-on … and suddenly, in the last minute of the last game of the season, Thomas was through, on his own, with a chance to win the Championship for Arsenal. “It’s up for grabs now!” Brian Moore yelled; and even then I found that I was reining myself in, learning from recent lapses in hardened scepticism, thinking, well, at least we came close at the end there, instead of thinking, please Michael, please Michael, please put it in, please God let him score. And then he was turning a somersault, and I was flat out on the floor, and everybody in the living room jumped on top of me. Eighteen years, all forgotten in a second. What is the correct analogy for a moment like that? In Pete Davies’s brilliant book about the 1990 World Cup, All Played Out, he notices that the players use sexual imagery when trying to explain what it feels like to score a goal. I can see that sometimes, for some of the more workaday transcendent moments. Smith’s third goal in our 3-0 win against Liverpool in December 1990, for example, four days after we’d been beaten 6-2 at home by Manchester United—that felt pretty good, a perfect release to an hour of mounting excitement. And four or five years back, at Norwich, Arsenal scored four times in sixteen minutes after trailing for most of the game, a quarter of an hour which also had a kind of sexual otherworldliness to it. The trouble with the orgasm as metaphor here is that the orgasm, though obviously pleasurable, is familiar, repeatable (within a couple of hours if you’ve been eating your greens), and predictable, particularly for a man—if you’re having sex then you know what’s coming, as it were. Maybe if I hadn’t made love for eighteen years, and had given up hope of doing so for another eighteen, and then suddenly, out of the blue, an opportunity presented itself … maybe in these circumstances it would be possible to recreate an approximation of that Anfield moment. Even though there is no question that sex is a nicer activity than watching football (no nil-nil draws, no offside trap, no cup upsets, and you’re warm), in the normal run of things, the feelings it engenders are simply not as intense as those brought about by a once-in-a-lifetime last-minute Championship winner. None of the moments that people describe as the best in their lives seem analogous to me. Childbirth must be extraordinarily moving, but it doesn’t really have the crucial surprise element, and in any case lasts too long; the fulfilment of personal ambition—promotions, awards, what have you—doesn’t have the last-minute time factor, nor the element of powerlessness that I felt that night. And what else is there that can possibly provide the suddenness? A huge pools win, maybe, but the gaining of large sums of money affects a different part of the psyche altogether, and has none of the communal ecstasy of football. There is then, literally, nothing to describe it. I have exhausted all the available options. I can recall nothing else that I have coveted for two decades (what else is there that can reasonably be coveted for that long?), nor can I recall anything else that I have desired as both man and boy. So please, be tolerant of those who describe a sporting moment as their best ever. We do not lack imagination, nor have we had sad and barren lives; it is just that real life is paler, duller, and contains less potential for unexpected delirium. When the final whistle blew (just one more heart-stopping moment, when Thomas turned and knocked a terrifyingly casual back-pass to Lukic, perfectly safely but with a coolness that I didn’t feel) I ran straight out of the door to the off-licence on Blackstock Road; I had my arms outstretched, like a little boy playing aeroplanes, and as I flew down the street, old ladies came to the door and applauded my progress, as if I were Michael Thomas himself; then I was grievously ripped off for a bottle of cheap champagne, I realised later, by a shopkeeper who could see that the light of intelligence had gone from my eyes altogether. I could hear whoops and screams from pubs and shops and houses all around me; and as fans began to congregate at the stadium, some draped in banners, some sitting on top of tooting cars, everyone embracing strangers at every opportunity, and TV cameras arrived to film the party for the late news, and club officials leaned out of windows to wave at the bouncing crowd, it occurred to me that I was glad I hadn’t been up to Anfield, and missed out on this joyful, almost Latin explosion on my doorstep. After twenty-one years I no longer felt, as I had done during the Double year, that if I hadn’t been to the games I had no right to partake in the celebrations; I’d done the work, years and years and years of it, and I belonged.
Our next game is at Anfield. Wanted a place for people to share their thoughts on our upcoming fixture. I've shared some of mine here.
Formation
We've got a few options. Although I don't see us running anything other than a 4-3-3, we've had enough LB issues that maybe Pep will go for something with more defensive security. I'll outline some popular choices and give my thoughts on them: 4-3-3: Our go-to, and most likely how we will line up. Something close to:
Sane - Aguero - Sterling D. Silva - Fernandinho - B. Silva Zinchenko/Delph - Laporte - Stones - Walker Ederson
Could see some variety in our backline but the goal is here is to not get burned by Liverpool's attacking trio making runs. 3-5-2: What we ran for our 5-0 game against Pool last season. This presumes that Mendy is healthy and Pep is willing to play him. I'm very curious to see if Pep will have us run this - while we lose our wingers, we're much stronger defensively as we can transition to 5 at-the-back out of possession. Something like:
Aguero - Sterling Mendy - D. Silva - Fernandinho - B. Silva - Walker Laporte - Stones - Otamendi Ederson
Few thoughts. Jesus has been woefully out of form, and we've seen Sterling play as a second striker in the past. The caveat is that this is an Anfield match and Raz is going to get boo'd every touch. Could see either. I'd actually love to see Mahrez here but that'd be a reach. Could also see Stonesy playing in Dinho's place and having Kompany as our pure CB. I'd also be interested to play a Sterling/Mahrez in Walker's spot and have him play RCB - but that's an experiment for a different game. 4-2-3-1/4-2-2-2: Now, to my knowledge, we haven't officially ever run these, and a big league game like Pool @ Anfield is not the time to be messing around (Pep pls). But after seeing Stones and Ferna on today as something akin to a RDM and LDM, it made me curious as to what our we'd look like if we ran:
Aguero D. Silva - B. Silva - Sterling Ferna - Stones Zinchenko/Delph - Laporte - Otamendi - Walker Ederson Aguero - Sterling D. Silva - B. Silva Ferna - Stones Zinchenko/Delph - Laporte - Otamendi - Walker Ederson
Don't really have much else to say about these, they have their pros and cons but they do strengthen the defense on our midfield.
Chelsea
I thought Chelsea did an excellent job last weekend - it's arguable but I think they were the better team, playing a 4-3-3. The two big takeaways from that game to me were:
David Luiz ran the show. Absolutely solid all around. Didn't make mistakes, kept his composure on the ball, and orchestrated playing out from the back.
Fluidity in the midfield. Chelsea played some excellent, one-touch football and almost completely negated Liverpool's intense press. As an aside, this speaks to both their quick uptake to Sarri's system as well as the sheer talent and quality of players like Kovacic, Hazard, Kante, Jorginho.
The key to their success was not giving the ball away to let Liverpool counter. Ross Barkley came on somewhere within the last 20 minutes or so and, while mostly invisible, definitely managed to lose possession more than once. We need our passing to be on point - especially in the middle third.
How we win & general tactics
Defense: Although not the most obvious strategy - we need to stop them from scoring. I've watched most of pool's games this season and I would argue that their front three are fairly out of form. Obviously they are still creating chances, but not to the extent they did last year. Firmino has been relatively invisible (inb4 link-up play) and Salah/Mane have been missing chances they would have made last season. However, with our high defensive line, we need to make 100% certain that our defenders are ready to sprint back at a moments notice. Look at how TAA made one misstep and let Hazard through. We also need to make sure we're clearing every ball that finds its way into our box before it even hits the ground - we saw what happened today when El Mago picked the Hoffenheim CB's pocket. We need to be clinical with our back line. Nothing flashy, minimal mistakes. One wrong move and we're down 0-1. I was so impressed by Stones' defensive quality when capped for England - he needs to be the David Luiz of the game. I'd like to see Walker essentially transition to a third CB - he never really provides much in the way of attack except for a quick pass out. My personal preference for LB would be Zinchenko, for a few reasons. One - he played against pool in the preseason and actually had a fairly good showing defensively. His ability to switch play looked really sharp last time he was on, and could absolutely come in handy. I do think Delph is better defensively, but that shocker from the Lyon game is fresh in my mind. The obvious weak point to me is our DM. Ferna's been caught out a bit too much recently, and isn't able to sprint around the box like he used to. I think Stones is an OK choice for the defensive duties of this, but he looked pretty lost when trying pushing the ball forward. Whoever plays it, we need them to be on point when preventing the counter. I say this knowing Pep will probably going to use this game to test run something we haven't seen like Zinchenko at DM and Mendy as LB in a back four. Attack: For us, it'll be gameplan as usual. Assuming we run a 4-3-3, we will depend on our strong midfield, passing around the box, and either our wingers tearing down to put in a cross or a midfielder looking to feed a runner through the middle. I'd also like to see us try for more chances outside the box (from our attackers, if I have to watch one of our defenders try from 30 yards out again I'm gonna lose it). Aguero/Sterling/Mahrez/B Silva have absolutely shown they can cut in and get off a shot on target. Something I'd also like to see us do is play with less possession. We've looked as deadly on the counter this season (cue trademark left-side run, cross to box) as Liverpool has lost in possession. Their midfield has excellent ball-winners in the form of Henderson and Milner, but not necessarily magic-producing when it comes to driving forward. Could see Keita causing some damage however if he plays for one of them or Wijnaldum. I watched our 3-0 CL loss highlights recently, and I think we can get 4-5 strong chances on goal. Between Anfield, Atkinson and the potential for Salah to tear past whoever our LB is, we're essentially starting this game one down. I absolutely believe we can take the three points - I've seen our quality when we're at our best - but it will depend on our mentality. This will almost certainly be our toughest fixture this season (Chelsea away looks rough too), so let's show up on Sunday and put up one hell of a fight.
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