Champions Manchester City were without comparison in the Premier League. Here I pick my heroes and villains from the season. A disclaimer: I am a Liverpool supporter.

Heroes

1. Alisson (Liverpool goalkeeper).

Without Alisson’s 95^th minute headed goal to beat West Brom, Liverpool would not have finished in the top four and they would not be playing in the Champions League next season. Alisson’s stunning effort, with the last play of the match, created Premier League history with him being the first Liverpool goalkeeper to ever score a goal. Liverpool had struggled all season in converting chances into goals and while teammate Mo Salah scored the league’s second most goals, there was none more spectacular and important as Alisson’s goal.

2. Jesse Lingard (West Ham/Manchester United)

Manchester United didn’t want him and clearly didn’t know how to use him. He got a ticket out of Old Trafford to reunite with his old boss David Moyes and Lingard was reborn. He scored twice on his West Ham debut in a 3-1 win against Aston Villa and he remained in the starting line-up for the next 16 matches. He scored nine goals and made four assists and was massive in West Ham securing their highest Premier League finish in more than 20 years and also a spot in the group stage of the 2021/22 Europa League.

3. Pep Guardiola (Manchester City)

There isn’t a better manager in professional sport than Manchester City’s Guardiola. He oozes class, in front of the camera and behind closed doors. He described his third Premier League title in four seasons as City’s boss as the most rewarding, given the challenges of Covid and playing with no fans. His City team played in 60 of a possible 61 matches in the four competitions, but their recovery from an indifferent start to the Premier League was unrivalled as they came from behind to be runaway winners. Guardiola’s Manchester City are a joy to watch for any football neutral. If you love football, you have to love Guardiola’s style of play.

4. Sergio Augero (Manchester City)

The club’s favourite son of the past decade left the Premier League in exactly the same way he arrived, with a two-goal burst as a second half replacement. Augero’s first and last Premier League games for City defined his influence at the club and he leaves a five-time Premier League winner. Augero, in his 389^th match for City, took his club tally to 260 goals and his Premier League total to 183 for City, which beat Manchester United’s Wayne Rooney’s record for the most goals scored by a player for one club. It was the fairytale finish to a fairytale City career.

Villains

1. Jordan Pickford (Everton goalkeeper).

Pickford’s illegal tackle to injure and end Liverpool defender Virgil van Dijk’s season will always rankle. It was the lowest point of my season. I may report on sport as a profession but I support Liverpool and here I am talking as a supporter and not a reporter. Van Dijk was always the glue to a successful title defence. Pickford is not the reason Liverpool did not win the title, but his cowardly challenge on Van Dijk certainly put the wheels of motion in place for Liverpool’s midseason implosion when the team took just 12 of a possible 42 league points.

2. VAR

I hate VAR like I don’t hate anything else in football. There is no consistency, there is only debate and there is still so much human error because it remains humans who rule on VAR. The on-field referee’s decision should be final. The referee will make mistakes and get some decisions wrong but football is a game played by humans and one that should be officiated on-field by humans. VAR, in the 2020/21 season directly affected 128 goals or incidents. 42 goals were disallowed, 34 goals were awarded, 29 penalties were awarded and 22 penalties were overturned.

3. Jurgen Klopp

This one may surprise people, but Klopp, all charisma as Liverpool were cruising to the title in 2019/20 season, was petulant, crass and uncharismatic for most of the season. He was stubborn throughout the season after he lost Van Dijk and refused to make the necessary adjustments. To borrow from a Liverpool supporter mate of mine, it was frustrating to see a coach who was defined by his tactical excellence and selection descend into a shadow of himself in this context.

Mark Keohane articles on IOL

Hugo Broos is a train wreck waiting to happen. Forget any five-year plans, he is unlikely to be around in 18 months.

Whatever the situation, the clever people at the South African Football Association, should have fought harder to find a resolution to local favourite Benni McCarthy’s demands to be the Bafana Bafana coach.

McCarthy, initially a breath of fresh air at Cape Town City, left suddenly and without much warning. He found a second home at Amazulu and a near perfect fit. The two, as club and individual, are thriving.

The players at Amazulu are loving McCarthy and he is getting results he shouldn’t be getting given the limitations in his squad and the abundance of talent elsewhere in the PSL.

But … and there is always a but in South African soccer, foreign is always deemed to be better.

Another foreigner was introduced to the South African soccer public in Hugo Broos and his first utterance was to tell the South African soccer fraternity to write off any prospect of qualification for the next World Cup.

Great stuff.

Not.

Cool gig if you can get it, when you start talking about five-year World Cup plans and place a greater premium on qualifying for Africa’s Cup of Nations than the World Cup.

There are those defending Broos as being a realist, but if so then what is the point of even playing in the World Cup qualifiers?

Broos has already thrown in the towel on a campaign that was supposed to be South Africa’s redemption from the disaster of the most recent failed Africa Cup of Nations qualification.

Alternatively, Broos is ensuring he isn’t fired because of a failure to make it through the World Cup qualifiers, and privately he believes he can stun all of South Africa and qualify.

He would then be hailed a Messiah.

It is wishful thinking to want to believe him to walk on water and I don’t see the point of paying a foreigner to advance mediocrity.

If the 2022 World Cup is already a write-off, then why not the investment in a local South African coach, who is given the time to build a team with the knowledge there is no expectation to win in the next 12 months?

I don’t want a realist in charge of Bafana Bafana.

I want someone who believes he is a miracle worker.

I want a boss who is a dreamer and who has ambition and aspiration.

Of all the Bafana Bafana national coach introductions over the past two decades, Broos’s left me feeling the most despondent. He was more a doomsday prophet than a pioneer.

Broos spoke of realism and losing.

He even spoke of death, saying that if Bafana Bafana failed to reach the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations in the Ivory Coast ‘you can kill’ him.

Crazy talk in a country like ours because you won’t struggle to find someone who would take him up on that invite.

Broos won’t be around in 18 months to be killed off, and I don’t mean literally taken out. I mean to be axed as coach. He will have left within a year.

He has been appointed because of past glories, having won the 2017 Cup of Nations title in Gabon with Cameroon.

Broos, post 2017, was a disaster with Cameroon. They lost 4-0 to Nigeria and won just one of six World Cup qualifiers and finished last in a Confederation Cup group, taking one point from a possible nine in three matches.

Cameroon couldn’t wait to send him packing and South Africa’s soccer bosses, schooled in sustained mediocrity, couldn’t wait to sign him.

You don’t need hindsight to know how this movie is going to end.

*Mark Keohane Keo’s Corner in Cape Times and on IOL

Adam Walton reflects on the short lived proposition of the European Super League (ESL), and Florentino Perez’s complete oversight of the sentiments and importance of soccer’s global fanbase and community.

Amongst the dredge of articles and tweets churned up by Sunday’s announcement and subsequent collapse of the European Super League, BBC reporter Dan Roan revealed how elite-club bigwigs were justifying their coup. Roan tweeted, ‘According to source, some of those involved in ESL call traditional supporters of clubs “legacy fans” while they are focused instead on the “fans of the future” who want superstar names’. 

These sentiments were echoed by Super League chairman, Florentino Perez, on Spanish television, who claimed, ‘Young people are no longer interested in football. They have other platforms on which to distract themselves.’ Basically, Perez and his cronies don’t care about local fans, because the real money comes from the streams and shirt sales in places like Delhi and Hong Kong. 

After I wiped the tears (of laughter and sadness) from my eyes at the thought of a group of billionaires, who would remember the moon landing, determining the interests of younger generations, I came to a minor realisation. I am a Cape Town-based Arsenal fan in my early-20s whose attention and subscription fees are wanted by these relics. The European Super League was created for me. Wow. 

This supposed fan-dichotomy relates to a question brilliantly tackled by Jonathan Wilson on The Guardian Football Weekly: is a local fan’s connection superior to the fan who lives 60 000kms away? Do these groups want different things?

I have no familial connection to Arsenal. I don’t have an uncle who played for their youth team in the mid-1980s. I wasn’t bought a shirt with “Henry” printed on the back for my fifth birthday. I would have to drive 13 144,6km on the Trans-Sahara Highway to get from my front door to the Emirates Stadium. Yet I have missed only two Arsenal games this season, and I was furious when I did. My family still talks about a tantrum I threw when the Gunners lost 3-2 to Swansea in 2012. And during the depths of lockdown, when I (like most people) was struggling with the seeming hopelessness of everything, just watching my team play was a soothing two-hour escape from bleak circumstance. 

This isn’t a shrine to my footballing loyalty. There are far more moving stories of “foreign” fandom: people waking up at ungodly hours to watch 0-0 draws with Crystal Palace; tattoos of club crests on unmentionable places; life-savings spent on trips to watch favourite teams play. Yes, these fans may not live within walking distance from Old Trafford, but to question their connection to the club is ludicrous. 

So where does this connection come from? Of course, there’s an appreciation for the sport itself. But beyond this, there is the inseparable feeling that a community is sitting and watching your team with you. When Harry Kane scores a last-minute winner, a fan in their living room celebrates knowing thousands of like-minded people, who share a passion for a football club and it values, are celebrating with them. It’s a shared emotional experience. Subconscious maybe, but palpably important. 

A geographically-challenged fan is also not confined to their living room. I have had multiple conversations in bars with complete strangers about whether Diogo Jota should play instead of Roberto Firmino, or about how Brendan Rodgers gets his teeth whitened. Beyond supporting a club, there is the experience of being a footballing fan, of being part of a community. 

This is the answer to Wilson’s question. The experience of a fan in Brasilia might be different from the fan in Manchester. But both value that intangible feeling of connection, in whatever form it comes. It’s what makes someone who has never stepped foot in England cry when a football club in South London win a game. It’s what makes being a fan so fulfilling, and its non-negotiable.

Mark Keohane, writing for IOL Sport, reflects on the success of Jose Mourinho over his managerial career as well as his relative success at Spurs – before being sacked – given the inadequacy of his squad.

To those who say Jose Mourinho is too conservative and his tactics outdated: I say he is a star that will never die out. I believe his axing as Spurs boss is neither a setback nor the end of his managerial career.

Jose hasn’t said much about his Spurs departure but if he had to speak, he would borrow from Mark Twain and declare: ‘Rumours of my death have been grossly exaggerated.’

Mourinho’s managerial career is very alive. He will ultimately end up in charge of Portugal’s national side, when he tires of club football, but for now he will resurface in a top league and at one of the best clubs.

Take that as a given.

He will forever be the Special One because of what he has achieved. That can never be taken away from him.

I loved his retort to Manchester United’s Ole Gunnar Solskjaer when Mourinho’s Spurs lost 3-1 in what would be his last game in charge.

Mourinho told Solskjaer: ‘I have won Premier Leagues, Champions Leagues, La Liga, Serie A … you have won three points.’

Those celebrating Mourinho’s axing at Spurs also delight in the manner of his exit at Manchester United. It was very sudden.

But Mourinho didn’t fail at Manchester United and he certainly did not fail at Spurs.

The latter are in the League Cup final on Sunday and still in a position to get a top four Premier League finish. This from a Spurs team that is more a top 10 than a top four team.

Former Manchester United midfielder turned television analyst Roy Keane a month ago blasted critics of Mourinho for refusing to acknowledge the limited squad at his disposal. Keane also hit back in a live television exchange with former Liverpool and England player turned analyst Jamie Redknapp, who had bemoaned Spurs’s struggle to be in the top four.

‘Before he (Mourinho) came in and took the job, Spurs had gone a year without winning away from home. There is a softness in this Spurs team. They have been soft for 40 years.’

For context to Mourinho’s tenure at Manchester United, he lost 28 matches in 144, with a winning percentage of 58.3%. Only Sir Alex Ferguson’s 59.7 winning percentage is better. In 2017/18, he also led a fragile United squad to second place in the league behind the incomparable Manchester City and won the Europa Cup and League Cup in 2016/17. Some managers have spent a decade at a big club and not had this kind of return. Jose’s time at Manchester United was no failure, even if his final season was a struggle, but no more of a struggle than we have seen, for example, this season with Liverpool’s Jurgen Klopp.

Spurs have been the perennial underachievers of English football and even though they made the Champions League final a couple of years ago, they were comfortably beaten by Liverpool. Mauricio Pochettino spent several years with Spurs and was lauded for four top four league finishes in five seasons and for making the Champions League final. His 159 wins were also the most by a Spurs manager in the post-war era.

But he won no silverware and his teams, despite being in the top four, never threatened to win the league. It didn’t make his term at Spurs a failure. No one mocked him on the way out and rightly so because within a week of arriving at French club Paris St Germain, he’d won his first trophy.

PSG are also in the Champions League semi-final.

Pochettino’s lack of titles and trophies at Spurs didn’t make him a poor manager. His teams were simply not good enough. Ditto the Spurs squad managed by Jose.

I wouldn’t be surprised to see Jose pop up at Bayern Munich and add to his domestic and European trophy collection.

Mourinho, as a reminder to his haters, has won a domestic title in a record four different countries, Portugal, England, Italy and Spain. He is one of only three managers to have won the Champions League twice with two clubs (FC Porto in 2004) and Inter Milan in 2010 and he is also a three-time Premier League champion with Chelsea (2005, 2006 and 2015).

He broke Barcelona’s stranglehold as La Liga champions, when at Real Madrid, and in 2010 did the treble of Serie A, Italian Cup and Champions League with Inter Milan.

Mourinho wins trophies, lots of them, but he also gets results.

He described his second-place league finish with Manchester United as among his greatest achievements, given the strength of the Premier League and the limitations of his playing squad in 2017/18.

When Spurs fired Pochettino and lured Mourinho back to England 17 months ago, the club was 14^th in the Premier League. At the end of the season, under Mourinho, they finished sixth.

This season, when Mourinho got fired, they were seventh and a win away from breaking into the top four, which they did in the first match post his departure. They will also play Manchester City in the final of the League Cup on Sunday.

Many have taken pleasure at Mourinho packing his bags at Spurs after just 86 matches in charge of a team whose last trophy success was the League Cup in 2008.

Mourinho at times made plodders look like professional footballers at Spurs, but not even he could transform chumps into champs.

Spurs, for the record, aren’t that good and Mourinho isn’t that bad.

He remains The Special One and he will add to his 25 trophies before Spurs ever win the Premier League.

Mark Keohane, writing for the Cape Times and IOL Sport, reflects on Pep Guardiola’s impact on Manchester City and English football as a whole.

On the eve of Manchester City’s quarter-final second leg match against Dortmund, Pep Guardiola declared that a failure for the club to win Europe’s most coveted title under his management would define his tenure at the club.

What nonsense.

This was modesty, not refined, but misplaced.

Pep’s already been the greatest influence as a manager in City’s history and no foreign coach has made as big an impact on the English game. More accurately, make that no coach, foreign or British.

Naturally, Guardiola judges his value on trophies. He did as a 14 year old, when he declared he would win 30 of the biggest trophies as a professional manager, and at just 50 years-old, he has done just that.

Winning big trophies has been the story of his managerial career at Barcelona, Bayern Munich and City and, in 13 seasons, he has won in excess of 30 big ones, with a league treble at Barcelona, a league treble at Bayern and a pending league treble at City confirmation that his impact transcends a first season immediacy.

He also won two Champions Leagues titles with Barcelona.

This year, Guardiola’s City team are positioned to win the Champions League, the Premier League and the League Cup, now called the Carabao Cup.

For the record: City will win the league for the third time in four seasons, are in the final of the Carabao Cup and the last four of the Champions league.

To dismiss Guardiola’s value to City based on the possibility of a Champions League play-off knockout defeat would be insane, as would the view of anyone who agreed with Pep on this particular perceived personal failure.

I reckon Pep said that just to get the likes of you and me to pay tribute to the glorious trail he has walked and continues to walk since arriving in Manchester.

Several years ago, Manchester United’s iconic Sir Alex Ferguson said that City could buy the best players in the world and win trophies with these imports but they would still never be a team and that they would never have the Manchester spirit of United.

Not only has Guardiola bought the best players and won trophies, he has turned them into a team in which these international ‘all sorts’ play for the club, the badge, their supporters and are constantly striving to create more history for a club that had won very little pre the Guardiola era.

The ‘very little’ is comparative to the historic achievements of United, Liverpool, Chelsea and Arsenal.

The victories have been consistent for Pep’s City, just like they were for Pep’s Barcelona and for Pep’s Bayern. Guardiola, since taking over as City boss in July, 2016, has a 73.85 winning percentage. He won 72.4% with Barcelona and 75.1% with Bayern.

To give context to these incredible numbers, he has a career percentage win of 73.78% over 13 seasons, with 30-plus major trophies as reward.

But it isn’t just the trophies that have defined Guardiola at Manchester City; it is his playing philosophy and how it has transformed the thinking of managers within the English game.

Former England striker-turned media analyst Gary Lineker told his millions of social media followers that Guardiola’s influence on the English game was greater than Sir Alex Ferguson and Arsene Wengner.

‘I will say it for him. He’s had the most positive influence of anyone, ever on our game,’ tweeted Lineker. ‘Total respect for Sir Alex’s achievements and, of course, he’s the most successful, but that’s an entirely different thing. Guardiola has changed the way we play and think about the game … from our obsession with direct play to total football … and they said it couldn’t be done.’

Guardiola’s City, since 2016, have rewritten nearly every domestic record.

They scored 100 goals and 106 points in the first Pep Premier League winning campaign, and they did it playing as if they were Barcelona.

And this is why Lineker, the scorer of 48 goals for England, bows to Guardiola.

‘Pep’s unique style of play has been replicated up and down the country … it is like every team, even in the lower leagues, is passing it around at times, like peak Barcelona.’

Adam Walton writes about Sergio Aguero leaving Man City, “that goal” against QPR and the role Aguero played in his affection for football. 

I started properly watching football during the 2011/2012 season. I had never been much of a sports fan, the grimaces and sympathetic looks of my school coaches having done little to encourage any prospective passions. As a long-proclaimed Arsenal supporter, this was the first year I dedicated two hours of every weekend to my chosen team. The season encapsulated the recent experience of Gunners fans: a late push for European football; infuriating away defeats; and my hero being sold to a rival at the end of the season. Hardly a recipe for a lifelong love of football.

However, despite my own team’s shambolic performances, the season was a spectacle. There was the Euro 2012-winning Spain team who, in my opinion, surpassed the World Cup winning squad. In a meeting of the world’s best-looking strikers, Didier Drogba’s heroics sank Mario Gomez’s Bayern Munich, which saw Chelsea miraculously snag the Champions League. Mario Balotelli was setting various things on fire. But of course, that season has echoed in football’s consciousness for one reason: that Sergio Aguero goal.

The moment barely needs replaying. I’ll do it anyway. On the final day of the Premier League season, Manchester City and Manchester United are level on points, yet the Citizens have a significantly better goal difference. United are to play Sunderland, City will play QPR. One win stands between the “Noisy Neighbours” and a league title. United cruise to a 0-1 victory. Unbelievably, with five minutes of extra-time remaining at the Etihad, City are 2-1 down. Edin Dzeko snatches a goal from a corner, yet a winner is improbable, verging on impossible. The ball is played into Balotelli in the box who, whilst falling over, lays the ball off to Sergio Aguero. One famous first touch, and he hammers the ball past Paddy Kenny. Mass hysteria. In the stadium, fans are praying, screaming, crying. In Cape Town, my 13 year-old self has long since thrown his lunch to the floor and is jumping on the couch in disbelief. 

Re-watching the last ten minutes of that game, the beauty of football, and indeed sport, becomes abundantly clear. The build-up is shambolic: Joleon Lescott nearly sends Jay Bothroyd through on goal; Samir Nasri lets a ball go out of play not knowing a City player had taken the last touch; and David Silva doesn’t realise he has to take the corner which Dzeko will score from. Yet, without all of these moments, which wouldn’t be out of character in a Sunday league game, one of the most awe-inspiring moments in sporting history would not have happened. 

Then there’s the reaction of the fans. Before the goal, the anxiety screwed onto their faces is still painful to see, and makes the pure ecstasy of their celebrations that much more potent. The emotional outpouring is such that Djibril Cisse, the QPR striker, celebrates with Nasri as if he’s won the league. If there was ever a shrine to the necessity of fans in football, these celebrations can’t be topped.

It is all this, the combination of raw emotion and human error, that saw an involuntary twinge of sadness creep into my Monday evening as I read Aguero is to leave Manchester City at the end of the season. I repeat, I am far from a fan of the Manchester City soft power machine. However, despite the club’s questionable morals, that goal left an undeniable impression on my life. I saw the elation that 22 people running after an inflated piece of plastic could bring to thousands of people. It cemented my love of football. If Arsenal was my gateway into the game, City’s comeback against QPR was my first full-on high. And from that moment, thanks to Serio Aguero, I’ve been a football junkie, left to chase that feeling for the remainder of my life.

With Aguero leaving city, there will be hundreds of pieces analysing his goal-scoring records, his trophies, or even his lack of International success. His achievements are incredible. But football isn’t watched for statistics, it’s for moments of pure emotion. I will never be able to extricate the Aguero goal from my love of football. Yes, it was a goal scored by a man I don’t know for a team I don’t support in a place I’ve never been, but it shows how amazing this game can be. It’s the reason I’m sad to see Sergio Aguero go.

Photo by Michael Regan/Getty Images

Mark Keohane, writing for “Keo’s Corner” on IOL Sport

The corona pandemic has turned the world upside down but it doesn’t seem to have altered the way of life economically and financially when it comes to football and footballers.

Something is very wrong with our world when 6500 migrant workers from India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lank have died in Qatar in the 10 years since the country was confirmed as the 2022 Fifa Soccer World Cup hosts.

I am an avid reader of news, arts, sports and whatever else my time allows for. Among the stories that immediately grabbed my attention this week was The Guardian’s investigation into labour rights and the 2022 Fifa World Cup in Qatar.

The investigation quoted Nick McGeehan, a director at FairSquare Projects, whose company specializes in labour rights in the Gulf.

McGeehan made the claim that the most significant proportion of migrant workers who had died since 2011 were only in the country because of the 2022 World Cup.

In this time, seven new stadiums, an airport, roads, public transport systems, a metro, hotels and a new city have been built. The estimated cost is 138 billion pounds.

FIFA, according to its projections, stands to gain in excess of three billion pounds from the 2022 World Cup, while labourers, who make up 95 percent of the workforce on all the World Cup sites, are paid 8 pounds and 50 cents an hour.

Country authorities and FIFA have vehemently denied the alleged number of deaths, but have not provided detailed statistics to prove otherwise.

FIFA’s leadership has also recently gone on a charm offensive in an attempt to convince the world that this will not be a World Cup tainted by labour abuse.

It certainly needs more than a charm offensive.

The decision to award Qatar the World Cup is one that has been beset by accusations of corruption, bribery and every underhanded deal imaginable. Post the awarding of the event, several of the most prominent FIFA executives have been charged and convicted when it comes to corruption, bribery and every type of unethical corporate and business practice.

Yet, Qatar’s right to continue to host the most premier global sporting event was not called into question.

Cash!

That’s why.

This World Cup will be as tarnished as the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Back then the most infamous imagery was that of the Olympic rings being replaced with a pair of handcuffs to emphasise crimes against child labour and the exploitation of migrant workers.

So many stories were documented about the blood that was spilled in preparing Beijing for the Summer Olympics.

But the controversy, post the 2008 Olympics, sadly died as quick a death as so many of those migrant workers did in the build-up to what was supposed to be an event that symbolized the human spirit.

More than a decade on and it is like reading horror stories from 2008 all over again.

When it is ever going to be enough?

Not in my lifetime … not ever.

At least that is the realist in me speaking.

Which doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be written about, spoken about and shared on a daily basis.

The more who know; the more who object and the more who rally … hell who knows … perhaps some good will come from it and human lives won’t so easily be sacrificed in the name of sport, and in this case, specifically soccer.

The amount paid to professional footballers is insane and out of sync with the rest of the planet’s inhabitants, but even this imbalance doesn’t compare with the number of human lives lost to a sporting event that is yet to be played.

It is sickening.

Adam Walton reevaluates the standing of Arsenal Football club, 28 weeks into the Premier League season.

For Arsenal supporters, the most soul-crushing moment from last season came in the Europa League exit to Olympiakos. The hysteria and relief of Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang’s late faux-winner was replaced by the even later Youssef El-Arabi goal, which sent the Greeks through on away goals. The combination of capitulation from a position of control, and inevitable farcical defending created an emotional cocktail all too familiar to Arsenal supporters. The defeat was also the Gunners’ last game before lockdown, leaving a lingering bitter aftertaste during the following months.

Post-lockdown, the Arsenal outlook brightened. Whilst the league campaign was unsalvageable, a shift to a back three, David Luiz’s adoption of meditation (I assume) and Aubameyang’s personal vendetta against opposition clean-sheets saw Arteta’s team unexpectedly scrape the FA Cup. At last, it appeared, Arsenal were progressing, following the underwhelming late and post-Wenger era. I, on occasion, may have even suggested that Arsenal would finish third behind Liverpool and Manchester City, come the end of the 2020/21 campaign.

At the time of writing, the Gunners sit 11^th in the Premier League table, 15 points worse off than third placed Leicester. My optimism was, shall we say, misplaced. Looking back, however, I should have known.

In my decade and a bit of dedicated Arsenal fandom (I wasn’t checking Expected Goals when I was 11), the club have followed a distinct pattern. With the exception of the 2015/16 season, the Gunners have been consistent slow starters, managing to secure underwhelming defeats to any lower league opposition that are put in front of them. This is then followed by a series of increasingly rash tactical changes, attempting to right the teetering campaign. Theo Walcott was played as a striker one year; Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain was made a wing-back in another. Andre Santos was even allowed a run as a regular starter one season, which really is the stuff of nightmares.

These stopgap solutions tended to work. For a decade, Arsenal would snag Champions League qualification and potentially have a deep run in the cup – the bare minimum. The late rallying would paper over any cracks that clearly remained from the start of the season, and once again supporters (including myself) would believe the club had turned a corner. It is this same trap that I fell into following the FA Cup win last season.

This campaign, however, is different. Arsenal have instead gone from being totally incapable to only mildly underwhelming. There is no late dash for the finish line in sight. This, ironically, is what fills me with hope.

For too long, Arsenal’s campaigns have been reactive, with nothing done about the underlying problems within the team. This season, however, there are no obtuse mid-season tactical shifts or last deadline day signings of injured players. Arteta has stuck to the philosophy which he believes will have the best long-term results for the club. Yes, fans may be terrified every time Bernd Leno plays a pass to Granit Xhaka with sixteen opposition players closing him down, but at least there’s an identity the squad can aspire to.

Perhaps more exciting is the long-overdue squad clear-out that happened over January; gone are the likes of Shkodran Mustafi, Sokratis, Sead Kolasinac and (painfully) Mesut Ozil. Not only is the club’s wage budget less strained (despite the best efforts of Willian), but it shows that faith is being placed in the glorious talent of youngsters like Bukayo Saka, Emil Smith-Rowe and Gabriel Martinelli.

There have also been positive recent performances. The horrors of Olympiakos have been overcome with a recent 3-1 away win, complementing the comeback victory against Benfica and the assured wins against Leicester and Spurs.

Before I am accused of hypocrisy, I am not predicting this squad will be challenging for the top four next season, or that winning the Europa League is at all realistic. This isn’t the trickery of previous years. Instead, I’m suggesting that this season Arsenal have finally hit rock-bottom. It certainly hasn’t been fun to watch, but it now means the club can rehabilitate. Of course, it’ll be long and often painful; there will probably be a few more days when Burnley have 17% possession and one shot on target, yet still score three. But it at least appears that Arsenal are on the right track, and that certainly gives me hope.

Mark Keohane, writing for “Keo’s Corner” on IOL Sport

What a week it will prove for Mamelodi Sundowns when its owner and inspiration Patrice Motsepe today is confirmed as the first South African to lead CAF.

South Africa’s national standing on the African continent has been in decline ever since Bafana Bafana’s 1996’s African Cup of Nations triumph.

It is 25 years since the late Nelson Mandela and Bafana captain Neil Tovey beamed in the trophy presentation to confirm South Africa as the best on the African continent.

Nationally, there has only been heartache since that glory day, but at club level it has been Motsepe’s Sundowns who have always provided the light. Not only have they dominated the domestic scene, but they have earned the right to be called one of Africa’s club giants.

South Africa teams have so often struggled to transfer domestic form into Africa, but Sundowns have transitioned seamlessly.

Last Saturday they inflicted a first home defeat on TP Mezembe in the Champions League in 11 years. Any visit to the Congolese suburb of Kamalondo in Lubumbashi was accepted as torture. Teams didn’t beat Mezembe, until Sundowns arrived and left 2-1 victors.

The Congolese supporters appreciate a quality football team and locals, through applause, acknowledged the significance of Sundowns’s triumph when the team return to their hotel.

Motsepe would have smiled the most, given this remarkable victory would come on the eve of his history-making appointment.

CAF’s leadership historically has been tainted and several of Motsepe’s predecessors have been synonymous with claims, allegations and confirmations of corruption and self-interest.

Motsepe is viewed as the light to lead African football out of the darkness.

The game in Africa needs a statesman, whose pedigree is beyond reproach and whose integrity is not in dispute.

Motsepe is that individual.

He is a billionaire, whose businesses flourish and he is a person with the Midas touch.

Motsepe’s Sundowns in the last decade have been record makers and record breakers. They are South African soccer’s symbol of excellence and consistency.

Motsepe’s entry into rugby, through investment in the Blue Bulls, has also had the desired effect. The Bulls are the current Currie Cup champions and also won the once-off Super Rugby Unlocked.

Motsepe is very much the Pied Piper and the expectation is that he will play an African tune that will have the rest of the world viewing African football governance with delight instead of disgust.

Motsepe takes over from Malagasy Ahmad Ahmad, who was banned from FIFA for two years because of governance issues.

Motsepe has historically been very private and he and his family have been the exception when it comes to seeking out the media spotlight. They have never indulged in or desired the media circus.

Motsepe will find it hard to protect his privacy now that he has accepted the task of restoring dignity to the continent’s football governing body.

The spotlight will be on him, some in the hope that he fails, but most in anticipation of a new dawn in African football.

Motsepe, born and raised in Soweto, will find it more challenging to govern in African football than it is to own a football club in South Africa.

But he wouldn’t have accepted the position if he didn’t believe he could make a difference.

Bafana Bafana will also indirectly be the beneficiaries of Motsepe’s African football elevation.

He will demand a certain standard as president and it may just translate to Bafana finally restoring its former glory on the African continent.

Sundowns are doing it on the club fields of Africa and Motsepe will do it in football’s boardrooms.

If Bafana can also get it right, then South Africa may finally be on the brink of being the powerhouse in all things African football so many assumed they would be a given 25 years ago.

In the second installation of “weekend moments”, Oliver Keohane reflects on three sporting moments from Friday to Sunday that sparked joy and excitement.

KOLBE CONTINUES TO COOK FOR TOULOUSE

Cheslin Kolbe continues to be one of rugby’s biggest superstars, and one of my favourite players to watch. In one particular passage of play this weekend, Kolbe managed to express his incredibly wide array of skills, including his balance, hands, spacial awareness, and step. To describe said passage of play would be to do it an injustice, so see for yourself below.

🤯 @Cheslin_Kolbe11 #SaffasAbroad pic.twitter.com/3rQNV5VzDY

— Jared Wright (@jaredwright17) March 7, 2021

JONA NAREKI’S GIANT PERFORMANCE

80 Kilogram, 175m Highlanders winger Jona Nareki was everything but small in steering his side to a 39-23 win over the Chiefs in Dunedin. His statistics read follows: Three tries (including an 80 meter intercept), an offload-assist for Shannon Frizell’s try (after bouncing Brad Weber), nine clean breaks and 196 running meters!

Also read: Nareki’s super statistics another statement against “size-ist” rugby culture

Watch: Nareki’s performance against the Chiefs

MAN UNITED’S MONSTER EFFORT

Before Sunday evening Manchester United had not trailed for a single minute in any of their last 19 Premier League games. Two minutes into their clash at the Ethiad Stadium and Bruno Fernandes had ended that streak with a penalty. Luke Shaw netted just five minutes into the second half and United, who now sit at second on the table (11 points behind City) ended City’s 21-game unbeaten streak with just 33% possession, a third of City’s total shots (eight to 23) and a third of their corner attempts (two to six). United must be credited with an away win against a side that truly was beginning to look unbeatable. Shoutout to the Red Devils for making the closing months of the Premier League just a little more interesting.

Mark Keohane, writing for IOL Sport.

Keane was the hard man of Manchester United and he is the hard man of football’s television analysts.

The sporting world needs more Roy Keanes.

Sports broadcasters love to appoint former players as analysts, but too often the on-field brilliance translates to in-studio boredom.

My god, most could play the game, but they haven’t got a clue when it comes to an engaging analysis.

Keane is the exception and this week he was my sporting highlight of the English Premier League.

His pre-match discussions were more entertaining than the 90 minutes of football that followed.

Keane doesn’t suffer a fool and, earlier in the week, it is exactly how he viewed former Liverpool midfielder Jamie Redknapp, who was talking up the virtues of Spurs as a top four team pre their match with Burnley.

Keane called Jose Mourinho’s Spurs an average Premiership team when Redknapp was berating their absence among the league’s top four.

Keane said five Burnley players would get into the Spurs line-up and, outside of Kane and Son, no Spurs player would make any decent team.

Redknapp rejected Keane’s comments and said Spurs were not an ordinary team.

And then the fun began.

Redknapp based his view on Spurs having loads of internationals in their line-up, to which Keane responded: ‘Playing for your country doesn’t make you a good player. If you can trap a ball you can play for your country these days.’

Redknapp went on the defensive, but Keane persisted: ‘Jamie, which players from this Spurs team would get in Liverpool, Man City or Chelsea’s team? You wouldn’t touch any of them, apart from Son and Kane.’

Redknapp was flustered, stumbled over his rehearsed lines and didn’t know how to deal with Keane’s brutal assessments.

The match was never going to be as entertaining.

Keane was equally robust in dismissing presenter David Jones’s assertion on Liverpool’s woes being down to centre back injuries and a lack of confidence.

‘Come on,’ he snapped. ‘We are talking about Liverpool Football Club.

‘We’ve spent the last six months speaking about Liverpool’s problems. And their lack of confidence. Sheffield United have lost 20 games this season … 20 games. I think they have scored 15 goals, so if we are going to spend the next 10-15 minutes saying they are going to be under pressure, worrying about Sheffield United, just focus on the game and get on with it. What about Sheffield United?

‘Where do you think Sheffield United are? Imagine losing 20 games, Liverpool should be rubbing their hands.

‘Listen, if Liverpool are worried about Sheffield United … then their players should retire. At the end of the day, you want to play a team who has lost 20 out of 25. Perfect scenario.’

Keane was all theatre.

He was emphatic in his condemnation of a rehearsed script and he gave me as a viewer an insight into the mentality he expected from top flight players.

Isn’t that why the broadcaster employed him?

Shane Warne, when it comes to cricket, is similar in his analysis. He puts you on the field, explains what he would do as a player or a captain in that situation and takes you to a place only the very best sporting minds have been.

Keane, every week, does that in the Premier League.

He has been accused of being controversial but he isn’t. All he does is speak from the heart and the mind that made him one of football’s finest.

What a privilege to listen to Keane talk just like he played.

What a viewer experience.

What a pity Keane is the exception and not the rule.

In a season of big signings but mixed selections, Mason Mount has survived and thrived under both of Chelsea’s managers, and continues to be the constant in a team full of foreign stardom, writes Adam Walton.

In the summer transfer window of 2020, Chelsea outspent every club in the world, by a distance. The array of
predominantly attacking talent, including Kai Havertz, Timo Werner, and Hakim Ziyech, made the already pricey
squad appear more suited to a FIFA career mode than anything grounded in reality. Talk of title contention
began to buzz, as the internet filled with predicted Chelsea line-ups. Few, if any, of the prospective team sheets
included Mason Mount, the 22-year-old Chelsea academy graduate who had broken into the first team in the
prior season. It appeared the boy from Portsmouth was to endure a turgid season, lost in the wake of Roman
Abramovich’s frivolous spending.

This season, it is safe to say, hasn’t gone as predicted for Chelsea. Under Frank Lampard, the team suffered the
same problems they did last season: an inability to defend set-pieces or counter-attacks, and a lack of clear plan
when going forward. Whilst the Blues failings remained consistent, so did the presence of Mount’s name on
Lampard’s team sheets. This isn’t to say Mount was at fault. On the contrary, while the big name signings
floundered, the young Brit continued to put in impressive performances, no matter what strange positions he and
his teammates were put in by the increasingly panicked Lampard.

As a potential title challenge was replaced by mid-table frustration, Lampard was in turn replaced by Thomas
Tuchel. Again questions were raised about Mount’s ever-presence in the team. With Tuchel being German, it
was only logical that he would unlock the potential of fellow countrymen Werner and Havertz (because everyone
with the same nationality automatically agree with each other, obviously). Was Mount, a favourite of Lampard’s
due to their time together at Derby County, about to be scorned? A teacher’s pet soon to be sent to the naughty
step?

Well, no. Mount, but for a snubbing in Tuchel’s first game, has started every game under the German. His
performances certainly validate his selection; Mount is Chelsea’s brightest attacking player, providing the link
between an industrious but unspectacular midfield pairing and whatever forward has been plucked from the
Chelsea stables on any given day. He also scored the winning goal against Liverpool, and spent the game
running counter-attacks from the half space on Chelsea’s right.

Mount is evidently a stubbornly competitive character, raising his game dependent on the level of those fighting
for his position. However, this shouldn’t be surprising. It’s this attitude that saw the Brit escape the infamous
Chelsea loan system merry-go-round. He’s also resisted the curse Chelsea put on promising British midfielders
(see Ross Barkley, Ruben Loftus-cheek and Danny Drinkwater). Perhaps it’s his early-2000s soul-patch facial
hair that’s fooled everyone into thinking he’s thirty two. Or maybe, despite the doubters, he’s actually a good
player. One thing’s for certain, if any of the big names in Chelsea’s squad want to take Mason Mount’s spot,
they’ve got a fight on their hands.

Antonio Conte changed the traditional nature of English football with the formational revelation of the “full back” which has proved to become a recipe for success in modern soccer, writes Lorcan Berg

For the longest time I had seen full backs as the most disposable and undesirable position on a football pitch. It just seemed that if you were in a room with all the positions and were told to shoot one, full back would be the one to bite the bullet.

Until Antonio Conte came to manage in the premier league in 2016/17 for Chelsea and blew my Liverpool-faithful mind.

English football is laden with tradition, and it doesn’t come more traditional than a good four-four-two, but my life was forever changed when Conte incorporated a 3-4-3 system. A blend of defensive discipline and overwhelmingly confusing attacking threat allowed for Chelsea to walk the Premier League. 

The names Marcos Alonso and Victor Moses would probably not be the first to get credited with Chelsea’s success, behind Fabregas, Hazard and Diego Costa, but the two aforementioned figures were pivotal. That season was the first time ever that I recall wing backs being utilized with such productivity, and the plan was executed perfectly. 

With three center backs this meant that the two either side of the central one doubled as “back up full backs”. The reason for this was that Chelsea played their full backs in a very advanced position, as wingers basically. Alonso and Moses would make overlapping runs after overlapping runs, with defense being a distant priority because they knew they had cover at the back with the wide center backs and holding midfielders like Matic and Kante filling in the space when needed. 

The use of attacking full backs also opened up further possibilities going forward. With the full backs essentially playing as defensive minded wingers what happens to the wingers? Hazard would cut inside more frequently because he knows he has Alonso behind him and either Pedro or Willian would form a double act with Moses. 

Scary. 

It gets even scarier when you have the brute that is Diego Costa putting his body on the line for every ball swung his way.

Since Chelsea’s successful 3-4-3 campaign of 16/17, I’ve paid a lot more attention to wing backs and the progression of their role in the modern game. We now frequently see a lot of the attacking responsibilities placed up on the full backs which requires them to have insane stamina, technical and mental sharpness as well as pinpoint distribution. 

Some teams notoriously employing full back reliant attacks are Liverpool, Bayern Munich and Man City, although Pep has his own thing going on with inverted full backs and position-less full backs like Cancelo. Whilst I watch football subjectively and base my opinions around the club I support like everybody else I really appreciate the sport for what it is. I am incredibly lucky that I get to witness the intricate details and mind games of modern football and to see them from a mostly neutral viewpoint.

On a more biased note I hope that whatever curse was put on Liverpool to viciously derail the entire infrastructure is soon lifted so that we can go back to playing liquid possession-dominating, counter attacking, full back dependant football because lord knows we are making the Roy Hodgson era look like prime Barcelona. Most importantly, I hope my kid grows up to be a wing-back.

As a lover of sport as a whole, and primarily rugby and soccer, the lack of action across the board during 2020 put into perspective the privilege we as writers and supporters have always been offered in terms of accessibility to a variety of sporting codes. Two months into the year we have soccer happening nearly every single day, and rugby – with crowds – back in full swing, among tennis tournaments, cricket and everything else. I’ve decided to pick my sporting moments from the past  weekend.

BALE’S BRACE

It may have taken 26 rounds of the Premier League to finally see the emergence of an emphatic Gareth Bale performance, but against Burnley on the weekend we finally got it. After scoring in the Europa League midweek, Bale took all of two minutes to calmly control a cross from Son Heung-Min and neatly touch it in with his left foot to begin Spurs’ ultimate 4-0 romp. Just over ten minutes later Bale was back with a 60 yard cross to assist Harry Kane for his goal, and on the 55th minute Bale, in the style that has characterised his career, slung in a stylish left-footed winder to make his stats two goals from three shots, one assist, two completed dribbles and five from eight duels won in his 70 minutes on the field.

Watch: Spurs v Burnley Highlights

IOANE’S INSTINCT

On the 76th minute of the Blues’ Super Rugby Aotearoa opener against the Hurricanes, Rieko Ioane clutched a fumbled ball from the grips of the Canes’ right winger, inside the Blues’ ten meter line, brushed away all 95 kilograms and 1.96m of Jordie Barrett and sped the length of the field to dot down and close off an emphatic second half showing from the Blues which saw them thump the Hurricanes 31-16. I enjoyed Ioane’s try so much because it was reminiscent of the Rieko who burst onto the Sevens scene at 17 and proved so dangerous in his explosive power and out and out speed. His transition from 11 to 13 has seen fewer of the traits that characterised his early career being expressed, so to see a try scored in that fashion was a pleasure to watch.

Watch: Blues v Hurricanes Highlights

NOISY NEW ZEALAND

Fans were screaming as the Crusaders beat the Highlanders and the Blues thumped the Hurricanes. Real fans! Not the simulated noise that the Premier League has had to resort to to combat the echo of 90000 capacity stadiums filled with just teams, management, medics and camera men. In a pandemic characterised by contradiction, perhaps one of the biggest ones has been the opening of many public places and events across the world, but very little intention to move towards regulated crowd attendance for sporting events during Covid. Understandably New Zealand are the outliers in that they don’t actually face the issue of Covid, but where regulated concessions are being made in every other sphere of life across countries, why not sport? Without fans, professional sport is left void of one of its integral pieces.

West Ham versus Tottenham was a clash of old school ways, a battle of managerial dinosaurs, writes Adam Walton.

In 2013, a meeting between David Moyes and Jose Mourinho implied a meeting between Manchester United and Chelsea. Both managers were in charge of two of the most successful football clubs in the recent history, and were counted amongst the elite coaches of the game.

Fortunes, it is fair to say, have not been kind in the years that followed. Mourinho has had two well-documented meltdowns at both aforementioned clubs. Moyes has been relegated with Sunderland and fired from Real Sociedad. Their decline has stemmed from their dogmatic use of a frustrating and old-fashioned defensive style, which in the world of false nines and gegenpressing, is not only boring but also ineffective. The general consensus amongst pundits and fans is that both are now past it. They’ve become slightly sad comedic figures in football, appearing as doddery old guys who wouldn’t know how to close a tab on a web browser. 

Sunday’s meeting between the Scot’s West Ham side and the Portuguese’s Tottenham team, was therefore a clash of old school ideas, a battle of the Premier League’s dinosaurs. The game offered little fresh insight into either team. West Ham scored an early goal in each half, proceeding then to nullify and frustrate Spurs in classic Moyesian style. To their credit, the North London club did threaten through the semi-retired Gareth Bale in the second half, but otherwise suffered from their rudderless attacking that has plagued the side this season. In a game of who could stifle best, Moyes emerged victorious. One could practically hear the tabloid articles about Harry Kane’s future being written already.

The result left Spurs in ninth, nine points behind their opposition on the day, who sit in the final Champions League place. Moyes, it appears, still has life left in football, whilst Mourinho is gradually transforming into the old man from Up. Why then, is one old-timer faltering while the other is rejuvenated?

Granted, West Ham do have a kinder fixture list, with no European or cup exploits to clog up their schedule. Tottenham also have glaring tactical deficiencies, particularly on their below par right flank. However, the answer is far more simple; West Ham needed a dinosaur. They needed Moyes.

Over recent years, West Ham have attempted to modernise and establish themselves as European contenders. They’ve bought expensive stars like Felipe Anderson and Andriy Yarmolenko, and appointed a Premier League winning coach in Manuel Pellegrini. Instead of the promised glory, however, the club have struggled, with signings underperforming and relegation battles taking the place of European contention. Fans, who mostly live in the working class East End, have felt the club losing its connection to their hardworking heritage, of losing its identity.

It’s this identity that has returned with the appointment of Moyes. He’s returned to the formula that served him so effectively at Everton for 11 years. Many players appear to be modern equivalents of the Moyes’ classic Everton sides. In Tomas Soucek, Moyes has his Mourane Fellani, a player that ghosts into the box and causes havoc at set pieces. Jesse Lingard is his Tim Cahill, a midfielder with an eye for goal that regularly runs beyond the central striker. There’s also a Leighton Baines re-incarnation in Aaron Cresswell, and the tireless grafter of Vladimir Coufal emulating Seamus Coleman at right-back. But beyond tactics, it’s the attitude that the manager has instilled in his players that has resonated with West Ham. They’re hardworking, aggressive, and not afraid to be left with an open head wound after challenging for a cross. In short, the club were crying out for some old fashioned grit and determination, and there’s no better manager for that than David Moyes. 

Whilst Moyes’ appointment at West Ham fits, the same cannot be said for Tottenham and Mourinho. Spurs, under Pochettino, were on an upward trajectory, playing amazing pressing football with a squad filled with world class talent. Their approach under the Portuguese is now infuriating and stale. The club has taken a backwards step, choosing a manager based on his reputation as opposed to his suitability. One can imagine the anger of the players, once reaching Champions League finals, being told to sit in two rows of four and play narrow. 

The difference between Mourinho and Moyes is therefore not in style, but in surroundings. To best express this, the dinosaur metaphor can be used one last time. Moyes, at West Ham, is a prehistoric shark, able to survive and thrive in the oceans which suit him best. Mourinho is a T-Rex, once the apex predator who now refuses to acknowledge his tiny arms are insufficient to deal with the approaching meteor. And like the T-Rex, his extinction is starting to look quite inevitable.

Ryan Vrede writes that Liverpool will be a domestic and European force again, but right now nobody fears them.