News Thread

The old expression “the league table never lies” is often best ignored at the start of the season, when most clubs are trying to come to terms with a high turnover of players from the summer transfer window or adapt to a new manager and his changing tactics. In truth, it isn’t until the end of the calendar year that we really see which clubs are on the rise and which ones are in desperate trouble of sliding down the league table.

On Tuesday morning, former Lille, Chelsea and Real Madrid star Eden Hazard confirmed that he would be hanging up his boots and retiring from football after more than 600 games and 15 seasons across three of Europe’s top leagues. The 32-year-old Belgian winger had been without a club since June, after leaving Madrid by mutual agreement, and following a lack of options and continued injury concerns Hazard took to social media to confirm that he was calling it a day.

Jose Mourinho is one of the most successful football managers in the history of the sport, but over the course of the last 10 years the Portuguese tactician has built something of a reputation that suggests he can never go the distance at a football club. And, much like we’re now seeing at Roma, the 60-year-old coach is capable of great success but also seems to run out of steam in his third season with a team.

There’s little doubt that 2023 has been a truly chaotic year for Chelsea, as the club has had to deal with a huge amount of turmoil on and off the pitch. While the London club still possesses the spending power to match just about any opponent across European football, that hasn’t yet translated into performances and good results. Despite possessing the fifth most valuable squad in the world, Mauricio Pochettino’s side are struggling to stay in the top half of the Premier League this season. 

Despite playing a pivotal role in Napoli winning their first Serie A title 33 years, it seems more and more likely that the Italian giants will look to sell star striker Victor Osimhen in the January transfer window. Although the Nigerian striker has enjoyed a good start to the new season, with six goals and one assist in his first 10 games, the player’s relationship with the club’s hierarchy has seemingly deteriorated to the point that both parties now seem intent on going their separate ways as quickly as possible. 

Chelsea slumped to eleventh place in the Premier League table on Saturday afternoon, after huffing and puffing against a strong Brentford side and somehow coming away without a single point. The Stamford Bridge side certainly dominated possession and many of the chances in the first half, but goals from Ethan Pinnock and Bryan Mbeumo in the second half earned all three points for Thomas Frank and his side. 

Chelsea’s inability to score goals was on show for all to see on Saturday, as the Stamford Bridge side failed to break down a Brentford side that ultimately snatched a 2-0 win despite their hosts having the lion’s share of chances. The defeat now leaves Chelsea in eleventh place in the Premier League table with just three wins from 10 games and manager Mauricio Pochettino with one of the worst starts as a manager of the club in the modern era. 

The pressure to be Chelsea’s main striker has gobbled up some of the finest forwards over the past couple of decades. It’s long been associated with some kind of curse that very few are able to break, with the likes of Fernando Torres, Álvaro Morata, Alexandre Pato, Radamel Falcao, Gonzalo Higuaín, Timo Werner and Romelu Lukaku all unable to display the magic they’d shown elsewhere in a Chelsea shirt. Between those seven alone, they scored just 61 goals in 272 Premier League appearances. That’s an average of just 0.22 goals a game.

Cole Palmer has received his first England call up, as Gareth Southgate turned to the 21-year-old for his latest Three Lions squad, for the qualifiers against Malta and North Macedonia this November. This means the €32 million valued Chelsea winger leaves the group of the most valuable footballers to have not been called up for their nations.

Thirteen British clubs feature in the top 50 highest attendances in the world during the 2023/24 season, with Manchester United remaining the best supported club in the United Kingdom. West Ham United and Tottenham Hotspur join the Manchester club in the top ten with two German clubs leading the way this season. Bayern Munich’s Allianz Arena and Borussia Dortmund’s Signal Iduna Park have both been at full capacity, with Dortmund claiming top spot with 81,365 fans.