🧊 Why Chelsea Will Beat Arsenal & Pep's Last Season at City? 😲

It was a good weekend for Liverpool as they hit the top spot in the Premier League after Man City lost 2-1 to Bournemouth. Talking of Man City, they also lost to Spurs the week before and then got hammered 4-1 by Sporting Lisbon in the Champions League on Tuesday night. This is the first time City have lost 3 consecutive games since April 2018. Talk of this being Pep’s last season in charge of the Manchester club is getting louder.

In other Premier League news, the manager who handed City that 4-1 defeat - Rúben Amorim - is on his way to Manchester. The Portuguese has signed a deal with United that will run until June 2027, with an option for United to extend the deal by an additional year.

As Man City went down in Lisbon, Liverpool put in an impressive performance by pumping Bayer Leverkusen 4-nil at Anfield. A hat-trick for Luis Diaz and Liverpool hitting form as we head into the intense winter schedule —the Premier League prediction markets are shifting as the race for the Premier League becomes increasingly unpredictable.

This week we look ahead to the big game on Sunday in the Premier League. Chelsea are looking decent at home, whilst Arsenal have been struggling to create. Will the return of Martin Odegaard change things? Also, don’t miss this week’s shocker featuring some comical OGs from a random game in Sweden.

Today's game plan:

• Don’t Miss This Game 🎯

• This Week’s Shocker 🤬

• Around The World 🌍

• Games to Keep an Eye On 👀

• Goat Trivia 🐐

Chelsea vs Arsenal | Sunday | 16:30 GMT

The late kick off on Sunday gives us a London derby to end out this weekend’s football as Chelsea welcome Arsenal at Stamford Bridge. Enzo Maresca’s Chelsea have surprised everyone this season by playing some pragmatic football and actually outscoring opposition teams. Despite plenty of backing by the talking heads/analysts on the TV, Arsenal’s season has faltered early mainly due to injuries to key creative players and poor discipline which has led to a number of red cards and suspensions.

All of this means there’s been a reversal in expectations for this game. Although Arsenal are unbeaten in their last 5 games against Chelsea, winning 4 of them and averaging 3 goals per game, many punters are predicting Maresca and Chelsea will do a job on Arsenal at Stamford Bridge.

Form & Team News

Chelsea’s form has been mixed this season but somehow they sit in 4th place in the Premier League table. Looking over their results a pattern emerges: they can do the job against the smaller and mid-table teams but haven’t beaten any of the ‘big clubs‘. For example, there’s been losses against Liverpool, Man City, and Newcastle so far this season.

The most recent Premier league outing was a 1-1 draw with Man United —a match that was a pretty scrappy affair with few examples of quality attacking play. However, the plus for Chelsea is that their home form has been solid under new manager Enzo Maresca. His tactics have allowed this Chelsea team to strike a balance between defensive resilience and creative attacking, mainly through the genius of Cole Palmer.

Before the game on Sunday, Chelsea welcome FC Noah to Stamford Bridge for a Europa Conference league on Thursday night. Chelsea are cruising in the Conference League having already dispatched Gent and Panathinaikos and are odds-on favourites to win the competition.

In terms of injuries, Chelsea are likely to have a near-fully fit squad to choose from for the visit of Arsenal. Maresca will likely rest key players for the game against Armenian minnows Noah, meaning Cole Palmer has a chance to fully recover after he took a set of studs to the knee from Lisandro Martinez at Old Trafford. The positive injury news for Chelsea is that Wesley Fofana, Romeo Lavia, and Reece James all played 90 minutes in consecutive Premier League games for the first time since April 2023. Chelsea are looking strong heading into the busy Christmas period.

GR Chelsea predicted lineup | Sanchez, Gusto, Fofana, Colwill, James, Lavia, Caicedo, Madueke, Palmer, Neto, Jackson

After two seasons in which they were near-perfect and composed from the start until the end, Arsenal have shown some vulnerabilities this season. The reaction to losing Martin Odegaard has been to focus on defensive rigidity, so much so that opposition fans have brought out the ‘Boring, Boring Arsenal‘ chant.

Regardless of Mikel Arteta’s mindset training, it seems nerves are creeping into this Arsenal side. In fact, Arsenal have lost 2 and drawn 1 of their last 5 Premier League games. There was a shock 2-nil loss away to Bournemouth and then a 1-nil defeat away at Newcastle. The draw came at home to Liverpool, a game in which Arsenal had the better of the play but conceded goals to individual brilliance.

What we are seeing in Arsenal this season is a lack of creativity away from home. The trip to Milan to play Inter in the Champions League tonight will be very telling about Arsenal’s level of belief.

The good news is that Martin Odegaard is back in the squad after 2 months out on the sideline. Odegaard is only recently back to training, so there are doubts over whether or not Arteta will risk the Norwegian ion the game against Inter. Arsenal are unbeaten in the league phase of the Champions League and are in a strong position anyway.

Odegaard’s return will give the Gunners a much-needed boost, but defender Riccardo Calafiori and Takehiro Tomiyasu are both doubts for Sunday’s game. Additionally, on-loan Raheem Sterling is ineligible to play against his parent club.

GR Arsenal predicted lineup | Raya, White, Saliba, Gabriel, Timber, Rice, Partey, Odegaard, Havertz, Saka, Martinelli

This Week’s Shocker…

There was a strange game in Sweden over the weekend. Down in the third tier of Swedish football, Eskilstuna beat Stocksund 5-4, but 3 of the game’s goals were own goals including this absolute calamity.

The Swedish FA has launched an investigation into match-fixing.

Around the world…

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 1 down at half-time, Spurs come back to beat Aston Villa 4-1

Aston Villa took the lead through Morgan Rogers and finished the first half 1-nil up, but it fell apart early on in the second half. Brennan Johnson got the equaliser before a quick-fire brace from Dominic Solanke. Then, in the sixth minute of added time, James Madison added the cherry on top with a nice freekick.

🇸🇦 Steven Gerard job as manager of Al-Ettifaq in doubt

Gerard has only been in charge of Al-Ettifaq for 16 months but the club are in the bottom half of the RSL and were recently knocked out of the King’s Cup at the Round of 16. In Saudi, the King’s Cup is the equivalent of England’s FA Cup and Gerard’s team were knocked out by Al-Jabalain, a team that plays in the second tier of Saudi football. But if he is sacked, Stevie will be expecting a hefty pay-off from his employers.

🇧🇷 The Derby Paulista disrupted by pig’s head on pitch

The Sao Paulo derby, known as the Derby paulista, between Corinthians and Palmeiras was disrupted on Monday night when a pig’s head was thrown onto the pitch. The grisly missile came from the Corinthians fans who call their rival Palmeiras fans pigs. Corinthians won the Brazilian Seria A game 2-nil thanks to goals from Rodrigo Garro and Yuri Alberto.

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 Deli Alli close to returning to top-flight football 

Remember Deli Alli? When Jose Mourinho took over at Man United, the one player Sir Alex Ferguson told Jose to sign was Deli Alli. The attacking midfielder, who used to play for Tottenham and England, who is now 28 has been training with Everton’s under-21 squad since his pro contract with Everton came to an end at the end of the 2023/24 season. There’s now talk that Alli is close to returning to top-flight football after recovering from injuries and other off-the-field issues.

🇸🇦 / 🇧🇷 Al-Hilal’s Neymar substituted after just 30 minutes

Now 32 years old, Neymar is struggling for fitness and is a shadow of the player he was for Santos, Barcelona and PSG. After signing for Al-Hilal in the summer of 2023, he tore his ACL in October 2023 and was out for 10 months. Now back ‘fit‘ and making just his 6th appearance for Al-Hilal, Neymar has picked up another injury. In Al-Hilal’s AFC Champions League game against Esteghlal, the Brazilian came off the bench in the 58th minute but was subbed off in the 87th minute after straining his hamstring.

Games to keep an eye on…

Inter Milan vs Arsenal | Wednesday | 20:00 GMT

The news ahead of this one is that Inter are set to rest a number of their key players, as they have a top-of-the-table clash against Napoli on Sunday. Inter boss Simone Inzaghi’s has spoken of his intention to rest some players in order to keep players for crucial fixtures in the packed fixture list requires him to preserve the condition of somecompeting with Napoli for the top spot. Despite the news that inter will be resting big players, they have looked solid in the Champions League this season: In their previous games, they’ve won the games they were expected to win against Young Boys and Crvena Zvezda and got a disciplined 0-0 draw against Man City.

PSG vs Atletico Madrid | Wednesday | 20:00 GMT

This is the stand out game on Wednesday evening. After making a rapid start, Marseille have trailed off in Ligue 1 and PSG are back at the top of the French league. Both of these teams have made shaky starts to their Champions League campaigns —PSG have picked up 4 points whilst Atletico have only picked up 3. Both managers will be motivating their teams to go for all 3 points in this game.

Juventus vs Torino | Saturday | 19:45 GMT

The Turin derby is known as the Derby della Mole, named after the Mole Antonelliana, a famous city landmark. Juve have been all over the shop this season and are currently in 6th place in Serie A. Their much smaller neighbours Torino are down in 10th having lost 4 out of their last 5 games in the league.

Liverpool vs Aston Villa | Saturday | 20:00 GMT

Thanks to Arne Slot’s strong start, the post-Klopp blues going around Anfield didn’t last long. Liverpool fans have found their voice again and the fanbase is starting to believe they can challenge for the Premier League title this season. Aston Villa have slipped down the table but are still in 6th and challenging for a place in the top 4. Some big wins in the Champions League, including that 1-nil victory over the mighty Bayern Munich, have villa fans raving about Unai Emery’s genius.

Real Sociedad vs Barcelona | Sunday | 20:00 GMT

Hansi Flick is getting some real nice football out of his Barcelona team. They’re scoring goals for fun and running away with La Liga already. Barca are already a full 9 points ahead of 2nd-placed Real Madrid, although Carlo Ancelotti’s team have a game in hand. If you want to see all sorts of goals, tune in for this game on Sunday night as it looks like Barca will blow Sociedad away.

GOAT Trivia…

Say congrats to…

The Germany legend Andre Schurrle [@Andre_Schuerrle] turns 34 today.

On this day in football…

Although the club badge has 1888 on it, Celtic were officially founded on November 6th, 1877.

The club was stablished by Brother Walfrid, primarily to help alleviate poverty among Glasgow’s Irish immigrant population in Glasgow. Money raised through the team’s efforts went towards charitable causes in the city. Celtic played their first official match on May 28th 1888, securing a historic 5-2 win over Rangers, the team that would become their eternal rivals.

Goal of the week…

Mo Salah took Liverpool to the top of the table by scoring his 164th Premier League goal in the 2-1 win over Brighton. The defender knows Salah is going to cut inside onto his left but he can’t do anything about it.

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