Welcome to a special festive edition of The Briefing, your one-stop shop for the big talking points from the Premier League.
There were eight games played on Boxing Day, with ramifications at both ends of the table. It was a superb day for Liverpool, who moved seven points clear at the top thanks to their 3-1 win over Leicester and Chelsea’s shock home defeat to Fulham.
There was another damaging result for Manchester City at home to Everton, more woe for Manchester United and (once again) a special day for Nottingham Forest.
Here, we dissect the choice moments.
Liverpool are in control – who can stop them?
There are weekends in the title race when probability becomes something more concrete.
Boxing Day may come to be recognised as the day when Arne Slot’s Liverpool were no longer merely early frontrunners and became the team whose trophy it is to lose.
Having come from behind to beat Leicester 3-1, they are now seven points clear at the top of the table with a game in hand over Chelsea. Arsenal, the only other major club within chasing distance, are two points further back and face a must-win game against Ipswich on Friday.
Liverpool have been ahead in the title race at this point in previous years but the big difference is that they do not have Manchester City breathing down their necks. Pep Guardiola’s team gave them no margin for error in 2018-19 and 2021-22 when even 97 and 92 points were not enough to be champions.
They are no longer competing and so the floor has been opened up for another team to set the pace for the first time since 2019-20, when Liverpool won their first title in 30 years by 18 points.
Mohamed Salah scores Liverpool’s third goal against Leicester (Jan Kruger/Getty Images)
They opened up such a wide gap early on that they did not have to experience the usual relentless pressure of a title race that sees momentum shift throughout. A similar pattern is emerging this season with just nine points dropped in a season where every major club is regularly shedding points to non-‘Big Six’ clubs.
Liverpool are on course for a 94-point season and are the only team performing at the level City have set as the benchmark.
Arsenal are 11 points behind the pace they set two seasons ago and six points behind last season’s. They are still in the mix and they have the experience of the last two seasons to call upon in the new year but Liverpool have a margin for error that Arsenal did not enjoy in the last two seasons.
And Chelsea? Enzo Maresca had been at pains to state that his young team are not ready to be considered title contenders but that is what all managers say until they are in so deep that they can no longer deny reality. The inability to see out the Fulham game was perhaps an indication that he was right.
In contrast, Liverpool did not panic when they went behind. They look like a team who believe they have the firepower to bail themselves out of any situation. It is a confidence that is setting them apart from the rest.
Why do Manchester United keep conceding ‘olimpicos’?
The lexicon of Manchester United fans across the world gained an unwanted addition this week: ‘olimpico’ — a goal scored directly from a corner.
First coined in 1924 when Cesareo Onzari scored for Argentina against Uruguay, the reigning Olympic champions, it is an exclusive club that David Beckham, Christian Pulisic, Thierry Henry and Megan Rapinoe (twice) and are all members of.
For the best part of a century it has remained a rarity but United are good at finding new ways to suffer and so they conceded the exact same goal twice in the same week, with two different goalkeepers. Altay Bayindir was first to be caught out in the 4-3 Carabao Cup defeat to Tottenham: Son Heung-min’s cross looping into the net after he struck the ball facing 90 degrees away from the target, almost like a golfer playing a sand wedge, to create spin on the ball.
Matheus Cunha’s technique was virtually identical on Thursday, helping to condemn United to a fourth Premier League loss in five games.
The cross was planted on top of Andre Onana, who was sandwiched between Matt Doherty and Santiago Bueno. The Cameroonian did not do enough to untangle himself and, as he jumped to punch the ball, he lost its flight which saw the ball sail into the net. Very few players, bar Onana, protested.
UK readers watch here:
A man down, and now a goal down!
Matheus Cunha’s corner swings STRAIGHT IN and Wolves lead Man Utd 😱#PLonPrime #WOLMUN pic.twitter.com/H0T3LvhzxG
— Amazon Prime Video Sport (@primevideosport) December 26, 2024
U.S. readers watch here:
A MATHEUS CUNHA OLIMPICO GIVES WOLVES THE LEAD OVER MAN UNITED. 😲
📺 USA Network | #WOLMUN pic.twitter.com/qAH9yMv7PT
— NBC Sports Soccer (@NBCSportsSoccer) December 26, 2024
Ruben Amorim has major problems to contend with and Onana’s suitability in goal is one of them. He has a tendency to deliver drama when none is needed (in the first half Harry Maguire was frustrated that he theatrically tipped over a bouncing header he could have caught) and he failed to command his penalty area, with Cunha’s olimpico being the end result.
More teams are likely to copy the blueprint in 2025.
How a pulled face exposed Haaland’s fragility
There was a time when Jordan Pickford pulling faces at a penalty would have provoked nothing more than a wry smile from Erling Haaland before he blasted the ball home.
But the Manchester City striker finds himself in a strangely human place.
With the score balanced at 1-1, Haaland confronted Pickford, who responded by widening his eyes and sticking out his tongue as if performing a Haka, the pre-match Maori war dance performed by New Zealand’s rugby union team. Haaland, inhaling deeply before puffing out his cheeks, played it cool but it did not work.
Jordan Pickford attempts to distract Erling Haaland before his penalty (Amazon Prime)
His tame penalty was easily parried by Pickford and while he did convert when the ball got played backed to him, it was ruled out for offside. It was his seventh penalty miss from 54 career attempts and his second in the last two months, but more significantly it meant that City’s slump now extends to one win in 13 games.
Since the start of November, they have earned the joint-fewest points (5) of any team in the Premier League, alongside bottom club Southampton. Haaland, meanwhile, has only scored three goals in his last 12 starts.
The Norwegian had just 22 touches and two shots against Everton. It is not uncommon, or necessarily a bad thing, for Haaland to be on the periphery of the game. His superpower is his finishing but his big chance conversion has dropped from 46.9 per cent and 41.1 per cent in his first two seasons, to 34 per cent this season.
Jordan Pickford saves Erling Haaland’s penalty (Darren Staples/AFP via Getty Images)
The sense of inevitability is gone and so has the fear in their opponents, as Everton’s late counter attacks (when they really should have scored a winner) underlined.
City’s dominance left some people cold but their decline has given their characters a new sense of humanity. Haaland was tantamount to a goalscoring robot for two years but since the Norwegian told Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta to “stay humble” after City snatched a last-gasp draw from them in September, it is as if that show of emotion has made him ‘normal’.
City need Haaland to return to his old levels fast, or they could slip further to mid-table mediocrity.
Goodbye Amazon – you’ll be missed
So farewell to Amazon Prime in the Premier League, we hardly knew ye.
Friday marks the final two games the part-time broadcaster will show before its Premier League deal expires at the end of the season. Sky Sports and TNT Sports will be the only two UK live broadcasters next season under a £6.7billion deal from 2025 to 2029.
That deal was too rich for Amazon’s blood, who have decided to focus on delivering the odd Champions League game instead.
Will Amazon be missed? Did it bring anything particularly good/different to our television party? Well, yes, the coverage was generally of a high standard, especially considering it was just dropping in twice a season, roping in freelance presenters, pundits and commentators.
Showing all 10 games in a matchday was pretty novel and worked especially well on Boxing Day, when eight matches were played. When Amazon first started showing Premier League games in 2019 there was a pretty annoying delay on its stream, meaning you couldn’t look at Twitter/X without avoiding spoilers, but hey, cutting down on social media use was probably no bad thing.
Other than that, there weren’t many gripes to be had; Amazon kept to a pretty similar model to Sky Sports and clearly took note of the preferences of viewers when it came to selecting who they had on screen, like Jeff Stelling and Chris Kamara, who were reunited on Boxing Day, while it was a pleasure to watch reliable old hand Jim Rosenthal in action at the City Ground alongside knowledgeable pundits Martin O’Neill and Les Ferdinand.
Chris Kamara back and reporting live from the City Ground! 🙌#PLonPrime #NFOTOT pic.twitter.com/WNCKKAdVTc
— Amazon Prime Video Sport (@primevideosport) December 26, 2024
If only TNT Sports would take note of such frivolous things as what the viewer wants.
Amazon’s penultimate day was actually quite hard to watch, not through any watery-eyed sadness for its impending departure, but because of the soupy fog which descended on the country. In Nottingham the mist was literally rolling in from the Trent (someone should write a song about that).
As Lucy Ward said during the Wolves vs Manchester United game, trying to get the ball off Cunha was like trying to tackle fog.
Anyway, Amazon’s exit won’t make much difference to the Premier League broadcasting landscape because it only had 20 games a season. But it did show up one of its competitors as to how football should be presented to us.
Forest fire is good for football
It was hard not to be swept up in the giddy euphoria that reverberated around the City Ground after Tottenham Hotspur became the latest victims of Nottingham Forest’s Nuno-lution.
Players were hoisted aloft, there were fist-bumping choruses of the crowd and dancing to Freed from Desire.
Forest are third in the Premier League and this is no statistical anomaly; Nuno’s team have earned their lofty position through a cocktail of relentless organisation, fully-committed buy-in from the players and vibrancy in attack.
Against Spurs, it was less about the creativity of Morgan Gibbs-White (although he did set up the winner with a perfect through ball) or the goals of Chris Wood, and more about their steely determination.
Their defensive rigidity has earned them seven clean sheets already and if that continues, they can be in the top four to stay, especially with Spurs and the two Manchester clubs floundering.
Nottingham Forest fans are loving their side’s surge up the table (Clive Mason/Getty Images)
Can Forest actually see this through? There aren’t many reasons to suggest why not.
Until recently with Newcastle and Aston Villa, the Champions League places have been a closed shop, but the unusual league table this year hints at a new world order, temporary or otherwise.
For fans all over the country, competing with the biggest and richest clubs in England now feels possible again. That’s a very good thing.
What’s coming next?
Friday
- Brighton & Hove Albion v Brentford (7:30pm; 2:30pm ET)
- Arsenal v Ipswich Town (8:15pm; 3:15pm ET)
Sunday
- Leicester City v Manchester City (2:30pm; 9:30am ET)
- Crystal Palace v Southampton (3pm; 10am ET)
- Everton v Nottingham Forest (3pm; 10am ET)
- Fulham v Bournemouth (3pm; 10am ET)
- Tottenham v Wolves (3pm; 10am ET)
- West Ham v Liverpool (5:15pm; 12:15pm ET)
Monday
- Aston Villa v Brighton & Hove Albion (7:45pm; 2:45pm ET)
- Ipswich Town v Chelsea (7:45pm; 2:45pm ET)
- Manchester United v Newcastle United (8pm; 3pm ET)
