Tag Futebol

Liverpool failed to seal their spot in the knockout stages of the Champions League as they were held to a 1-1 draw in their penultimate group match against Napoli at Anfield on Wednesday night, but that may not be their biggest issue.

The Reds are at the top of Group E but lie three points above third-placed Red Bull Salzburg, who they face in Austria in their final fixture next month knowing that a point will be enough to see them progress.

One player it remains to be seen whether they will be with or without for their crucial clash is midfielder Fabinho,  who went down injured and was replaced in the 19th minute of the match by Georginio Wijnaldum.

The look of anguish in his face on the ground, as seen below, was hardly great, as well as the fact that he wasn’t able to carry on.

The Daily Mail has since reported that he was spotted with Deco post-match with a protective boot on, suggesting the injury is more than just a knock.

Given how much of a key player he has been for Liverpool this season – 2.5 tackles, 1.3 interceptions and 1.1 key passes per game in the Premier League according to WhoScored is testament to that.

The Merseyside outfit don’t really have another specialist defensive midfielder like the Brazilian, so it would be a blow to lose him ahead of what looks to be a tough December when it comes to fixture congestion.

With Liverpool currently flying high in the Premier League, both the fans and Jurgen Klopp will be praying for some good news once the scans arrive.

In other Liverpool news, the Reds are interested in signing a pacey attacker who would be perfect for Klopp…

QPR have a good chance to get back to winning ways following a run of three games where they have failed to pick up three points.

Despite the recent failures, Mark Warburton is aware that the players need to maintain their belief, and as a result it is unlikely that he will make too many changes despite a poor performance last time out.

His team were not as effective going forward as usual against Leeds, achieving one shot on target, but against a Middlesbrough side which occupies a relegation spot they could have more luck.

The R’s boss still seems to be in doubt about which formation suits his team the best, reverting back to a 3-5-2 at Elland Road, and he should stick with that moving forward.

On the six occasions he has started with the formation his side have won four times, with the only two defeats coming against high-flying Leeds and West Brom.

Considering that, here is how QPR should line-up against Jonathan Woodgate’s team.

Watch Queens Park Rangers Videos With StreamFootball.tv Below

Warburton will be keen for defensive improvement, and if Toni Leistner passes a late fitness test it is important he starts, as familiarity amongst the backline is important in building understanding and with it, consistency.

The centre-back also put in an impressive display against Millwall a few weeks ago and that should allow Lee Wallace to bed in, having also done well on occasion last weekend.

As this is a game QPR will look to dominate with their usual possession style, it would benefit the team if Todd Kane played.

He is more athletic than the 6 foot 2 Angel Rangel and thus better suited to the wing-back role, particuarly as he will likely be coming up against George Friend and Ashley Fletcher.

The attack should remain the same as they have been key this season, with the front three of Eberechi Eze, Jordan Hugill and Nahki Wells hitting a combined 21 goals this campaign.

That means they should be able to unlock the opposition, and with bit more discipline at the back QPR should see the game out, and hopefully achieve their first clean sheet of 2019/20 in the process.

Kylian Mbappe is undoubtedly one of the world’s biggest football players and, because of that, speculation linking him with moves to some of Europe’s biggest clubs will always be rife. 

Now, another big rumour has emerged in regards to the former Monaco youngster.

PSG would certainly not want to lose one of their prized assets, but his relationship with the current manager – Thomas Tuchel – is reportedly not great, with AS claiming that the German still places Neymar at the forefront of his plans now the Brazilian is backfiring on all cylinders for the Ligue 1 super-club. Indeed, this comes amid suggestions from the same outlet last week that the Spanish giants were eager to bring the World Cup winner to the club.

Mbappe was left on the sidelines for PSG’s Champions League encounter against Club Brugge last week, but came off the bench to score a second-half hat-trick in emphatic style.

“I wanted to demonstrate how difficult it is to do without me,” he said after the match (via AS), which suggests he was fairly unhappy with the selection policy.

Los Blancos are arguably the biggest club on the planet and propel elite talent further than they have gone before – take Cristiano Ronaldo for instance: a rising star with Manchester United, he joined Madrid in 2009 for £80m and transformed into one of the best players in history.

Given his quality in front of goal having scored 88 career goals already (per WhoScored), Mbappe could help replace some of the goals Ronaldo used to deliver, with Marca recently noting how the likes of Eden Hazard and Luka Jovic have failed to replace him.

The 20-year-old has already won the World Cup with his country at such a young age, but in terms of club football, history has shown that players who stay at PSG and walk Ligue 1 each season – while continually falling short in the Champions League – do not go on and become Ballon d’Or winners.

Indeed, to truly hit the top level, perhaps replacing a legend such as Ronaldo at one of the biggest clubs in the world is the way to get him there. After all, the report itself claims Mbappe’s aim is to win the top individual award in the game, with that looking more likely in the Spanish capital over the years.

Madrid fans, do you think you’ll land Mbappe? Comment below!

Wolves head to Slovakia later this evening to face Slovan Bratislava as they look to build on their Europa League triumph over Besiktas last time out.

The hosts currently top Group K after picking up four points across their first two matches.

Domestically, Nuno Santo’s side have turned a corner by going unbeaten in their last six games in all competitions.

Are Gareth Southgate’s Aston Villa roots the reason behind the Wolves player in the video below being overlooked?…

Strangely, despite having a stadium ban, Wolves and Slovan Bratislava will battle it out in front of a full house as, under UEFA regulations, children under the age of 14 are allowed free entry with over 15,000 now expected in attendance.

But Nuno faces other worries as an injury crisis has struck following their 1-1 draw with Southampton at the weekend, leaving his squad worse for wear.

Portuguese winger Diogo Jota made his comeback from injury on Saturday as a substitute when replacing Patrick Cutrone just after the hour mark.

Nuno wouldn’t have wanted to rush the 22-year-old back into action, but he may well have to feature at the national stadium.

Both centre-back Ryan Bennett and Ruben Neves were forced off through injury against Southampton, adding to Pedro Neto, Romain Saiss and Morgan Gibbs-White on the sidelines.

Reverting back to the 3-4-3 system would see Wolves cope best in their absence as their only two fit senior midfielders can feature in Joao Moutinho and Leander Dendoncker.

Watch Wolverhampton Wanderers Live Streams With StreamFootball.tv Below

This also hands a place at right wing-back for Matt Doherty with Adama Traore playing behind Raul Jimenez in the attack.

The Portuguese manager is left with no option but to play Jesus Vallejo and Conor Coady together with Bennett potentially out.

It’s either that or he calls on the inexperience of Max Kilman, which isn’t out of the realms of possibility as the 22-year-old’s only appearance this season was against Pyunik in the qualifiers.

The rest of the squad should remain much the same, provided the players have made the trip unscathed and that everyone has remembered their passport.

Mesut Ozil was excluded from Arsenal’s squad for the sixth time this term ahead of last night’s Europa League clash against Vitoria SC prompting Ian ‘Moose’ Abrahams to claim he may as well ‘just leave.’It’s not looking good for Ozil, at the moment. Once a cherished piece of footballing art, Unai Emery appears to have made it his life’s mission to freeze the German out from his squad, affording him a meagre two appearances and 142 minutes of football.And while he’s sat on a cool £350,000 per week deal, at 31-years-old we’re fairly positive he doesn’t want to spend the remaining years of his football career collecting dust.Watch Arsenal Live Streams With StreamFootball.tv Below

The Gunners only narrowly beat their Portuguese foes last night thanks to two freekicks from summer signing Nicolas Pepe. Had they failed to register a win, which was entirely possible given that Vitoria took the lead on two occasions, serious questions would have been asked of Emery, whose decision to play Ainsley-Maitland Niles in one of his attacking midfield roles backfired spectacularly.

The 22-year-old recorded a lowly 5.3 rating on WhoScored and was hauled off at half-time after making the error that led Vitoria’s second goal.

The Moose was straight to the point prior to kick-off…

[ad_pod ]

When it rains, it pours. Manchester United’s first-team didn’t enjoy the greatest of days on Sunday after slipping to a 2-0 defeat to West Ham in the Premier League.

Now, it appears the curse has hit their U-23 side too, after they received a 4-1 thrashing at the hands of Aston Villa on Monday night.

The Red Devils’ youth side had previously not lost a game in the Premier League 2, but fell to their first defeat of the season to the Villans.

After seeing the U-23s’ result, United fans took to Twitter to voice their thoughts on how things appear to be going horribly wrong for the club as a whole.

Many supporters of the Manchester side delivered a worrying assessment of things, suggesting that the whole club is “falling apart”.

Some Red Devils fans insisted a “virus is spreading” and that it is all a “mess”.

Check out some of the reaction of United fans below:

[ad_pod ]Danny Rose’s performance in Tottenham Hotspur’s 2-1 defeat at Leicester City on Sunday afternoon appears to have split the London club’s supporters.According to WhoScored, the 29-year-old had a pass success rate of 73%, whilst he won four tackles and two aerial duels during his 90 minutes on the field.And whilst there were some Spurs fans who were pleased with the Englishman’s display at the King Power Stadium, others were not happy one bit with what they were witnessed.Watch Tottenham Hotspur Live Streams With StreamFootball.tv Below

England captain Harry Kane sent Mauricio Pochettino’s side ahead on the afternoon, but Ricardo Pereira levelled the scores before James Maddison came up with a late winner for Brendan Rodgers’ team.

There was a real split when it came to the performance of Rose, who was strongly linked with a move away from the capital club during the summer transfer window.

A selection of the Twitter reaction to his latest outing can be seen below:

[ad_pod ]

This article is part of Football FanCast’s Pundit View series, which provides opinion and analysis on recent quotes from journalists, pundits, players and managers…

Aston Villa’s new academy chief Mark Harrison has claimed it was the shared vision of the owners and management staff that helped convince him to make a switch across the Midlands.

What’s he said?

Harrison had been in charge of West Brom’s academy for the past 13 years, helping them to become established as one of the best in the country.

This summer one of their latest hot prospects, Louie Barry, earned a move to La Liga giants Barcelona whilst Rekeem Harper, Sam Field and Jonathan Leko are all highly-thought of at the club earning minutes in recent seasons.

Villa themselves have a promising youth setup, but in recent times they have seen locally-born players thrive elsewhere after winning the NextGen tournament, which is why they have appointed Harrison as their new academy manager.

He said:

“I was really impressed with how they sold the club to me. I was enthused from the first time I met them.

“What really drew me here was the potential. You can see with the owners and the senior management the vision they have. I got a real good feel for how they want to build not only the club but the academy.

“I was part of a vision, certainly early on at West Brom when Dan Ashworth was technical director.”

Purslow promise soon to be a reality?

Villa CEO Christian Purslow has made it clear in the past on the club’s desire to build a young an exciting team, stating that they need a ‘clear pathway right through the academy to the first-team with outstanding recruitment and development.’

The arrival of Harrison certainly is the first step in putting that plan into motion, although, it may be a while until we see it potentially bearing fruit.

The former Baggies academy man was there for 13 years, and it is only over a recent period of time that his work has started to see an effect with the aforementioned crop of youth players.

His work has clearly been appreciated by Purslow if he’s seeing him as one of the main men to lead his Villa vision.

[ad_pod ]

The Croatian posted a WhatsApp conversation he and his teammate had after the winger mistakenly sent him the image that he would later upload on Instagram himself.

Lovren had a bit of a joke with the two-time Golden Boot winner as he claimed that he was flexing his muscles and breathing in to enhance his physique.

The centre-back certainly does have a point in his messages. Salah has no reason to be posing topless in mid-September as the weather in the north of England definitely doesn’t warrant stripping off.

[ad_pod ]

[ad_pod ]

The Premier League season finally gets underway this weekend.

Aston Villa are back in the big time too after a three-year absence following relegation in 2016.

Dean Smith’s men come into the latest campaign with an almost entirely new squad of players after 12 arrivals walked through the door at Villa Park this summer for a total amount in excess of £130m.

How many of those players feature on Saturday remains to be seen but we’ve had a go at predicting who may well be in the starting XI against Tottenham at 5.30pm.

With so many new faces arriving in the claret and blue this summer, Villa boss Smith has plenty to think about as they kickstart their season with a tough test against the Champions League runners-up.

There could be as many as seven debutants whilst a familiar trio is likely to be deployed in the heart of the pitch and there should be a start for one of their most popular loan stars from last season.

[ad_pod ]

Tom Heaton should be a certainty to start in goal as he bares the most experience in England’s top-flight of any of their current goalkeepers with 96 Premier League appearances to his name. In front of him could be as many as three new defenders.

Tyrone Mings is a familiar face and he has struck up a nice partnership with Bjorn Engels during pre-season. At right-back, Smith may favour the youthful Frederic Guilbert over Ahmed Elmohamady with both the new signings playing in France’s top tier last season.

Matt Targett joined in a £15m move early in the summer so that left-back spot could be his for the foreseeable future.

Smith added some big names in midfield but we’re not expecting any of them to make their debuts from the start on Saturday.

Watch Aston Villa Live Streams With StreamFootball.tv Below

Douglas Luiz joined from Manchester City but wasn’t able to link up with his new teammates until last week due to delays over his work permit and fellow arrival Marvelous Nakamba has only had one game to settle in, though he could be on the bench.

That means Conor Hourihane is likely to deputise in holding midfield as he did ever so astutely last season and during this pre-season and he will surely be joined by the popular duo of John McGinn and captain Jack Grealish.

In attack, club-record signing Wesley Moraes is a shoo-in to make his debut considering the fee paid and the other options. Meanwhile, Anwar El Ghazi, scorer in the playoff final, has a niggle which could see Trezeguet start on the left wing with Jota occupying the other side.

[ad_pod ]