The Double Pivot: Soccer analysis, analytics, and commentary

We've got news. Caley and Goodman walk through the setup of the proposed Super League, its apparent business goals, the structural problems in European football that brought us to this point. and what we think is likely to emerge on the other side of this.

@Guidetobirds on the wage issue at the heart of the Super League: https://fileundertragicomedy.wordpress...

There's a title race in Spain, suddenly! And there was a great Clasico. We break down the game and why we think Barcelona are still favorites despites losing to Real Madrid and sitting third.

And we begin our top four profiles, going over how Leicester City and West Ham got here and how the relative stability of their xG numbers in both cases hides some real changes over time.

(Opening from The Gay Science, Friedrich Nietzche)

Chelsea and Leicester lost, Liverpool and West Ham won, Spurs -- who still technically in the top four race! -- drew with Newcastle. We walk through the small changes in the race this week and our favorites to get through. 

It's an international break and the US Men's National Team has good players on it, some of whom were even allowed by doctors and public health authorities to play with the team. Dest, Pulisic, Reyna, Aaronsen, formations, Musah, the Gold Cup, it's all here.

There's Derby talk and Chris Wilder talk and Kelechi explodes but the Premier League ain't giving us much right now. So we get into some of the weird stats of Covidball and the consistently uninteresting big performers of the season.

A variety of topics, variously arranged! The Manchester Derby, the Madrid Derby, "Der Klassiker", is Milan good or not, the end of the Messi and Ronaldo Era, the era of the supremacy of the Premier League? We get to it all.

Months of "meh" at the bottom of the table have been transformed into moderate amounts of drama. We discuss how Fulham got, well, not good exactly, but solid enough defensively to get draws, and the risks now for Burnley, Newcastle, Brighton(?) and Southampton(??).

Managers! xG! Is Klopp doing something wrong now? Is Potter? Our answers are pretty decidedly no, but we get into how you ask questions about managers when something is going wrong under the hood, statistically or tactically or with all of their players getting injured at once, say.

How PSG pressed Barcelona out of a big tie, how Leipzig failed to contain Liverpool, Dortmund surprising us a bit against Sevilla, all our takes on the latest round of the Champions League right here.

A lot has changed since we last covered the top teams in Europe. We take on the teams playing this week in the Champions League, including PSG's injury problems, how far Barcelona have rebounded, the peculiar new Leipzig system, Ronaldo's new/old role, and more.