Key events
Arne Slot has been speaking ahead of Liverpool’s trip to Leeds on Saturday evening. The Reds will hope to make it seven points out of nine after following up a 2-0 win at West Ham with a 1-1 home draw against Sunderland. In truth, nine points would have been the expectation from these three games although Slot is putting a positive spin on events.
“Four points out of two games is different from the last two home games we’ve played, in which we lost both and conceded seven goals [3-0 v Nottingham Forest and 4-1 v PSV].
“In the last two games, we were one deflection away from keeping two clean sheets. That’s a step forward if you compare it to seven goals conceded in two games. We did not concede from a set-piece, which is also important, and we got two results.
“There are positives to take, but of course we are still not where we want to be. Let that be obvious and clear. It is definitely our aim to come back to the top four because we’re obviously not happy with the position we are in at the moment.”
Back to domestic matters and last night’s Premier League clash at Old Trafford. Despite looking absolutely woeful against Liverpool, West Ham managed to nick a point with a late equaliser against Manchester United. Ruben Amorim was pretty miffed it’s fair to say.
Ashes news. Quick plug for our other live blog. It was looking a bit grim for England but then two quick wickets! What a catch by Will Jacks! Rob Smyth has the details.
More World Cup draw content and Will Unwin has been looking at worst-case scenarios, the big misery guts. Then again, it would surely be massive fun for England to be grouped with Erling Haaland’s Norway.
Here’s England boss Thomas Tuchel talking about the prospect of being drawn against Scotland. Yes, such a group could happen.
“If it happens, it happens and we make the most of it. It will be a nice story. I have no wishes on opponents. I think if you wish for something and think you are superior, it’s close to arrogance and you don’t want to be arrogant. We want to respect everyone.”
More Tuchel pre-draw quotes here.
You’ll see the current crop of World Cup mascots at the top of the page. I’ll also list them below in case it changes. Anyways, this is a nice graphic. Personal favourites and the ones that have resonated are Willie (England 1966), Juanito (Mexico 1970), Naranjito (Spain 1982) and Ciao (Italy 1990).
The trio for 2026…
The Village People are playing at the World Cup draw today. Yep, I’ve even seen a full ‘Who are the Village People?’ Explainer piece on another website. We won’t go that far but I couldn’t help but wonder if any of the originals are performing. Turns out, founder Victor Willis – either the policeman or the naval officer – is still part of the line-up despite now being 74. Today’s current Village People are now a six-piece and, according to Wiki, there have been 21 previous members. This reminds me of a time I stayed in an Airbnb in Liverpool and the owner told me she was married to a former member of Kool & The Gang. This was very exciting news until finding out that about 1 in 8 people had also been in the band.
Our David Hytner is in Washington for the World Cup draw. And he has an important message in this analysis piece: amid all the hoopla, Friday’s event must be all about firing the starting gun on football’s biggest show.
As in every World Cup, there’ll be a clamour to coin a ‘Group of Death’. In theory, we could have one for 2026 comprising Argentina, Morocco, Italy and Norway.
But, remember kids, never rule out the least chilling member of the quartet. How about 2014 when Costa Rica won a Group D featuring England, Italy and Uruguay. Lest we forget, Roy Hodgson’s side were killed off after just two games.
It’s 188 days until World Cup 2026 but precisely zero days until the World Cup draw! Let’s start with the basics and this highly entertaining Explainer piece from Tom Lutz.
Before you go in depth, a quick note that the 12 groups for the World Cup will be formed by one team from each pot.
Pot 1: Canada, Mexico, USA, Spain, Argentina, France, England, Brazil, Portugal, Netherlands, Belgium, Germany.
Pot 2: Croatia, Morocco, Colombia, Uruguay, Switzerland, Japan, Senegal, Iran, South Korea, Ecuador, Austria, Australia.
Pot 3: Norway, Panama, Egypt, Algeria, Scotland, Paraguay, Tunisia, Côte d’Ivoire, Uzbekistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, South Africa.
Pot 4: Jordan, Cape Verde, Ghana, Curaçao, Haiti, New Zealand, four European playoff teams, two intercontinental playoff teams.
Preamble
It’s World Cup draw day! Beyond the overbloated nonsense and political posturing, this is still must-watch TV/radio/live blog as theoretical games we play on FIFA actually become wallchart reality. The whole shebang starts at around 5pm although it’ll be a while after that before any names are actually drawn.
Beyond that, just two days after the last one was completed, there’s another round of Premier League matches. This is Matchweek 15 and yet the table still looks a bit weird and unsettled. As The Anfield Wrap’s Phil Blundell wrote on X: “Really funny how the Premier League season is basically everyone bar Wolves fans, Arsenal fans and City fans going ‘how are we below them?’
Righty, while keeping one eye on the Ashes, keep the other one on here where we’ll have loads of team news, manager press conferences, World Cup draw buildup and much, much more!
