February 7 – The names of neither Barcelona nor Real Madrid will be on the Copa del Rey this season after both were sensationally knocked out of the Spanish cup at the quarterfinal stage.
February 6 – The English Football Association is to introduce new guidelines limiting the amount of heading children will be allowed to do in training.
February 6 – Lionel Messi has criticised Barcelona sporting director Eric Abidal over an interview in which the Frenchman criticised Barcelona players for not working hard.
February 5 – The English Premier League has vowed to improve the standards of VAR after a plethora of baffling and inconsistent decisions throughout the season.
February 4 – Parma’s Dejan Kulusevski (pictured on loan from Juventus) tops the table of most playing time for big-5 league players born in the 2000s. The young forward has played in 95% of Parma’s games and is followed in the table by another Italian club player, midfielder Sandro Tonali (Brescia).
January 30 – Forget the US women superstars, it is Canada’s Christine Sinclair’s name will now be etched into the record books. On Wednesday, the Canadian striker scored twice in a 11-0 win over Saint Kitts and Nevis in Olympic qualifying to become the all-time top scorer in international football, surpassing previous record holder Abby Wambach of the United States.
January 29 – ‘Clinical’ is a word often used by commentators about teams that make the most of their goal chances to win games. The CIES Football Observatory have translated that basic observation into a data model that measures team efficiency.
January 21 – A ranking of teams by the number of fouls committed per game see Liverpool leading the way as the team with the least fouls per match so far this season (8.1).
January 17 – England and Tottenham Hotspur have been dealt a potentially massive blow after a leading orthopaedic surgeon predicted Harry Kane will miss not just the rest of the season but also Euro 2020 in the summer.
January 15 – Liverpool players dominate a fan vote on UEFA.com for the website’s team of the year 2019. While the club are the new face of European football dominance, two old faces, Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, both made the final XI.
January 14 – Heightened speculation that former Tottenham Hotspur manager Mauricio Pochettino could take over at Barcelona have been well and truly quashed with the appointment of Quique Setien to replace the sacked Ernesto Valverde.
January 13 – FC Barcelona’s search for a new manager to succeed Ernesto Valverde continues after Xavi turned down his former club.
January 10 – England captain Harry Kane’s perennial injury jinx has struck again, this time for far longer, leaving his club Tottenham Hotspur reportedly scouring the transfer market for cover.
January 10 – Amid all the criticism over human rights abuses and accusations of sports washing at the address of Saudi Arabia and its hosting of the Spanish Super Cup, Atletico Madrid tore up the script on Thursday in Jeddah by defeating FC Barcelona 2-3 to set up a Spanish Super Cup final against city rivals Real Madrid.
January 6 – Ali Al Habsi, the Omani goalkeeping legend who made a name for himself as the first Arab player from the GCC countries to play in the Premier League, has announced his retirement from international football, aged 38.