The Double Pivot: Soccer analysis, analytics, and commentary

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Just How Bad Is the Bottom of the Premier League Table? Nov 28, 2023

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The relegation race, such as it is, is defined by the historic weakness of the promoted teams and the 10-point deduction taken by Everton. We put the weakness of Sheffield United, Luton Town and Burnley in recent historical context and talk about how we remain relatively unconcerned about Fulham, Bournemouth and even Everton despite those teams being in situations that would make them serious relegation fodder in a normal season.

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777 Partners and Everton with Liz Hoffman Nov 20, 2023

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We are joined by Semafor's Liz Hoffman, who has broken all the big 777 Partners news in the last week, to talk about what she discovered, what her business and finance reporting means for Everton Football Club and what we still have to learn.

Read Liz's reporting (and sign up for her newsletter) here: https://www.semafor.com/newsletter/11/15/2023/777-partners-bought-sports-teams-with-insurance-customers-cash

And check out her book too: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/669739/crash-landing-by-liz-hoffman/

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Shady Cypriot Banking and Chelsea Football Club Nov 16, 2023

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Roman Abramovich hasn't been owner of Chelsea for a while but he's back in the news with a big leak of documents from Cypriot banks where he did his shady banking. We take stock of what these stories actually mean, what they tell us about how oligarch football team ownership functioned, and whether there will be any consequences for Chelsea.
On the Video International "trade": https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-67300638
And the football payouts: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/nov/15/chelsea-fc-face-new-questions-over-how-roman-abramovich-funded-success

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Premier League Lightning Round Nov 06, 2023

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Everton, Brentford, Arsenal, United, Bournemouth, West Ham, Brighton, Liverpool and more.

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How Bad Are Manchester United? Nov 01, 2023

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The Derby gives us the opportunity to do the United pod that's been needed. An impressive win for City (who attacked!) but the real story coming out of it is how bad United were and how fully in line with their performance this season that is. Why is it so bad and can it get better?

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He Can't Keep Getting Away With This: The Newcastle Story Oct 24, 2023

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Their numbers are so good. Drill down a little and their numbers are so weird. And this was true last season too except they were weird in a completely different way! What are we to make of this?

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The Double Pivot Discord Fixes Football: Part I Oct 17, 2023

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We asked for your galaxy-brain ideas to fix the game of football and you delivered. We discuss proposals to fix video review and the offside rule, as well as the multi-ref system.

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Man City Lose Again Oct 10, 2023

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The best team in the world lost again. Does it mean anything? We talk about how City and Arsenal approach their weekend clash, what we can glean from the data about City's attack not quite clicking, and how we think it could get fixed.

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Referees Oct 02, 2023

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They got a big call wrong in an unusually straightforward way in Spurs - Liverpool. So what's to be done? We talk about what this means about refereeing and VAR, the prospects for positive change and the profound structural limits on organizing toward it.

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North London Derby Sep 27, 2023

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Spurs and Arsenal played to a more or less fair draw, but given our priors this leads to different kinds of questions about Spurs and Arsenal. Why isn't Arsenal's attack quite clicking? Can Spurs keep taking these risks in possession? And we talk about the tactics of the game and stuff.

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