The Double Pivot: Soccer analysis, analytics, and commentary

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Tony Bloom and the Premier League Sports Gambling "Scandal" Dec 05, 2025

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There has been a lawsuit filed against Tony Bloom and his sports gambling syndicate alleging, well, the lawsuit is actually just asking for money. But it is also about how sports gambling syndicates work and specifically how the one owned and run by the owner of Brighton works, and we wanted to talk about that and about Premier League gambling policy.

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Tottenham in Crisis Nov 27, 2025

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A hot start on points masked underlying problems, but a blowout loss to Arsenal and what should have been a blowout loss to Chelsea have brought focus back to what seems to be wrong at Tottenham. We break it down.

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The Football Gambling Scandal Rocking Turkey Right Now Nov 17, 2025

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It's a huge, wild, and complex story. Referees suspended, players implicated, the third and fourth divisions suspended, criminal investigations into Super Lig clubs and referees. We break down what's going on in Turkey and we ask, is this just the first open reporting of risks to sporting competition that are present across professional football and global sports?

Wikipedia and links for the Turkish football story: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_Turkish_football_betting_scandal

Ankaraspor - Nazillispor: https://en.haberler.com/it-had-been-talked-about-for-days-here-is-the-2157354/

Cleveland Guardians scandal: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/emmanuel-clase-arrested-pleads-not-guilty/

Sports Betting and Players in US Sports: https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6807760/2025/11/14/sports-betting-players-nfl-nba-mlb-nhl/

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Man City - Liverpool Analytics Nov 14, 2025

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City won 3-0. The non-penalty xG in the match was dead even. What does that mean, what are the statistics telling us about this match and about Man City and Liverpool?

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Ballon d'Or! Ballon d'Or! Nov 03, 2025

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We kick off the new Double Pivot Ballon d'Or tracker podcast series with a discussion of why we're going to be doing this, tracking both the players who we think will deserve the award and who is more or less likely to win in, and how we think about those problems. And of course we check in on the obvious leaders right now -- Erling Haaland, Kylian Mbappe, Harry Kane -- as well as some players we're watching to see if they can get into consideration.

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The Future of College Football, and also Soccer, with Bill Connelly Oct 27, 2025

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We talk to Bill Connelly, ESPN staff writer and author of the book Forward Progress, about the American sport that we all agree has the most uncanny resemblance to European and global soccer, college football. We talk NILs and conferences and the transfer portal, and we talk the super league and the socio model and the Bundesliga. What both college football and European soccer eventually become are two of the most fascinating questions in sports, and understanding one can help you think about the other, too. We even talk a little bit about analytics.

Forward Progress: https://www.triumphbooks.com/forward-progress-products-9781637278703.php

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New Premier League Team Ratings Oct 23, 2025

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Caley has built a new projection and team rating model so we talk through what it tells us about the Premier League right now. Arsenal's incredible defense, Newcastle's confusing defense, Liverpool's problem defense, Palace's attack, Spurs not looking entirely terrible, Sunderland looking strong, and more.

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2025 Worst Contracts Draft, Part I Oct 17, 2025

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We are joined by two of the Double Pivot's official correspondents -- Salacious Gossip Correspondent Joel Wertheimer and Financial Shenanigans Correspondent Skanda Amarnath -- for the second annual Premier League worst contracts draft.

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Premier League Table Sorting Oct 10, 2025

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It's analytics podcasting time. We are table sorting and talking Arsenal, City, Chelsea, Liverpool, Newcastle and Manchester United.

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Real Madrid and Florian Wirtz Sep 29, 2025

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We continue to monitor teams and players that are underperforming our expectations, or, perhaps, overperforming and then suddenly dramatically underperforming our expectations in the case of Real Madrid. What went wrong in the Madrid Derby and what does it tell us about Xabi's new-look Madrid? And after Liverpool's underwhelming early season statistics finally translated into dropped points against Crystal Palace, we consider why Florian Wirtz is not producing at his previous level.

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