Although the Premier League season may have only been 10 matches into the current season, it was enough of a sample to highlight Nuno Espiritio Santo’s managerial deficiencies and after suffering another heavy defeat while in charge of Tottenham, chairman Daniel Levy had to act.

Act he certainly did and swiftly to boot, as less than 48 hours after a hapless Tottenham were punished by Manchester United at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, the former Wolves manager was now also the former Spurs boss.

While on the topic of acting swiftly, chairman Levy’s next act was even faster and just a day after Espirito Santo was given his marching orders from N17, Antonio Conte was the next man through the door.

An appointment that has seemingly galvanised a rather fractious fanbase and with the former Chelsea, Inter, Juventus and Italy manager now on board, it may have turbocharged Tottenham’s season overnight.

Because not only has Conte coached some of the biggest names in European football, but he also has an incredible pedigree when it comes to winning trophies, as success in both the Premier League and Serie A will attest to.

As the man who started Juventus’ incredible chain of nine successive Serie A scudetto, he would oversee the first three between 2012 and 2014 and his dominance in Italy did not stop there either, as a further title was won with Inter last season.

Those Italian domestic crowns act as the bookend of his career haul and with his time at Chelsea also bringing him a Premier League title in 2017 and the F.A. Cup a year later, this is a man who can only be considered a natural born winner.

Something that Tottenham will certainly need this season and with five league defeats to their name already, there was a feeling that the longer they operated with Nuno Espirito Santo in charge, the further they would have slipped down the table.

A feeling that undoubtedly created a sense of urgency within the Tottenham board and now that Conte and his coaching staff are on board, there is every chance that he could turbocharge the rest of the season.

Even though, there has been that quintet of league defeats and a quartet of them have been rather ugly – the only respectable loss which did not see Tottenham ship three goals to the opposition, was the recent away reverse to West Ham, the campaign is still salvageable.

If only due to the fact that, five losses have been met by the same amount of Premier League wins and with nothing in the way of draws being recorded at the time of writing, they remarkably find themselves in the hunt for the European places.

Not only that, but they are still in each of the three cup competitions – admittedly the F.A. Cup is not an ongoing concern until the New Year, but fans of the club will need to latch on to as many positives at present and silverware could well be an option after the arrival of Conte.

Something that the former Juventus midfielder will almost demand now that he has arrived and although he only has an 18-month contract, he will definitely not be looking to waste the first six of those. 

A stance that was evident during his first appearance in the Tottenham technical area and with his rejuvenated set of players taking it to Vitesse Arnhem early on, they were good value for their 3-0 lead in the Europa Conference League.

However, that first appearance would have also highlighted the size of the task ahead and what looked like being a comfortable win for his new charges, would eventually see them narrowly win by three goals to two.

Still though, a win is a win to get proceedings underway and arguably, Conte would have learned more when his team were on the backfoot, than opposed to when they were cutting through the Vitesse defence with ease.

Now, it seems as if everything is up for grabs in the white half of North London and if a run of positive league results can be found immediately, there is no reason to exclude Tottenham from the top-four conversation towards the end of the season either.

*Credit for all of the photos in this article belongs to AP Photo*

FIRST PUBLISHED: 8th November 2021

In the summer of 2020, as nearly every football club in Europe sought to tighten their purse strings and ride out the storm from the uncertain situation around the world, Chelsea took a drastically different approach.

After narrowly sealing Champions League football under Frank Lampard, the club brought in a treasure trove of attacking stars such as Hakim Ziyech, Timo Werner, and Kai Havertz, signed Ben Chilwell from Leicester City to provide an upgrade in their left back position, and brought in Thiago Silva on a free transfer after his contract at Paris Saint-Germain expired.

However, as the deadline day of the summer transfer window quickly approached, they found themselves in desperate need of a goalkeeper.

Two years after joining from Athletic Club for €80 million, a record fee for a goalkeeper, Kepa Arrizabalaga had failed to convince in London, causing the Blues to pursue Gianluigi Donnarumma, Nick Pope, Jan Oblak and various other options.

Instead, they opted to sign Édouard Mendy from Rennes, a decision that prompted reactions of “Who?” and “Why are we signing a 28-year-old from France” from Chelsea fans. Fast forward a year later, it’s fair to say the Blues fans have changed their tune.

Born in Normandy to a Senegalese mother and Bissau-Guinean father, Mendy developed at Le Havre’s youth academy before switching over to Cherbourg, where he would remain until the summer of 2014.

At 22, Mendy found himself out of football for a year and queuing up at the local job center for employment.

“For a football player or anybody else, being unemployed is like getting slapped across the face,” Mendy said in an interview with SoFoot.

“Repeated failures leave marks on you and you start thinking that maybe you are not made for it.”

Seven years have passed, and today, Mendy earns a yearly salary of £3,900,000 at Chelsea, but his recent form and stellar performances over the past year make it seem a near guarantee that he will earn a massive raise soon.

After joining on a five-year contract in September 2020, Mendy became the first African goalkeeper to play in the Premier League since Carl Ikeme in 2012 and kept a clean sheet in his first three league matches.

The Senegal international played a vital role in between the sticks as Chelsea narrowly sealed top four and won their first Champions League in nine years, keeping nine clean sheets in the entire competition and equalling the record number set by Santiago Canizares in 2000/01 and Keylor Navas in 2015/16.

These performances saw the now 29-year-old named as the Goalkeeper of the Season for the 2020/21 UEFA Champions League with 286 points -- Ederson, who finished second in the voting after losing in the Final in Porto to Chelsea, received 154.

When watching Mendy, one cannot help but be blown away by his physical attributes: a height of 6’4” and a weight of 86 kg and a seemingly infinite wingspan, but those characteristics are only the tip of the iceberg.

Not only has he been a vast upgrade over Kepa in terms of quick reactions, positioning, coming out to claim crosses and punching, but he has also thrived with the ball at his feet and played a key role in Thomas Tuchel’s build-up.

The stats speak for themselves: his clean sheet percentage of 56.9%, his save percentage of 78.8% and his goals against of 0.63 per 90 all put him in the 99th percentile amongst goalkeepers over the past 365 days, per FBRef.com.

Whilst rival fans may argue the case for David De Gea, Manuel Neuer or Thibaut Courtois, there is a strong argument to be made that Mendy is the most in-form goalkeeper in Europe right now.

And with Chelsea currently topping the table with 25 points from 10 games, he has a chance to lead the Blues to their first Premier League title since 2017.

Mendy will be heading off to Cameroon in January for the month-long Africa Cup of Nations, where he’ll be looking to lead Senegal to their first ever major trophy.

The last edition of the tournament saw Mendy start Senegal’s first two matches before being injured in the warmup to their final group stage match against Kenya.

He was forced to withdraw from the squad with a broken finger, with Alfred Gomis -- the man who replaced him at Rennes after his transfer to Chelsea -- starting in goal as Senegal advanced to the Final where they would lose to Algeria in Cairo.

Chelsea will be hoping that Mendy steers clear of injuries and leads his nation to the promised land, before quickly jetting back to London for the home stretch of the campaign.

When he joined Chelsea for £22 million, Mendy was viewed as a short-term stopgap option who would make way for a bigger name such as Donnarumma and Oblak in the near future.

Instead, he has firmly established himself as one of Chelsea’s most crucial players and has allowed the Blues to assume the leadership of the table with just three goals conceded in 10 league matches and one goal conceded in four Champions League matches.

He is an inspiration for all players, a player who never gave up and never stopped pushing to achieve his goals, and who, at the ripe age of 29, is finally receiving his just rewards.

• Despite their short history, Olympique Lyonnais Féminin have achieved phenomenal success.

• Over the past decade, they have become the dominant global force in women’s football.

• Their attraction to players is obvious, and many of the greats have represented the club.

History

Olympique Lyonnais football club were formed in 1950, but it was not until half a century later, in 2004 that Olympique Lyonnais Féminin, the women’s team, were created by the club owner Jean-Michel Aulas.

The city did have a women’s team prior to that, called Lyon FC, whose most successful period was in the 1990s, when they won five league titles.

However, when they were taken over and rebranded in 2004, their status soon changed and significantly so.

Aulas had huge ambitions for the team, which he backed with significant funds, and it was not long before they became a leading force in women’s football, a position they have largely retained ever since.

Their success is not just based on the money available, with many of their stars the highest paid female footballers in the world, but because Aulas made a commitment to treat the men’s and women’s teams equally.

Honours

In under two decades since its formation, the team has won a huge number of trophies and set a high standard for all other teams to match.

They won their first league crown in 2007, losing just a single game during the season, and this began a period of total domestic dominance that stretched to 14 successive league titles, breaking multiple records along the way.

The club have also won a record nine Coupe de France titles since 2008 and in 2019 won the Trophée des Championnes, an annual trophy contested between the Ligue 1 champions and the winners of the Coupe de France.

In Europe, they have also straddled zeniths, though their path has understandably been tougher.

They did not secure their first Champions League until 2011, with a victory over Turbine Potsdam, then promptly retained the trophy the following season.

Thereafter, their domination was total, with five successive continental titles from 2015 on secured, making them the most successful side in Europe until Barcelona won the competition in 2021.

There will be plenty of bets this season on them adding to a considerable haul.

Famous Players

During a period of unprecedented success, the club has witnessed many great players pull on the Lyon shirt, a comprehensive who’s who of global talent, including the likes of Megan Rapinoe and Lucy Bronze.

In truth, there are far too many to mention, but one player who definitely merits a name-check is goalkeeper Sarah Bouhaddi, a key component of the world’s most formidable women’s team for a decade, though her team’s brilliance ensured she was not always the most overworked of players.

In front of her, Amandine Henry was one of the game’s greatest defensive midfielders, winning the French league 12 times with Lyon and the Silver Ball at the 2015 World Cup.

She joined Lyon in 2007 as they began their period of trophy winning and later captained France.

As for goal scorers, step forward Sandrine Brétigny, who between 2000 and 2012 scored 211 goals in 241 appearances.

She is not the club’s highest scorer however, because that honour going to Eugénie Le Sommer, who having joined the club in 2010 went on to net 276 times in 334 appearances across a highly prolific decade.

Best Current Players

Many players do not stay for long at Lyon, but someone who certainly bucks that trend is Wendie Renard, France’s towering captain and elite centre-back.

She has been with the club since 2006, making her 400th appearance in 2021. Likewise, the Tunisian, Amel Majri has been at the club since 2010; a hugely talented and versatile midfielder who has reverted to left-back in recent years.

Norwegian international Ada Hegerberg has been the main source of goals for many seasons. She joined the club in 2014 and was a success from the start, scoring an incredible 34 goals in 32 games during her debut campaign.

Most seasons this iconic figure in women’s football has averaged over a goal per game and she was undoubtedly a worthy winner of the 2018 Ballon D’Or.

Having returned from serious injury in 2021, check our football odds today backing her for future success.

Elsewhere, midfielder Catarina Macario is a player with almost unlimited potential. Born in Brazil, she moved to the US in 2011, and has developed into one of the world’s most promising players.

Finally, the French star Delphine Cascarino has been a mainstay as a winger for club and country, having joined Lyon in 2009, aged only 12.

Overall, the team is packed with stars, but intriguingly some of their most talented players have been loaned to OL Reign of late, after Lyon’s parent company took control of the American club in 2020.

Lyon Women Rivals

If anyone is going to break Lyon’s domestic stranglehold, then it may be the club that leaves others in their wake in the men’s version of the game, Paris Saint-Germain.

PSG Feminine have markedly improved in recent years and justifiably felt very hard done by when losing out on the 2020/21 title, after the season was suspended in March 2021.

The placings at the time were used as the final table, with Lyon three points clear, but with PSG still to play away from home.

A closer league title suggested that the gap may be narrowing, as further evidenced by Lyon needing penalties to beat PSG in the 2021 Coupe De France final.

And so it proved in the 2020/21 season, with PSG securing their first ever title in the women’s game, holding off the challenge of Lyon by a single point.

With both teams starting the 2021/22 season on fire, it seems a true rivalry has emerged in the sport, with Ligue 1 odds suggesting another closely fought title race.

Pertinently, PSG also ended Lyon’s grip on the Champions League in 2021 with a quarter-final victory and it seems Lyon have some true competition in future years should they wish to replicate past successes and remain one of the best women’s football teams in the world.

FIRST PUBLISHED: 8th November 2021

• Arsenal Women are the most successful women’s football team in England
• Founded in 1987, they have won 15 league titles
• Read below for more on the club’s history, stadium and iconic figures

Arsenal have been at the forefront as the women’s game has grown in England.

This is a club which has not just been focused on its standing in the Premier League odds, but taken the initiative with investment and promotion of their women’s team.

While some of the best midfielders in Premier League history were lifting trophies at Highbury, Arsenal Women were developing from a project to a professional sports team, a true juggernaut conquering England and beyond in the noughties.

History

Arsenal Women Football Club was formed in 1987 as ‘Arsenal Ladies’. They are the most successful English women’s team of all-time, holding numerous records across various competitions.

Long the dominant force in the women’s game, Arsenal Women is the only team in the history of the English game – male or female – to complete a continental treble while going undefeated for the season.

Vic Akers founded the club back in the 1980s and was appointed as their first manager.

It was not an immediate success with Arsenal Ladies only playing occasional matches through their first few seasons. They didn’t turn professional until after the millennium despite winning their first league title a decade previous.

It didn’t take long after that for the Gunners to establish themselves as one of the best women’s football teams in the world.

As the men’s time enjoyed success, the club made a substantial effort to fund and treat its women’s team equally.

With Akers at the helm, Arsenal had a world-beating setup for scouting and training. Trophies followed as the academy produced stars aplenty.

There was a run of seven consecutive league titles, featuring six unbeaten campaigns. There was no safer bet than backing Arsenal Women under Akers’ stewardship – they even conquered the continent, lifting the UEFA Women’s Cup in 2006/07.

More glory followed in the post-Akers era with the Gunners winning the inaugural Women’s Super League.

Akers had occupied the job for over two decades, and the club entered relative turmoil after with managerial changes becoming common. The silverware continued to accumulate, though, and there was a remarkable influx of talent under Pedro Losa.

In 2017, the club made the significant decision to rebrand as Arsenal Women Football Club.

Stadium

Arsenal Women play at Meadow Park in Hertfordshire. It is also the home to Boreham Wood. The Gunners have used Meadow Park since they were founded.

With Arsenal’s youth teams and Watford reserves also using the stadium, Meadow Park is a busy venue throughout the football season. It has a capacity of 4,500, though only 1,500 are seated.

A redevelopment in 2019 provided a touch of Highbury to Meadow Park. The North Bank Terrace obviously is far from a carbon copy, but it shares the name of a famous stand from the Gunners’ former home.

Best Players

Many of the best female footballers of all-time have pulled on the red and white of Arsenal.

Alex Scott net worth has become a hot topic in recent years following her groundbreaking work as pundit and presenter, but it shouldn’t be forgotten that the Football Focus host is also one of Arsenal’s best ever players.

A long-time teammate of Scott, Rachel Yankey is also an Arsenal icon. Yankey is the all-time leader in England caps and played an integral role in six league titles.

With pace to burn and mesmeric quick feet, Yankey was as entertaining as she was effective.

Starring alongside Yankey and Scott for club and country, Faye White was a dominating force at the heart of the Arsenal defence through the late-90s all the way to her retirement in 2017.

White won 10 league titles and nine FA Cups with the club – that’s a medal haul few in English football can rival.

Moving onto more recent Arsenal stars, Vivianne Miedema is the all-time leading scorer in the Super League, and at just 25 years old, could yet break numerous records at the club.

Miedema is one of the best players of her generation, pairing sublime technical ability with lethal finishing.

All-action midfielder Jordan Nobbs moved to Arsenal from Sunderland in 2010, winning three Super League titles since then. Nobbs was crowned FA Player of the Year in 2016 and has been an integral cog for club and country.

While the team success hasn’t been as common, the Gunners have continued to compete, with Nobbs as the driving force in the middle third.

Honours

Arsenal Women have won 15 league titles. No other club has more than four.

Their 14 FA Cup wins is six more than second-placed Southampton. Arsenal remain the only English club to win the Champions League, with no other side every reaching the final.

Here’s a complete list of Arsenal Women’s honours:

• League titles – 1992-93, 1994-95, 1996-97, 2000-01, 2001-02, 2003-04, 2004-05, 2005-06, 2006-07, 2007-08, 2008-09, 2009-10, 2011, 2012, 2018-19
• FA Cup – 1992-93, 1994-95, 1997-98, 1998-99, 2000-01, 2003-04, 2005-06, 2006-07, 2007-08, 2008-09, 2010-11, 2012-13, 2013-14, 2015-16
• League Cup – 2011, 2012, 2013, 2015, 2017-18
• Champions League – 2006-07

Previous Managers

Arsenal Women have had seven managers in their history. Vic Akers is the one of the most successful football managers of all time with 36 trophies to his name.

The former kitman of the men’s team led the women’s side to 11 of the club’s 15 league titles.

Tony Gervaise succeeded Akers but only lasted for a short period before swapping roles with Laura Harvey.

Harvey made history as the club’s first female coach, and she was followed by Shelley Kerr in 2013. Kerr won more silverware before resigning in 2014, with Pedro Losa taking over.

Losa overhauled the squad with signings and the introduction of young talent. Joe Montemurro took the reins in 2017, winning the Super League in 2018-19, but he departed in 2021 and was replaced by Jonas Eidevall.

• Vic Akers – 1987 to 2009
• Tony Gervaise – 2009 to 2010
• Laura Harvey – 2010 to 2013
• Shelley Kerr – 2013 to 2014
• Pedro Martinez Losa – 2014 to 2017
• Joe Montemurro – 2017 to 2021
• Jonas Eidevall – 2021 to present

*Credit for all of the photos in this article belongs to AP Photo*

FIRST PUBLISHED: 8th November 2021