Tactics Tom is in charge for England the results were the same and the football was not scintillating but it was tactically distinct and interesting to discuss. So we had Grace Robertson of graceonfootball.com join us to discuss it. Support the showBy Mike Goodman and Michael Caley

We are joined by the Athletic's Adam Crafton to discuss his and his colleagues' reporting on Manchester United, what's happened since Jim Ratcliffe took over, what they claim they're doing and what it means for the club. And then we also discuss the increasingly explicit American political context of the upcoming World Cup and international soccer …

We are joined by financial journalist (and soccer and cycling fan) Ben Walsh to learn about the great sport of road racing, the background of INEOS as a sports ownership group, and how fans of cycling were well ahead of the curve on what to expect from Ratcliffe at Manchester United. Check out Ben's newsletter, The Bender: https://bendwalsh.substac…

Big matches in the Serie A title race get their due and then we talk about the team with the best underlying numbers in the Premier League recently, which as you surely all know is Crystal Palace. Palace: https://bsky.app/profile/scott.cannonstats.com/post/3ljdm73v3wn2o Ovalle: https://bsky.app/profile/lawsonsv.bsky.social/post/3ljjheamocs26 Suppor…

Huge six-pointers all around and we take stock of the teams we covered last week (City, Forest, Newcastle, Chelsea, Bournemouth) and ask how much we need to think further about Brighton and Villa after they made up ground. Simon Tinsley's PL projections: https://analytic-fpl.streamlit.app/ Support the show…

There are probably right now five teams in a race for three spots. We take a close look at Nottingham Forest, Chelsea, City, Bournemouth and Newcastle and handicap the race. It's a close one! Simon's projection website: https://analytic-fpl.streamlit.app/ Support the show

We wrote an article on financialization and soccer for Bloomberg, and it helped us crystallize our thinking on the state of the business of football. On labor costs and competition, on regulation and financialization, on Covid-era changes in the economic environment, on oligarch and state ownership and what it means for solidarity in the capital cl…

After multiple contradictory developments, Tottenham landed Mathys Tel on loan from Bayern and also signed a deal with Bayern and Tel for an option that remains hard to pin down. We talk about the story here and how it probably went down (we disagree a little on this!) and what kind of player Tel is and what Tottenham can expect. Support the show…

Two big matches between teams in the chase for the Champions League places. What we learned from City's new tactical approach, how Chelsea approached this match, and how Bournemouth won big. Support the showBy Mike Goodman and Michael Caley

Another weekend, another loss, another tumble further into the bottom half of the table for Tottenham and United. We talk about the problem of what a club should do when things are bad and yet there isn't a lot to be done immediately and they really just need a longer-term strategy or better execution of such. Support the show…

Manchester City are adding Omar Marmoush, Abdukodir Khusanov, Vitor Reis in the same window and maybe also Andrea Cambiaso. Will these signings fix the crisis at Man City? Support the show

Usually when things look a little funky in the Premier League table, you can count on an analytics podcast to tell you it's mostly variance. But this season, the wide open race for top four or five really reflects a pile-up of pretty good teams. We walk through these contenders and how they've gotten here. Support the show…

A new financial fair play / registration crisis at Barcelona as a judge backs La Liga's determination that they cannot register Dani Olmo under La Liga FFP, setting him up for free agency. But Barcelona's financial situation has changed a lot in the last couple years, and the possible negative effects of this are not as stark as they were potential…

It is still the most interesting statistical and tactical story in the Premier League. In world football probably. Pep Guardiola is trying some new tweaks on his system and his team keeps dropping points. We talk through what's changed since the slide began, what happened against Everton, and what to expect in the transfer window. Support the show…

Leicester City fired Steve Cooper a few weeks ago, and this weekend the two managers in 19th and 20th place in the Premier League, Gary O'Neil of Wolves and Russell Martin of Southampton, both got the sack. We take a look at the very different stories of these three clubs, what we expect from the relegation race this season, and the trend of defens…

Jim Ratcliffe sacked his Sporting Director Dan Ashworth after a pretty short term. It is not a hopeful moment for the new football system at United. We discuss what we know about how their football operations work and then move from there to talking about new manager Ruben Amorim, his system, and how the players are fitting together. Adam Crafton a…

It's a very exciting season in Italy, with multiple teams in touching distance of first place and no obvious favorite yet in December. We walk through Napoli, Atalanta, Inter, Fiorentina, Juventus, Lazio and Milan. Support the showBy Mike Goodman and Michael Caley

Five losses in a row, three in the league. And it's not really a five-match thing, the losses are somewhat fluky but performances have been down badly at City ever since Rodri got injured. We break down what's (relatively) wrong with City and why we're skeptical it can be wholly fixed. Support the show…

We are joined by official Double Pivot English Correspondent Grace Robertson to discuss the new England manager Thomas Tuchel (who is not actually managing England yet) and what to expect from this team over the coming World Cup cycle. Support the showBy Mike Goodman and Michael Caley

(This is a subscriber episode from October, now unlocked for all listeners.) Poker pro Jonathan Jaffe joins the pod to talk all things stats and the practical ways we think about using probability to make decisions. See the GTO LAB podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@GTOLAB Support the showBy Mike Goodman and Michael Caley

The first manager sacked in the Premier League is Manchester United's Eric Ten Hag. He has not done a particularly good job, but there are few hallmarks of good process in his sacking. Support the show

We talk about Liverpool - Chelsea, City's struggles, Arsenal's, well, you know, and whether there is truly a big three in the Premier League as we expected. And then on to the real stuff: the Netflix romantic comedy Nobody Wants This, on which we have so many takes. Support the show

We take questions from the Double Pivot discord on these topics, we remember some center backs who scored goals, and we fight the urge to throw out the script and do a pod on Nobody Wants This. Support the show

It's in our wheelhouse.* What exactly did a legal review panel find in relation to the Premier League's "associated party transaction" rules, why are City and the PL spinning this ruling so aggressively, what is an ownership loan anyhow, and what's to come next for the financial regulation of English soccer? * we also learn the etymology of 'wheelh…

In the Premier League this season, a number of the most striking team stories appear to be, when you dig into the data, fundamentally tactical stories. This means we're talking about Ten Hag and Ange and how Spurs and United have been playing, but also we look at the major shifts in style of play at Chelsea and Crystal Palace and what Fabian Hurzel…

An extremely strange match, and one in which Manchester City's tactical approach to the second half most particularly deserves analysis. But the draw and the injury to Rodri in the first half leave us with a peculiarly wide open Premier League title race. Much to discuss! Support the show

The Premier League has four matchdays done, and that means we have just enough data to be dangerous. What's going on with Liverpool. Nottingham Forest, Southampton, Spurs and Arsenal? Support the show

Todd Boehly and Behdad Eghbali are fighting over Chelsea. We break down the exact financial relationships here and the context for their fight, and what it tells us about the business of football in the modern era and what might come next for Chelsea. Support the show

Saudi Arabia alter their course but continue to struggle, we end up going deep on PSG's transfer window, and how wages end up getting treated differently from transfer fees in the market. We're still trying to make sense of a bunch of things! Support the showBy Mike Goodman and Michael Caley

The US Men's National Team has a new coach. He's a good one. We look back on the trajectory of Pochettino's career, his tactical ideas, and what it might mean for the USMNT. Support the showBy Mike Goodman and Michael Caley

The one with Chelsea. Also Everton and Fulham and the previews of the rest of the league will be available to subscribers on the Patreon. Support the showBy Mike Goodman and Michael Caley

All 20 teams in the Premier League and it starts here. We're going in alphabetical order and talking about how it could go right and how it could go wrong for AFC Bournemouth, Arsenal, Aston Villa, Brentford and Brighton. Support the show

We keep waiting for the summer transfer window to shake out and it keeps not. The best example of this is how Victor Osimhen is not only still a Napoli player but does not seem to be particularly close to becoming a player on another big team. We have some theories about what's slammed the breaks on the transfers. Support the show…

A reasonably comprehensive 2-1 Spain victory ends the Euros. We break down how Spain got it done and why England never managed to click into gear the whole tournament. And we look to future for the top European sides, what questions do we have heading into the next World Cup for England, Spain, Germany and France? Support the show…

Well those were certainly four football matches. Another discussion of what's wrong with England, why the Netherlands struggled with Turkiye and what it might mean for the semifinal, and then there's the other semifinal! Why Portugal-France was so bad, an elegy for Portugal's wasted tournament, the big Mbappe question, how Spain barely survived, wh…

The Copa America is over for the USMNT after just three matches. It was pretty dumb. We consider what we learned, if anything, from this tournament and what the US should do now with limited competitive matches before 2026. And some bonus Uruguay and Italy takes. Support the showBy Mike Goodman and Michael Caley

England and a number of other countries. What's wrong with England and why they're still the favorites, some depressive Italy/Switzerland takes, Netherlands pretty good, and accountability for our Lawnball picks. Support the show

The favorites mostly keep winning, but all the different ways they're winning are worth some discussion. England, Italy, Germany, Spain, Netherlands, and Switzerland, a lot to whip through! Support the show

We've got a full Euros preview for you in three parts. Part 1 covering groups A and B is right here with takes on the highly competitive Group B of Spain, Italy and Croatia, on the enigma that is Germany and Nagelmann's plan to make them even weirder, and I guess Switzerland is there too. You can read Grace's newsletter at graceonfootball.com. Supp…

The double-correspondent triple-podcast blowout draft commences. We are joined by Salacious Gossip Correspondent Joel Wertheimer (@wertwhile) and Financial Shenanigans Correspondent Skanda Amarnath (@irvingswisher) to draft the very worst contracts in the Premier League. Support the showBy Mike Goodman and Michael Caley

Barcelona, Juventus, Bayern and Chelsea appear to have lined up their managers. It's not exactly what we expected. Some takes on how the managerial market has changed in the last few years as well as our skepticism about these choices for most of the clubs involved. Support the showBy Mike Goodman and Michael Caley

We talk briefly about the Champions League final and then take a question from the discord about fullback / wingback transfers which segues into a longer discussion about trends in buildup structure and pressing in top level football and the diverse expectations of wide defenders in these systems. Support the show…

A mailbag question on what the team of the season is, excluding players on the richest clubs, prompts a discussion of what "non big six" should mean anyhow, and then we get moving on talking about some great striker seasons. Support the showBy Mike Goodman and Michael Caley

We are joined by Grace Robertson of www.graceonfootball.com to discuss Liverpool, who have chosen a manager. What do we know about Arne Slot, what's intriguing and what's worrying, and how do we think Liverpool are approaching the current transition? Support the showBy Mike Goodman and Michael Caley

We've been doing our Champions League match breakdowns for subscribers, and this week it's the free podcast. Pretty good match! Support the showBy Mike Goodman and Michael Caley

A lot is happening right now in the administration of the game of football. There's a proposal for a Premier League salary cap, and we discuss what exactly this means, why it's so very different from PSR, and whether it stands any chance of succeeding. And there's the government regulator, which we have both become convinced will not happen in the …

A big weekend in the title race, Liverpool and then Arsenal lost winnable home matches in succession and it was highly dramatic, but it seems far from obvious to us that we learned much from the drama. Support the show

The club is in an odd spot. They're at risk of relegation, and worse, relegation would probably be a death sentence for Everton Football Club as an operation. But they're also pretty good? With some valuable assets to sell? And a good manager? If it weren't for everything else... So we discuss how we would approach the problem of running Everton. S…

We take questions from the mailbag on how we watch games, on Jeremy Doku and Brennan Johnson, and then we end up building an entire theory of the intersection of player development and modern tactics in the development of really fast guy wingers. Support the showBy Mike Goodman and Michael Caley

Part Two of our conversation with official Double Pivot Financial Shenanigans Correspondent Skanda Amarnath (@irvingswisher). And while there are a lot of important details, there's a simple takeaway. Chelsea's PSR crunch is significantly worse than has been generally reported. Support the show