Premier League

Why Brajan Gruda solves Brighton’s biggest problem
21Aug By Cody AcevedaNo Comments
Features, Premier League

Why Brajan Gruda solves Brighton’s biggest problem

Brighton are entering uncharted territory in the 2024/25 season. For one, their new manager, Fabian Hürzeler, is the youngest ever in Premier League history. More importantly, the 2024/25 season is Brighton’s first season in the Premier League without Pascal Groß.  The Seagulls sold Der Kaiser to his boyhood club Borussia Dortmund for £8m. Groß scored the club’s very first Premier League goal and left as their all-time top Premier League goalscorer and assist man. Not to mention his versatility. Groß played every position apart from goalkeeper during his seven-year spell as a Seagull.  Replacing a player like Groß is impossible, but I think Brighton have done the next best thing by signing Brajan Gruda. Brajan Gruda, the Groß replacement Out of all the skills that made Groß g...
Read More
Transfers: Barca’s Gundogan mistake, Brighton take a huge risk, Juve outsmarting Milan?
20Aug By Kevin ParviziNo Comments
Champions League, Features, LaLiga, Premier League, Serie A

Transfers: Barca’s Gundogan mistake, Brighton take a huge risk, Juve outsmarting Milan?

Did Barcelona make a mistake by signing Ilkay Gundogan? Will Brighton's transfer gamble be worth the reward? And are Juventus getting one over on AC Milan this summer? Here is the latest analysis behind some of world football's hottest transfer news stories. Juventus stealing Pierre Kalulu from AC Milan Juventus had a lot of problems last season, but the defense clearly wasn't one of them. So much so that Gleison Bremer and Danilo were two of the best center backs in Serie A, while Federico Gatti joined Bremer with significant interest from around the Premier League. Still, Juve wanted to land a young center back to potentially start over Gatti for new manager Thiago Motta and then take the reigns as a star in defense from Danilo, who is heading closer to the end at age 33. Alth...
Read More
EPL Burning Questions: Marcus Rashford’s future? Brighton back to Europe? 3 new stars for Aston Villa?
19Aug By Kevin ParviziNo Comments
Features, Premier League

EPL Burning Questions: Marcus Rashford’s future? Brighton back to Europe? 3 new stars for Aston Villa?

Here are five burning questions around the Premier League after the first weekend of action for the 2024/25 season. Can Bukayo Saka be the Player of the Season? Bukayo Saka lost out to title rival Phil Foden for the 2023/24 Premier League Player of the Season award, which didn't sit too well with Liverpool fans (Mohamed Salah) or Arsenal fans. It feels like Saka is underappreciated outside of North London, possibly the victim of his own consistency and unselfish, all-around play as a superstar winger who is just as willing to create, hug the touchline, or even defend as he is to cut inside on his trusty left foot and score. Saka showed that all-around quality in a comfortable 2-0 win for Arsenal against Wolves, and although the performance was nothing less than what Mikel Arteta an...
Read More
10 Premier League players with a point to prove in the 2024/25 season
15Aug By Kevin ParviziNo Comments
Features, Premier League

10 Premier League players with a point to prove in the 2024/25 season

From a trio of Chelsea stars to a high-priced Manchester United duo and even a pair of very talented Manchester City stars, here are ten Premier League players with a major point to prove in the upcoming 2024/25 season. West Ham RB Aaron Wan-Bissaka West Ham purchased Aaron Wan-Bissaka to replace Vladimir Coufal as their next right back, signing the former Crystal Palace man from Manchester United after Noussair Mazraoui rejected the Hammers in order to replace AWB at Old Trafford. The game of right back musical chairs lands West Ham a potentially high-upside starter at right back - at least, higher upside than Coufal - because AWB was one of the top fullbacks in the Premier League during his time with Palace. Wan-Bissaka averaged an astounding 3.7 tackles and 2.4 interceptions p...
Read More
The 5 best Brighton players you need to know for the 2024/25 season
14Aug By Cody AcevedaNo Comments
Features, Premier League

The 5 best Brighton players you need to know for the 2024/25 season

After qualifying for the Europa League in the 2022/23 season, Brighton took a massive step back last season, finishing 11th in the league. The Seagulls have their eyes on qualifying for Europe again this season with new manager Fabian Hürzeler.  People have talked enough about Brighton’s 31-year-old manager; it’s time to look at the players who could take the club back to Europe this season. Here are the five Brighton players you need to know: RW Yankuba Minteh In typical Brighton fashion, the Seagulls may have pulled off the best signing of summer with their purchase of Yankuba Minteh from Newcastle for £30m.  The 20-year-old winger spent all of last season on loan with Arne Slot’s Feyenoord, where he had 10 goals and 5 assists in 27 league matches. He averaged 0.93 goal contribut...
Read More
Who has the better career, Zlatan Ibrahimovic or Robert Lewandowski?
13Aug By Kevin ParviziNo Comments
Bundesliga, Champions League, Features, LaLiga, Ligue 1, Premier League, Serie A

Who has the better career, Zlatan Ibrahimovic or Robert Lewandowski?

Strikers have always been the glamor players in world football, and over the last 20 years, few goal-scorers made as many headlines as Robert Lewandowski and Zlatan Ibrahimovic. Lewandowski is still going strong as one of the best strikers in Spanish football, likely finishing up his career with Barcelona after forcing a move away from Bayern Munich, where he became one of the greatest strikers of all time. Meanwhile, Zlatan, who also played for Barcelona briefly, is retired and enjoying the next step in his career as an executive for AC Milan, one of his former clubs. In fact, Zlatan played for all three powerhouses of Italian football, but perhaps his period was a largely overlooked tenure in Paris as the first face of the Qatari project before the arrivals of Neymar and Kylian Mba...
Read More
Tottenham, Dominic Solanke, and conflating ambition with imprudence
11Aug By Kevin ParviziNo Comments
Features, Premier League

Tottenham, Dominic Solanke, and conflating ambition with imprudence

Tottenham were one of the most active teams in the Premier League in both the last summer and winter transfer windows, bringing in the likes of Guglielmo Vicario and Micky van de Ven to transform their defense while adding James Maddison and Timo Werner as big names to boost the attack. In their first season under Ange Postecoglou, Spurs finished fifth in the Premier League, but to get to that next level and return to the Champions League, Tottenham understood that they would need to make a splash by signing one true star to boost their attack. Their choice appears to be Dominic Solanke of Bournemouth, as Tottenham have agreed to sign the player for a whopping 65 million pounds, replacing Harry Kane's presence in the box two years later. Solanke emerged on the Tottenham transfer r...
Read More
Making sense of Niclas Fullkrug’s sudden transfer to West Ham
10Aug By Kevin ParviziNo Comments
Features, Premier League

Making sense of Niclas Fullkrug’s sudden transfer to West Ham

West Ham made headlines in the Premier League by signing a new No. 9 this summer, pivoting quickly from the increasingly frustrating pursuit of Aston Villa striker prospect Jhon Duran to inking AC Milan target Niclas Fullkrug of Borussia Dortmund (and Werder Bremen) fame. The German international is coming to London at a 27 million euro fee, joining a long list of well-known strikers around European football to make a big-money move to West Ham just when they were starting to get some hype. Let's take a closer look at Fullkrug as a player and make sense of why the Hammers are signing a player past the age of 30 who has never scored 20 goals in a Bundesliga season. Why he left Dortmund Niclas Fullkrug only spent one season at Borussia Dortmund after Edin Terzic advocated to sign the...
Read More
What West Ham fans must know about Guido Rodriguez’s playing style, strengths, and fit
7Aug By Kevin ParviziNo Comments
Features, Premier League

What West Ham fans must know about Guido Rodriguez’s playing style, strengths, and fit

Although Guido Rodriguez was most frequently linked to Barcelona and even seemed to have a deal in place for the Real Betis star before Hansi Flick evidently vetoed the transfer upon his arrival in Catalunya. Therefore, that opened the market wide open for the best free agent defensive midfielder available, and after rumors initially surfaced, West Ham decided to quickly secure the signing of the 30-year-old Argentinian No. 6. to join their midfield options. As West Ham welcome the veteran LaLiga standout to their side, let's take a closer look at how Guido Rodriguez can help the Hammers in the 2024/25 Premier League season as they look to get back to European football after winning the 2022/23 Conference League. Here's a look at Guido's playing style, the strengths that he can br...
Read More
Every Premier League team’s most valuable player heading into the 2024/25 season
4Aug By Kevin ParviziNo Comments
Features, Premier League

Every Premier League team’s most valuable player heading into the 2024/25 season

Addressing the topic of a player's value is extremely difficult in world football, especially when comparing across positions and even ascribing value to a player specific to the team they play for. One way to define "value" is an equivalence to importance. That is to say, a player is valuable because he is important to his team, and the "Most Valuable Player", which is the phrasing Serie A uses for its annual award in a hearken to American sports, is therefore the player who helped his team the most. But in this article ,I'd like to discuss value in a less nebulous but equally challenging realm, which is a player's financial value on the transfer market in a perfect vacuum in which leverage, contract, and overall situation are taken out. Let's take a look at the most valuable pla...
Read More