CS EPL Summer Season 6.26

REMINDER - CS is on SUMMER HOURS 

• The Schedule You Should Expect - CS will be 1X weekly, with occasional breaking news content during the offseason.

• Season Previews to begin in late July, daily, leading up to MW1.

• Match Week 1. PL Season 2024/25 kicks off August 17 and we will be back to our Tuesday, Friday Schedule.

Clean Sheet will be looking to grow in Year 2 - PLEASE SHARE by giving the following link for those to sign up - OR - respond to this email with an email to sign up.

In Today’s CleanSheet:

• Summer Headlines ☀️📌

• Euro2024🌍

• Copa America🌎

Summer Headlines ☀️📌

• Buying. Selling. Lots of player movement and rumors. For the latest, check out Sky Sport live transfer center.

• Tree Becomes Fox. Steve Cooper officially became Leicester City’s manager. Cooper had a successful run with Nottingham Forest leading them to promotion and then keeping them up. He was sacked last season as Forest did not take a step-up, finishing one spot ahead of relegation. A big reason Cooper was hired, his experience in the PL and fighting to keep a side up. Will be interesting watching the fan base to see if they connect with Cooper, who moves less than 30 miles south (Nottingham to Leicester) in the East Midlands of England.

• PL Managers. Is this the last of manager movement before the upcoming season? On the surface you would think all the clubs are set for next season, but history tells us to expect at least one more move, which would be surprising.

  • Next Manager to go based on “rumors” - Thomas Frank (Brentford), Marco Silva (FFC), Eddie Howe (Newcastle).

  • The 2023/24 PL season saw 8 managerial moves. That is about average - here are the last 7 seasons manager movement - 8, 11, 9, 8, 5, 8, 10.

  • For comparison, the Championship is much more volatile, over the last 7 seasons 22, 26, 16, 16, 12, 14, 16 managers have left.

  • 11 managers have been in their current PL role 1 year or less.

  • 4 managers have more than 3 years

    • Pep with 8 years at City.

    • Thomas Frank at Brentford at 6 years.

    • Mikel Arteta at Arsenal at 4+ years.

    • Marco Silva at Fulham at 3 years.

• June 30, 2024. Several PL clubs have until the end of the month to improve their Financial Fair Play standing or they will be at risk of starting the season with negative points or be spending part of the season wondering if they will lose points. Something to keep an eye on as we get closer to the start of the season.

  • FFP Basics - see Hot Topic from Match Week 2.

  • For a little more - see Hot Topic from Match Week 10.

• Profit. A Definition. A financial gain, especially the difference between the amount earned and the amount spent in buying, operating, or producing something.

  • For the first time in 6 years Championship (the league below the PL) made more money in revenue than they spent on wages. Across the 24 teams’ revenue was north of $940M, however other expenses mean the clubs in the Championship together had losses exceeding $400M. This means owners are covering the losses in hopes of a payday with a promotion to the PL.

  • For comparison, wages in the PL surpassed $5B as clubs took in close to a combined $8B.

Euro2024🏆🏆🏆

For all things Euro’s, check out the official UEFA website here.

CS Takeaways from the competition so far…..

• Best punishment for finishing last. @FBAwayDays (X) found this guy - who lost his Fantasy Football League and had to go to the England v Denmark match in a full-on Scotland kit, wig and all, with the name “McShitAtFPL" on the shirt.

• Culture & National Pride. Is it just the CS or is there a big difference between teams that seem to be treating their national team involvement as a sideshow/boondoggle and those that are they to play for their country? Sure seems like it.

• In Parallel. In order to keep the competition fair, the final matches of a group are played at the exact same time so no team can see the result of another match and change the way they play. And, this is the kind of excitement you can get - goals in stoppage time that change the group standings.

  • Here is a GREAT 1 min on the SEVEN changes in Group D as the matches went on.

  • In Group C, nothing changed, until it did.

    • Germany scores at 90’ to draw Switzerland and win the Group.

    • Hungary scores at 100’ to beat Scotland.

• Luka Modric Cam. Just keep playing, what a cool 60s and Croatia take the lead over Italy.

• Italy. But then the reigning Euro champs knock out Modric and Croatia.

  • From OUT to IN at 98’

    • In English

    • In Italian

    • The great Giorgio Chiellini reaction

• Speaking of Italy, What a National Anthem. Italy just has style and culture.

Current Status for Round of 16 Match Ups.

Biggest thing to notice - one side of the bracket is stacked with historical favorites - Spain, Germany, Portugal, France.

CS “Rankings” and assessment in a couple words or less

Looking Like Contenders

• Germany - Home, solid.

• Spain - Young, in form.

• Portugal - Experienced, gelling.

Must Find Another Gear

• England - Lackluster, underachieving.

• Netherlands - Sloppy, energetic.

• Switzerland - Unkown’s, spoilers.

• France - Underachieving, lacking.

Any Given Day

• Italy - Typical, defensive.

• Austria - Overachieving, dangerous.

• Denmark - Winless, lossless.

Incomplete

• Belgium - Tired, need more

• Turkey - Improved, opportunistic

• The rest - hoping for a wildcard.

Copa America🌎

You can find the standings and more at Copa America 2024.

USMNT

• Solid Start. Should’ve beat Bolivia and did 2-0, could’ve been more, but took care of business and Pulisic looked like the real deal leading the team.

• Next Up

  • Thursday June 27 v Panama 5pm in Mercedes Benz Stadium Atlanta

  • Monday July 1 v Uruguay 8pm at Arrowhead Stadium Kansas City

  • If the USMNT gets out of the group they would play Saturday July 6 in either Allegiant Stadium in Vegas or State Farm Stadium in Phoenix most likely against Colombia or Brazil.

On The Pitch

• Brazil disappoints, drawing with Costa Rica. While Brazil dominated the play, Los Ticos frustrated Brazil all night.

• Argentina looks every part of the favorite.

• Colombia also looks the part beating Paraguay 2-1. That’s 24 unbeaten for the Colombians. The goals were scored by two Crystal Palace players - Daniel Munoz and Jefferson Lerma.

• Uruguay beat Panama 3-1 under legendary Argentine manager Marcelo Bielsa who managed Leeds United back to the PL 2 years ago.

Atmosphere over Attendance

A lot of discussion around the Copa America has been the attendance of matches in the US. The USMNT played in Dallas at Jerry World and had under 50,000 fans in an 80,000-seat stadium.

Just looking at the videos and pictures, there are LOTS of empty seats in these stadiums and the atmosphere is just not there. In fact, it’s reported the first 6 matches had only 65% attendance. It’s really bad optics.

Now, compare that to the atmosphere and sold-out venues in Germany for the Euro’s and there are a lot of frustrated people, including US soccer fans.

• Interesting article from Worldsoccertalk.com.

• Another talking ticket prices and pointing out the average attendance at Copa is actually larger than the Euro’s.

Quick CS Take -

It’s not about attendance, it’s about ATMOSPHERE. And, many things can be true at the same time.

• Euro’s atmosphere is elite and much more interesting than Copa.

• European soccer culture is way better than the US, by a mile.

• Copa can’t compare to Euro’s, and it’s clear as they are overlapping.

• Euro’s would sell out stadiums double the size.

• Messi is THE draw. Then other South American teams and Mexico whose fans live in the US (Colombia, Brazil), then the USMNT. Some Copa’s will have BIG attendance, others will have small.

• Copa is doing pretty well and will highlight what needs to be done before the US hosts the World Cup in 2 years.

Also,

• Travel is easier for the European sides to get to Germany, cheaper too.

• All the venues are in a much smaller geography, easier to get around.

• Travel and venue costs are much more in the US and to get to the US.

• The stadiums in the US are MUCH bigger than the stadiums in Germany, so while they are not full, there are good numbers attending but the atmosphere is nowhere near what it could be.

• Copa is seeing some good numbers. Over 3M people, peaking at 4M, tuned in to the USMNT match versus Bolivia. That is the largest audience to watch a soccer match on FOX in the US. But remember, that is 1/3 the number of people to watch the NFL….draft.