In Today’s CleanSheet:

• Headlines 📌

• What 2 Look 4 👀 

• Hot Topic 🔥🔥🔥- FA Cup

• Off Island 🏝️ - Paramount+ & ESPN+

• Best Bets 💰

Headlines 📌

What’s Up with That. Random things you may be interested in.

• Arsenal. Saw their nice lead at the top of the table disappear and it is most likely their own fault. The Gunners (according to ESPN UK) have committed more errors leading to an opposition goal than any other team in the Premier League in 2023.

• Financial Fair Play - Again. Everton are operating with a 10-point deduction and have called bs on the lack of even application of the rules. Enter Nottingham Forest. Forest have spent $250M on 42 new players since being promoted 2 years ago and some estimate (worldsoccertalk.com) they may be in violation of FFP. Man City has also been accused of FFP violations that have yet to be decided on. Expect more insight and decisions in February.

• Goalies are People Too. Injuries hit Scottish side Arbroath, so they brought on a replacement, GK Ali Adams, as an attacking player, then this happened. (6s X)

• Petr Cech. Leads the PL all time in CleanSheets with 202. Second best is David James at 169. USMNT Keeper Tim Howard had 132 for Man United and Everton. Ederson (30 yo), Man City, has the most for active players, 108.

• Most Goals Conceded in 24 hours. Well, not really, but Man United, Andre Onana and Cameroon have all agreed that he will play for United on 1/14 in the PL and then Cameroon in AFCON on 1/15. (Credit to @trollfootball on x)

• MO Saleh, The Egyptian King. In honor of Saleh’s 150^th and 151^st PL goals, lets look at his current season at Liverpool so far - all stats lead the PL.

  • 14 Goals

  • 8 Assists

  • 22 Goal Involvements

  • 163 Touches in opponents' box

  • 33 Shots on Target

  • 17 Major chances created.

• Speaking of Liverpool. Defender Virgil van Dijk has played in 90 games at Anfield, he has 75W 14D 1L.

• Klopp. Loses his wedding ring post match - then finds it. (30s X)

• James Milner. Made his 632 PL appearance, moving him into a tie for second all time behind Gareth Barry at 653. Milner’s appearances - 230 with Liverpool, 147 with City, 100 with Villa as well as matches at his current club BHA 12, Newcastle and Leeds 18.

• X. As you probably have noticed, the CleanSheet leverages X(Twitter) more than other social media platforms to share content. It seems to be the easiest/fastest way to share. Sites like YouTube have commercials and Websites have cookies/ads/annoying pop-up videos. etc.

So, that being said, here are highly followed X Fan Accounts the CS has found for each PL team. If you have a favorite X Fan Account - please let the CleanSheet know - just reply to this email ([email protected]). In addition, now might be a good time to check out the Season Preview for your favorite team - or check out each team - the Previews have more content like great X follows.

What 2 Look 4 👀- FA Cup

No Matches this weekend. Match Week 21 for each PL team is spread over 10 days.

Match Week 22 will then pick up midweek Tuesday, January 30.

Hot Topic 🔥🔥🔥

With no PL games this weekend - the FA Cup takes center stage.

FA Cup - English Soccer knockout competition open to ALL eligible clubs down to Level 9, roughly 750 teams per tournament. The first 6 rounds are a qualifying competition, where 32 teams progress to round 1. Round 1 involves those teams plus 48 teams from League 1 & 2. The third round then adds the 44 teams from the PL to the Championship. Many consider the FA cup a bigger achievement than winning the PL. The winner qualifies for the following years Europa League. Man City are reigning champions.

• 8 Rounds of Qualifiers have already been played. Teams in the higher leagues are given byes out of many of those rounds.

• 64 Remain. We are now in the Round of 64, like the NCAA tournament, winners will advance to the round of 32, then the sweet 16 etc.

• 32 Matches this weekend. Here are the PL (Tier 1) teams matchups.

  C=Championship (tier2), 1=League 1 (tier3), 2=League 2 (tier4), no designation=PL

Notables

• Maidenstone United is the “lowest league” club remaining, Tier 6, they host Stevenage (1)

• League 1 Side Wigan will host “giant” United.

• Sheffield United travels to League 2 side Gillingham (2).

• 4 PL v PL match ups

• Yes, Wrexham made the top 64 as a League 2 side, Rob & Ryan will be watching as they travel to Shrewsbury Town (1).

• For the full schedule check out The Emirates FA Cup.

Off Island 🏝️

Looking for the fix - check out ESPN+ & Paramount+.

In addition to the FA Cup on ESPN+

• Italy’s Serie A & Spain’s La Liga has a full slate of matches this weekend on Paramount+ and ESPN+.

• Germany’s Bundesliga is off this weekend and will be back January 12 on ESPN+.

Best Bets 💰

CleanSheet Picker Standings

CleanSheet Season Gains/Losses: