A few life notes:
She got here. At 8:04 in the morning on the first of September, a 6 pound bundle of sass kicked in the door of my life. She is glorious even when fussy. And just look at those tiny fingers. Labor? Pretty fast. Delivery? Pretty smooth. Adjustments and recovery? Ehhhh. Getting there.
She is not named Bartola. But I do call her Bartie when her mom isn’t listening. I feel like all good movie girl dads always have a name only they call their daughters. In fact, I am pretty sure that’s the way Hollywood tells you they’re good dads. Examples (for and against) in the comments, please.
I wrote the bulk of this last week. (In the period of my life I’ll call the Before After Times. As opposed to something like 2017, which was the Before Before Times.) There are some current events I’d like to cover, like the Brazil-Argentina World Cup Qualifier, the US Men’s National Team shitting the bed (just like my kid did last night!) … and there was another thing I forget because I haven’t slept in *checks watch* 7 days!?! It’s been 7 days already!?! Maybe those things will show up in the second newsletter this week.
And now, a basic primer on the Premier League. This got way longer than I thought it could. So it’s light on history.
Other planned explainers in my mind are: The English Football Pyramid and the Cups 101, Premier League 201 - History, Premier League 301 - The Clubs at a Glance, World Cup Qualifying 101. Other 101.
A few topical notes:
This is going to be boring and droll, probably. But sometimes, the basic facts just are.
I know I slip back and forth some between Queen’s Football English and American English in some of my posts. I would never judge someone for using one or the other, but in these explainers, I’m going to try to go a bit more to the Queen’s Football side. Because, again, my goal is to make you not the dumbest person in the pub. And part of that is not making all the dumb American soccer fan mistakes I did (do).
So, for example, on these explainers, I’ll say things like, “Chelsea are going to try to sit back and make you beat them,” instead of “Chelsea is going to sit back and make you beat them.”
I will not, however, type things like “favourite,” and “colour.” Because you’re not spelling when you’re talking in the pub. Also, fuck u.
I might make some of these explainers insultingly basic. That’s because when I got into this I knew nothing. You probably know more. So gloat in that.
Have you ever met a kid that had their GI Joes playing with their Transformers and then Batman swoops in and you just want to pick up all their toys and say, “THESE GUYS AREN’T IN THE SAME UNIVERSE!!!” and run away and tell the kid they can have all their toys back when they learn to behave?
Well, club football (especially in Europe) can feel a lot like that. We’re just going to deal with the English Premier League in this explainer, but 99 percent of it will carry over to Germany’s Bundesliga or France’s Ligue 1 (“un”) or Italy’s Serie A (It’s pronounced just about like “Syria,” just with a little pause between the “Syri” and the “ah.”) or Spain’s La Liga.
For all intents and purposes don’t apply this explainer to MLS. It’s unlike these leagues in a whole lot of fundamental ways. (But still enjoyable.) It’s like a bunch of Americans devised a soccer league.
I’ll try to not make any statements that cause me to have to later say, “Well, actually, I said this never happens, but here’s when that happens.”
I will likely fail and say something I have to walk back in a future explainer on something else.
Here we go
The basic unit of professional soccer in Europe is the club. The club I support is Liverpool. Currently, Liverpool’s men play in the English Premier League. The Premier League is the highest division of club football in England (and Wales). This is sometimes called the top flight.
The guys you see playing on NBCSN, Peacock and NBC, are the First Team. Underneath that, you’ve got the Under 23 squad, the Under 18 squad and the Academy, where kids as young as 9 get started in the system.
Alongside the First Team, you have the Women.
“Technically, ” the Premier League started play with the 1992-1993 season. There are 20 clubs in the Premier League. Unlike American sports leagues, there are always 20 clubs in the Premier League. Which is to say there is no expansion or contraction.
This year, the Premier League membership looks like this:
(Location in parenthesis) ”non-obvious pronunciations in quotes” [Common names you might hear them called in brackets]
Arsenal (London)
Aston Villa (Birmingham) “Vill-uh” [Villa]
Brentford (London)
Brighton and Hove Albion (Brighton) [Brighton]
Burnley
Chelsea (London)
Crystal Palace (London) [Palace]
Everton (Liverpool)
Leeds United (Leeds) [Leeds]
Leicester City (Leicester) “Lester” [Leicester]
Liverpool (Liverpool)
Manchester City (Manchester) [Man City or City]
Manchester United (Manchester) [Man U or United]
Newcastle United (Newcastle on Tyne) [Newcastle]
Norwich City (Norwich) [Norwich]
Southampton (Southampton)
Tottenham Hotspur (London) [Tottenham or Spurs]
Watford (Watford)
West Ham United (London) [West Ham]
Wolverhampton Wanderers (Wolverhampton) [Wolves]
Just for a frame of reference I often lose sight of: The population of England is 55 million1. The population of the US is 330 million. So it’s as if ~one-sixth of the US is supporting two-thirds the teams of the MLB.2
Further, the area of England is 50,000 square miles. The area of the state of Alabama is 52,000 square miles.
So, the Premier League is taking the state of Alabama and adding 18 more War Eagles and Roll Tides IN THE SAME SQUARE FOOTAGE. Only with 100 to 125 years of build up. And if Auburn and Alabama had been on different sides of the Civil War.
It’s easy for me to just take the Premier League as another part of my sports diet. But it’s really not that on the other side of the pond.
The season
Premier League seasons run from August to May. Every team plays every other team twice in the League; once at home and once away. So that makes the season 38 matches.
Within the season, there are typically 4 international breaks. For the purposes of the Premier League, this just means there aren’t any matches on those 4 weeks.
Obviously, the point of football is to score more goals than the other team. But just like you’d never say, “the Yankees beat the Mets by 2 points last night,” you’d never say “City beat Arsenal by 5 points this weekend.”
And here’s why: If a club wins a match, they receive 3 points in the standings. If they draw (tie), both clubs get one point. If a club loses, they receive 0 points in the standings.
The standings are called “the table.” A record that is 5-4-1 would be 5 wins, 4 ties and 1 loss, or in QE, Won, Drawn, Lost. And while we’re on the subject of how to read things, the home team is listed first, even in MLS.
So that 5-4-1 record would net out to 19 points. (5*3) + (4*1) + (1*0). So the table is ranked by points. And then, the first tiebreaker is goal differential. So if 5-4-1 there had scored 20 goals and allowed 10, their GD would be 10.
The end of the season
At the end of the 38 game Premier League season, that’s it. There are no playoffs. The Premier League Champion is the team with the most points at the end of playing every other team twice. Ties get decided by Goal Differential, then by Goals Scored. If they’re still tied then, they’re awarded the same position in the table.
But we’re playing for more here than just determining that year’s champion.
In a simple universe, the top 4 teams for the 2021-2022 season will advance to the 2022-2023 UEFA Champions League. (Usually just called “the Champions League.”) That’s right. This year’s team will qualify for next year’s competition.
The 5th place team in the Premier League will advance to the 2022-2023 UEFA Europa League. (Usually just called “Europa.”) Again, it’s this year’s team qualifying for next year’s competition.
ANNNND, the 6th place team in the 2021-2022 Premier League will advance to the 2022-2023 UEFA Europa Conference League.
I’m also going to point out that we don’t live in a simple universe and sometimes that can become a mess.
Extra credit
Here’s the non-simple universe situation: The winner of the 2021-2022 Champions League will be automatically qualified for the 2022-2023 Champions League. And, the winner of the 2021-2022 UEFA Europa League automatically qualifies for the 2022-2023 Champions League.
So, if you finish 5th (or 6th or 7th or whatever) in the 2021-2022 Premier League, but you win the 2021-2022 Champions League, you’ll get one of the spots in the 2022-2023 Champions League. Same thing if you win the UEFA Europa League. You automatically qualify for the next year’s Champions League spot.
And if you win the 2021-2022 UEFA Europa Conference League, you qualify for the 2022-2023 UEFA Europa League.
And you thought the Bowl Championship Series was daffy. At least that was used to qualify and seed teams for games that same roster of players would be playing in.
Fin
That’s all I’ve got in the tank right now. I’m 99 percent sure I’ve got a diaper to change. Because of course I do.
Yes, I am ignoring Wales in these numbers. Because they’re inconsequential and only very slightly figure into this comparison. I can’t wait to see my hate mail from the Welsh. It’ll look like this, “JnnwerasdfnasrRDFgtvaeasvve! fHnviewnvveswersdd? GNIOAGNEAGEWR!”
Before you bring up MiLB, just save it for the Football Pyramid explainer.
The 20 Alabamas in Alabama anaology is brilliant. Been watching EPL for about 5 years and I never really thought about how many top flight teams are squeezed into limited real estate. It explains a lot actually. And contrasts. Enjoy these days, they go waaaaaaay faster than you can imagine. She'll be asking for the car keys before you know it!
glad the young one came through healthy and happy! and genuinely great explainer dude!
just adding in here because you nodded at it with the "technically," - and maybe you're going to hit all of this in the Football Pyramid breakdown - but yeah, any time commentators (esp on NBC) talk about "Premier League records" take it with a huge grain of salt y'all.
the "Premier League" is a) not in any significant way different to the former "Football League First Division" and b) was created so that the clubs could seize lucrative TV money without sharing it with the rest of England's football pyramid [a system unique to England, which is part of why it has become the richest league in the world while Serie A and La Liga struggle to compete outside the top clubs]. It's also why promotion and relegation is such a GIGANTIC deal in England, in ways that will definitely be in the pyramid chat.
this generally annoys me cuz the propaganda machine on NBC say that Manchester United have the most "Premier League" titles with 13, but Liverpool have won the first division (including the Premier League, which they kept saying we'd "never won" lol) 19 times, just one behind the Red Devils (Manchester United).
as I likely will often note in these comments... capitalism is dumb and invents new stuff to replace stuff that was just fine and should have been left alone