It's All Over Now, Baby Blue

Manchester City are officially Premier League Champions.

Kick Off

OK then. Let’s start with the Premier League.

Manchester City clinched the Premier League title on Saturday after Arsenal lost 1-0 to Nottingham Forest.

I’m going to leave it with Aaron Ramsdale to sum up.

Elsewhere, Brighton secure European football for the first time in their history after beating Southampton 3-1. They’ve been such an out and out joy to watch this season and I’m delighted for them.

Incidentally, I’m also pleased that Forest secure their spot in the league. I have a small soft spot for them and feel like they’re a “proper” Premier League team.

On the other hand, another “proper” Premier League team, Leeds United, look in a whole heap of trouble after losing 3-1 to West Ham on Sunday. Tonight could see Leicester’s fate sealed if they fail to win against a buoyant Newcastle United which sees their battle for their status go yet again to the final day when they play Spurs at Elland Road.

Speaking of Spurs… actually, maybe let’s not eh? I know my Spurs pals just want the season over and done with so let’s give them the gift of not talking about them.

It was lovely to see Brentford win however, a good chunk of the reason being that I simply like Brentford a whole deal and adore Thomas Frank. They’ve now won the Battle of West London with neither Fulham nor Chelsea able to catch them.

Chelsea indeed secured, if we can use that word for a negative, a bottom half finish for the first time in… ages? [Ed. please check this]. They’ve had such a weird and woeful season and you wonder what on earth is going to happen at the club in the Summer.

Finally, Liverpool legend Roberto Firmino ended his last game in style with a goal that has given the team, to some chagrin, a spot in the Europa League. Now I understand the disappointment of not getting UCL but the Europa League is genuinely good fun. Thursday games are tiring sure but embrace it! Enjoy it! There’ll be some fun away days!

Right then, Europe!

I feel like there’s not much worth talking about when it comes to La Liga (apart from the obvious which I’ll address below) nor really Serie A, which we can’t really get a proper handle on until the Juve saga and potential points deduction is concluded.

I will say however that it was lovely to see Olivier Giroud scoring a hattrick against Sampdoria with goals from Leão and Brahim to add to the 5-1 thumping. Napoli Inter was also fun for the final half hour. I watched Dortmund Augsburg and so it was 1-0 when I turned it on and it certainly kicked off after that, ending 3-1 to Napoli.

I also dipped into the Primeira Liga and watched a bit of Benfica Sporting last night. A win would have secured the title for Benfica but they could only draw meaning that Porto have a slim chance of snatching it on the last day.

In France PSG could also have secured the revolting Hexagoal (truly, it is a heinous trophy) but Lens also won. With two games left, Lens could still do it, if PSG drop points and they win both their games. Will it happen? Probably not. But as always, we can hope!

Lastly then, Germany.

The Meisterschale is going down to the last day after Bayern were felled by Leipzig and Dortmund, eventually, beat Augsburg. This puts Dortmund at the top of the table, two points clear of Bayern. They just need to beat Mainz. Mainz who I watched get thumped by relegation threatened Stuttgart on Sunday. One more game. Just. One. More. Game. 🙏🏼

The final final thing I want to talk about in this section is the utterly astonishing game of football many of us were lucky to witness on Thursday.

Sure, I watched Newcastle Brighton but thanks to a prompt from Kelly Cates who was hosting the game, I switched over to Sky Sports Football for the second leg of the League One play-off match between Sheffield Wednesday and Peterborough United.

Peterborough led 4-0 after the first leg, and it felt like a mountain to climb. They got their first break after only nine minutes with a penalty, this was followed by another goal after 25 minutes and third after 71. It felt like a lost cause going into stoppage time with the score at 3-4 on aggregate. Then Palmer somehow managed to bundle home a goal on 90+8 which sent Hillsborough into raptures and frankly, I’m choking up just thinking about it too.

The ground was silenced after 105 minutes when Wednesday scored an own goal, only to respond just seven minutes later to re-tie the game.

It went to penalties which Wednesday won, with cool heads and some great spot kicks, and Peterborough hitting the crossbar.

The scenes of jubilation afterwards were incredible.

Darren Moore, Wednesday’s manager, had been the victim of online racist abuse following their first leg defeat and it was such a beautiful, karmic thing to see him take his team to the final. The gushing praise for him afterwards from everyone was wonderful to hear as well.

Half Time

There’s only one subject worth talking about here this week and that’s the continual racist abuse of Vinicius Jr in La Liga and the pathetic treatment he receives from authorities. He has Carlo’s support, he has his teammates’ support, I’m sure he has a big swathe of support in his own fanbase (I’m excluding anyone who says he “shouldn’t react” here or that “yes it’s bad but he does also antagonise them”. No) but does the have the support of La Liga? Of the Spanish press? The Spanish media? It very much seems not and it’s disgusting. I’ll leave the final words of this section to the man himself.

Full Time

I think we were all surprised when Graeme Souness quit Sky Sports a few weeks ago with no warning or any detailed explanation. One of the things he mentioned though was that he was launching a big charity thing and today he’s on the sofa circuit promoting it. He’s going to be swimming the English Channel in support of the charity DEBRA. You can read all about it here on the page to donate as well as watching a very emotional video with Graeme and a sufferer of EB.

In response to a tweet complaining about the quality of next year’s UCL and the teams in it, a very Football Twitter conversation occurred

Graham Kelly is to blame for the Victorian attitude to players taking their shirt off in celebration

After Spurs’ capitulation to Brentford and before the women’s team game which the stadium was also hosting as part of a double header, End of Season awards were handed out…

oh no

After the news that City’s lawyers were trying to stop the case against them due to one of the prosecuting barristers being an Arsenal fan, I took the opportunity to use my two favourite fans this season in a tweet

The logo for the 2026 World Cup in Canada, the US and Mexico was revealed last week. Yeah.

Shirt of the Week

This week’s shirt is the MLS Pride pre-match jersey. Look how pretty it is!

Thirst Trap

No specific Thirst Trap this week, instead I thought I’d present my Premier League Hot XI.

It was in response to a tweet where this was the team. It made me shake with annoyance. Just an absolutely outrageous selection. There are two here on mine and some are OK I guess but bloody hell.

Here is mine. Yes you’ve probably seen it on Twitter already but I think you can agree it’s far superior! And I’ve got subs.

And that’s your lot for this week! I think next week will be a round up of the season so please please message me or tweet me with your favourite moments as there’s no way I’ll remember them all.

Until then, have lovely weeks all!