Throughout the course of the weekend, the LaLiga title race went from wide open, to totally over, to back as it was before a ball had been kicked. Credit to Real Madrid for sticking around while their season is on the brink of imploding around them.
In the Premier League, the title race is nearly officially over, but the race for European places is as competitive as ever. Just two points separate third from seventh, meaning that one bad day at the office could be the difference between a place in the UEFA Champions League and a season full of dates in the UEFA Conference League.
Meanwhile, in the Bundesliga, Germany’s last remaining clubs were knocked out of European competition, but Bayern Munich returned to some sense of normalcy by dismantling a relative minnow.
All that and more in this edition of Weekend Review as Sam Tighe, Alex Kirkland and Constantin Eckner look across Europe for the big takeaways and highlights from the weekend.
Top takeaway: Champions League pressure cranked up on Forest
Nottingham Forest will have watched, with increasing concern, as Manchester City, then Aston Villa and then Chelsea won this weekend. It’s the last thing they needed as they gear up to face Tottenham Hotspur on Monday, knowing that despite a near-perfect season to date, they’ve been dragged back into the fight for a top-five berth — and with every passing week, their grip on one of those places has appeared to slip.
The nature of some of those results will have alarmed the Tricky Trees, too. Chelsea showed a surprising resilience to come from behind and beat rivals Fulham in the 94th minute, Villa dismantled a Newcastle United team that had won five in a row and City — for all their faults — found a way to win again.
Forest, meanwhile, urgently need to set the form book straight: They have not responded well to a couple of key recent injuries, losing twice on the spin. A trip to the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium will not be easy — especially as Spurs just put in their most accomplished performance in months against Eintracht Frankfurt last Thursday — and they’ll be feeling the heat generated by their rivals’ results.
Will the pressure make them or break them?
Best match: Brentford 4-2 Brighton & Hove Albion
Cheekily dubbed the “well-run club derby” on local radio before the game, this match did anything but go to plan. Bryan Mbeumo and Yoane Wissa continued their scoring sprees and the Seagulls refused to quit despite Joao Pedro‘s red card for violent conduct on the hour.
Best goal: Gabriel Martinelli at Ipswich Town
Lesley Ugochukwu (Southampton), Amadou Onana (Villa) and Pedro Neto (Chelsea) all scored phenomenal, thumping efforts this weekend, but there’s just something about the move for Martinelli’s goal for Arsenal that we can’t shake off. It was so precise and so deft, with Mikel Merino‘s brilliant back-heel taking it from “well worked” to “a class above.”
MVP of the weekend: Ollie Watkins, Aston Villa
Watkins delivered a No. 9 masterclass at Villa Park on Saturday. He scored one, assisted another, hit the post, struck the bar and left central defender Fabian Schär utterly dazed by his relentless movement, speed and hold-up play. It was an unbelievable display. — Tighe
Dan Thomas is joined by Craig Burley, Shaka Hislop and others to bring you the latest highlights and debate the biggest storylines. Stream on ESPN+ (U.S. only).
On the pitch, his Real Madrid side crashed out of the Champions League at the hands of Arsenal and he limped off injured late on after attempting a tackle. His participation in next weekend’s Copa del Rey final against Barcelona is now in question.
Off the pitch, things arguably went worse. The striker is the majority owner of French club Stade Malherbe Caen, who lost 3-0 on Friday night to Martigues, a result that officially relegated them to the Championnat National (France‘s third tier) with three games to play.
It marks the end of a disastrous campaign for Caen, who dropped from Ligue 1 to Ligue 2 in 2019, and had hoped for brighter horizons following Mbappé’s takeover. Things have only got worse, though; in January the fans protested against the way the World Cup winner was running the club, and now relegation to the semiprofessional third rung has been confirmed. — Tighe
Beautiful football in a beautiful locale
Looking at the Serie A table, one would not be too impressed by Como‘s position. The team from picturesque Lago di Como are currently 13th in the standings, but that only tells part of the story, because manager Cesc Fàbregas has done a tremendous job in developing a side who feel quite comfortable in possession, recording the seventh-highest average ball possession percentage and the sixth-highest shot output. Unsurprisingly, rumors linking Fàbregas with a club like RB Leipzig have emerged in recent times.
Before the weekend, Como had won their previous two games against Monza and Torino. They faced Lecce at the Stadio Via del Mare on Saturday and beat Marco Giampaolo’s side 3-0. While Como’s defense allowed a number of chances, their attack involving playmaker Nico Paz looked pretty great once again.
Despite the attractiveness of the city and a famous minority owner in Thierry Henry, Como as a club has a ceiling in Serie A. Fàbregas is making sure they hit it as soon as possible. — Eckner
