Another weekend of football cracking, another great set of figures to chew. Here’s the best.
PREMIER LEAGUE
Chelsea and Leicester City started the weekend with a 2-2 draw. Arsenal and Manchester United drew without a goal against Burnley and Wolves respectively, while Tottenham Hotspur surprised Manchester City 2-0. But let’s start with the behemoth that is The Liverpool Football Club.
22
Thanks to their 4-0 win over Southampton, and city’s defeat, Liverpool are 22 points clear of second-placed Manchester City in the PL table. This is the greatest advance a league leader has ever had in English high-flying history.
20
Their domination at home certainly helps. Liverpool have now won their last 20 league games at Anfield; only once in English history top flight has a team had a longer run of victories on home soil – Liverpool themselves between January and December 1972, under Bill Shankly.
Now the rest.
0
Burnley have never led in 11 PL games against Arsenal. Portsmouth are the only team to have played more games against an opponent without ever leading – 14 games against Chelsea.
6
Only Jurgen Klopp (9) has beaten Pep Guardiola more times than Jose Mourinho (6). No other manager has won more than three games against him.
117
Tanzania is the 117th nation to be represented in the PL, with their national team captain Mbwana Samatta making his debut (and scoring) for Aston Villa on Saturday.
6
A statistic that sums up how bizarre this season has been for Arsenal – Only Liverpool (0) have lost fewer games than the Gunners (6) but only Norwich City (4) and Watford (5) have lost.
LA LIGA
Real Madrid maintained their lead at the top of the table with a 1-0 win over Atletico Madrid, Barcelona remains within striking distance with a 2-1 win over Levante. The surprise package of the season, meanwhile, were Getafe. Their 2-0 win at Athletic Bilbao means they are now third in the league.
13
Zinedine Zidane has quietly gone on the resurrection of Real Madrid after their poor performance last season. And it started from the back. Real Madrid have conceded only 13 goals after 22 league games this season, the least they have ever conceded at this stage in the history of the competition.
Bundesliga
Borussia Dortmund beat Union Berlin 5-0, Bayer Leverkusen lost to Hoffenheim 2-1, and RB Leipzig and Borussia Monchengladbach drew 2-2. All this means that normal service has been resumed in Germany – after their 3-1 win over Mainz, Bayern Munich are now leading the league by one point.
7/3
But the headlines were all about a man, a January signing who played only 136 minutes of Bundesliga football. Erling Haaland is the first player in Bundesliga history to score seven goals in his first three appearances. Those seven goals came from his first seven shots on goal in the league.
Serie A
Juventus continue to pace in Serie A, losing 3-0 to Fiorentina by maintaining their three-point lead over Inter Milan, who beat Udinese 2-0.
1
Daniel Maldini is the first player born in the 2000s to play a Serie A game with AC Milan. He is the third generation of Maldinis to play for Milan after Father Paolo and Grandfather Cesare.
11
Romelu Lukaku is the first player in the three-point era by win (since ’94-’95) to score more than 11 goals in his first 11 away appearances in Serie A.
25
With his accolade in Lazio’s 5-1 triumph over SPAL, Ciro Immobile has now scored 25 league goals this season. At this stage of the season, no player in history had any more (Antonio Valentin Angelillo also scored 25 goals for Inter in 1959). The Lazio striker is the first player in the top-5 of the European championships to reach the 25-goal mark this season.
MONTRE MESSI-RONALDO
Cristiano scored two goals, Lionel helped two. Age is just a number, isn’t it?
9
Ronaldo is the first Juve player to score in nine consecutive Serie A appearances since David Trezeguet in December 2005.
50
In the 50 Serie A games that Ronaldo has played so far, he has had a hand in 50 goals (40 goals, 10 assists). No one has scored more since arriving in Italy (tied with Ciro Immobile).
1
With two assists on Sunday, Messi now has the most assists (8) in La Liga this season. He is also the league’s leading scorer (14).