Matchweek 4 - Breaking the deadlock

Introduction  

Rich: Hello my name’s Rich and welcome to our weekly round-up section called ‘This Week’ on Premier Skills English.  

Jack: Hi there. I’m Jack. That’s right. We’re going to discuss all the latest football action from Matchweek 4 in the Premier League.

Rich: And not only that because we’ve also got lots of interesting words and phrases to help you talk about football in English.

Jack: And we want you to use and practise these phrases by interacting with Premier League fans from around the world in our comments section.

Rich: You can find all our latest content on the Premier Skills English homepage or the Premier Skills-British Council Facebook page.

Jack: Let’s start with this week’s headlines!

Headlines

Rich: United are in the pink with win at Burnley.

Jack: Wearing their new pink away shirt, Manchester United got back to winning ways with a comfortable 2-0 win at Burnley. Romelu Lukaku broke the deadlock after 27 minutes with a fine header and added a second just before the break. Lukaku could have had a hat-trick as United had plenty of chances on the break in the second half.

Rich: Hornets sting Spurs in comeback win.

Jack: Watford continued their 100% start to the season with a big win against Tottenham. Spurs took the lead through an own goal, but goals from the captain, Troy Deeney and defender, Craig Cathcart, gave Watford the win. Watford will enjoy the international break from the top of the Premier League!

Rich: Reds and Blues at the top. 

Jack: Liverpool and Chelsea both won to maintain their 100% starts to the season. Chelsea won 2-0  although it took until the 72nd minute for them to break down a stubborn Bournemouth defence. Liverpool got an early breakthrough against Leicester when Sadio Mane scored. Roberto Firmino looked to have made the game safe but a big mistake from goalkeeper, Allison made it 2-1 but Liverpool held on.

Rich: Some great matches last weekend and well played Watford. Top of the league.

Jack: What a great story! You predicted they would be relegated at the start of the season!

Rich: What do I know, hey?

Vocabulary alert!

Rich: In our vocabulary alert, we look at some football English that we used in this week’s headlines.

Jack: The words and phrases we’re looking at this week are all connected to the word ‘break’.

Rich: The words and phrases are: the break, the international break, a breakthrough, to break through, to break down, on the break and to break the deadlock.

Jack: We’ll start with the easier words and then look at the most difficult ones.

Rich: Break can be either a noun or a verb. When it’s a noun it usually means a short period of time to rest or when you stop doing something before you start doing something again.

Jack: Lukaku scored just before the break.

Rich: In football, the break is the half-time interval when players rest for fifteen minutes.

Jack: Watford will enjoy the international break.

Rich: The international break is a period of time when Premier League matches stop so international matches can be played. 

Jack: So, there are no Premier League matches next weekend because of the international break.

Rich: Liverpool got an early breakthrough.

Jack: This is more difficult but it usually means the first goal in a match. It emphasises that a team got through the opponent's defence.

Rich: United had plenty of chances on the break.

Jack: On the break describes a style of football. If a team play on the break it means they turn defence into attack very quickly.

Rich: Break can also be a verb.

Jack: It took Chelsea until the 72nd minute to break down a stubborn Bournemouth defence.

Rich: To break down a defence means to finally create chances or score against a team that is defending a lot and defending well.

Jack: You could also use break through to mean the same thing here.

Rich: Lukaku broke the deadlock in the 27th minute.

Jack: This phrase means the same as break through but it emphasises that defences had been very strong up until this point. It is often used when a game is 0-0 for a long time.

Rich: OK, your challenge now is to listen for these words in the rest of this podcast. 

Jack: The words you need to listen for are: the break, the international break, a breakthrough, to break through, to break down, on the break and to break the deadlock.

Football Awards

Rich: Right, every week, we give out three Matchweek awards. 

Jack: The awards are Player of the Week, Team of the Week and Goal of the Week.

Rich: In the comments section, you need to tell us if you agree with our choices.

Jack: These awards always create a lot of discussion between fans of different teams which is good to see.

Rich: Lots of you agreed with our choices last week but not all of you. A lot of this was to do with our choice of Fulham as Team of the Week.

Jack: AndoiungSpurs from Vietnam, Rafael RC and Rafael Robson from Brazil, Milos from Serbia and Deepakdev004 all thought we should have chosen Tottenham.

Rich: And we agree with you! The problem was that we recorded the podcast before Tottenham's excellent 3-0 away win against Manchester Utd!

Jack: Now that’s sorted out, let’s talk about this week’s awards.

Rich: Let’s start with this week’s Player of the Week award.

Jack: Eden Hazard was outstanding for Chelsea, Alexandre Lacazette superb for Arsenal and Danny Ings was brilliant for Southampton.

Rich: But our Player of the Week is Watford’s Troy Deeney. He was fantastic in defence and attack for Watford against Spurs. A real captain’s performance.

Jack: What about Team of the Week? A difficult choice this week. Wolves got their first Premier League win, the top three all won and Arsenal and Manchester Utd were both impressive.

Rich: But our Team of the Week is Southampton. A first win of the season for Southampton. Once they broke the deadlock there was no way Palace were going to break down the Saints defence.

Jack: Finally, Goal of the Week. Raheem Sterling scored a cracker for Manchester City, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang’s goal for Arsenal was brilliant but our Goal of the Week Award goes to another Manchester City player.

Rich: Kyle Walker scored a brilliant long-range goal. It was his first goal for Manchester City after 52 matches for the club.

Jack: I’m sure he will be very happy when he hears he has won the Premier Skills English Goal of the Week Award!

Matchweek Prediction 

Jack: Every week, Rich is going to predict the result of one Premier League match and we want you to make your prediction, too.

Rich: Lots of you made predictions last week for the Watford - Tottenham game but only one person predicted the exact result. What a brilliant prediction! That person must know everything about the Premier League!

Jack: OK, you can’t stop boasting now, we know that it is you!

Rich: Really? Me? That’s brilliant news!

Jack: That’s three points for Rich and if you want to check our prediction league and where you are in the table, click the link on the page below this podcast.

Rich: You can join our prediction competition at any time. Just log-in to the Premier Skills English website and make your Premier League predictions on the Matchweek 4 page.

Jack: There are no matches this weekend because of the international break so Matchweek 5 begins on the 15th September. What match are you going to look at, Rich?

Rich: There is no doubt what the big match is in Matchweek 5. It’s Spurs against Liverpool. Spurs will be looking to bounce back from their first defeat of the season against Watford. Liverpool will be looking to extend their 100% start to the campaign. This will be a close match but I expect Liverpool to make an early breakthrough as Tottenham's defence hasn’t looked that strong so far this season. However, I think Spurs will come back into the match and probably get a goal on the break as Liverpool look for a second. Final score Tottenham 1-1 Liverpool.

Jack: Another Spurs match? OK, I think Spurs will win 2-1.

Rich: Make your predictions on the page below. You get one point if you predict the right result and three points if you predict the right score.

Jack: Right, that’s all we have time for. I hope you have enjoyed this football round-up. Join the discussion at the bottom of the page. 

Rich: Bye for now and enjoy your football.