This Week: Cup Glory

Introduction -  Cup Glory

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

Rich: Hi there. I’m Rich. We’ve got lots of interesting words and phrases to help you talk about football in English.

Jack: And I’m Jack and we hope you are all well.

Laura: The Premier League season is over but Premier League teams will still be in action over the next few weeks.

Rich: We’re going to talk about what happened in the FA Cup Final, look ahead to European action and also the Play-off Final.

Jack: And on top of all that we have plenty more football English for you to learn, too.

Laura: First of all, we’re going to take a look at three football headlines and focus on some useful bits of vocabulary. 

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

Jack: And a little later we’ll also have a Premier League prediction for you. This week we’re going to talk about a crunch Champions League match between Manchester City and Real Madrid.

Laura: If you listen to us on Apple Podcasts, you can leave your comments in the review section. We do read all the reviews and would love to hear from you.

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

Jack: Don’t forget that we also have our weekly Premier Skills English podcast that is released every Friday. Every week we help you with some different vocabulary or an aspect of grammar.

Laura: Our latest podcast is called Learning Vocabulary: Agreeing and Disagreeing.

Rich: We take a look back at the Premier League season and decide to give out a few Premier Skills English awards.

Laura: But Rich, Rowan and Jack can’t agree and they end up arguing.

Jack: We focus on words and phrases we use to agree and disagree. You can find the lesson on the homepage on the Premier Skills English website. 

Rich: You’re now going to hear our three headlines. After each headline, we’ll have a little discussion and look at some vocabulary. 

Laura: The words and phrases we are looking at this week are: put clean through, brought down, second leg, home leg, bounce back and play off final.

Jack: After the headlines, we want you to make a Premier League prediction and we have a language challenge for you to have a go at.

Headline 1

Rich: Cup glory for Arsenal.

Jack: Arsenal won the FA Cup for a record 14th time with a come from behind victory against Chelsea. Pierre Emerick Aubameyang was the hero for the Gunners with a brilliant double. Christian Pulisic had given Chelsea an early lead before Aubameyang was put clean through before being brought down by Cesar Azpilicueta. Aubameyang made no mistake from the spot. His second, and the winning goal, was world-class, going past Kurt Zouma before chipping the keeper to win the cup for Arsenal.

Laura: Happy with the result, Jack?

Jack: Yes, very happy. I was always confident. There is something about Arsenal and the FA Cup. We’ve won it fourteen times now. Amazing stuff.

Laura: And you need to keep hold of Aubameyang.

Jack: Yes, he’s brilliant. He just gets better and better.

Rich: And the cup win also means Arsenal have qualified for the Europa League.

Jack: Yes, a great end to the season. 

Laura: Let’s have a couple of phrases from the headline. We said that Aubameyang was put clean through for his first goal.

Rich: This is a phrase we hear a lot but can be difficult to understand. It means to be put in a lot of space in front of  goal with only the goalkeeper in front of you.

Jack: A player is put through by a pass from a teammate. In the FA Cup Final. Kieran Tierney played a superb pass that put Aubameyang clean through on goal.

Laura: Aubameyang ran forward to collect the ball and there were no defenders in front of him - one defender had to tackle him from behind and concede a penalty. 

Rich: The other phrase we want to look at is to bring down. We said that Cesar Azpilcueta brought Aubameyang down. He was brought down in the penalty area and a penalty was given.

Jack: To bring someone down is a phrasal verb that means to cause someone to fall over. In football, it usually happens when one player tackles another. 

Rich: And it’s nearly always a foul. Let’s move on to our second headline.

Headline 2

Jack: Crunch European matches resume.

Laura: This week sees the return of the Champions League and Europa League with Premier League teams looking to progress in both competitions. Manchester City take a 2-1 lead into their Champions League home leg against Real Madrid while Wolves are looking to progress in the Europa League - their match with Olympiakos of Greece stands at one-one with the second leg at Molineux on Thursday.

Rich: That Manchester City - Real Madrid game should be an absolute cracker. City have been scoring loads of goals but Madrid have just won the Spanish league.

Jack: City are ahead in the tie and they have home advantage - they can do it.

Laura: Wolves now need to win the Europa League if they want to play in Europe again next season. Win the Europa League and it would be the Champions League for them next season.

Rich: Some exciting ties. Let’s look at a bit of language. We spoke about the home leg and the second leg in the headline.

Jack: The word leg is used to describe one part of a journey, competition or activity.

Laura: Imagine you are going on a long train journey from Paris to Beijing. You could talk about the Paris to Berlin leg or the Warsaw to Moscow leg. You would be talking about that part of a long journey.

Rich: Car races or rallies have legs. The Paris-Dakar rally is a famous car race. It has different legs as the cars race from France to Senegal.

Jack: It’s the same idea in football. In European competitions, there are usually two legs. One at each stadium. Manchester City are playing the home leg in their tie against Real Madrid. 

Laura: This is also the second leg. City won the first leg 2-1. 

Rich: So, you have the first leg and the second leg and also the home leg and the away leg.

Jack: Let’s move on to our third headline.

Headline 3

Laura: West London battle in richest match in football.

Rich: Tuesday evening will see the third and final team promoted to the Premier League in what is often described as the richest match in football - the Championship play-off final. The match is between Fulham who are looking to bounce back to the Premier League after one season away and Brentford who have never played in the Premier League. Whatever happens there will be another West London team in the Premier League next season.

Jack: I’m going for Fulham.

Laura: I’m going for Brentford.

Rich: Let’s look at a bit of language. We used the phrase bounce back. Fulham are looking to bounce back to the Premier League.

Jack: Bounce back is a phrasal verb that means to be successful again after some difficult times.

Laura: Fulham were relegated last season but they are hoping to get promoted this season. They are trying to bounce back.

Rich: Our last bit of language this week is the play off final. Leeds United and West Brom have already been promoted to the Premier League and on Tuesday night we will find out the final team to be promoted when the play-off final is played at Wembley.

Jack: The play offs are matches that are played between the teams that finish between third and sixth in the Championship. The play off final is between two of those teams.

Laura: This season the play off final is between Brentford and Fulham. Who do you think will win it?

Rich: OK. We’ve looked at three stories and six bits of vocabulary in our headlines. The words and phrases we’ve looked at are: put clean through, brought down, second leg, home leg, bounce back and play off final.

Jack: Have a listen to the headlines again and see if you understand the vocabulary we’ve looked at. 

Prediction

Laura: It’s time for our Premier League prediction. 

Jack: Thanks for predicting Chelsea last week. This meant that Arsenal’s FA Cup victory was never in doubt.

Rich: Yes, very good. You’d better have a go at our prediction this week.

Laura: We’re going to turn our gaze towards the Champions League.

Jack: Yes, Manchester City against Real Madrid. It should be a great match. Real Madrid have some great players but so do City and remember they hold that important advantage from the first leg. Lots of people are predicting lots of goals in this one but I think it will be tight but City will do it - a draw will be enough. Final score: Manchester City 1-1 Real Madrid.

Rich: I think City will do it, too.

Laura: Me, too. So, there are our predictions. What’s yours? Do you agree? You can make your prediction for the Champions League or Europa League on the Premier Skills English website.

Language Challenge

Rich: To finish up the show we’ve got a quick language challenge connected to this week’s vocabulary.

Jack: Earlier we used the phrases home leg and second leg. Here are three other phrases which use the word leg. Can you complete each sentence?

Laura: Have you heard? Marcus Rashford is moving to Manchester City.

Rich: I don’t believe that for a minute. You’re _______ my leg.

Jack: Shall we go out for a walk? I’ve been sitting at my desk all day and need to _______ my legs.

Laura: What arguments have you in favour of that? None. You haven’t got a leg to ______ on.

Rich: We want you to write the correct answers on the Premier Skills English website where we have some more questions and activities connected to this week’s show.

Jack: Or write your answer on Apple Podcasts if that’s where you listen to us. Just write the answers in the review section and say hi.

Laura: Before we finish we just wanted to say that we hope you found this lesson useful and we hope that all of you stay fit and healthy.

Rich: Bye for now and enjoy your football.