Matchweek 29 - Leapfrog

Introduction  

Jack: Hello my name’s Jack 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: We want you to use and practise these phrases by interacting with Premier League fans from around the world in our comments section.

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

Jack: You can find all our latest content on the Premier Skills English homepage or the Premier Skills-British Council Facebook page. 
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Rich: Let’s start with our headlines!

Headlines

Jack: Liverpool held to derby day draw.

Rich: Liverpool dropped another two points in the race for the Premier League title as they were held by a battling Everton team in the Merseyside Derby.

Jack: City leapfrog Liverpool into first.

Rich: Manchester CIty’s 1-0 win away at Bournemouth took City back to the top of the Premier League. Riyad Mahrez got the winner and City are one point clear with nine games to play.

Jack: Arsenal pay the penalty against Spurs.

Rich: The North London Derby finished one-all but Arsenal missed a last-minute player and had a player sent off in injury time. Aaron Ramsey gave Arsenal the lead but Harry Kane scored from the spot to level the scores. Pierre Emerick Aubameyang had the chance to win it for Arsenal but his tame spot-kick was straight at Hugo Lloris in the Tottenham goal.

Jack: Arsenal should’ve won that. I thought they were really unlucky.

Rich: Yeah, they played really well. I wish Liverpool had played as well in their derby against Everton.

Vocabulary alert!

Jack: In our vocabulary alert, we look at some football English that we used in the headlines.

Rich: Our six words and phrases this week are: derby, to drop points, battling, leapfrog, to score from the spot, and tame.

Jack: Our first phrase is derby. A derby is a match between two teams from the same city or region. Last weekend was the North London Derby between Arsenal and Tottenham and the Merseyside Derby between Liverpool and Everton.

Rich: Merseyside is the region of North West England which Liverpool is in.

Jack: Our next phrase is to drop points. This is the number of points you don’t earn by drawing or losing a game. Liverpool dropped two points against Everton because they only drew.

Rich: We usually talk about the teams at the top dropping points because it is expected that they usually win.

Jack: Everton gave a battling performance. The word battling is used as an adjective here and means to fight and try very hard.

Rich: The next phrase is to leapfrog. The phrase means to get to a higher position in a ranking or table by going past someone else or another team.

Jack: Like a frog jumps or leaps over something.

Rich: Exactly. Manchester City leapfrogged Liverpool last weekend to go to the top of the table.

Jack: The next phrase is to score from the spot. The spot is the penalty spot so to score from the spot means to score a penalty.

Rich: Harry Kane scored from the spot. However, if you hit a poor penalty without much power your penalty might be described as tame.

Jack: Tame is the opposite of wild. Aubameyang’s tame penalty was easily saved by Hugo Lloris.

Football Awards

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

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

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

Rich: Let’s start with Player of the Week. There were some strong performances in Matchweek 29.

Jack: Aaron Wan-Bissaka looks like a great player for Crystal Palace, Hugo lloris made that last minute penalty save and Declan Rice played well for West Ham.

Rich: But our Player of the Week is Manchester Utd’s  Romelu Lukaku. Two brilliant goals including a last-minute winner kept United’s good run going.

Jack: What about our Team of the Week? 

Rich: We could go for West Ham, Chelsea, City, United, Wolves or Watford who all had good runs but we’re going for Crystal Palace.

Jack: A great 3-1 away win for the Eagles and they are flying at the moment.

Rich: And, finally Goal of the Week. I think we’re just going to focus on one match - Manchester Utd’s 3-2 win against Southampton. There were so many brilliant goals in that one.

Jack: Lukaku’s were good and James Ward Prowse scored a special free-kick for Southampton but we’re going to go with Andreas Pereira’s long-range thunderbolt. Brilliant.

Matchweek Prediction 

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

Rich: Make your predictions on the Premier Skills English website. You get one point if you predict the right result and three points if you predict the right score.

Jack: What’s the big match in Matchweek 30?

Rich: It’s another fixture that is very important in the race for Champions League places. On Sunday, Arsenal host Manchester United. Both teams are in good form, United are still unbeaten in the Premier League under Ole Gunnar Solsjkaer and Arsenal are playing well and haven’t lost at home this year. I think there will be lots of goals in this one and I’m predicting that Arsenal will come out on top. Final score: Arsenal 3-2 Manchester United

Jack: I’d be happy with that result.

Rich: 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 on the Premier Skills English website. 

Jack: If you listen to us on Apple Podcasts, don’t forget to leave us a review. We’d love to hear from you.

Rich: Bye for now and enjoy your football.