
The casualness was part of Eden Hazard's brilliance. Plus, we never saw him have to readapt his game as he aged. In a roundabout way, never seeing Hazard fade away in smaller leagues is its own sort of immortality.

Because soccer is unpredictable and fun and joyful and compelling- because it's a very good thing- it attracts the amoral, cynical, and outright awful people, who seek to capitalize on our interest in it.

There is a unity between Jurgen Klopp’s philosophy of pressure and his ability to shape raw material, to turn the potential of Cody Gakpo into something tangible and match-winning at a Premier League and Champions League level.

The same drumbeat that carried Eden Hazard to Real Madrid will try, in a syncopated cadence, to push him out. It is the peculiar thing that Madrid does.