Sports
World Series champs — again! Game 7 win cements Dodgers’ dynasty
TORONTO — On a night when the Los Angeles Dodgers became the first team in 25 years to repeat as World Series champions, one glorious era in the franchise’s history ended while another one very much looks like it might continue indefinitely.
The Dodgers closed out the Toronto Blue Jays with a 5-4 win in extra innings in Game 7 on Saturday, a fitting finale for what was easily the best World Series of this decade and perhaps much longer than that. As Los Angeles closed in on another crown, it was easy to think about the fourth lefty on the Dodgers’ bullpen depth chart, a 37-year-old who just happens to be a future Hall of Famer and who was watching his last game as an active big leaguer. That end-of-the-bullpen southpaw might very well be the greatest Dodger of them all.
The lefty is Clayton Kershaw, who announced his retirement late in the season and has been on something of a farewell tour ever since, only getting into a couple of postseason games before warming up in the bullpen when Game 7 ended in the 11th inning. Kershaw hasn’t been a mere bystander: His snuffing of a bases-loaded Toronto threat in the Dodgers’ epic 18-inning Game 3 win in this World Series was crucial. And that’s gratifying because it means Kershaw was at least a contributor to the third championship of his storied career. He went out on a high note.
While Kershaw is calling it quits, the team he is leaving behind is as strong as it has ever been. Indeed, it might be as strong as any team has ever been when you consider a multiyear window, and the trajectory of the franchise strongly suggests this already tremendous period of domination is not going to end anytime soon.
As the Dodgers bid adieu to an all-time great, it’s worth considering the Kershaw era as a whole; where the Dodgers were when he arrived in Los Angeles as a touted first-round hotshot; and what they have become since — which is, simply put, one of baseball’s greatest dynasties.
MANY STAR PLAYERS, managers and executives passed through Dodger Stadium over the years, but the post-1988 championship drought stretched on and on. By the time the turmoil during the latter part of the Frank McCourt ownership era gave way to the arrival of the Guggenheim group in 2012, the Dodgers were wallowing in mediocrity even as Kershaw rose to the peak of his profession, winning his first Cy Young award in 2011 and finishing second in 2012.
Kershaw was great, but the Dodgers, overall, lacked an identity. They weren’t even the economic bullies that they’ve become. During Kershaw’s first five seasons, the Dodgers ranked from eighth to 10th in Opening Day payroll, per Cot’s Baseball Contracts.
Then came the Guggenheims, and after the 2014 season, Andrew Friedman arrived from the Tampa Bay Rays as the Dodgers’ lead baseball executive.
“I think when the new ownership group came in, and Andrew came in, I just think it felt very, like, professional,” Kershaw said. “It felt very, like, ‘This is how you do it.’ And I was younger too, so I didn’t understand it. But now … all of us are in it together.”
By the time Friedman arrived, the Dodgers’ climb back to the elite was already underway. They won back-to-back National League West titles in 2013 and 2014, seasons in which Kershaw added two more Cy Young Awards and an MVP trophy. But the Dodgers’ pennant drought persisted.
Since then, the Dodgers have morphed, re-morphed and morphed again into baseball’s most relentless organization. The stars have trickled in nearly every season, either from within or without. For every superstar the Dodgers have acquired — including Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts and Freddie Freeman (all former MVPs, like Kershaw) — others such as Manny Machado and Trea Turner have come and gone.
The Dodgers’ payroll reached No. 2 in 2013, and it has remained in the top five ever since. According to Cot’s, L.A. began the season with MLB’s highest payroll seven times, including this one.
Yet all through this rise in revenue and payroll alike, the Dodgers never slacked in scouting, development, analytics, research, medical science or any facet in running an organization. If it exists, the Dodgers are in pursuit of industry leadership in it. And in doing so, they have become what some see as baseball’s newest evil empire.
“There’s always critics,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. “We’re in a big market. We’re expected to win. Our fans expect us to win. I can’t speak to what revenue we’re bringing in, but our ownership puts it back into players, a big chunk of it. That’s the way it should be with all ownership groups.”
Increasingly, the subject of organizational identity seems to come up in conversations about industry trends. The idea is that every organization needs to have a clearly defined set or traits, a style of play that serves as a guiding light for everything from scouting, drafting, development, free agency and the trade market.
What is the Dodgers’ identity? Really, it’s all the above. And more. When Kershaw joined the Dodgers, they were a proud franchise that arguably was defined by a lustrous past. Now, the Dodgers are the one team that can claim to be all things.
“I think that should be everyone’s goal,” L.A. starter Tyler Glasnow said. “Try to build the best playoff team you possibly can. You obviously have to get there, and it’s a little different for the Dodgers. They have done so many things for so many years, from development to signing guys. They’re in a different position than most [teams].”
Whatever their opponents’ strength is, the Dodgers are going to do it better. The brain trust in L.A. remains young. The resources keep growing. And so the chasm between the Dodgers and everyone else keeps getting wider.
Kershaw arrived with a franchise with a proud past trending toward the middle. He leaves with one whose ceiling might be too high to identify.
“It starts with Andrew and [Roberts] and all the way down,” Kershaw said. “There’s no hierarchy here. Everybody does their job in trying to win the game. There’s not one thing that’s more or less important than the other thing.”
ONE THING THAT strikes you when you’re around the Dodgers is the degree of loyalty that their players express to the organization. Certainly Kershaw himself could have left a number of times, and in recent years when he worked on one-year contracts, there were frequent rumors he might want to finish his career with his hometown Texas Rangers.
But Kershaw never left, and the Dodgers never tried to push him out, even though they likely could have replaced his late-career rate of production with a younger, more cost-efficient player. Instead, they let Kershaw linger in his annual decision on whether to keep going and rolled out the red carpet when he wanted to return. Because of that, he will become one of the most precious things in baseball: a one-team Hall of Famer.
But it isn’t just about how they treat their stars. Take Miguel Rojas, once the starting shortstop for the Miami Marlins who has become a fringe player in L.A., a defensive specialist and a sometimes starter when other players are injured. The Dodgers are his original organization, and even as his career has iterated, he remains Dodger blue at heart and it was his home run that knotted Game 7 in the ninth inning.
“The Dodgers gave me an opportunity to go to minor league camp in 2013,” Rojas recalled after Game 6. “Then I got a chance to play in the big leagues in 2014 when I really wasn’t an impact player in the minors. They gave me an opportunity, and I will never forget that.”
Enrique Hernandez cited the communication between the team and the players as what separates the Dodgers from other teams.
“Other organizations, they’re like, ‘We’re going to do things our way, and you’re just a player, you work for us,'” Hernandez said. “But I think these guys just want to make sure that we’re on top of our game at all times.”
That too is what the Dodgers have become: a team that players want to play for, where they feel appreciated.
“Even playing against them, watching, it was just always in the back of my mind: I wanted to be a Dodger and play on that team,” L.A. starter Blake Snell said during the NL Championship Series. “To be here now, it’s a dream come true. I couldn’t wish for anything more.”
The Dodgers don’t sign every free agent, though last winter it felt like it at times. As the Dodgers’ payroll has increased, so has their international influence. Of course, the marquee signing was Ohtani during the 2023-24 offseason. Following in his footsteps have been Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Roki Sasaki, both of whom played vital roles in the Dodgers’ run to the latest championship.
Accompanying the focus on overseas stars has been a tremendous growth in business partnerships looking to capitalize on the overwhelming popularity and attention that is given to the Japanese superstars, particularly Ohtani. So, the Dodgers’ revenue not only keeps growing, but it’s hard to imagine what the ceiling for it could be.
Yet despite the depth of resources, they’ve been able to play footsie with the various luxury tax thresholds because on top of all of the money that goes into their big league roster, they are still cutting no corners in their scouting and development program, either internationally or in the states.
As a proxy to illustrate how consistent the Dodgers’ pipeline is, consider this: According to Baseball America’s annual preseason prospect ratings, the Dodgers have not ranked outside of the top 10 since 2013. This season, which they entered with baseball’s highest payroll and a new World Series trophy in tow, ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel ranked their system No. 1 in the sport.
“People just overlook the fact that every year, we probably have a top-five farm system in baseball,” Roberts said. “This year, I think we probably have the No. 1 or No. 2. We pick at the bottom of the draft every year, towards the bottom, and we still have young guys, whether by way of trade or development, that continue to help and contribute.”
This is what it all comes down to. The Dodgers aren’t beating everyone in just spending or just analytics or just scouting or just development or just free agency. They are beating everyone in everything.
“You see free agents and you see other guys, they want to be a part of something that is built to last,” Kershaw said. “We don’t want to be one-hit wonders as free agents. You know when you sign up to be a Dodger that you’ll be in these [playoff] situations.”
No, the Dodgers aren’t a shoo-in to win the World Series every year. The just-completed World Series was the perfect illustration of that. With a bounce here or there the other way in two of Toronto’s losses, the Blue Jays would be champs and Game 7 would have never happened. That’s always going to be the case in baseball’s current playoff format.
But the Dodgers are a virtual shoo-in to be considered a leading World Series contender every year. The early 2026 title odds began to circulate this week and — spoiler alert — the Dodgers are already prohibitive favorites to win the 2026 World Series.
If you have Dodgers fatigue, you better put on a pot of coffee, because unless something drastic changes, they are not going away for a very, very long time. And if you wonder what that means in the context of baseball history, consider this: The great New York Yankees dynasty, the lineage that stretched from Ruth to DiMaggio to Mantle, lasted from 1921 to 1964.
When a team reaches this ongoing level of organizational success, hovering above all others, it can create a self-reinforcing dynamic that lasts for decades. The Dodgers are in Year 13 of their current postseason streak, with five NL pennants and now three World Series titles, but they very well might just be getting started.
“The mainstays that we have in our lineup, that are going to be here for a long time, and just the continuity, the expectation now is this, every single year, and that’s not easy to do,” Kershaw said. “But that’s what everybody expects.”
THE ARGUMENT THAT Kershaw is the greatest Dodger ever is an easy one to make. Certainly, this is subjective, but it’s a proposition with a statistical defense. This isn’t to diminish the impact of legends such as Jackie Robinson, great for ways far beyond what he did on the field, or Sandy Koufax, whose cometlike career ended at age 30 because of injury. That’s just it: Many of the Dodgers’ all-time greats either had short careers or spent a lot of time with other teams.
Take a bottom-line metric such as the Baseball Reference version of WAR. You can always quibble about the conclusions of WAR, particularly when it comes to pitchers; but when one player has a sizable edge over another, WAR is probably right. Kershaw has a sizable edge over every former Dodger, with his 80.9 bWAR far ahead of second-place Pee Wee Reese (68.5).
Maybe this will change in time, especially if Ohtani plays into a ripe old age. But for now, it’s pretty clear that in terms of cumulative accomplishment, Kershaw is the most prolific Dodger who has ever lived.
Here is where the strength of the Dodgers might be best illustrated: For some teams, the loss of a franchise icon can be a little discombobulating because that player is so entwined with the identity of what the franchise has become. With these Dodgers, there’s no such concern.
It’s not to take away one iota from anything that Kershaw has ever done. It’s just that with Ohtani around as one of the most famous athletes on the planet and Betts and Freeman among the best players of their generation as surefire Hall of Famers, the Dodgers have an identity without Kershaw.
He has been the constant through all of this, the golden link in the great chain that binds an era of one of baseball’s flagship franchises to the next. For much of Kershaw’s career, especially when it came to the postseason, it felt like he was tasked with carrying the Dodgers on his back as he built a legacy and a résumé that stands right alongside that of any other pitcher in the history of an organization that has produced some of baseball’s best, not the least of whom is Kershaw’s close friend Koufax.
Yet by Saturday’s finale, Kershaw’s presence on the Dodgers was really more luxury than necessity, and that’s certainly no insult to the great lefty. It simply speaks to the behemoth that the Dodgers have become.
Once, the Dodgers’ success was attached to the question of how far Kershaw could take them. By the time he celebrated with his teammates for the last time on Saturday, the worm had turned. The Dodgers had become so powerful that as the final chapter came to a close, Kershaw was just a passenger on one of baseball’s most glorious rides, one whose end is so far away that no one can imagine when or where or if it will ever end.
You know it’s probably going to be Arsenal or Manchester City for the Premier League title; Burnley and someone else for relegation; and one of, like, eight or nine different teams for the final two or three UEFA Champions League places.
These are the races that matter. These are the races we talk about. They frame everything that happens with a given club: Is the manager keeping the team safe from relegation? Are the new signings boosting the midtable club into the European places? Can that new striker put that already-excellent team over the top in the title race?
But in reality, clubs don’t function in this way. Or at least, they shouldn’t function in this way. They’re signing players, developing talent, and acquiring coaches with a multi-year view into the future. If everyone only cared about this season, every player in the league would be 27 years-old.
So, today, we’re going to rank all 20 Premier League clubs based on how the future looks. This isn’t a prediction for who is going to win the league in a couple of years — that wouldn’t be fun since we’d be stuck picking someone from the so-called Big Six. Instead, it’s a ranking of how likely a team is to have self-defined successful seasons in the future.
To create the rankings, we’ll use a combination of four inputs:
• Squad age: The team’s average age, weighted by minutes played this season, via FBref.
• Young talent: The combined Transfermarkt value of the team’s players aged 23 and under.
• Managerial stability: A combination of how likely the current manager is to be at the club in a few years and how confident we should be that the club would be able to replace their current manager with the right guy.
• Club health: A combination of how highly I think of the ownership and the team’s decision-makers, the state of the team’s financial health, and how likely they are to be relegated at some point.
We’ve ranked each club in each of the four categories, added them up, and came up with the following list. Let’s get to the Premier League Future Power Rankings!
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Overall score: 14
• Squad age: 5
• Young talent: 4
• Managerial stability: 3
• Club health: 2
Reason for hope: It doesn’t feel like any of their recent moves have been major successes. There’s no clear young star on the roster like Moisés Caicedo or Alexis Mac Allister. And teams aren’t knocking Brighton’s doors down to hire Fabian Hurzeler, either.
But despite all of that, the club is currently in 10th, and they have the seventh-best expected-goal differential in the league. Midtable might be the floor for a team that, according to FBref, has the fourth-lowest wage bill in the Premier League. Still, they still have a ton of young potential on the roster. If two of them become stars at the same time, this could be a Champions League club.
Reason for concern: Take all of that and spin it around. They haven’t whiffed on any signings, but the club has some more money now, thanks to its continued presence in the league and the growing financial gap between the Premier League and everyone else. And as Brighton have started to spend more on transfers for individual players, there haven’t been any real hits.
There’s a chance — a small one — that their player-identification model doesn’t work higher up the market.
Overall score: 19
• Squad age: 2
• Young talent: 11
• Managerial stability: 5
• Club health: 1
Reason for hope: Last season, Brentford’s per-game expected goal differential was plus-0.09. This season, Brentford’s per-game expected goal differential is plus-0.09. Did I mention that they lost their manager to Tottenham and their best player to Manchester United over the summer?
Reason for concern: They’ve outscored their opponents by one goal since they were promoted back in 2021. Given their wage bill — estimated by FBref to be the smallest in the league — that’s an incredible level of relative performance. But Brentford still haven’t shown the upside that we’ve seen from Brighton. One season of bad luck could still plunge them down into a relegation battle.
Overall score: 20
• Squad age: 9
• Young talent: 7
• Managerial stability: 1
• Club health: 3
Reason for hope: So much has gone wrong this season. Every key player has spent time on the sidelines. It’s increasingly looking like summer signing Viktor Gyökeres just isn’t good enough to play consistent minutes for a team at this level. And Manchester City have already passed them on goal differential.
… But despite all of that, they’ve clearly been the best team in the Premier League so far: a plus-1.09 xG differential, while no one else is even at plus-0.8.
Reason for concern: They’re all-in. After multiple seasons with one of the youngest rosters in England, this team’s average age is just, well, average. Gyokeres has attempted two shots in the Premier League in his last five appearances, and with sizable fees already invested into Kai Havertz and Gabriel Jesus, they might be stuck with what they currently have at center forward.
Overall score: 23
• Squad age: 1
• Young talent: 1
• Managerial stability: 14
• Club health: 7
Reason for hope: They’ve collected more young talent than probably any other club in Premier League history. And those double No. 1 rankings don’t even include all of the great prospects over at Strasbourg, the ownership group’s other club in France.
Reason for concern: It’s still unclear whether the people in charge know how — or even want — to turn that talent into a team that could genuinely win domestic and continental trophies. Their current accounting books would violate the Premier League’s new squad-cost-ratio rules, and I don’t know if Enzo Maresca is the right guy for this job or if Chelsea know who his best replacement would be, either. We know Chelsea’s future is filled with talent — but we don’t know a whole lot beyond that.
Overall score: 25
• Squad age: 14
• Young talent: 3
• Managerial stability: 4
• Club health: 4
Reason for hope: Now, here’s the club where everything has gone wrong this season. Almost none of the new signings have played well. Most of the guys from last year’s team look worse. Mohamed Salah might leave the club — and might have already left the company of the best players in the world. Manager Arne Slot can’t find any of the right buttons to press. They’ve already lost more games than they did all of last season.
And yet: they’re two points back of fourth place in the Premier League and tied for sixth place in the big Champions League table.
Reason for concern: This was the first real transfer window for new-ish sporting director Richard Hughes. The club spent a ton of money — and they got significantly worse.
The Alexander Isak signing, in particular, was a massive departure from the way Liverpool usually do things: a record-breaking fee for an already-in-his-peak-years, injury-prone player with system-fit issues. Their transfer moves no longer deserve the benefit of the doubt.
Overall score: 29
• Squad age: 3
• Young talent: 15
• Managerial stability: 6
• Club health: 5
Reason for hope: The two more subjective rankings here are a combination of inference and what I know from people I talk to in the sport. But Bournemouth were willing to move on from a beloved manager who saved them from relegation because they (1) knew they got lucky, and (2) thought they’d identified a better option.
This kind of decision only gets made when a club really knows what it’s doing, from top to bottom. Most of the soccer world thought it was madness when they fired Gary O’Neil. Now, pretty much every club in the world would be willing to hire Andoni Iraola.
Reason for concern: The top-end talent seems to have dried out, and we’re already seeing it both from their results and performances this season. I trust Bournemouth to go through a rigorous process of identifying an eventual Iraola replacement — I trust they’ve already done it, too — but what does this team look like with a different coach and without players who will go on to start for PSG and Real Madrid?
Overall score: 31
• Squad age: 3
• Young talent: 2
• Managerial stability: 13
• Club health: 13
Reason for hope: After an era-ending season where the squad looked old and Pep Guardiola couldn’t find any solutions for a team that frequently got trampled by the Premier League’s increasing athleticism, City have turned the roster over in one offseason. They’re back to being title contenders — at home and abroad.
Reason for concern: There are those 115 Premier League charges still hanging over the club, and Pep Guardiola’s contract expires at the end of next season.
Man City have such financial power that they’ll always be competitive, but we’ve never seen a club with this much money be transformed into the vision of one man before. What happens when Pep leaves? And what punishment might the league still have in store for its most dominant club?
Overall score: 37
• Squad age: 12
• Young talent: 12
• Managerial stability: 7
• Club health: 6
Reason for hope: They’ve lost Michael Olise and Eberechi Eze in consecutive summers. And somehow, the more talent they lose, the better they get:
• 2023-24: minus-0.09 xG differential per game
• 2024-25: plus-0.30 xG differential per game
• 2025-26: plus-0.48 xG differential per game
Reason for concern: Oliver Glasner isn’t long for London — South London, at least — and Palace’s track record with coach hirings is mixed before the Austrian arrived to replace Roy Hodgson. While Palace seem to have a better handle on Championship prospects than anyone, their young-talent pipeline is starting to dry up. With Marc Guéhi expected to leave either in January or after the season, how many more star departures can they weather?
Overall score: 38
• Squad age: 6
• Young talent: 5
• Managerial stability: 16
• Club health: 11
Reason for hope: If Spurs had Brighton’s budget, we would be raving about all of the young talent they’ve built up over the past couple years. In fact, only Brighton and Chelsea have more 23-and-under players with an estimated market value of €10 million or more.
If you’re going to run off a bunch of disappointing seasons in a row, you need to be building for the future while your results are in the tank. Spurs have at least done that.
Reason for concern: They’re … getting worse? Here’s their expected goals differential, or xGD, over the past three seasons:
• 2023-24: plus-0.13 xGD/game
• 2024-25: minus-0.12 xGD/game
• 2025-26: minus-0.43 xGD/game
Former club chairman Daniel Levy is gone, but the club’s long-term performance level is lower than it’s been at any point this century.
Overall score: 40
• Squad age: 6
• Young talent: 10
• Managerial stability: 10
• Club health: 14
Reason for hope: Sunderland aren’t your typical relegation survivor. Sam Allardyce isn’t on the sidelines, and Gareth Barry isn’t playing in the midfield. Instead, they’re managed by Regis Le Bris, who had never coached in England before and had only been the manager at one other club before joining Sunderland.
And — OK, sure, Granit Xhaka is basically their Gareth Barry. But beyond him, this isn’t a roster of late- and post-peak Premier League vets. Just two of their most-used 11 players are in their 30s and almost everyone who comes off the bench is 25 or younger.
Reason for concern: Although they’re currently in eight place, they have the 17th-best xG differential in the Premier League. And that’s after a season in the Championship when they ranked seventh by the same metric. Now, xG isn’t a perfect indicator of team performance, but clubs that overperform their aggregate chance quality tend to eventually come crashing back to Earth — at some point.
Overall score: 41
• Squad age: 10
• Young talent: 6
• Managerial stability: 15
• Club health: 10
Reason for hope: They figured out how to fix the attack in a single summer. Last season, United scored 44 goals in 38 matches. This year, they’ve scored 30, and they’ve only played 16 games. For the first time in a long time, United identified a problem, threw a bunch of money at it, and actually got the result for which they were hoping.
Reason for concern: Five Manchester United players have created a combined 3.0 expected goals and assists so far this season. Four of them are 26 or older, two of them are 30-plus (Bruno Fernandes and Casemiro), and Ahmad Diallo is the only one (23) who still hasn’t hit his prime.
They’re going to have to replace Bruno and Casemiro over the next couple seasons, and by the time they figure it out, their two major attacking signings from this summer, Matheus Cunha and Bryan Mbeumo, could already be aging out of their primes.
Overall score: 43
• Squad age: 18
• Young talent: 14
• Managerial stability: 2
• Club health: 9
Reason for hope: Here’s how many points every Premier League team has won since Oct. 24, 2022:
In other words, Aston Villa have been one of the four best teams in the Premier League since Unai Emery replaced Steven Gerrard.
Reason for concern: They’re really old — and they’re on a gonzo heater right now. I have no doubt that Villa’s weird style of play — high line with little pressure, slow possession but also lots of through balls — is fooling the models that measure these things, but Villa are three points off the table despite, uh …
Can they retool as the roster gets older and the results inevitably start to go against them?
Overall score: 44
• Squad age: 16
• Young talent: 9
• Managerial stability: 11
• Club health: 8
Reason for hope: If Lewis Hall can stay healthy, Newcastle might have the best pair of young fullbacks in the Premier League — if not the world.
Both Hall and Tino Livramento are already fantastic passers, and I think the single-best predictor of whether or not a young player will have a successful career might be how much progressive passing they do. Livramento is 23, Hall 21, and they both rank in the 84th percentile or better among all players at their position across Europe’s Big Five top leagues for progressive passes completed.
Reason for concern: That’s really it? Nick Woltemade has been OK to start his career, Anthony Gordon is a solid Premier League player, but every other key contributor to this team is at the end or already past his peak years.
The first era of Saudi ownership at the club was an on-field success; they were in a relegation battle when the new owners came in; they’ve been a top five team in the league since. But that version of Newcastle looks like it’s reaching its conclusion. What comes next?
Overall score: 51
• Squad age: 8
• Young talent: 8
• Managerial stability: 18
• Club health: 17
Reason for hope: They’re even younger than they look. Among the 14 players who have featured in at least 400 minutes this season, just two are older than 30: 33-year-old keeper Mats Selz, who has played every minute of all but one match this season, and 34-year-old striker Chris Wood, who has only started seven games but pushes the average age up since he’s so old.
Nikola Milenkovic and Ibrahim Sangaré are both 28, but the other 10 players are all 25 or younger. A lot of their big signings from this summer haven’t featured much yet, and many of them are 23-and-under, so there’s potential for Forest to get even younger
Reason for concern: This is the worst-run team in the league because of the guy who owns it. Now, there are a bunch of smart people working at Forest, and you can see it shine through in every fourth or fifth signing they make — hello, Elliott Anderson! — but they’re already on their third manager of the season.
Sean Dyche has stabilized the club after the philosophical whiplash from Nuno Espirito-Santo to Ange Postecoglu, but owner Evangelos Marinakis is a complete wild card who is liable to do something ridiculous at any moment. The only reason they aren’t lower is that they’re five points clear of the relegation battle.
Overall score: 52
• Squad age: 18
• Young talent: 13
• Managerial stability: 9
• Club health: 12
Reason for hope: David Moyes has been willing to play Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall, Ilman Ndiaye, and Jack Grealish … and a center forward all at the same time. While they’re still waiting for one of those strikers to start producing, KDH, Ndiaye, and Grealish all rank in the top 15 in the league for expected assists created. That’s something to build on!
Reason for concern: Grealish is only on loan, and this is tied with Villa and Fulham for the oldest team in the league. Everton signed a bunch of young prospects this summer, but Thierno Barry, Tyler Dibling, and Adam Aznou have combined to start 10 matches this season. Dibling has only played 80 minutes; Anzou hasn’t played at all. There is some young talent on this roster — internal solutions to the aging issue — but can we trust Moyes to integrate the next generation?
Overall score: 60
• Squad age: 13
• Young talent: 20
• Managerial stability: 12
• Club health: 15
Reason for hope: Leeds were one of the all-time great Championship sides last season, and they were one of the most popular picks I can remember for a promoted side to stay up. They’re currently just one spot clear of the relegation places, but they’ve been significantly better than that.
Through 16 matches, their total xG differential is just minus-1.0 — a fantastic mark for a team that was in the second-division last season, and the 11th-best differential in the league so far.
Reason for concern: Wilfried Gnonto is the only player under the age of 25 who has even played a single minute for Leeds this season. And he’s only started four matches. Part of the reason Leeds were so good last season and why their underlying performance has been so impressive is that they’re built to win right now. But beyond the next couple of years, the cupboard is almost completely bare.
Overall score: 61
• Squad age: 18
• Young talent: 19
• Managerial stability: 8
• Club health: 16
Reason for hope: After Pep Guardiola and Mikel Arteta — or, the managers for the two best teams in the league — Marco Silva is the Premier League’s longest-serving manager. They’re only ranked eighth in my managerial-stability rating because Fulham’s previous managerial hiring history is total chaos, but while he’s there, Silva secures the club’s floor.
This might not sound like a compliment, but it is: We can be confident that Marco Silva is not going to make Fulham worse than the aggregate talent on their roster.
Reason for concern: Outside of midfielder Joshua King, there’s no young talent making any kind of impact. And, well, there’s not much peak-age talent, either. Seven of Fulham’s 11 most-used players are 29 or older. Unless they start signing some younger players and integrating them into the club soon, the bottom could fall out — especially if someone else decides they want to hire Silva.
Overall score: 65
• Squad age: 14
• Young talent: 16
• Managerial stability: 17
• Club health: 18
Reason for hope: They spent a combined €66 million on a pair of 21-and-under prospects, Mateus Fernandes and El Hadji Malick Diouf, this summer, and both of them pretty much immediately became two of the most important players on the team. For a club that’s too long obsessed over acquiring famous older players like Niclas Füllkrug, the identification and subsequent integration of Fernandes and Diouf is a notable, positive change.
Reason for concern: They’re terrible? Simon Tinsley’s projections give the Hammers a 50% chance of being relegated. Per FBref, West Ham are paying higher wages than half of the teams in the league, and they’re currently a coin-flip away from lugging an expensive, aging roster down to the Championship.
Overall score: 69
• Squad age: 11
• Young talent: 18
• Managerial stability: 20
• Club health: 20
Reason for hope: I, uh, their roster isn’t that old? I’m struggling here …
Reason for concern: They have two points through 16 matches, they’ve scored the fewest goals, and they’ve conceded the most goals. Both of the sites I’ve mentioned put their probability of being relegated north of 96%.
Overall score: 72
• Squad age: 17
• Young talent: 17
• Managerial stability: 19
• Club health: 19
Reason for hope: They’re only six points from safety, and stranger things have happened … right?
Reason for concern: According to FBref’s Stathead database, which goes back to the 2017-18 season, only three Premier League teams have posted a per-game xG differential below minus-1.0: Norwich City in 2021-22, Southampton last season, and Burnley this year. Those other two teams? They both finished in 20th.
Real Madrid defender Éder Militão is “100%” confident he will be fit in time to play at the 2026 World Cup.
The Brazil international ruptured the biceps femoris tendon in his left leg during Madrid’s 2-0 league defeat against Celta Vigo on Dec. 7 and could be sidelined until April 2026.
Using crutches, Militao, arrived in Rio de Janeiro on Thursday and told reporters: “No return date has been set. The priority is the World Cup.
“Doing things well so I can come back strong. [I’m] 100% confident.”
“When fit, Militao, who played at the 2022 World Cup, has been a regular in Brazil’s squads.
“Militao, 27, has struggled with serious injuries in recent seasons. In August 2023, he tore his left ACL and only returned to action in March 2024. Last season, he was sidelined for eight months after tearing his right ACL and damaging his meniscus.
“Carlo Ancelotti, who coached Militao at Madrid before taking over the Brazil national team in May, recently warned his players that only those that are “100 percent fit” will make Brazil’s World Cup squad.
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Militao is expected to miss Brazil’s international friendlies against France and Croatia in the March international window.
Five-time winners Brazil begin their World Cup campaign against Morocco on June 13 in New York. They face Haiti six days later in Philadelphia before their final Group C game against Scotland in Miami.
Pakistan won the toss and elected to bowl first against Bangladesh in the semi-final of the ACC Men’s U19 Asia Cup 2025 at The Sevens Stadium in Dubai on Friday.
Pakistan have qualified for the semi-final after winning two out of three group matches against Malaysia and the United Arab Emirates. The national side was defeated by arch-rivals India in the group match.
On the other hand, Bangladesh remain unbeaten in this tournament so far, having won against Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, and Nepal.
Playing XIs
Pakistan: Farhan Yousaf (c), Usman Khan, Abdul Subhan, Ahmed Hussain, Ali Raza, Daniyal Ali Khan, Hamza Zahoor, Huzaifa Ahsan, Mohammad Sayyam, Mohammad Shayan, and Sameer Minhas.
Bangladesh: Azizul Hakim Tamim (c), Zawad Abrar, Samiun Basir Ratul, Sheikh Paevej Jibon, Md Abdullah, Farid Hasan Faysal, Kalam Siddiki Aleen, Iqbal Hossain Emon, Rifat Beg, Ahmed Shahriar, and Md Shabuj.
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