Ruben Amorim is fresh off the biggest win of his Manchester United reign. The team’s 2-1 victory over Liverpool on Sunday was the first time the Portuguese coach has managed back-to-back Premier League wins since his appointment nearly a year ago. It also made him the first United boss to win at Anfield since 2016.

There is, though, an argument that Brighton‘s visit to Old Trafford on Saturday is even more significant. Amid all the problems Amorim’s faced since taking the job a little under a year ago in November 2024, United’s record against the rest of the so-called Big Six has been respectable. In 11 Premier League games against those teams (Liverpool, Manchester City, Arsenal, Chelsea and Tottenham Hotspur), Amorim has recorded three wins, three draws and five defeats. Victory over Liverpool served to reinforce a point the 40-year-old made after the narrow defeat to Arsenal on the opening weekend of the season: that United “can win any game in the Premier League.”

Amorim’s record against newly promoted teams is also good — five wins, one draw in six matches against Ipswich Town, Southampton and Leicester City last season, and Burnley and Sunderland in 2025-26. For a while, it looked like his players were only capable of beating sides not long removed from the Championship. But in games against the other 11 teams (Brighton, Bournemouth, Newcastle United, Aston Villa, Everton, Crystal Palace, Brentford, Fulham, Nottingham Forest, West Ham United and Wolves) his record drops to just three wins, three draws and 12 defeats from 18 games.

United’s biggest problem isn’t in games against Liverpool and Manchester City, or Southampton, Sunderland and Burnley. The issue, rather, is when they play anyone else.

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Against the Big Six, Amorim has a win percentage of 27.7% and has earned 1.09 points per game (PPG). For newly promoted teams, it’s a 83.3% win rate and 2.67 PPG. Against everyone else, however, Amorim’s win percentage is just 16.67%, with a miserable 0.67 points earned per game.

The match against Liverpool was a big result, but there’s a case to be made that victory over Brighton this weekend would represent a far better yardstick of United’s progress.

For Amorim, the issue around games against teams like Brighton is about pressure. There’s naturally extra pressure around a game United should win; beyond that, there’s an additional pressure to win in a certain way. Amorim touched on it himself before the trip to Anfield when he was asked why his team have fared better against bigger teams.

“Maybe the expectations,” he said. “When you have to win, it’s so much harder to play like that. That’s why when you play in big clubs, you need to win every match, especially when people are expecting you to win. We have some difficulties sometimes to deal with that. When people expect Manchester United to win that game, maybe it’s easier for the players to perform, and we need to change that.”

To a certain degree, what happened against Liverpool played into that. Despite Arne Slot’s team heading into the game on the back of three straight defeats, Liverpool were still heavy favorites. Against Brighton, United will be expected to win.

It was perhaps what drove Amorim to attempt to control the view of his team after beating Liverpool. “I want you guys [the media] to continue with the narrative you are,” he said. “Don’t change that. That is best for me.”

The one thing Amorim can control is how United play, and that in itself has caused him problems. It’s also something he predicted before he even arrived in Manchester. When Amorim’s Sporting CP thrashed Manchester City during his long goodbye in Portugal, he was quick to explain why United fans shouldn’t get too carried away. Sporting won 4-1 despite having only 27.3% possession and nine shots, compared with City’s 72.7% possession and 20 shots.

Asked afterward if he realized how excited United fans would be after the result, Amorim played it down. “It doesn’t mean anything,” he said. “Manchester United can’t play that defensively.”

It’s something he has battled with throughout his time at Old Trafford. After beating Ipswich 3-2 in February with 10 men following Patrick Dorgu’s first-half red card, Amorim acknowledged that his team was having more success when forced to play on the back foot.

“I think that is clear, and it is hard for me,” he said. “If we have players like Harry Maguire and [Matthijs] de Ligt defending the box, they are really strong, but then when they have to cover a lot of space, the game changes for them. … It is really hard for me to play like we play in the second half. But I feel the players are more comfortable sometimes defending in the low block.”

Not only did United not have expectations weighing them down at Anfield, Amorim also felt comfortable employing tactics that irked Slot. “It is always difficult to play against a team that defends in a low block and mainly plays the long ball,” the Liverpool manager said after watching his team have the majority of possession, more shots and more shots on target.

Brighton at home is a different game than Liverpool away. Fabian Hurzeler’s side won 3-1 at Old Trafford in January despite having less than 50% possession and only three shots on target. Seven days after facing Brighton, United will travel to Nottingham Forest, where they lost 1-0 in April despite having 62.8% possession and 23 shots. Forest had 31.8% possession and just two shots on targets, but won thanks to a clinical early counterattack finished off by Anthony Elanga.

In short, Brighton and Forest offer Amorim a different problem to the one he faced at Anfield. It’s one that, so far, he has struggled to solve. Amorim called the result at Liverpool “the biggest win in my time at Manchester United,” and it’s easy to understand why. It was a statement victory in a big game against a fierce rival.

But the true measure of where his team is at will come this weekend. Amorim acknowledged that in the media room at Anfield on Sunday. “It has been a good day,” he said. “Now we must focus on Brighton. We will see after Brighton.”

Brighton at Old Trafford perhaps doesn’t come with the hype and glamor of playing Liverpool at Anfield. For Amorim, however, it has taken on an even greater importance.

Former 11-year NBA player Damon Jones was arrested Thursday amid charges that he allegedly disclosed privileged injury information about a “prominent” basketball player to facilitate illegal sports betting, authorities announced.

LeBron James was the prominent player, a source close to James told ESPN.

James was not accused of wrongdoing in the indictment.

Jones was one of 34 people arrested, along with Portland Trail Blazers coach Chauncey Billups and Miami Heat guard Terry Rozier, as part of a yearslong investigation spanning nearly a dozen states and involving tens of millions of dollars, FBI director Kash Patel said.

The investigation outlined two separate cases — one on illegal sports betting and another on rigged poker games involving the Mafia, authorities announced.

Jones was an unofficial, unpaid part of former Los Angeles Lakers coach Darvin Ham’s staff and is no longer with the team under current Lakers coach JJ Redick. Ham invited Jones to be a part of team activities after James spent the summer of 2022 with Jones present for many of his offseason workouts.

James was unaware that Jones, his former teammate and assistant coach with the Cleveland Cavaliers, was involved in gambling activity when Jones spent time around James and the Lakers during the 2022-23 season, the source said. The federal indictment alleges that before a Lakers game against the Milwaukee Bucks on Feb. 9, 2023, Jones texted a co-conspirator to “get a big bet on Milwaukee tonight” because James was going to be out.

James, who passed Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as the NBA’s all-time leading scorer in the previous game on Feb. 7, 2023, would go on to miss three straight games because of soreness in his left ankle.

Jones allegedly added via text: “Bet enough so Djones can eat [too] now!!!”

Without James, Milwaukee beat the Lakers 115-106.

Additionally, the indictment alleges that the following season Jones provided nonpublic information to a co-conspirator in connection to the Lakers’ game against the Oklahoma City Thunder on Jan. 15, 2024.

The Lakers had no comment on the allegations against Jones when reached by ESPN on Thursday morning.

Speaking after practice on Thursday, Redick said the league’s anti-gambling rules have been reiterated to his team this season — independent of the FBI’s investigation.

“We’ve had two meetings on it already,” Redick said. “It’s obviously on the front of everyone’s awareness given the last two years, but other than that, there’s no other comment.”

INGLEWOOD, Calif. — The Los Angeles Chargers defeated the Minnesota Vikings 37-10 on Thursday night at SoFi Stadium.

Four days ago, the Chargers played their worst game of the season. They were embarrassed and beaten down by the Indianapolis Colts in a 38-24 loss at home.

“We looked like s—,” a dejected Derwin James Jr. said after that game.

Even before, the Chargers had appeared out of sync. They had lost three of their past four, and their sole win, a 29-27 victory over the lifeless 1-6 Miami Dolphins, didn’t sit right with the team.

“We supposed to blow them out,” a frustrated James said then.

Ultimately, the Chargers had looked nothing like the team that began the season 3-0 by sweeping the AFC West.

But the paradigm shifted in a significant way Thursday. The Chargers played one of their best games of the season in a pummeling of Minnesota.

Playing in their first full game with tackle Joe Alt since Week 3, the Chargers did whatever they wanted on offense, and their defense shut down the Vikings to avoid their second two-game losing skid this season.

It was a much-needed win for a Chargers team spiraling into irrelevance. The win gives them a chance them to reclaim first place in the AFC West if the Denver Broncos lose on Sunday.

Trend to watch: Justin Herbert‘s interceptions.

Herbert’s ability to hit throws that few other quarterbacks in the NFL can replicate is what makes him great, but this season he has also put the ball in harm’s way. He threw his seventh interception of the year Thursday. Herbert was backed up against the Chargers’ goal line, rolling to his left, and tried to hit a smothered Ladd McConkey with a pass that was tipped and intercepted. The Vikings scored their first touchdown on the next drive. In this game, where the Chargers dominated, it was a meaningless turnover, but Herbert’s poor decision-making in recent weeks could hurt the Chargers if it continues.

Most surprising performance: Kimani Vidal.

The Chargers’ sixth-round pick in 2024, who was released after the team cut the roster to 53 players, racked up 117 yards on 23 carries and scored his first career rushing touchdown.

Vidal also had a standout performance against the Dolphins in Week 5, with 124 rushing yards against the league’s worst run defense, but until Thursday, that game seemed like an anomaly. By dashing a defense that held the Philadelphia Eagles‘ Saquon Barkley to just 44 yards and 2.4 rushing yards per carry just last week, Thursday proved Vidal can be a consistent impact player.

Stat to know: Oronde Gadsden II is the first rookie tight end since Mike Ditka in 1961 with 240 receiving yards and two receiving touchdowns in a two-game span.

Gadsden, who finished with five catches for 77 yards and a touchdown, has emerged as one of Herbert’s favorite targets and one of the Chargers’ best receiving tight ends in recent memory. A fifth-round rookie, Gadsden had the most receiving yards by a Chargers tight end since Antonio Gates in 2009 in last week’s game, when he finished with seven catches for 164 yards and a score. He appears to be headed toward having a significant role in the passing offense this season.

Next game: at Tennessee Titans (1 p.m. ET, Nov. 2)

There is no sugarcoating it. The Vikings played one of their worst games in the four-year Kevin O’Connell era Thursday night, and it left them at a crossroads in a season that is rapidly deteriorating.

It was the second-worst loss in the O’Connell era by point differential. The worst was a 40-3 loss to the Dallas Cowboys in 2022.

The Vikings are now 3-4 and squarely positioned in last place of the NFC North, with the NFL’s most difficult remaining schedule ahead of them. The Chargers, losers in three of their previous four games, dominated them in every phase. The Vikings are ravaged by injuries, which continued to pile up Thursday as tight end Josh Oliver (foot) and cornerback Jeff Okudah (concussion) were added to the list, and the team is now facing a massive competitive decision.

Will the Vikings deem quarterback J.J. McCarthy (ankle) ready to return for their next game, Nov. 2 at the Detroit Lions? And if so, will they stick with him no matter how he plays — knowing their playoff hopes are in the balance?

The Vikings committed to a cash payroll this season of more than $350 million, hoping they could compete for a deep playoff run while developing McCarthy in real time. It doesn’t look good for the former, and now it might be time to find out about the latter.

Most surprising performance: The Chargers gashed the Vikings’ defense in every way imaginable. Some opponents have managed to accumulate yards against them this season, but before Thursday night, the Vikings had at least been able to limit scoring.

They entered the game tied for No. 10 in the NFL with an average of 20 offensive points allowed per game. But they had no answers Thursday for Justin Herbert, who weaved through their blitzes to rush for 62 yards and throw three touchdowns. The Chargers faced little resistance in amassing a total of 419 yards and 29 first downs.

What to make of Wentz’s performance: In what might have been his last start for a while, Carson Wentz was clearly in pain throughout the game — largely because of a left shoulder injury suffered Oct. 5 that is still requiring a harness. He also appeared to hit his throwing hand on Chargers linebacker Khalil Mack‘s helmet in the first half.

It’s admirable that Wentz kept pushing through, but at times it was tough to watch. Rookie Max Brosmer would have been next in, and the Vikings likely didn’t want to expose him to the mess Wentz was experiencing.

Trend to watch: The Vikings played almost the entire game without their starting tackles, Christian Darrisaw and Brian O’Neill, even though both had played every snap in Week 7.

O’Neill (right knee) was inactive and Darrisaw (left knee) left after nine snaps and did not return. That left the Vikings to go most of the way with backup Justin Skule at left tackle and third-string tackle Walter Rouse on the right side. It wasn’t a recipe for creating running lanes or protecting the quarterback, and it showed. The Vikings finished with 34 rushing yards and took five sacks.

Next game: at Detroit Lions (1 p.m. ET, Nov. 2)