Summer Tournaments: Ruthless

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. 

Rich: Let’s start with our headlines!

Headlines

Jack: Unlucky 13 for Thailand.

Rich: The USA put 13 goals past Thailand in the Women’s World Cup - the biggest ever margin of victory at a World Cup Finals. The USA were ruthless as they battered the Thai team scoring six goals in the final 16 minutes of the match. 

Jack: Copa America kicks off in Brazil.

Rich: Brazil have kicked off the Copa America and the hosts got a much-needed win against Bolivia. They won 3-0. There have also been big wins for Uruguay, 4-0 winners against Ecuador and Colombia, 2-0 winners against Argentina.

Jack: Premier League fixtures announced.

Rich: The Premier League fixtures for season 2019/20 are out and there are some mouth-watering matches to look forward to. Manchester Utd - Chelsea is on the opening weekend that’s August the 9th to 11th but we’ve got to wait until November for Liverpool - Manchester City!

Jack: One final thing in our round-up of the action before we move on to the vocabulary.

Rich: What’s that?

Jack: We want to congratulate Liubomyr from Ukraine someone who has been listening to our podcasts for a long time now.

Rich: Ah, yes. Ukraine won the FIFA under-20 World Cup last week. They beat Italy in the semis and South Korea in the final.

Jack: Congratulations Ukraine and we hope you are happy Liubomyr, Ukraine seem to have some great young players - especially the goalkeeper.

Vocabulary alert!

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

Jack: Our six words and phrases this week are: margin, ruthless, to batter or to be battered, much-needed, to be out and mouth-watering.

Rich: Let’s start with the word margin. We said the USA’s result against Thailand was the biggest ever margin of victory at a World Cup Finals.

Jack: The margin is the amount of time, votes or, in football, goals someone or a team wins something by. The margin of victory between the USA and Thailand was 13 goals. If it had finished 13-1 the margin would have been 12.

Rich: You often hear the phrase a narrow margin if something was close and margin is often followed by the preposition ‘of’. We often hear the margin of victory could have been bigger.

Jack: The next word is ruthless. Ruthless is an adjective that is used to describe someone that is very determined and doesn’t care if they hurt others to get what they want.

Rich: A team is often described as ruthless if they continue playing to a very high level after the game has been won easily.

Jack: The next phrase is to batter or be battered. It means to hit very hard or cause lots of damage to something.

Rich: It is often used informally in football when one team loses badly. Thailand were battered by the USA. There are lots of words that are used in football in a similar way. Some examples include: thrashed, crushed and annihilated.

Jack: The next phrase is much-needed. This phrase is obviously used to describe something that is needed a lot but it’s interesting how it is used as an adjective.

Rich: We might say something like tourism gives a much-needed boost to an economy or like in the headlines ‘Brazil got a much-needed win against Bolivia’.

Jack: It's often used in football to describe a team that wins for the first time in a while.

Rich: The next phrase is to be out. We said the Premier League fixtures are out.

Jack: This means that the fixtures have been released and they are available. The phrase is often used about books, games and films. Is the new James Bond film out yet? Is FIFA 20 out yet?

Rich: The final phrase this week is mouth-watering. This is usually used to describe food that is delicious. It makes our mouths water because it is so appetising. 

Jack: We can also say a top match is very appealing or mouth-watering. Like Manchester Utd - Chelsea on the opening weekend of the season.

Rich: OK, so there are our six words and phrases. Listen to this part of the podcast again if you are not sure how to use them.

Jack: The words and phrases are: margin, ruthless, to batter or  be battered, much-needed, to be out and mouth-watering.

Football Awards

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

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

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

Jack: Let’s start with Player of the Week. Manchester Utd’s Alexis Sanchez scored and captained Chile to a 4-0 win against Japan, Marta became Brazil’s record goalscorer at a World Cup and Andriy Lunin had a great tournament as Ukraine won the Fifa under 20 World Cup.

Rich: But our Player of the Week goes to the USA’s Alex Morgan. Five goals in one match at a World Cup Finals is a brilliant achievement nevermind the opposition.

Jack: The next award is for Team of the Week. France, Germany and the USA are all doing well but our team of the week is Australia who came from behind to beat Brazil 3-2.

Rich: It’s only the second time in the history of the Women’s World Cup that a team has come back from two goals down to win a match.
Jack: And finally, our Goal of the Week. Arsenal’s Vivianne Miedema has become the Netherland’s all-time top scorer and scored a cracker against Cameroon.

Rich: But our Goal of the Week goes to Italy’s Aurora Galli who scored the goal of the tournament so far against Jamaica.

Jack: Check out those goals if you haven’t seen them yet.

Matchweek Prediction 

Jack: Every week, Rich predicts the result of one big match. The Premier League season is over, but there is still plenty of football.

Rich: The Women’s World Cup continues as does the Copa America in Brazil.

Jack: But on Friday the biggest football tournament in Africa kicks off and there is plenty of Premier League interest.

Rich: That’s right it’s the Africa Cup of Nations which will be played in Egypt over the next month and has been expanded to 24 teams.

Jack: Liverpool’s Mohamed Salah and Sadio Mane are there for Egypt and Senegal. Crystal Palace’s Wilfried Zaha and Tottenham’s Serge Aurier will be in action for Ivory Coast and Newcastle’s Christian Atsu will be playing for Ghana.

Rich: Those are just a few of the Premier League players in action.

Jack: OK, Rich what about predictions? There are 24 teams. Egypt are the hosts and have won it a record seven times. Who is going to win?

Rich: With 24 teams the Africa Cup of Nations is one of the biggest tournaments in football and it’s not easy to predict a winner. I expect Senegal and Nigeria to be strong. Cameroon will want to hold onto the trophy they won last time and Algeria and Morocco have the players and the team that could win it. But, I’m going to go for the favourites, Egypt. With Mohamed Salah and the home fans behind them, I think they will win the tournament again.

Jack: I’m going to back the Black Stars. I think Ghana will win it. Right, that’s all we have time for. I hope you have enjoyed this football round-up.  Let us know your predictions and join the discussion at the bottom of the page on the Premier Skills English website. 

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

Jack: Bye for now and enjoy your football.