This Week: Signing of the season

Hello my name’s Jack and welcome to the weekly round-up called ‘This Week’ on Premier Skills English.

In this week, we’ve got lots of interesting words and phrases to help you talk about football in English.

If you are listening to this podcast on Apple podcasts or Spotify you can also visit the Premier Skills English website at britishcouncil.org/premierskillsenglish where you’ll be able to download the podcast.

On the Premier Skills English website, you can read the transcript and join the Premier Skills English community by completing a language task in the comments section. This will really help you remember the new words and phrases from the stories from the Premier League.

The words and phrases we are looking at this week are: natural ability, quest, setback, a fingertip save, a stinging effort, contested, to write something off, a careless challenge, on a mission and the floodgates opened.

Listen out for these phrases in the headlines and stories.

After each story there will be a short language focus and then there will be a task for you to complete and then at the end of the podcast there will be a new football phrase.

But before that, I want to look at last week’s football phrase. If you didn’t hear it last week, here’s one more chance to guess now.

Last week’s football phrase was quite a tricky one. It was from the hard phrases in the Premier Vocabulary section. The phrase was *** ***** **. This means to become involved in a situation, usually with enthusiasm. On the pitch, you sometimes hear it as an instruction yelled by fans when they want a player to try to tackle an opponent. Off the pitch, we use it before starting or getting involved with something, often food. I once stayed in a hotel that had an amazing breakfast. When I walked into the dining room every morning, the smell would get my taste buds going and I couldn’t wait to *** ***** **.

Congratulations to Hsn from Turkey - and ... that’s it. Only Hsn got the answer right last week. Taha Gashout was close with a couple of good efforts, but only Hsn got the right answer which was get stuck in. I have chosen something from the easy vocabulary words in Premier Vocabulary this week so I hope we get more answers.

OK, let’s get on with this week’s three football stories!

Eriksen energises Brentford’s wild comeback

This might be giving the Danish midfielder a little more credit than he deserves, but it was a treat for all to see Eriksen’s natural ability has not gone away following his cardiac arrest last summer.

Chelsea took the lead when Antonio Rüdiger ended his quest for a long-range goal with a blistering drive in the 48th minute. However, this was no setback for the bees who struck back two minutes later when Vitaly Janelt equalised.

Eriksen gave Brentford the lead just four minutes later when he found himself alone in the Chelsea area with just the keeper to beat. With a cool head, he lifted the ball over Edouard Mendy to make it 2 1.

Brentford played superbly. They were aggressive in attack and bold with the ball scoring twice more; a second for Janelt and a late goal for Wissa.

Final score: Chelsea 1 - Brentford 4

The phrases I want to talk about from this story are: natural ability, quest and setback.

Natural ability is a slightly strange expression. It basically means the same thing as talent. An ability is the physical or mental skill to do something. It is something you are able to do. Now, almost all abilities are learned, but some people are quicker and better than others. This is talent or natural ability. Some players look so relaxed and in control on the pitch that their ability looks easy, like it comes naturally to them, like it is a natural ability.

A quest is a task, usually an attempt to find something, but it could be an attempt to climb a mountain or defeat an enemy. In the olden days, knights and warriors went on quests to prove their bravery. When the word is used these days, it’s usually to describe an attempt to find something that’s very difficult to find and takes a long time to do. You can also use it to describe an attempt to do or achieve something that is very difficult. In the story, Antonio Rudiger ended his quest for a long-range goal when he scored. I described it as a quest because he’s been trying to score a long-range goal for a long time.

The last word was setback. A setback is something that happens that delays a project or stops you from doing something that you have been working on, at least for a bit. It’s often used by scientists when they are working on some cutting edge science. Perhaps their equipment malfunctions or one of the team has to stop working. These events could delay the progress of the team, they could set the team back. Each of the events could be described as a setback.

Let’s move on to the next story.

Sá is Wolves’ signing of the season

At the end of the match with Aston Villa on Saturday, Conor Coady, Wolves captain, jumped into Jose Sa’s arms. The Portuguese keeper only arrived last summer on a five-year deal from Olympiakos.

Wolves had dominated the first half and had a comfortable two goal lead. But Villa were clawing their way back into the game and if it weren’t for a fingertip save of a powerful shot from distance followed by a stinging effort from Coutinho, Wolves lead could have crumbled.

Sa conceded a penalty in the 86th minute and Wolves three points were in danger. In the final minute of the match, a yellow card earned Villa a free kick inside Wolves half. McGinn fired the free kick into the box where Matty Cash was waiting to volley the ball straight at the goal. But Sa was ready for it and saved the goal and the three points.

Final score: Wolverhampton Wanderers 2 - Aston Villa 1

The phrases I want to talk about from this story are: a fingertip save and a stinging effort.

A fingertip save is quite an easy phrase for football fans. It’s used to describe a save when the goalkeeper has to stretch and can only get the tips of their fingers or very ends of their fingers to the ball. Sa managed to save a powerful shot from distance by leaping across the goal and reaching out to deflect the ball with the tips of his fingers.

The other phrase I want to talk about is a stinging effort. An effort in this sense is an attempt on goal. If you try to do something in sports, perhaps shoot for goal or try to sink a basketball and miss, if it was close, people might praise your attempt with the phrase ‘good effort’. If something stings, then it causes pain, usually a sharp and quite intense pain that passes quickly. It’s also used to describe what a venomous plant or insect does, like a wasp or bee or scorpion, though I think a scorpion is an arachnid. Anyhow, I mean the bugs that can hurt you with a ... well a sting, not a bite. In the UK, we only really have wasps, bees and nettles which are plants that grow wild and have a mild irritating sting. The feeling of getting stung by a nettle, though, is not really a sting. Nettle stings kind of itch and hurt a bit, but if you use the word sting to describe pain, it means something more intense and that passes quickly.

Coutinho’s was a stinging effort which implies that it was blocked by Sa, rather than caught and rebounded off him quite painfully, perhaps smacking him on the arms. So a ball that smacks off your arms or torso could be called a stinging effort.

Let’s move on to the final story.

Spurs win in style

The Champions League places this season will be the most fiercely contested in years with five teams separated by just five points. When Spurs lost at Manchester United, some commentators wrote them out of the running. However, they have written themselves back in with a string of convincing wins leading to Sunday’s demolition of Newcastle United.

The first half hour of the match was just a warm up. Neither team looked that great until Son Heung-min gave away a free kick just outside the box with a careless challenge. Schar whipped the ball round the wall and into the far corner putting the visitors in the lead. From that moment on Son was on a mission. He won a corner which Eric Dier fired right back. Son swung a second attempt into the box and this time Ben Davies was on hand with a smart header to level the scores. When they came out after the break, the floodgates opened and within 9 minutes Matt Doherty had scored and Son Heung-min had got one of his own. Emerson Royal scored after 63 minutes and was subbed off 20 minutes later for his replacement Stephen Bergwijn to find the net after just two minutes on the pitch.

Final score: Tottenham Hotspur 5 - Newcastle United 1

The phrases I want to talk about from this story are: contested, to write something off, a careless challenge, on a mission and the floodgates opened.

This is quite a list for one short story, but I think there are lots of useful words and phrases. The first was contested. This is the past participle of the verb to contest being used as an adjective. To contest means to compete for something or to try to win something. It can also mean to dispute a result, you might hear about contested election results, but here it means to try to win something. It’s most commonly used in the passive voice. So the Premier League title is contested by 20 teams, at least that’s how the season starts. There are five teams that are contesting the fourth Champions’ League spot, that are trying to finish fourth in the league to qualify for European football. This makes the fourth place, highly contested.

The next phrase I want to talk about is to write someone out of something. Now, I think that this phrase comes from TV series where the writers control who will appear in the story and might write out a character they don’t like. However, it’s also very similar to the phrase to write something or someone off. This means to accept that something has been lost or at least has no value. It’s most commonly used in finance to talk about debts that a bank knows will not be repaid. Also, in car insurance in the UK; it’s used when a car has been in an accident and the damage is too expensive to repair or can’t be repaired safely so the car is considered written off and needs to be scrapped. Both these phrases when used in a football context mean that a player or team has been judged to be out of the competition.

I said that Son Heung-min had given away a free kick with a careless challenge. If you are careless, you are not being careful enough. It means you are not paying attention. Lots of accidents occur because people are being careless. So a careless challenge in football means a tackle that is a bit rough, perhaps a little late or slightly dangerous. If a tackle is really dangerous because a player is not thinking about their opponent’s safety at all, it could be described as a reckless challenge. Reckless means really careless in a dangerous situation.

After that mistake which allowed Newcastle to score, Son was on a mission. I like this phrase, it’s quite colloquial, I think. It’s similar to ‘on a quest’ only it implies a kind of strong focus. It comes from the military. If a soldier is on a mission, it means they have an objective that they need to accomplish and should not let anything distract them from their mission. When we use it to talk about footballers or regular people, it means they really want to do something and won’t let anyone distract them. It’s often used in a light hearted way. If you see someone who is really in a rush or is working really hard at something, you could say they are on a mission.

The last phrase I want to talk about is the floodgates opened. This is another interesting phrase because I think the figurative use of floodgates is really common but the literal use is rarely used. You normally find floodgates on dams, on barriers to stop water. If the water level behind the dam or barrier gets too high, the floodgates need to be opened to let the water through and reduce the pressure. We use the phrase to open the floodgates to mean to allow a new situation to develop quickly and for something that was stopped in the past to become commonplace. So when the law changes, this might open the floodgates for certain businesses. In the example in the story, the floodgates were United’s defence, holding back the goals. Unfortunately for Newcastle, the floodgates were opened and

Spurs scored 4, it was a flood of goals.

OK. That’s 10 words or phrases today. The words and phrases from the stories were: natural ability, quest, setback, a fingertip save, a stinging effort, contested, to write something off, a careless challenge, on a mission and the floodgates opened.

Listen to the headlines one more time to hear these words and phrases in context.

Eriksen energises Brentford’s wild comeback

This might be giving the Danish midfielder a little more credit than he deserves, but it was a treat for all to see Eriksen’s natural ability has not gone away following his cardiac arrest last summer.

Chelsea took the lead when Antonio Rüdiger ended his quest for a long-range goal with a blistering drive in the 48th minute. However, this was no setback for the Bees who struck back two minutes later when Vitaly Janelt equalised.

Eriksen gave Brentford the lead just four minutes later when he found himself alone in the Chelsea area with just the keeper to beat. With a cool head, he lifted the ball over Edouard Mendy to make it 2 1.

Brentford played superbly. They were aggressive in attack and bold with the ball scoring twice more; a second for Janelt and a late goal for Wissa.

Final score: Chelsea 1 - Brentford 4

Sá is Wolves’ signing of the season

At the end of the match with Aston Villa on Saturday, Conor Coady, Wolves captain, jumped into Jose Sa’s arms. The Portuguese keeper only arrived last summer on a five-year deal from Olympiakos.

Wolves had dominated the first half and had a comfortable two goal lead. But Villa were clawing their way back into the game and if it weren’t for a fingertip save of a powerful shot from distance followed by a stinging effort from Coutinho, Wolves lead could have crumbled.

Sa conceded a penalty in the 86th minute and Wolves three points were in danger. In the final minute of the match, a yellow card earned Villa a free kick inside Wolves half. McGinn fired the free kick into the box where Matty Cash was waiting to volley the ball straight at the goal. But Sa was ready for it and saved the goal and the three points.

Final score: Wolverhampton Wanderers 2 - Aston Villa 1

Spurs win in style

The Champions League places this season will be most fiercely contested in years with five teams separated by just five points. When Spurs lost at Manchester United, some commentators wrote them out of the running. However, they have written themselves back in with a string of convincing wins leading to Sunday’s demolition of Newcastle United.

The first half hour of the match was just a warm up. Neither team looked that great until Son Heung-min gave away a free kick just outside the box with a careless challenge. Schar whipped the ball round the wall and into the far corner putting the visitors in the lead. From that moment on, Son was on a mission. He won a corner which Eric Dier fired right back. Son swung a second attempt into the box and this time Ben Davies was on hand with a smart header to level the scores. When they came out after the break, the floodgates opened and within 9 minutes Matt Doherty had scored and Son Heung-min had got one of his own. Emerson Royal scored after 63 minutes and was subbed off 20 minutes later for his replacement Stephen Bergwijn to find the net after just two minutes on the pitch.

Final score: Tottenham Hotspur 5 - Newcastle United 1

Language Challenge

Right, now it’s time for you to think about the language again.

Here are 10 sentences with gaps in them and you have to complete the gaps with the words and phrases from this podcast.

Number 1: I wish you would train more. You have so much ________, if you trained more you could be brilliant.

Number 2: When the court decided that the company was guilty, it ___________ to many more lawsuits.

Number 3: He spends hours in the gym every day in his _______ for a perfect body.

Number 4: She was fed up with people ______ her ____ because of her age.

Number 5: This was as fiercely _________ a match as any international could be.

Number 6: My son was told off by his teacher because his work is often _________.

Number 7: Look at that guy go! He’s really going for it. He must be __________.

Number 8: I had a little cut on my finger so I put some disinfectant on it which really ______.

Number 9: She had been making a good recovery, but slipped yesterday and suffered a ________.

Number 10: If you play the guitar, you get hard skin on your _______ from pressing down the strings.

Leave your answers in the comments section on the Premier Skills English website and I will go through them next week.

Football phrase

Now it’s time for this week’s football phrase. This phrase will be the same in this podcast and the podcast on Friday so I will announce the answer and the usernames of people who have got it right next Monday ... or Tuesday.

This week’s football phrase is an easy one for football fans. The word is ******. This is a type of kick which is special because the player who kicks receives the ball from a high pass or cross and then strikes the ball before it hits the ground, without even a touch to control the ball. These can be really powerful and almost impossible to stop if they are on target.

That’s all I have time for today. Before I finish, I just wanted to say that I hope you found this podcast useful, and I hope all of you stay fit and healthy and safe.

Bye for now and enjoy your football.