Dortmund would do their best to keep Bellingham in the team. After losing Haaland they can't afford losing another huge talent as well. At least they would like to keep him until finding a replacement for him. But it wouldn't be an easy task to do as Bellingham is a very talented player. I wonder what he thinks about his future now. Dortmund are having a good run in the Bundesliga now actually. If they somehow manage to become the champions they might have a bigger chance to convince Bellingham to stay.

Manchester City showed there was nothing wrong after having some difficulty against Dortmund in the Champions League. Haaland continues from where leaves like in all of his games. I wonder how Arsenal or another big team will deal with this Manchester City in the Premier League this season. Because Manchester City are a more complete team now and I expect them to play even better in the biggest games of the league. As long as we see a title competition until the end like in the previous season there is no problem for me. 

Barcelona would have still won easily even if Elche didn't get that red card. They aren't one of the teams that can stop Barcelona in Camp Nou these days. I know that Barcelona drew with Vallecano here before but it was the beginning of the season. As of now I don't see many teams that can steal even one point from them. It might happen only due to a tight fixture maybe. Because there is a really tight one waiting for all teams due to World Cup in November in the end.

I wonder if we would see a golden boot rivalry between Lewandowski and Haaland this season. Haaland is better for now but there is a long season ahead.  

If Allegri is sacked then most probably we would see Tuchel to fill his place. However I would still doubt whether this change would affect them very positively. I don't know the real reason behind their poor performance now. They had really good times with Allegri in the past as well. Maybe it's not because of Allegri now. But he needs to improve the morale of his players as fast as possible. They are very inconsistent in not only the Champions League but also Serie A.

This is very familiar with Chelsea's condition. We will see if Graham Potter will be the solution for them.

No I meant that Chelsea might be thinking of releasing Kante and bring Frenkie de Jong into his place. I haven't heard of any interest in Kante by Manchester United.

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Manchester United are interested in Youri Tielemans according to news. He has only one year left on his contract and it is really difficult for Leicester to extend with him while they are one of the biggest candidates to relegate from the Premier League now. Arsenal had some interest in him last summer as well but I think this time Manchester United might be alone in this race. I assume he would lean towards joining Manchester United.

Dortmund are likely to have one of their most comfortable games tomorrow against Schalke. It looks like Schalke are still not ready for the Bundesliga despite having a really good season in the 2nd Bundesliga. I was expecting them to be more determined than this. There are still big issues in their defense and they are an easy target for Dortmund normally. However Dortmund haven't been very productive in the league recently. They have scored only 8 goals in 6 games. But this can still be their exploding game too.

Dortmund -1.5 handicap @2.02 seems very nice to give it a chance. But if one wants to add a safer bet to parlay then Dortmund win @1.38 is also nice for multis.

I was pretty sharp with my predictions for today's games but didn't place a bet on any unfortunately.

Aston Villa won as I expected from them. It wasn't easy at all but all they needed was three points no matter what the final score was going to be. This would be a help for taking a deep breath for the team and Gerrard. They have made really good signings so far but it is still not understandable how they can start this much bad. I thought of a draw for the Fulham game or maybe even a Fulham win depending on their effort. They really managed to beat Nottingham 3-2 by taking advantage of defensive weaknesses of Nottingham. It was interesting that Mitrovic didn't score any in a game like this.

Udinese - Inter can be considered as a tough game for both sides as well.

Udinese are one of the striking teams of this season taking their effort so far into account. Their performance against Roma was incredible as they destroyed Roma by 4-0. This might be a little scary for Inter as well but I don't expect such absurd score this time. Inter don't have a consistent form these days. It was like they have had a pattern like winning and losing consecutively for four weeks in the league. I didn't like their effort against Torino also despite winning. They were solid against Plzen and maybe this would help them a little here. Rather than betting on Inter, both teams to score might be more reliable @1.63.

I feel like Aston Villa will be the winner against Southampton and the Nottingham - Fulham will end in a draw.

The odds for these predictions are pretty attracting but it'd be a very risky betslip at the same time. Aston Villa need this win after a winless streak for weeks. Steven Gerrard might be under pressure after getting only one win in six weeks. This can be the time to start improving their form. As for Fulham they have been pretty capable of scoring goals against even the biggest teams of the league. Mitrovic is their biggest card in this game as well. Nottingham have a terrible defense line (14 goals conceded). If Fulham have a good day they might even win here but it's still not very credible prediction.

Atletico Madrid are the same for two seasons. They start the season not very well but they make up for their mistakes in time slowly. But this still isn't enough for them to compete for the league title seriously of course. They need to be consistent as much as possible otherwise they have no chance against Real Madrid and Barcelona in the standings. They would only be able to compete with teams like Sevilla, Betis and Villarreal for example.

Simeone is doing his best for the team as always. I appreciate his effort but maybe these strategies are old for Atletico Madrid from now on. If they want to play bigger they will need to make big changes. This will take some time for the team to reap the benefit of this change but it would be worth it. For example, I think the exact same thing for Juventus too and Allegri might be likely to get sacked soon after poor results.

Sheriff Tiraspol were an unpredictable team even though bookmakers were showing Manchester United as the absolute favourite by a very low odd. However Manchester United prevented any surprise by bringing the score to 2-0 in the first half already. Ronaldo didn't have an impressive performance even though he scored a penalty. His performance is far from the previous season for now and this will push Erik ten Hag to prefer Rashford over him more in their Premier League games.

However he might still continue to choose Ronaldo in all of the Europa League games. It isn't nice to see Ronaldo being treated as a backup player but there is nothing to do about it unless he makes a big improvement in his effort.

Manchester United don't need Frenkie de Jong anymore in fact. Because they have already signed Casemiro for the defensive midfield position and I don't think they need to sign another player who has a similar role. However Chelsea might make a move for him as there have been rumours relating him to them as well. We might see a move by Chelsea in January maybe. Maybe they are thinking of replacing Kante with him as soon as possible. As you know, Kante has only one year left on his contract.

On the other hand, Xavi started to give so much opportunity to Frenkie de Jong in the starting eleven lately. Therefore it might cause de Jong to be eager to stay here rather than leaving.

I know that Atletico Madrid can have really big difficulties in scoring as for some games. However they haven't had any problem about that for three weeks in the league. I believe that they can find a way to do this against Real Madrid in their own stadium as well. Real Madrid were even 1-0 behind first against Mallorca last week. In addition to that, Real Madrid conceded one goal in each game they had in the league so far. Therefore Atletico Madrid should also be able to score in some way. Maybe even the first goal will come from them which would make things more difficult for Real Madrid.

Juventus would be able to defeat Maccabi Haifa in both games I believe. However the most important thing is to collect as many points as possible from PSG and Benfica as well. But this is going to be too difficult for them as long as they continue to play like this. Normally they would be able to collect at least 4 points in those games. They need to find a way out to reach this performance level again. Maybe Allegri's departure or some other changes in the team can improve their performance.

But I'm dreaming now most probably and we might see Juventus in the Europa League after the group stage.

Fenerbahce were really worrying against Rennes. They gave big openings in their defense to Rennes in the first minutes of the second half and two of them ended up with goals. Rennes were nearly making the score 3-0 as well if their shot didn't come back from the goal post. It was like a turning point of this game at the same time. Because a short time later, Irfan Can scored a superb goal and increased the hopes of the team for an equalizer. It came in the stoppage time by a penalty finally which was a devastating blow to Rennes.

However Fenerbahce need to solve their defensive issues immediately. There is a significant inconsistency there as it seems.

Zlatan isn't expected to return before January 16 due to having knee surgery. But even when he returns I don't think that Milan will be more eager to sell Rafael Leao. Zlatan is very old and he is here for leading the team rather than playing like a goal machine like in the old times. Therefore they need a great player like Leao to score and assist them in their games. But Leao would be likely to leave most probably too if he learns about a serious interest by Manchester City in the future. Of course Milan can use the money to sign another great player to fill his place then.

How come Atalanta are easy team to beat now? They are at the second position in the standings by sharing the points with the leader, Napoli. They won 4 games in the league so far and didn't lose any. In this case Roma have a very difficult job to do against them whatever strategy they use against them. Roma defeated them here last season by 1-0 and they are even stronger than that season now. This might be a help for them to be more effective against Atalanta. However I still expect a very close score like 1-0 or 2-1 in case they beat Atalanta.

Juventus still need some improvement in the squad indeed. Pogba is out until January now and it is not even guaranteed whether he will come back strong and solve the problem in the midfield. They need to add some new players to the team to strengthen the lineup. Allegri's usual game plan might not be working anymore at the same time. Because they are terrible in the Serie A and this tournament both. The board must be nearly out of patience about Allegri these days and they have the right to feel like this too.

Who knows maybe Allegri might be even sacked if Juventus get a negative result in their game up next against Monza.

I also agree that Harvey Elliott isn't good enough for the starting eleven yet. Liverpool had money to buy a solid midfielder in his place but they didn't want to make such move. Maybe we would see a move in January who knows. On the other hand, the team didn't have a solid performance as a whole for a long time. The Ajax game seemed like a hope as their performance was really satisfying. We need to see this Liverpool dominance from now on. Salah also scored which would increase his self-confidence again to start making a big contribution to the team. They have a long break ahead of them to focus on getting much better.

The statistics aren't wrong actually and you can find it here: https://www.flashscore.com/match/dfrFJubO/#/h2h/overall

I meant the games in San Siro in the Serie A. If you check the source you can clearly see that the last time Milan defeated Napoli in a league game in San Siro was December 14, 2014. This is why I found it interesting.

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Another interesting game of the week is Roma - Atalanta of course. Both teams are in a great shape. It is really hard to pick a side but there is just a feeling like Roma will win by one goal here. But as for betting on something, my choice would be both teams to score. Roma are better than before about being productive and Atalanta are also much stronger than the previous season. We might see a nice duel with goals from each side.