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Football Phrase of the Week: Close the gap
In this week’s football phrase we see the expression, ‘close the gap‘ after Manchester City’s win over Arsenal in the Premier League. You can read a transcript of this post below, while you can also view our glossary of football terms here and visit our site to access all our previous posts and podcasts. You can also find out more about these phrases in our football language forum. If you have any suggestions or questions then you can contact us here.
DF: Hello everyone. This is Damian from the Learn English Through Football team and I hope you are all well. I’m here in sunny London after a big weekend of football. Liverpool win the Merseyside derby with a last-minute winner; Real Sociedad won the Copa del Rey after beating Atletico Madrid on penalties and Manchester City beat Arsenal in a big game at the top of the table in England. And it is this game that we will look at to explain some football expressions: close the gap And game in hand.
Stinger: You are listening to Languagecaster (in Dutch)
DF: Yes, you are listening to the Learning English Through Football Podcast, or as we know it before, Languagecaster. And the message is in Dutch.
Close the gap
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DF: Right, as we mentioned in our last podcast, it’s the business end of the season and this week’s football expression comes from the big showdown between Manchester City and Arsenal at the weekend where Manchester City won 2-1 to put them three points behind leaders Arsenal but by a margin game in hand. This means the title race has opened so wide that we don’t know which team will win the title, but now we have two teams competing for the title. So, before this match Arsenal were six points ahead at the top of the standings, but after the defeat they are now only three points ahead or three points ahead of City who are in second place. And this means that Manchester City has reduced or close the gap.
Game in hand
Now another phrase we heard after this game was ‘game in hand‘. City is three points behind Arsenal with a game in hand. This means City have played one game less than Arsenal; they have six games left while Arsenal only have five. And this also means that if City win their game, they will be ahead on goal difference – . or goals scored. Both teams will have the same number of points but City will have a better goal difference or they will score more goals.
DF: Stinger: You are listening to the Learning English Through Football Podcast (in Italian)
Goodbye
DF: OK, so in this week’s football expressions we’ve seen the expression, ‘close the gap‘ And ‘game in hand‘ after Manchester City’s win over Arsenal. Can you think of other words or phrases related to this expression? And what about other languages you know?
We have also opened a new post in our forum where you can find out more about this expression (closing the gap) and you can also practice using this expression there.
Stinger: You’re listening to Languagecaster.com (Learn English Through Football Podcasts) (from an Arsenal fan)
DF: That’s all the football expressions this week: close the gap And ‘game in hand’. We’ll be back with our weekly podcast with more football language at the weekend. Enjoy this week’s football and see you soon. See you!
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