Shirley Baker captured a lost way of life. She never got the credit she was due

By the age of 12, Richard Hall was already living a life of crime. The Wiganer spent his first six years being raised by his parents, who were addicted to heroin.

The season began with Manchester City’s new £51m signing, Erling Haaland, scoring … a lot. The Norwegian struck twice on his Premier League debut, at West Ham, scored another against Newcastle where City rescued a 3-3 draw, and then racked up back-to-back hat-tricks against Crystal Palace and Nottingham Forest. Contrast that with Darwin Núñez, Liverpool’s big summer recruit, who netted on his league debut at Fulham before head-butting Palace’s Joachim Andersen to earn a red card and suspension. The highlight (lowlight?) of the month came after Chelsea’s match with Tottenham, when the rival managers, Thomas Tuchel and Antonio Conte, became locked in a comically fierce handshake.

The simplest deals are often the best deals, and too many overthought this one. What would a manager like Pep Guardiola do with a guaranteed goal machine with the cruising speed of a runaway Scania and the height of an Olympian pole vaulter? The answer, once the requisite adjustments had been made, was that Guardiola and Manchester City now had the use of a goalscoring force so powerful that early 20th-century ghosts such as Dixie Dean and George Camsell were brought back to prominence. All while journalists reached for metaphors along the lines of “wrecking ball” and “Death Star”; Haaland appears to have made City more powerful than they could possibly imagine. Pity poor Darwin Núñez, who entered the season being compared to the Norwegian, and at Liverpool had the kind of inconsistent season that might be expected of a new signing in a new country. From two goals on his league debut at West Ham onwards, there could never be doubts in Haaland.

The euphoria of that win over Spain may have just about worn off.

Erik ten Hag stood stock still, forlorn. He isn't a man of much emotion but this had been a soul-destroying few minutes.