Expansive Europeans befuddle Premier League elite as set-piece shtick backfires | Jonathan Wilson

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But the Champions League is not like the Premier League. The crowding of the six-yard box, the full bearhug grappling, the meat wall to block the goalkeeper … it turns out all of those are penalised by European referees, and that is a problem for Premier League teams.Those fears about English domination of Europe look a little overblown after a chastening week for Premier League clubs: played six, won none.

It’s one round of matches in which five of the Premier League sides played away and it would be wrong to read too much into that. But certainly the impression in Istanbul was that the Spanish referee, Jesús Gil Manzano, was very aware of the practices of Premier League clubs at set plays and was primed to look for offences – which, of course, he found, because they are there at every set play.

Slot, not unreasonably, queried how Gil had missed Virgil van Dijk being dragged down at the near post, but that’s the problem with being from a league that has become notorious for wrestling at set pieces; referees are primed to see your fault.If this is some directive to prevent the Champions League going the way of the Premier League – the directive being nothing more sinister than to enforce the laws – it’s probably overdue. Or that teams have convinced themselves that set plays are the only way to attack?It feels as though the Premier League has, en masse, become subject to some invidious group-think.