The Warm-Up: Sanchez storm, FA probe launched and England beat the world champions

The clock ticked over to the mid-evening media embargo and, hey presto, there it was: the revelation that Alexis Sanchez’s unceremonious benching at Anfield was not down to some sort of long-ball epiphany for Arsene Wenger, but rather the result of a training-ground tantrum in midweek. With Sanchez’s patience apparently running out with his team-mates, the incident suggested the feeling was increasingly mutual – a frank exchange of words in the changing rooms later, and the Chilean was dropped from the team.

Nobody could say this hadn’t been coming. Sanchez’s emphatic on-pitch gestures of disapproval have graduated from being the charming idiosyncrasies of a born winner to the last flounces of a player who can’t wait to get hold of some silverware somewhere else.

Wenger – as with every decision he makes, big or small – stood by his selection policy at Anfield, even if the true motivation needed some careful media briefing to show itself. But – and this almost types itself these days – it feels like yet another cycle of the Arsenal Way: a big-name player heading for the exit door when he feels like the club’s ambitions are unlikely to materialise to match his own.

There ain’t no probe like an FA probe – not a NASA probe, not even…y’know, other types of probe – and it’s probing time for the disciplinary panel. The facts? Well, we know that Tyrone Mings got a cheekful of Swedish elbow, soon after Zlatan Ibrahimovic’s head had felt the sharp studs of the Bournemouth defender. Beyond that, it all becomes rather unhelpfully murky.

Chief among the unresolved issues so far is the particularly slippery one of intent, which – I hope you’re sitting down for this – seems to rely quite heavily on club affiliation.

Knowing for sure what players intended to do at any given moment – short of polygraphing them, live on TV – is as futile as trying to guess what referees did or didn’t see, and how sure they were in either case. Endless replays from several angles serve only to entrench the (unbiased, perfectly calm) armchair officials in their judgements, and leaves the referees (post-stag-do or not) out to dry.

The possibility that referees – in this instance, Kevin Friend – don’t see and register absolutely everything that happens on a football pitch is simply too inconvenient for ravenous football consumers. Better to assume they’ve “bottled” it or inexplicably favoured the other team. And that’s why we’re having the same debates every week.

Belo Horizonte and Joe Gaetjens, 1950. Alexi Lalas and “Yanks 2 Planks 0”, 1993. Two defeats to the USA that dealt a concussive blow to the English footballing ego, and which have never really been definitively avenged.

The invitational SheBelieves Cup might not offer payback in full either, but England women’s 1-0 win against the world champions in New Jersey was, in its own way, an equally satisfying turning of the tables.

Ellen White’s 89th-minute winner gave Mark Sampson’s side the spoils, and the England coach talked it up as a “defining moment” for the women’s game. The USA had lost only once on home turf since 2004 and this win, Sampson said, was like “a rugby team winning in New Zealand against the All Blacks”.

It might not be enough to start talking of international power shifts in the women’s game, but England will have a use for this stepping stone: the European Championship in Holland this summer. Sampson believes his team can win it, and now he has some solid justification.

Post-match interviews can be vacuous affairs, devoid of any meaningful insight into the 90-minute experience of being a top-flight footballer. Fortunately, then, Tottenham’s Jan Vertonghen stepped forward to blow away those perceptions with his in-depth analysis of Tottenham 3-2 Everton.

Yeah, cheers Jan.

There’s something very un-English about Adam Lallana. Maybe it’s the surname. Maybe it’s that he’s blossomed slowly into a capable midfielder instead of being hailed as the new Paul Gascoigne at the age of 18. Maybe it was one moment of ice-cool decision-making that helped turn a slightly nervous-looking 2-1 lead into a comprehensive 3-1 victory.

Time after time you see overwhelming counter-attacks come to nought because the attacking side have almost too many options. The sight of Lallana pirouetting on the halfway line – to allow Divock Origi to get back into something approaching an onside position – was an example of creative intuition that we haven’t associated with English midfielders for a generation.

When you’re struggling for any semblance of form or momentum at the bottom of the table, it must be galling to watch those around you start gathering some steam of their own. For managers, it must be doubly disconcerting to see that brought about by a change of leadership.

While Swansea, Hull and Leicester have all been defibrillated by new managers, new ideas and new belief, Middlesbrough now stand out like a sore thumb.

With even Crystal Palace showing some signs of life, as Sam Allardyce’s methods kick in, Karanka might now be wondering not just if 11 games are enough to save Boro from the drop, but if there’s still time for him to be jettisoned for another rescue artist.

No wins in 10 is bad enough. 19 goals scored in 27 games is positively woeful.

Feed the Goat, and he will score. But he’ll also have shares in Bermuda’s no.1 asphalt company. And he’ll also manage Evo-Stik Northern League Premier Division side Ilkeston. Shaun Goater’s story is like no other, and he tells it well to the Guardian’s Paul Doyle.

Apropos of tonight’s Premier League offering (see below), here’s Gianfranco Zola circumnavigating Julian Dicks not once but twice back in 1996:

West Ham v Chelsea is the pwoper nawty, ‘ave-some-of-that, come-and-say-that-to-my-face Monday night game this week. The visitors have the task of restoring their Premier League lead to 10 points, while the Hammers would dearly love to summon some of the old Upton Park spirit in their new(ish) home. Could be a cracker.