Get ready for a first taste of Bigger Cup’s Bigger Games guarantee

Big Cup is back, and it’s bigger than ever. The new “league phase” format features four more teams than the old group stage, with each club playing an extra two fixtures – all of which means the total number of games required before handing the trophy to Real Madrid has increased from 125 to 189. What once seemed a distant flight of fancy became very real in August’s head-swivelling tombola, with fixtures spat out of Uefa’s super-computer by the dozen before you could say: “Is this a €uropean $uper £eague?”

Aside from Uefa head honcho Aleksander Ceferin, who peacock-strutted through the ceremony and a self-indulgent promo clip, few will have been happier with the new draw than Aston Villa fans. They return to Europe’s elite competition for the first time since their title defence was ended by Juventus in 1983. This year, visitors to Villa Park include Juve, Celtic and Bayern Munich – an occasion which will be especially poignant after the death of 1982 European Cup final hero Gary Shaw. Travelling Villans will get trips to Monaco, Bruges and Bern (and Leipzig, but this is Big Cup – everyone has to play Leipzig).

For this week only, Bigger Cup is spread across three days – handily scheduling Arsenal on Thursday night for b@nter purposes – and Villa get the honour of kicking things off in one of Tuesday’s two early games. Villa start the “Swiss model” against Swiss champions Young Boys, who are currently riding hi … [Football Daily checks table] … rock bottom of their league. Three points are surely a must and would allow Unai Emery’s men to kick back and enjoy themselves – our own sputtering Commodore 64 simulator suggests five or six more points would probably get them a playoff place.

Later on, Milan v Liverpool offers the first taste of Uefa’s Bigger Cup, Bigger Games guarantee, pitting two Big Cup collectors up against each other on opening night. Arne Slot’s smooth and speedy start behind the wheel at Anfield was halted by taciturn traffic cop Nuno Espírito Santo, while Milan manager Paulo Fonseca is also fidgeting in his new seat after one win from four Serie A games. There will be a little tension in the air at San Siro, even though the group stage now stretches beyond Christmas and both teams will surely go through regardless of this result.

Tuesday’s other games – Juventus v PSV, Bayern v Dinamo Zagreb, Real Madrid v Stuttgart and Sporting v Lille – give off a Gazprom-heavy whiff of Big Cup group stages past, a format so tired and predictable that many fans are prepared to give this weird new setup a chance. Don’t forget Uefa’s other promise: in Bigger Cup, every match matters because of the seeded knockout rounds. Will Bayern shut up shop at 3-0, or go for five or six goals to boost their goal difference? Will Madrid turn in an unconvincing 2-0 victory, and win the trophy in May regardless? And will the glaring flaws in Bigger Cup be remedied by stealthily tweaking it into a de facto €$£? The answers are coming, as if we didn’t know them already.

Join Scott Murray at 5.45pm (all times BST) for updates on Young Boys 2-2 Aston Villa, then Rob Smyth will be at the helm at 8pm for Milan 1-2 Liverpool and Taha Hashim will be all over the rest of the night’s Bigger Cup and Milk Cup action with his clockwatch at the same time.

Erling [Haaland] scoring again … it is starting to make us laugh … we love the Premier League so we watch all the games. We watch [Manchester City] as well, which is normal. It doesn’t get to our head. We need to focus on us” – Jorginho on how the Norwegian goal-bot’s relentless scoring spree has had Arsenal’s squad chuckling heartily. Will they chortle if he hammers three past them next weekend?

The mailbox was deleted this afternoon. They thought the group was defunct. They also said most of the mail going to the inbox was junk, based on the sender information … sorry about this” – a letter from The Man confirming that our letters address was killed off because he thought we retired a long time ago. Yep. We told him we’re still here. Maybe he should sign up. Anyway, this means that if you won a prize last week you’ll need to write in with your address so we can get it posted to you. We lost all the old emails. Sorry about that!

Send letters to, yes, the.boss@theguardian.com. Today’s prizeless letter o’ the day winner is … The Man Rollover. Terms and conditions for our competitions can be viewed here.

And so to the English third tier, where you may have heard there was a top-of-the-table clash between Birmingham and Wrexham on Monday. Minority owner Tom Brady was in town to watch Blues wrestle with Deadpool’s and Rob McElhenney’s high-flying Robins. Someone at St Andrew’s made the ill-advised decision to take Brady to his seat next to David Beckham via the away end, so he was given an ear-splitting rendition of “who the [eff]in’ hell are you?” The NFL legend took it in his stride, mind, and seemed to enjoy the fare on offer. He was seen applauding excitedly after a brawl sparked by Paul Mullin getting up close and personal with a leg belonging to Birmingham’s Alex Cochrane. Some accused the Welcome to Wrexham star of bringing his teeth to the party. He denies this: “I know what it looks like … but it didn’t happen,” Mullin yapped on TwiXer. “Although you can tell his leg was thinking about attacking my mouth.”

As for Cochrane, he told Sky Sports after the game: “I don’t really know [if he bit me] to be honest, I was on the floor. I think it was just a bit of handbags, out of nothing, but not too much. Just a load of nonsense, really.” The drama gave Brady much to chew on and he left on a high after a 3-1 win that took Blues joint top with Wrexham. We look forward to a Hollywood film being made about the early-season clash in which Timothée Chalamet plays the part of Welshpool.

In a similar scenario to our email account, Liverpool keeper Alisson has complained that The Man didn’t consult footballers before making extra demands of them in Bigger Cup. “Nobody asks the players what they think about adding more games, so maybe our opinion doesn’t matter,” he growled.

Manchester City’s Rodri has even stronger opinions on the matter – player workload, not our email – and thinks strike action could be on the cards if extra fixtures keep getting added. “Yes, I think we are close to that,” he sniffed. “If it keeps this way we will have no other option. It is something that worries us.”

Chelsea’s Sophie Ingle is the latest WSL star to suffer from the curse of the ACL. The Wales captain was hurt in the club’s 9-0 friendly win over Feyenoord.

Yoane Wissa will be out for a “couple of months” after sustaining ankle-knack for Brentford against Manchester City. “Unfortunately, not good news … it’s very frustrating,” sighed Bees boss Thomas Frank.

Udinese are currently basking in the light on top of Serie A after roaring back from two down to beat Parma 3-2, Florian Thauvin scoring twice.

And Erik ten Hag has told Antony to stop spitting his dummy out and earn the right to play for Manchester United. “He’s impatient,” groaned the United manager. “He wants to play. But in top football there are laws. You pick the team that has most chance to win the game.” Ouch.

He’s away at the moment, but Chaos in the Box, the new David Squires book, is coming. You can order it now through our bookshop and get a 20% discount.

As Villa return to Big Cup for the first time in more than four decades, veterans of their 1982 triumph get their chat on with Ben Fisher about blistering boots, Billy Connolly and the trophy being temporarily stolen from a pub in Tamworth.

Aston Villa fans are allowing themselves to be exploited by failing to protest vigorously against their exorbitant Big Cup ticket prices, laments Barry Glendenning.

Jonathan Liew suggests the new dawn of I Can’t Believe It’s Not The €uropean $uper £eague Big Cup might just be another way of making the rich richer.

Arsenal’s new signing Rosa Kafaji gets her chat on with Suzanne Wrack about being inspired by Ronaldinho and facing her former club in Women’s Big Cup.

Will Unwin meets Barnsley’s Vimal Yoganathan, the first person of Sri Lankan Tamil descent to play professionally in England, before the Tykes’ Rumbelows Cup meeting with Manchester United on Tuesday night.

And our latest WSL preview spotlights the title chances of a strengthened Manchester City.

It’s April 2001 and a Yeovil Town mascot takes a seat on the ball before his side’s top-of-the table clash against Rushden and Diamonds at Huish Park. The match wasn’t a classic. It ended 0-0 and the visitors kept their noses in front of the Glovers, pipping them to promotion into the Football League.