Category: football

Arsenal

ásnl – We don’t pronounce the e or the a at the end.

Bournemouth

boónməth – Some people may say the mouth part like the word mouth but most of us replace the vowels ou with the short schwa sound ə.

Brighton & Hove Albion

brajnənhouvalbýən – To be honest most people just call them Brighton so you don’t need to learn the whole name (only f you want to sound really clever). Some people, those who have better (more standard) pronunciation will say the letter T in the middle but in my accent and for many others, we drop the T but leave a glottal stop.

Burnley

bɜnli – The schwaa sound that replaces the UR is the long version. It sounds like the noise we make in English urrgh when in Czech you say fuj (something is disgusting).

Chelsea

čelsi – The most common error I hear is people pronouncing the S as a Z. It should be pronounced as an S.

Crystal Palace

kristəlpaləs – Again, change the letter A at the back of both words to a short schwa.

Everton

evətən – As with Brighton, the T in the middle is optional but remember to replace it with a glottal stop if you omit it.

Huddersfield Town

hudəzfíltawn – Many speakers with my accent (West Yorkshire) would actually drop the H from the beginning and as well as the D from the end of HuddersfielD and as Huddersfield is also in West Yorkshire, you’ll sound like a real local if you pronounce it this way.

Leicester City

lestəsiti – Or just lestə. A perfect example of the letters in the word being more confusing than helpful.

Liverpool

livəpůl – Try to take out your rolled R from the middle and replace with a schwa. Also, the double O is a long sound like in the word ZOO not short as in look.

Manchester City

mančestəsiti – Not so hard but do try to replace the rolled R at the end of Manchester with a schwa.Or just simply ‘site’ to their local supporters.

Manchester United

mančestəjůnajtid –  Or just simply jənajtid (optional T/glottal stop) to their northern born supporters. With united you can also pronounce it jənajtəd.

Newcastle United

ňůkasljůnajtid – The N in Newcastle is said more like an ň or nj, something called an intrusive j sound. It’s the sound of a letter that we don’t write. It’s the same sound you make when saying words like, you, universtity and Europe. (Jolanda and Jachim)

Southampton

sawthamptən – The OU part of SOUTH is said in the same way as when we hurt ourselves and say OW!  (cow, coward).

Stoke City

stouksiti – This has been the most difficult one for me to work out how to pronounce using Czech sounds so listen carefully.

Swansea City

swonzisiti – Ok, so the word SEA is a soft S sound and yes, it looks the same as in ChelSEA but here it IS pronounced like a Z.

Tottenham Hotspur

totnəmhotspɜ – This club has the unfortunate title of ‘Most Overpronounced Football Club Name in the World’. You do not need to pronounce every letter you see, if you do you will sound quite ridiculous. To sound more like a native, remove the E from the middle of the word, don’t pronounce the H in the first word and if you REALLY want to sound good, replace the TT with a simple glottal stop. If this is all a bit much for you, try calling them just  SPURS (spɜz).

Watford

wotfəd – Simply right? Optional T, replace with glottal stop, the A sounds like an O and the OR becomes a schwa.

West Bromwich Albion

wesbromičalbíjən – NEVER EVER, I repeat, EVER pronounce the W in BromWich, the same can be said for Norwich City or Harwich. However, you do say it in Northwich Victoria (8th level of English football league system). Also drop the T from WesT.

West Ham United

westhamjůnajtid – Here we do pronounce the T in West but sometimes drop the H from Ham to make Westam.

And so to the end of this piece on how to pronounce English football club (Premier League) names. The final recording is a reading of the English Premier League results from the weekend of Fri-Sun 24-26th November 2017. You can hear how I naturally read them. Note, this is slightly different to how I would pronounce them when I talk. During this reading, my pronuncation is more of an attempt at a BBC standard.