Football Grid

Football Grid is a 3×3 grid where each cell is the intersection of two clubs: you must name a footballer who has worn both shirts. Six clubs are drawn each day, three as columns and three as rows. One grid lined up Manchester City, Barcelona, Valencia, Girona, Flamengo and the PSV, a mix of Spanish, English, Dutch and Brazilian corridors. Nine cells, nine guesses, and one constraint that changes everything: the same player can only be used once.

1. Open futbolle.com/football-grid: the day's grid shows its six clubs, the counters "Filled: 0/9" and "Guesses left: 9".
2. Identify the club at the head of the column and the one at the head of the row: their intersection defines the question asked by the cell.
3. Type a footballer's name into the field beneath the grid; suggestions appear from two letters onward.
4. Choose the player from the list: there's no need to designate a cell, the game automatically places the name in the appropriate cell.
5. If no cell matches, the game notifies you and the guess is still deducted.
6. Continue until you fill the nine cells or exhaust the nine guesses.

The one-player rule turns every good idea into a dilemma: that journeyman who ticks three boxes, you can only place him once. Nine guesses for nine cells, it's the kind of budget that punishes haste without ever making the grid impossible.

Either the named player automatically falls into the cell he validates, or the game responds that he has no place on this grid. The two header counters do the rest of the informing, "Filled" for conquered cells and "Guesses left" for the remaining budget, and the help clarifies that a guess without a cell is spent like the others.

Grille du jour

A single daily grid, renewed at midnight local time according to the page. The game states that the club combination is computed from the date, so it is identical for everyone that day, and that each cell is checked before publication to guarantee at least one valid answer.

• Scan the nine cells before typing the first name. A cell between two clubs that have almost never exchanged players should be tackled while the budget is intact, not with the final guess.
• The player who fits three cells is your best card, and the rules forbid replaying him: place him on the cell for which you have no other idea, not on the first one where you see him fall.
• Loans count, youth-team appearances do not, and a club a player was signed to but never played for also does not count. A forgotten loan season often unlocks the cell that seemed closed.
• A grid that mixes a Brazilian club with five European clubs opens a different corridor from the others: think of careers that crossed the Atlantic in either direction, including at the end of a career.
• The pool goes far back in time; a striker from the 1990s is worth exactly as much as a recruit from the current season: when a cell blocks, look older first.