Football Connections Game — Group Players by What They Share

Football's Take on the Connections Format

The Connections puzzle format — find four groups of four things that share something — became enormously popular through the NYT Connections game. Football Brain brings that same satisfying format to football, with groups built from real players and genuinely clever links.

The football version works especially well because the sport naturally creates so many overlapping categories. Players share clubs, leagues, nationalities, trophies, positions, managers, and eras. There's almost always more than one plausible grouping for any given player — which is exactly what makes the puzzle fiendish.

What Kinds of Connections Appear

Some categories are relatively straightforward: all played for the same club, or all won the same trophy. Others go deeper. You might need to identify four players who were all part of the same World Cup squad, or four players who share an unusual career stat. The hardest categories often involve lateral thinking — four players connected not by a club or competition but by something more obscure that only proper fans would catch.

The categories are always colour-coded by difficulty. Yellow is the most accessible, red is the hardest. The puzzle is designed so that the easy categories tempt you into choosing wrong — a player who fits an obvious group might actually belong to a sneaky fourth category you haven't spotted yet.

Strategy and Skill

The best approach is to identify your most confident group first, but not to rush. Scan all 16 names before making any selection. Look for players who could fit multiple groups — those are often the traps. The overlapping players tend to be well-known enough that you'd naturally group them with obvious teammates, but they've been deliberately placed to lead you astray.

Football Connections rewards breadth of football knowledge. You need to know enough about different leagues, eras, and competitions to spot non-obvious connections. Pure Premier League knowledge won't always be enough — some of the best puzzles draw on European football history, international tournaments, and the careers of players outside the very top tier.