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England will need to go through the playoffs after finishing second in the group despite easing their way past UkraineITV are not particularly interested in this game, they have spoken about Friday night for about 15 mins. Look forward, folks.Sarina Wiegman: “Every game you don’t win, it hurts. Friday was a hard one because we didn’t create any momentum. Continue reading...
Iraq striker questioned for seven hours at O’HareTeam photographer denied entry after more 10 hoursIraq return to World Cup for first time since 1986Iraq’s World Cup striker, Aymen Hussein, was held and questioned for nearly seven hours at Chicago’s O’Hare airport after arriving with the squad early on Saturday, an Iraqi sporting official said.Hussein was finally allowed in, but the team’s photographer was barred from entering the United States, said the official who works for the Iraqi Olympic Committee, but has close contacts with the team. Continue reading...
Mexico defeat Australia 1-0 in friendly ahead of World CupLoss adds to pressure on Tony Popovic to get squad selection rightAustralia may have lost their World Cup warm-up match to Mexico 1-0. But with just two weeks until their first match of the tournament against Turkey, the Socceroos appear to have found something more important: confidence.A second-half turnaround against Fifa’s 15th-ranked side almost secured a draw for the Socceroos, who had three good chances to equalise on Saturday night in California. Despite a conservative approach, Tony Popovic’s side showed resilience and increasing positivity as they took the game to the World Cup co-hosts and 78,479 mostly green-clad fans who filled the Rose Bowl Stadium. Continue reading...
Dutchman departs after disappointing title defenceLive reaction: Slot leaves Anfield after two yearsLiverpool have sacked Arne Slot after a troubled Premier League title defence and are likely to turn to Andoni Iraola to replace him. Slot has been dismissed with immediate effect and, Liverpool say, with great reluctance after a review into a season that was overshadowed by the death of Diogo Jota and featured 19 defeats in all competitions.With Champions League qualification secured on the final day, and the Liverpool hierarchy claiming for several months that they backed the Dutch coach, the 47-year-old had expected to remain at the helm. Continue reading...
NYC mayor has taken aim at Fifa over ticket prices1,000 tickets on offer for $50 each, including transportTickets available for every NY/NJ game excluding finalNew York City’s mayor, Zohran Mamdani, on Thursday announced that a new tranche of 2026 World Cup tickets will be made available to residents of the five boroughs at $50 per ticket. The tickets, which will be distributed via random draw, will be for every game at New Jersey’s MetLife Stadium other than the final. They will also include bus transportation to and from the event.A total of 1,000 tickets will be available as part of the program, with a block of about 150 tickets for each of the seven games. The tickets will be located in the upper bowl of the 82,000-capacity MetLife Stadium. Continue reading...
From the end of the Invincibles and the post-Wenger wilderness years to the steady rise under Mikel ArtetaThe Invincibles were slain in Manchester on Sunday 24 October 2004, when Arsenal’s record 49-match unbeaten run ended in a traumatic, wildly controversial defeat at Old Trafford. It took a month for Arsenal to process their grief and rage; by the time they did, José Mourinho’s remorseless Chelsea had zoomed past them. Though Arsenal were still the most watchable team in England, something had died in them. Continue reading...
Italian is expected to follow Pep Guardiola and it seems the decision was made a long time agoNow the secret is out it is possible to look at Enzo Maresca’s incendiary remarks about his “worst 48 hours” at Chelsea through a different lens. Change is coming at Manchester City, who are preparing for Pep Guardiola’s departure at the end of the season, and it does not require much reading between the lines to work out their decision to pass the crown to Maresca was made a long time ago.There never was a clear explanation from the Italian after he sat in front of the media after Chelsea’s unspectacular 2-0 win over Everton on 13 December and surprised the room by taking the extraordinary step of going to war with his employers. “Since I joined the club, the last 48 hours have been the worst because many people didn’t support us,” he said. “People didn’t support me and the team.” Continue reading...
Plus: winning two titles in the same season, trophies with family connections and an easy routes to finalsMail us with your all of your questions and answers“Carlisle and Barrow will play each other next season in the Cumbrian derby in the National League,” writes Peter Hutchinson. “The clubs are located at opposite ends of Cumbria and the distance between the two grounds is some 78 miles [by car]. Does this make it the greatest distance between two teams involved in a ‘derby’?A couple of clarifications: answers here will feature the shortest distances by car. The second, perhaps more important, point is that we are excluding matches that are simply rivalries. Specifically, we are looking for matches between teams that are linked based upon their proximity or geography, rather than, say, a ‘clásico’ between Real Madrid and Barcelona, which is essentially a historical rivalry in which the distance between the two teams is largely irrelevant (save for being in the same country).Can you find a derby based on proximity or geography with teams more than 386 miles apart? Emails to the usual place: [email protected]. Continue reading...
San Siro emptied early after supporters once again sang the former director’s name as club faces lack of Champions League football … againThere were more than seven minutes left to play, plus injury time, in a crucial end-of-season game, yet San Siro was already half empty. Milan’s Ultras had deserted the Curva Sud to prepare a post-game protest, but even the less organised, more forgiving parts of the club’s fanbase could not be bothered to stay until the end of another humiliating defeat.Their team was losing 3-0 to Atalanta and it hardly even felt a surprise. With this loss, inevitable as it now appeared, the Rossoneri had collectedseven points from their past eight games. Only three teams in Serie A had done worse over the same stretch. Two of those – Verona, and Pisa – have been relegated. The third, Lecce, are perilously close to joining them. Continue reading...
League to convene disciplinary panel at ‘earliest opportunity’Furious Boro want playoff opponents to be punished severelySouthampton have been charged with misconduct by the English Football League and will face an independent disciplinary commission set to be convened “at the earliest opportunity”.Middlesbrough remain furious after catching a man they maintain belongs to Tonda Eckert’s backroom staff allegedly spying on a vital training session before Saturday’s Championship playoff semi-final first leg against Southampton at the Riverside Stadium. Continue reading...