Soccer Page 279 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
This Slave-Built Qatari World Cup Stadium Sure Is Pretty!
Judging by the looks of the newly renovated Khalifa International Stadium—the first stadium construction project the nation has completed ahead of the 2022 World Cup it will host—Qatar’s massive population of migrant workers, who toil under life-threatening conditions in a working system often descr...
Referee Awards Penalty For Handball By Player Who Wasn't In The Game
Thanks to this boneheaded play by Sporting CP’s reserve team player Budag Nasirov, it’s now certain that all handballs in the box are penalties, even if a player, like Nasirov at that moment, is not actually in the game....
Karim Benzema Blasts Mathieu Valbuena Over Sex Tape Scandal: "He Invented It All"
Hey, remember that time Real Madrid star, France international, and one-time Rihanna canoodler Karim Benzema was arrested and charged with aiding a blackmail plot against fellow France international Mathieu Valbuena in relation to a possibly made-up sex tape? You do? Yeah, it’s kind of a hard one to...
Ezequiel Lavezzi Adds To List Of Questionable Photo Poses With Slant-Eye Portrait
Ezequiel Lavezzi, currently making ungodly sums of money playing in China, has a history of revealing too much of himself in photos. He has posed with his butt cheeks out. He has posed with a naked vagina. Adding to the collection is this photo, in which he bares his racial insensitivity for all to ...
Cesc Fàbregas On Chelsea Winning EPL Title: "Football Is Fucking Unbelievable"
For the second consecutive season, Chelsea scored the goal that determined the winner of the Premier League. Last year, it was Eden Hazard getting one against Tottenham to crown Leicester City champions. This time, Chelsea made themselves champions thanks to Michy Batshuayi’s late goal against West ...
Behold, The Most Blatant Handball Of The Year
Chelsea need to beat West Brom this afternoon to clinch the Premier League, but if Jonny Evans keeps this up, forget it. Late in the first half, Evans escaped Cesc Febregas’s pressure with a straight-up karate chop on the ball and he got away with it. ...
Goalie Momentarily Forgets Where He Is, Concedes Very Dumb Goal
Soccer is hard. There are so many other people on the field: teammates, referees, opponents, occasionally the odd dog. One can be forgiven for the occasional lapse. However, this howler from Ottawa Fury FC goalkeeper Callum Irving is a transcendent fuckup....
FIFA Makes Completely Meaningless Ethical Stand
The U.S.-led North American bid for the 2026 World Cup earned 93 percent of the 209 votes in FIFA Congress today. In March, the North American soccer federations requested an exclusive window to begin submitting technical specifications, which would give them a head start in the planning process. Bu...
FIFA Did A Bunch Of Shady Shit This Week
There is a lot of corruption going on in the world, but not at FIFA, no siree. Since numerous top officials were arrested two years ago, and longtime president Sepp Blatter was ousted and replaced by the much chiller Gianni Infantino, one might assume that FIFA now takes corruption and ethics seriou...
Real Madrid Finally Overcame The World's Best Player By Building The World's Best Team
For close to a decade now, Real Madrid have been tasked with solving the most difficult problem facing any club in the whole sport: What do we do about Lionel Messi?...
Karim Benzema's Houdini Act All But Destroys Atlético Madrid's Comeback Dreams
Atlético Madrid had a mountain to climb in order to get back into their Champions League semifinal tie against Real Madrid after losing the first leg 3-0, and it looked for a minute that they just might do it. Atleti jumped out to a 2-0 lead just 16 minutes into the match, needing just one more goal...
Referee Barfs, Receives Red Card
Overcome by some kind of stomach bug, or maybe, as the wonderful Scottish commentator supposes, so offended by the poor quality of this weekend’s Dundee-Kilmarnock match, line judge Andrew McWilliam couldn’t resist the urge to puke, and began blowing chunks out there on the pitch. The head ref took ...
FIFA's Four-Match Suspension Of Lionel Messi Overturned On Appeal
A little over a month ago, some snitches in the Chile soccer federation ratted out Lionel Messi for saying some mildly harsh words to a referee after an international match. FIFA suspended Messi for four matches in response, endangering Argentina’s chances to qualify for the World Cup and threatenin...
José Mourinho Needs To Win The Europa League He Once Disdained
José Mourinho, the manager who just a few seasons ago said, “I don’t want to win the Europa League. It would be a big disappointment for me. I don’t want my players to feel the Europa League is our competition,” is now desperate to win the Europa League. And after today’s 1-0 first-leg semifinal win...
Russian Cup Final Features More Punches And Red Cards Than Goals
That is Lokomotiv Moscow player Ari up there with the leaping right hook, apparently not content with only beating FC Ural on the scoreboard, but also wanting to win the mid-game fight. Unfortunately for the Brazilian, the bout would end in a relative draw, with both teams landing some solid haymake...
Cristiano Ronaldo Gutted Atlético Madrid
Cristiano Ronaldo has a penchant for doing only two or three things in any given game, but those two or three things usually end up being the most important things. That’s exactly what happened today, when Ronaldo scored a hat trick today against Atlético Madrid. His second was the prettiest, when ...
May The Soccer Gods Bless Atlético Madrid, Who Deserve To Win The Champions League
O ye mighty Soccer Gods, how blessed are we, the fans of the sport you so nobly watch over! You’ve given us over a decade of The One, your favorite son, the one and only Lionel Messi, and we have praised you for it! In recent times, you saw fit to grant us arguably the greatest team feat of all time...
Emre Can Smashes Acrobatic Golazo To Put Liverpool Up 1-0
When Liverpool winger Philippe Coutinho was forced off in the 12th minute after taking a knee to the thigh, the club’s all-but-assured win over Watford looked less certain. Right before the half, though, Emre Can got on the end of chip from Lucas and did this:...
Cesc Fàbregas Really Does Have Eyes In The Back Of His Head
If you’ve ever wondered how the world’s most spatially aware players always seem to know exactly where everyone is on the pitch at all times, then this video of Cesc Fàbregas and his rubber neck should go a long way towards explaining that yes, these guys truly can see everything at all times:...
Happiness Is Watching Mario Balotelli Drive PSG Insane
Mario Balotelli’s Nice hosted Paris Saint-Germain this weekend in what was a hugely important match in the Ligue 1 title race. Nice did what they’ve done all year and upset the odds by whooping up on PSG by a score of 3-1, and Balotelli scored a pretty goal to kick off the beatdown. By the end of th...