association-football Page 18 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
Messi survives despite it all at the Copa
It’s been weird whenever I check in on Copa America. With the Euros taking place in front of fans and the mess that the Copa was before it even kicked off, it kind of feels like it’s taking place in some sort of dungeon club that you need a password to get into and you have to provide your own leath...
Spain rules the day, but not final result
Spain did just about everything they wanted against Italy. They suffocated Jorginho out of the game, denying all routes to him from the defense and keeping Italy’s attack at bay through a pretty aggressive high press. They kept the ball for most of the game, and didn’t do that usual Spanish thing of...
The problems with FC Barcelona
With the Euros wrapping up, the next few weeks will be filled with the usual summer madness of transfer stories and players signing here and there or not signing here or there and the rumors that cover both....
Get in the ring
Brazil is going to the semifinals of Copa América after a 1-0 victory over Chile on Friday night, but Gabriel Jesus won’t be....
Denmark can absolutely win the whole thing
We’ve reached the quarterfinals of Euro 2020(1), which is when fans of the countries still in contention really start dreaming, and the rest realize that fucking-off-of-work time is probably going to run out with only three Monday-Friday match days left (#DayDrinkingIsForAllSeasons). For the teams t...
France couldn’t just turn it on and off forever
Yesterday, we dove into the very nature of Spain. How its championship pedigree is still around, but how the frustrating, and at times incomprehensible, frailties that surrounded that glorious era are in their DNA, too. And you’ll see all of them in the same match. They can’t help it. It’s who they ...
First it was very much Spain, then it wasn’t, then it was, then it wasn’t, and now we don’t know what to think
I’ve been using the term “Spain’ing” a lot during Euro 2020, harkening back to the era before Spain was drenched in medals, where they would always squander any tournament despite fielding one of the most talented squads. They could find any way to lose back then, whether through simple malaise, or ...
Unai Simón must love baseball, because this is a whiff
Spain benefitted in their last group game from Slovakia’s Martin Dubravka throwing the ball into his own net, so clearly frustrated at Spain’s inability to find the area between the posts that he felt there was no choice but to show them how easy it could be. People in sports love to say these thing...
Mentioning Ronaldo’s past won’t cost you the coverage
It’s easier for me to lower my standards. I’m a cisgender male, and never been sexually assaulted. I shouldn’t, and it’s just the path of lesser resistance, but it happens. So when it comes to coverage from networks or major websites or newspapers of athletes whose involvement in sexual assault is k...
This is why you don’t put too much stock in the group stage
It wasn’t so long ago that the European Championships were kind of perfect, in that it all made sense. Only 16 teams made it, which is just about the same amount of European teams that make the World Cup, so rarely were there true no-hopers in the draw. Four groups of four meant teams couldn’t duck ...
It’s never enough for England
You would think after winning the group, having the second-tightest defense in Euro 2020 so far (1.4 x GA), and being safely into the Round of 16 would be enough for England fans. But of course, this is England, and if they’re not complaining or being miserable, much like sharks not swimming, they d...
Martin Dúbravka was so sick of Spain’s wastefulness he took care of it himself
Ever watch a game and you’re sure that one player out on the field just has their circuits short out for a second? Their brain becomes the rainbow pinwheel of frustration as things fail to load? It can happen to all of us. It just doesn’t happen to us on a stage quite as big as the one Slovakia’s Ma...
A most Spurs-y summer
You have to hand it to Tottenham. While they certainly haven’t come anywhere close to curing their basketcase ways, they’ve at least learned to shroud it in bigger happenings in the soccer world to avoid attention. When they fired Jose Mourinho, essentially admitting to and correcting a gargantuan m...
SEE IT: It’s Thunderbastard season!
Denmark’s last group game in Copenhagen was always going to be an emotional wringer. After all, they’ve been through, and all the fans have witnessed, with their advancement hopes riding on not just their result but the one from the Belgium-Finland game, it set up to be a night full of torture, glor...
Belgium found the turbo button — it wears No. 7
The best you can describe Belgium’s situation as against Denmark was “awkward.” While a good portion of the Belgian squad is personally involved with Christian Eriksen,Thursday’s game was about Danish unity and recovery. This was clearly a catharsis for fans and players in red alike, a group that we...
Christian Eriksen to receive heart starter device
Christian Eriksen will receive an implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD), a heart starter device, days after his suffering cardiac arrest in a soccer game. The Danish player collapsed during the team’s opening match against Finland last Saturday in the Euro 2020 tournament....
SEE IT: Haitian goalkeeper lives out every netminder’s worst nightmare
Have you ever messed up an easy task — like decorating your dining table for guests but then realizing the pieces on the table aren’t symmetrical? Then, in a desperate attempt to fix your mistake, you accidentally knock over all the plates, breaking your fine china and leaving you a slobbering mess?...
That’s what Paul Pogba is supposed to be
It’s always difficult analyzing or discussing Paul Pogba. I’ve found myself on both sides of it just in the past year or two. How good was he at Juventus? Isn’t it easier to play when Claudio Marchisio is doing some of your running and Andrea Pirlo is there to spread passes to you? Maybe, but eight ...
Rüdiger HUNGRY!
I bet, my fellow footyphiles, that we thought we were done with international tournaments including players nibbling on each other, what with Luis Suarez not involved in the European Championships and probably too old for the next World Cup. And Copa America has bigger problems, though I suppose we ...
Shock of shocks, the story UEFA sold wasn’t the case
Out of the many shocks of Saturday’s Denmark-Finland Euro 2020 game was that the game continued not even two hours after Christian Eriksen collapsed on the field. When it was announced, most couldn’t fathom that either team would be in any kind of state to play. Part of UEFA’s statement — “per the p...