national-s Page 9 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Athletes who turned their careers into an April Fools joke on all of us

Happy April Fools Day to all. I hope everyone reading this hasn’t already gotten duped by one of their friends or loved ones. If you have, it’s okay at least you didn’t get fooled like these organizations did when they picked the “star” of their franchise. There’s been so many examples of these play...

The Pulisic, the bad, and the ugly of USMNT’s up-and-down weekend

It was a mixed day for USMNT fans Sunday. Then again every day pretty much is. The afternoon saw the full squad win their first game in Europe against a European team in five years, beating Northern Ireland 2-1. Yeah, it was Northern Ireland. Yeah, it was Northern Ireland’s B-team. Still, Christian ...

Empty protests of Qatar World Cup show players see evil, but can't close FIFA's Pandora's Box

It’s been a week for performative protests in soccer. Last Sunday, Glasgow Celtic and Rangers followed Wilfried Zaha’s lead and tore the facade of the kneeling before the opening whistle protest. It was just three days after one of Rangers’ players was racially abused by an opponent, and it was clea...

The USWNT’s fight for equal pay is still kind of nebulous

Yesterday, Megan Rapinoe and Margaret Purce met with President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden. Afterward, both Rapinoe and Purce met with the press. As always, Rapinoe was forthright, cutting, insightful, and funny. None of what comes next is to argue against Rapinoe being anything less than a ...

Winning doesn’t change everything, ask Megan Rapinoe

“There is no level of status, and there is no accomplishment or power, that will protect you from the clutches of inequality. One cannot simply outperform inequality.” – Megan Rapinoe, testifying before the House Committee on Oversight and Reforms on March 24, Equal Pay Day...

USMNT finally gets an important win with Yunus Musah

The November friendlies against Wales and Panama could have been the biggest tease ever. They kind of felt like that at the time. It was the first time the US had called together only European-based players, which is what a lot of fans had been clamoring for. After all, who didn’t have fatigue of wa...

U.S. Soccer Could Learn Something from England and [Checks Notes] Brazil (!) on Equal Pay

For Palestinians In And Out Of Refugee Camps, Al Wihdat Is More Than A Soccer Team

The Jordanian professional soccer team Al Wihdat plays at the heart of a refugee camp, both literally and figuratively, and is both a literal and figurative product and reminder of dispossession. Palestinian refugees and their descendants are the backbone of the club’s fanbase; their jerseys are red...

Some Good And Practical Ideas For Making Sure The Spelling Bee Never Ends In An Eight-Way Tie Again

Did you know that eight different children won the National Spelling Bee last night? Yeah, eight! A tween octet spelled 47 words correctly in a row, and because the Spelling Bee got rid of tiebreakers this year after having them in written form for the last two years, they all have to share in an un...

Afghanistan Football Federation Members Accused Of Sexually Abusing Women's National Team Players

The Guardian has a report today in which multiple figures involved in Afghanistan women’s soccer exposed what they say is a culture of abuse of the female national team’s players on the part of prominent male figures in the Afghanistan Football Federation. One former captain of the women’s team and ...

The American Outlaws Still Care About U.S. Soccer

On Oct. 10, 2017, the U.S. Men’s National Soccer Team suffered the most crushing defeat of its modern era: a 2-1 away loss to the tiny island nation Trinidad & Tobago which—coupled with simultaneous wins for Honduras and Panama—assured that in 2018 they’d be watching the World Cup from home for the ...

Yemen Has Been Ruined By War, But Its Soccer Program Is Still Kicking

Nearly every day, news of some fresh tragedy arrives from Yemen, a nation that has been devastated by a brutal conflict between Houthi forces and a Western-backed military coalition led by Saudi Arabia. At some point, the ruination starts to run together. Yemen cholera outbreak kills more than 2,000...

Gibraltar Wins First Competitive Match In Its History

History was made at the Vazgen Sargsyan Republican Stadium in the Armenian capital on Saturday as Gibraltar won its first ever competitive match, beating Armenia 1-0. The self-governing territory was first officially recognized by UEFA in 2013 and had lost 22 competitive matches since, including all...

Mesut Özil Quits International Soccer In Letter Decrying Racism And Unfair Double Standards

Mesut Özil retired from German international soccer Sunday, in a lengthy statement released on Twitter. Özil says the fallout from a photo he took with Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in May lays bare a kind of racism he’s subjected to as a German with Turkish heritage, and that “enough is en...

Football Recruit Picks Florida; Mom Wearing Vols And Bama Gear Walks Out

Wide receiver Jacob Copeland had narrowed down his school to three options for today’s National Signing Day: Tennessee, Alabama, and Florida. He picked the Gators. His mom, wearing a Vols hat and Tide sweater, picked up her handbag and bounced. Yikes!...

Please Do Check Out The Spicy Drama Going Down At The International Society For The History Of The Map

I’ve found, personally, an inverse correlation between how interesting an institutional power squabble is and how significant the institution in question is. A power squabble at the highest levels of a large national government, for example, is not really interesting; it will very often be terrifyin...

Sweden Knock Italy Out Of World Cup Qualifying

For the first time since 1958 and only the second time ever, the Italian national team will not qualify for the World Cup. A 0-0 draw with Sweden in the second leg of the European play-off round sealed their fate, after the Azzurri lost 1-0 in the first leg on Friday....

Don't Panic, The USWNT's Struggles Might Be A Good Thing

Tameka Butt capitalized on a Becky Sauerbrunn mistake to score the only goal of Australia’s first-ever win against the USWNT in 27 tries. Her 67th-minute score last night in Seattle, after what announcer Ian Darke referred to as “dithering defending,” gave her side (ranked seventh by FIFA) a histori...

Jordan Morris Is Your Unlikely Gold Cup Hero

“Idk why Jordan Morris is out there,” I typed to the Deadspin staff exactly two minutes before his game-winning goal. Morris was barely scoring in MLS with the Seattle Sounders this year, and even his two goals in this tournament came against the far inferior Martinique. He looked lost and mistake-p...

A Beautiful Jozy Altidore Free Kick Gave The USMNT A Short-Lived Lead

Jozy Altidore was in a bit of a slump, having not scored for the USMNT since September of 2016. But suddenly, he’s on fire, with two goals in fewer than 90 minutes across the past two games....