world-cup Page 23 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
Tis but a glimpse
It’s not official yet. The USMNT still has to dot the i’s and cross the t’s and all that. Which means they have to manage to not lose to Costa Rica by six goals or more on Wednesday. Quite frankly, the more impressive feat than qualifying for the World Cup would be losing by six in Costa Rica, and e...
I want my win in the Azteca, Gregg Berhalter
Right off the bat, I know all the logic the US might keep something in reserve tonight at the Azteca vs. Mexico. The USMNT has not been able to thread the three-matches-in-seven days windows all that well. The Panama game is the real crunch one of the three this time, as a win there basically guaran...
Golden State’s good, bad, and ugly have all been on display
The Golden State Warriors’ penchant for losing games they have in hand is almost becoming legendary. They’re the fastest gunslingers in the West, but they could teach a masterclass in shooting themselves in the foot on too many occasions this season. On Sunday night, these Warriors had a victory in ...
Gregg Berhalter drops the ball on USMNT roster
Expected, disappointing. Two words that best describe my reaction to seeing the United States Men’s National Team’s roster for the final trio of octagonal World Cup Qualifying matches, beginning next week. Outside of the core, can’t-miss players and super-subs, which any soccer fan with a brain coul...
With Steph Curry ruled out indefinitely, what of these Warriors?
A once-promising season has turned into an injury-plagued campaign for the Golden State Warriors. The injury bug bit Golden State again Wednesday night in their 110-88 loss to Boston, when Steph Curry went down in the second quarter on a questionable play involving the Celtics’ Marcus Smart. Curry h...
Ryan Turell wants to be the first Orthodox Jew to play basketball in the NBA
It’s not just about him. Yeshiva University’s Ryan Turell clearly gets that, much in the same vein as Brian Flores with his recent lawsuit against the NFL, trying to put a greater focus on equal treatment of minorities in the league knows it’s not just about him. Central to both is the overriding pr...
The Cinderellas most likely to have a ball in March
The introduction of the modern seeding system to the NCAA Tournament in 1979 gave way to the age of upsets. Before long, the Cinderella moniker was attached to dozens of teams that played well beyond expectations. The immortal words of John Wooden, architect of college basketball’s transcendent dyna...
Kyrie Irving has his way with Orlando, scoring 60 points one game after Durant drops 53
If I told you Kyrie Irving was cooking on the court last night, you’d probably say, “OK, what’s new,” right? But Kyrie was on an entirely different level in Tuesday night’s 150-108 win against the Orlando Magic, going for 60 points in only 35 minutes of game action. Irving had 41 in the first half, ...
Kevin Durant daggered the Knicks, then Mayor Adams
If you want to get an idea of how the power dynamic between the Brooklyn Nets and New York Knicks has drastically shifted, Sunday’s matchup gave us a window. The Nets now think they run the city....
Klay’s offensive explosion against the Bucks was great, but he wanted more
Klay Thompson broke out of his shooting slump in a big way Saturday night in Golden State’s 122-109 win over Milwaukee. Thompson dropped 38 points on the Bucks with six rebounds and five assists, connecting on eight three-pointers in the process....
U.K. finally gets around to sanctioning Chelsea’s Roman Abramovich
Roman’s got to go. Hand in your keys to the club before you do more damage to those who don’t deserve it. As it turns out, plenty of people who said politics had no place in sports really meant politics that they don’t agree with had no room at the table. Loud banishment of policy came at the inters...
Kylian Mbappé passes the audition but PSG spectacularly fail another test
While the word “narrative” has become something of a cinder block sitting in the intestines of sports, sometimes you just can’t avoid how much it’s beating you over the head. Kylian Mbappé lining up against Real Madrid in the round of 16 in the Champions League was one of those times. Mbappé is stil...
With Weston McKennie done for the season… now what?
For as much excitement as this batch of the USMNT has generated, most of that has been tempered by the fact that A) they’ve rarely actually played all that well together and B) they’ve rarely all been together and in anything near top form. There will be those, the most rose-colored glasses-adorned ...
Whew… we need to talk about the Russian gymnasts
This morning, I woke up to the sight of a river of people, from the elderly down to the babies carried in their parents’ arms, trying to escape Ukraine. I watched my TV in horror as they slipped and slid uphill, some of them falling, wondering if they were going to get back up again. Behind them, a ...
Biathlete Yevhen Malyshev killed defending Ukraine
Nineteen-year-old Ukranian biathlete Yevhen Malyshev was killed in action on Tuesday while fighting for the Ukrainian military against the ongoing Russian military invasion. His death was confirmed Wednesday by the International Biathlon Union, who wrote, “Above all, the IBU expresses its deepest co...
Why you never dance with devils
The reckoning has finally come for the sports organizations that have played footsie with autocratic nations. And not just FIFA and the International Olympic Committee, but for the Premier League, Formula One, and any sports league that has cashed checks from questionable international sources while...
Oh, damn, MLS started this weekend
Part of it was due to still being on vacation, and the other part was my general obliviousness. But I only realized at the last minute that MLS started its season this weekend, about 12 minutes after the last one ended with NYCFC’s manager in his undies in the rain in Portland, thanks to having to w...
![FIFA doesn’t want to ask itself the hard questions [Updated]](https://images.deadspin.com/tr:w-900/a44dd2b11a33459944cad5312eacef87.jpg)
FIFA doesn’t want to ask itself the hard questions [Updated]
It is so simple, at least to anyone not entangled in the middle of the mess. All of Poland, Czechia, and Sweden have said they will refuse to play Russia in World Cup qualifiers at the end of March. While a ban from FIFA isn’t going to end Russia’s occupation of Ukraine, there is no pressure point t...
Fedor Smolov is that guy
After years of political tension between the countries, Russia officially invaded Ukraine on Wednesday, bringing swift sanctions and reaction from around the world, as countries almost unanimously opposed the actions spearheaded by Russian President Vladimir Putin....