… In 2010 it was a foul on Chelsea’s Michael Ballack in the FA Cup final that made Boateng, then playing for Portsmouth, public enemy No1 in Germany. The national captain was consequently ruled out of South Africa 2010 with ankle-ligament damage and never played for Germany again. In 2014 it is not Boateng’s actions but his […]
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Nations League?
Uefa explores internationals shake-up with Nations League plan From ESPN…The plans, revealed in Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet, remain vague but there is a “concrete proposal” to introduce the concept, which may see teams separated into divisions based on their seeding and then competing for promotion and relegation. The season would, theoretically, be played out over ten matchdays […]
Time for Jack to step up
Jack Wilshere, the player famously described by Arsène Wenger as having a “Spanish technique with an English heart”, will be captain and talisman for both club and country for a generation. Substituted after 67 minutes in Kiev on Tuesday night following his worst showing in an England shirt, Wilshere returned to the home comforts of […]
Football Manager Craze
As the computer game that discovered Lionel Messi prepares to launch a 21st edition, its popularity has never been greater. … “I went and did a gig at Manchester City and met a load of the players,” says the self-confessed City fan. “I met Micah Richards, the defender, and I was a bit rude to him. Afterwards my […]
Human Traffic – Africa’s Lost Boys
It has been a starting point for some of the world’s top soccer players. As youngsters, the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo, Andrea Pirlo, Carlos Tevez, Javier Mascherano, Thierry Henry and Nicolas Anelka all played in the Mondial Montaigu youth tournament in France. Known as “Mondial Minimes,” the 40-year-old competition is contested by under-16 national teams over Easter, […]
World Cup: Qatar 2022 – Summer or Winter?
Fifa faces winter of discontent over World Cup 2022 as chance of summer tournament in Qatar recedes This time last year the Premier League chairman travelled to the International Centre for Sports Security conference in Doha. All five feet seven inches the statesman, he used his keynote address to warn his Qatari hosts they should not […]
Heat turning up on La Roja
Heat turning up on La Roja by Graham Hunter Make no mistake about it, Spain’s six-year status as the uncontested world No. 1 international side is about to be attacked with all weapons and — hopefully for the contenders — battered into submission over the next 15 months, starting this week. I say six years because […]
Ronaldinho is back!
Of all the various methods Ronaldinho is reported to have found to irritate the coaching staff at Paris Saint‑Germain during the early days of his soon-to-be stratospheric European career, my favourite is the story of Ronaldinho being spotted, in the wee hours of a weekday morning, playing the bongos on stage at the Club Bikini […]
Sympathy for the ‘devil’: In defense of Sepp Blatter
There can’t be many people whose image has sat side by side on a front page with Colonel Gaddafi, the now expired former dictator of Libya. But Sepp Blatter, the president of soccer’s governing body FIFA, is one of the few to hold this dubious honor. It was June 2011, and The Sun — a […]
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