Patrik Eler channeled Thor in his team’s Ligue 2 opener on Friday, striking an incredible goal from nearly 40 yards out. The ferocity and speed with which the ball was struck gave the goalkeeper little chance to save the shot, even from such a long distance.
In a recent New York Times article by Andrew Keh, the writer delved into the strange but fascinating world of Finnish sports. One famous event Keh chronicled is the Swamp Soccer World Championships, a 20-year-old competition that now draws more than 2,000 people annually.
While Neymar hasn’t entirely exited Barcelona, he has shown himself the door at Thursday’s training session in Miami. With Barca slated to play Real Madrid Saturday in a friendly, Neymar’s bust-up with new signing Nelson Semedo is exactly what the tabloids craved.
Football is a reflection of our daily life — we frequently encounter things that can be shocking and absurd. As the summer transfer window reaches new heights and top European clubs buy and sell players for astronomical sums, here are some of the most shocking transfer window stories ever.
France was 15 minutes away from an unthinkable early exit, the No. 3 team in the world going out in the group stage of the Women’s Euros. Down a goal and down a man since the 17th minute, France received a helping hand from an unlikely source — Switzerland’s goalie. More precisely, it was the lack of a hand.
In a playing career that included stints with Roma, Sampdoria, Lazio and Inter, Serbian Sinisa Mihajlovic built a reputation as one the world’s finest dead-ball specialists. Alongside Andrea Pirlo, no player has scored more goals from direct free kicks in Serie A history than Mihajlovic with 28.
He was named Torino manager before the start of last season and guided the club to a ninth-place finish in Italy’s top flight. For a goalkeeper, playing under Mihajlovic is obviously a nightmare.
The hype for the 2017-18 La Liga season has been decidedly low-key, and for good reason. Is there really any stopping Real Madrid? The club’s loss of Alvaro Morata hasn’t exceptionally weakened them, and capturing Kylian Mbappe would mean that we’re about 20 years away from parity being restored to European competition.
On one hand, preseason friendlies definitely do not matter. On the other hand, preseason friendlies between teams like Chelsea and Bayern Munich definitely matter.
Not for any competitive reason, of course. When Bayern and Chelsea met in the International Champions Cup Tuesday, Munich's 3-2 win wasn't predictive of anything. No, the Chelsea-Bayern friendly definitely mattered because we hadn't seen elite soccer in a while and missed players doing things like what Thomas Muller did.
If you have not been watching UEFA Women's Euro 2017, you have been missing out. The Netherlands beat Belgium 2-1 on Monday, but the moment of the match came when Belgium's Tessa Wullaert lobbed a volley over the beleaguered Dutch goalkeeper for an incredible long-range goal.