With a total of 17 titles in the European Cup/UEFA Champions League, no country comes to close to matching Spain’s level of dominance on the continent. By extension, La Liga is often viewed as the world’s premier league competition. When looking at the La Liga top scorers of all time, the level of quality throughout the history of the competition is evident.
For those of us that are old, we see a meeting between the Netherlands and Germany sans Wesley Sneijder, Arjen Robben, Robin van Persie, Bastian Schweinsteiger, Mesut Ozil and Thomas Muller and even more of our already decrepit existence goes to die.
Still, a meeting between Holland and Germany in Amsterdam remains on of the few fixtures on the international calendar that you’re innately drawn to, and today's exercise showed exactly why.
Although England’s performance against the Czech Republic was thrilling and Scotland’s humiliation to Kazakhstan was funny, there’s not a lot to get excited about in Euro 2020 qualifying as nearly half of the competing nations will ultimately earn a place at the 16th European Championship.
This is why they paid the man. After agreeing to a new four-year contract with Los Angeles FC back in January — one that’ll pay Walker Zimmerman more than the MLS max budget charge of $530,000 — the center back produced to goods for his side last night in a dramatic 2-1 victory over Real Salt Lake at Banc of California Stadium.
For all of his goal-scoring success in the past couple of years with Manchester City, Raheem Sterling entered this international break with just four goals in 47 international appearances.
Sterling nearly doubled that mark on Friday.
England hosted the Czech Republic in the first match of Euro 2020 qualifying for both countries. Sterling looked right at home, scoring a hat trick to lead the Three Lions to a 5-0 victory.
More remarkable than the goals, however, was the Raheem Sterling celebration after his second strike.
The reigning World Cup champions were always expected to trounce little Moldova to open Euro 2020 qualifying on Friday. But the class and beauty on display in France’s first goal was another stunning reminder of the quality of the best team in the world.
France was marvelous in its run to the World Cup title last summer and pretty much the entire roster was back for the start of Euro 2020 qualifying this week. Chief among those were Antoine Griezmann and Paul Pogba, who combined for the opener against Moldova on Friday.
When Denmark convenes for a friendly against Kosovo (March 21) and a massive Euro 2020 qualifier against Switzerland in Basel (March 26), it’ll do so without an attacker that many are desperate to finally see at the senior level — 22-year-old FC Copenhagen winger Robert Skov.
It was a great weekend for teenage homegrown players in Major League Soccer as two academy products — Toronto FC’s Ayo Akinola and the Philadelphia Union’s Brenden Aaronson — marked their first starts with goals.
Akinola is a 19-year-old who’s recently been called-up for the U.S. pre-U-20 World Cup training camp in Spain. The Detroit-born forward appeared in four matches as a substitute for Toronto last year, totaling only 45 minutes.
However, on Sunday he was given his first start, went 85 minutes in the 3-2 win over New England and scored his first goal.
Yesterday, Barcelona opened a ten-point gap at the top of LaLiga with only ten matches remaining, all but guaranteeing the club’s fourth league title in five years. The performance that earned the cushion was a 4-1 away victory over Real Betis at the Benito Villamarín, and all four Barca goals were of the highest order.