A UEFA Executive Committee meeting in the Slovenian capital of Ljubljana has hashed out some future Champions League final locations, so we can now confirm sites for 2021, 2022 and 2023. This year’s final will be staged in Istanbul, and then Ol’ Big Ears will travel to Saint Petersburg, Munich and London over the course of the following three competitions.
Loris Karius bloopers are like the Rolling Stones: They never get old and they never stop entertaining.
With this week's Champions League matchups done and dusted, you might be tempted to think European football is finished until the weekend. Well think again! The Europa League kicks of today and there are a ton of matches worth getting excited about. Here are the 10 I'm most excited about, and my corresponding predictions for each match.
Basel vs. Krasnodar
For the world’s 130th-ranked side, the sight of Cristiano Ronaldo “Ronaldo Chopping” and “SIUUUU-ING” his way around a 5,000-seat stadium was simply too much to bear. So Lithuania decided to stand off and give him 57 touches, seven shots and four goals in exchange for a substitution in the 79th minute of a 5-1 loss to Portugal. That’s a good trade.
The evidence for Belgium and Manchester City midfielder Kevin De Bruyne being the finest passer of the ball on the planet is mounting. He’s opened his Premier League campaign with an assist in four straight matches — including two against Tottenham — while becoming the quickest player in EPL history to reach the milestone of 50 career dimes; it took him 18 fewer appearances than Mesut Özil.
Today, the Belgian recorded a hat trick of assists against Scotland in Euro 2020 qualifying, and it only took the 28-year-old 32 minutes to accomplish the feat in Glasgow.
With a 4-2 victory over Russia on Sunday, Portugal captured a record sixth Euro Beach Soccer League championship. Incredibly, Europe’s 16th most-populated country has now unified all four male UEFA titles after winning Euro 2016, the 2018-19 Nations League, UEFA Futsal Euro 2018 and now the beach soccer crown.
Spain may have made beating Romania look difficult Thursday, but before the match Thiago made playing soccer look easy. A video released by the Spainish national team of Thiago skills has gone viral among the soccer community.
The video captures the Bayern midfielder making cross-field passes with another teammate; sounds simple enough right? Oh yeah, I forget to mention that he's juggling and passing the ball between teammates without the ball touching the ground.
Sergio Ramos picking up a yellow card is about as newsworthy as Zlatan Ibrahimovic being narcissistic. This Sergio Ramos yellow card, however, was a bit different.
After a stellar World Cup campaign in which she helped carry the Netherlands to a World Cup final, Dutch playmaker Danielle van de Donk continues to show that she’s world class. Tuesday night's 3-0 thrashing of Turkey was business as usual for the Netherlands women’s national team, but that didn’t keep Van de Donk from adding a little bit of magic.
The 2018-19 UEFA Champions League technical report was released today, and it’s got 51 pages of highly entertaining and valuable information that analyzes specific tactical and technical trends at the very top of the world’s game. The comprehensive overview of last season’s competition includes some fascinating insights.