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Jesse Marsch’s first season as RB Leipzig manager was always going to be full of growing pains. He had impossibly large shoes to fill in replacing Julian Nagelsmann — who led Leipzig to the 2020 Champions League semifinals, becoming the youngest-ever coach to reach that stage — and Marsch inherited a side in transition with Dayot Upamecano and Marcel Sabitzer following Nagelsmann to Bayern Munich while Ibrahima Konaté signed with Liverpool.

When it comes to women’s college soccer, Stanford is the preeminent program in the Pac-12, regularly producing USWNT stars like Julie Foudy, Christen Press, Kelley O’Hara, Andi Sullivan, Alana Cook and Catarina Macario. So whoever the Cardinal are playing, they know they’re going to get their best. On Sunday, it was the Colorado Buffaloes trying to knock off Stanford and nearly doing so thanks to a stunning CU bicycle kick goal. 

BARCELONA - Ansu Fati marked his first start in almost a year by scoring one goal and creating another as Barcelona came from behind to beat Valencia 3-1 in LaLiga at Camp Nou on Sunday.

Despite being allowed a full capacity crowd for the first time since March 2020, Barça's ground was only half full — and those in attendance were silenced after five minutes as José Gayà's long-range strike swerved into the far corner.

JOSÉ GAYÁ GOLAZO

With just two weeks remaining in the NWSL regular season, the North Carolina Courage welcomed NJ/NY Gotham FC to WakeMed Soccer Park on Sunday afternoon in a match with huge playoff implications.

After a scoreless first half, Midge Purce got the opener for Gotham in the 54th-minute before adding a second 10 minutes later. The 26-year-old forward is now her team’s leading scorer on the season with eight goals.

Qualifying for the World Cup from Concacaf is hard, the narrative goes. Away trips are brutal experiences and every point is hard earned, we’re told. And yet, a quick glance at social media over the last month or two since the USMNT began World Cup qualifying paints a different picture, one that suggests U.S. coach Gregg Berhalter is a stinking pile of flaming diapers for failing to win every single game in qualifying. It had us thinking about USMNT World Cup qualifying history, and how past teams have fared compared to this one. 

Norwich City got its second point of the Premier League season with a scoreless draw against Brighton on Saturday. A brutal Josh Sargent miss vs. Brighton in the first half will have the Canaries wishing they got all three points.

Josh Sargent Miss Vs. Brighton

Sargent Had a really good half otherwise, too. #USMNT pic.twitter.com/6EbKOmZNJ6

The 2021 Golden Boy finalists list was revealed on Friday and USMNT star Gio Reyna’s name is on the list. The Golden Boy is an annual award voted on by 30 different journalists to determine the best under-21 player in Europe. 

The Golden Boy was created in 2003 and has been won by notable names like Lionel Messi, Wayne Rooney, Paul Pogba, Kylian Mbappé and Erling Haaland. An American has never won the award before.

Reyna is the third American in the last four years to make the cut as a finalist for the honor. Here are the players he will be competing with this year.

Arsenal defeated Hoffenheim 4-0 in the Women’s Champions League on Thursday to move up to second-place in Group C. The Gunners’ victory saw the first Tobin Heath Arsenal goal, along with scores from Vivianne Miedema, Leah Williamson and Kim Little.

Heath got her first Champions League start with Arsenal. She previously made an appearance as a substitute in Arsenal’s Champions League opener against Barcelona, where Heath picked up an assist.