With Lionel Messi, Luis Suárez and Ousmane Dembélé all sidelined through injury, new signing Antoine Griezmann took center stage in Barcelona’s 5-2 victory over Real Betis at the Camp Nou on Sunday night.
After losing their season opener last Friday against Athletic Bilbao, Barça’s nightmarish start continued when Nabil Fekir opened the scoring for Betis in the 15th minute.
Manchester City kept pace with Liverpool at the top of the Premier League table with a 3-1 victory over Bournemouth on Sunday morning, but the Citizens were made to work for all three points. Sergio Agüero and Raheem Sterling had given City a 2-0 lead by the 43rd minute, but just before the halftime whistle Harry Wilson struck this marvelous free kick to pull the Cherries back into the match.
As an American, it’s only natural that you’ll go through life encountering people that aren’t soccer fans. I’ve found — time after time — that the greatest bridge over that divide is Zlatan Ibrahimović. Introducing the big Swede’s personality to the uninitiated turns ambivalence into interest, and showing the Galaxy striker’s most famous goals turns interest into “holy shit, that’s incredible!”
LAFC moved one step closer to securing the top seed in the Western Conference — and the MLS Supporters’ Shield — following a 4-0 beatdown of rivals San Jose on Wednesday night at Banc of California Stadium in Los Angeles. Diego Rossi opened the scoring in the sixth minute, Carlos Vela registered a brace by the 41st and Joshua Pérez put the finishing touches on an emphatic victory.
Vela’s first arrived from the penalty spot in the 17th, but it’s his outrageous solo goal in the 41st-minute that could have a shout at the MLS Goal of the Year Award.
No club has won the Brasileirão more than Palmeiras, which makes it odd that five Brazilian clubs — São Paulo, Grêmio, Santos, Cruzeiro and Internacional — have all achieved more success in South America’s premier club competition, the Copa Libertadores. Palmeiras has only won the title once, and that happened all the way back in 1999.
It’s that time of year again: FIFA has announced the 10 finalists for the annual Puskás Award, the trophy given to the player, male or female, “judged to have scored the most aesthetically significant, or ‘most beautiful,’ goal of the calendar year.”
This most certainly wasn’t the case last year when Mohamed Salah scooped the award after Liverpool and Egypt supporters spammed the fan vote. The goal Salah scored against Everton back in December of 2018 hadn’t even won the Premier League’s Goal of the Month, so it was an awful joke to see it given the prestigious Puskás Award.
Real Madrid led, but only just. Karim Benzema had given Los Blancos an early lead but Luka Modric picked up his first straight red card in more than 300 matches with Real. Then came an insane Toni Kroos goal vs Celta Vigo, ensuring all three points for the Merengues on Saturday.
After Benzema’s goal in the 12th minute you’d be forgiven for thinking Real Madrid would cruise to an opening-day victory. But Modric’s 56th-minute red card complicated things a bit.
The UN should look into Memphis Depay for crimes against humanity because he just ended Angers center back Mateo Pavlovic on Friday.
Lyon cruised to a 6-0 win with Depay and Moussa Dembélé scoring two apiece, but it was the Depay assist vs Angers that was the highlight of the match (unless you’re the Pavlovic family, which is now forced to deal with life without Mateo).
I could describe for you the 89th-minute Aritz Aduriz goal vs Barcelona, or I could let the stellar Ray Hudson’s words speak for themselves as he gushed over the “magisterial” strike.
“A goal that will give you physical arousal.”
“As cool as James Bond in a white tuxedo.”
“A goal that would make Ebenezer Scrooge smile.”
“Perfection from Aduriz.”
Frenkie de Jong and Matthijs de Ligt are gone, sold to Barcelona and Juventus, respectively, for a combined $183 million.
But Ajax can still score some of the prettiest team goals in Euope.
The Dutch champions, who came within a whisker of the Champions League final last season, routed FC Emmen VV 5-0 on Saturday at Amsterdam ArenA in the Eredivisie, with four goals resulting from the home side making the extra pass.