Japan's professional leagues only began play in mid-February, but there's already a strong contender for goal of the season in the J2 League after Matchday 3 of the competition.
Shimizu S-Pulse (relegated from the top division last year) traveled to V-Varen Nagasaki on Friday and earned a 1-1 draw with one of the greatest late equalizers you'll ever see.
Bournemouth stunned the fans inside Emirates Stadium on Saturday with a goal straight from kickoff to take a 1-0 lead. Philip Billing scored just nine seconds into the game for the second-fastest goal in league history.
Arsenal would rally from 2-0 down in the second half and grab all three points with a 97th minute Reiss Nelson goal to win 3-2. What a game.
First, let’s look at how the game started.
Having the World Cup in the middle of the English Premier League season has split the campaign into two chapters. Heading into Matchday 26, The18 created an EPL table that only consists of results since the World Cup break.
The updated table shows how in form some teams are and accurately depicts how poor other teams have performed.
Here’s the table and some of the biggest surprises.
Ronaldinho’s last Barcelona goal was scored against Atlético Madrid on March 1, 2008. At the time of writing, that moment took place 15 years ago. How time flies.
Ronaldinho’s final goal for la Blaugrana is the legacy of that game, however on the day it was a triumphant 4-2 victory for Atlético Madrid.
Ronnie scored the opening goal in the 29th minute with a spectacular bicycle kick. The assist from Xavi wasn’t too shabby either.
I've seen enough. I'm declaring 17-year-old AZ Alkmaar phenom Kees Smit the winner of the 2023 Golden Boy Award, and there's nothing some preciously talented La Masia graduate at Barcelona can do about it.
Over a month ago, the Netherlands youth international came to my attention with an incredibly inventive goal during an indoor match. It's as beautiful as a Rembrandt.
After earning rave reviews for its presentation of Major League Soccer on opening weekend, Apple TV is wasting no time in hooking more fútbol fans to its product with the release of a trailer (narrated by David Beckham) and release date for a new documentary, Real Madrid: Until The End.
When you think of the greatest solo dribbling performances in soccer Diego Maradona’s “Goal of the Century” and some of Lionel Messi’s goals come to mind. The best dribbling we’ve seen so far in the 2022-23 season has come from the most unlikely of sources.
César Montes came back from injury in Espanyol’s LaLiga game against Mallorca on Saturday, and a goal-saving tackle in the match's closing minutes has half the city of Barcelona sprung over the Mexican center-back.
"Cachorro" returned to the Espanyol XI, played the full 90 minutes and had a goal-saving slide tackle in the closing minutes of the game. Montes showed his recent physical problems won't stop him from getting back to his previous form. This is worthy of chronic replays.
Nashville SC kicked off the 2023 Major League Soccer season on Saturday in front of a packed GEODIS Park in Nashville, Tennessee, with a 2-0 victory vs. NYCFC. One of the biggest topics of discussion was the kits Nashville wore.
For the first time ever, Nashville wore black at home as the team showed off their stunning “The Man in Black Kit” which is a tribute to the great Johnny Cash. The thousands inside the stadium blacked out the stadium.
Part of the nod to Johnny Cash included having his son, John Carter Cash, open the season with some guitar. Epic.
In the heart of downtown Milwaukee, just a mile from the shores of Lake Michigan lies American soccer’s oldest success story that deals not in grass and touchlines but turf and boards.
The Milwaukee Wave has operated for nearly forty consecutive years and is the oldest continuously operating professional soccer team in the United States. That remarkable feat is not achieved through sheer luck, but rather, meticulous attention to detail. It's an entire organization that has bought into doing things the right way because for the Wave, success is not an option, it's an obligation.