Europe

BERN — UEFA has overseen 61,859 COVID-19 tests since August, allowing more than 500 European matches to be played and making soccer one of the safest environments in the world, it said on Thursday.

The European soccer body, which has been criticised by some media for pressing ahead with international football during the pandemic, said that only 340 of those tests had been positive — 0.55 percent of the total — and only 3 percent of matches had been canceled.

It’s not at all what you want to see when you turn on the TV to watch Barcelona play at the Camp Nou, but Wednesday’s Champions League match against Dynamo Kyiv transformed into a goalkeepers’ duel between the returning Marc-André ter Stegen (six saves) and 18-year-old Ruslan Neshcheret (11 saves). 

With Lionel Messi still unable to score from open play and Antoine Griezmann unable to score by any definition of the word, Barcelona’s 2-1 victory was narrowly achieved but ultimately retains the club’s 100 percent record in Group G.

Weston McKennie, the 22-year-old Texan, has a lot of egos to deal with while on loan at Juventus. Cristiano Ronaldo obviously looms large in any locker room, but you know folks like Álvaro Morata, Paulo Dybala, Adrien Rabiot, Aaron Ramsey and Juan Cuadrado want to see their share of the ball. Remarkably, McKennie aided two of the largest personalities on the squad without even touching the ball. And yes, we’re calling it a Weston McKennie assist, because America god damnit.

With Aaron Wan-Bissaka and Luke Shaw playing the roles of marauding fullbacks, Axel Tuanzebe the false center back, Bruno Fernandes the floating No. 10, Donny van de Beek the floating No. 8 and Juan Mata and Nemanja Matić the taxidermied zebras, Manchester United produced the sort of display that makes you wonder why Mauricio Pochettino is still out of a job on Wednesday.

The Real Madrid stadium renovation completion date remains June 2022 with the $650 million project now taking shape after over one year of redevelopment work. 

Although the Santiago Bernabéu capacity will hardly change following the renovation — going from 81,044 to 81,043 — the biggest visual difference is the addition of a retractable roof that covers all of the pitch while the fixed roof structure protects all of the stadium’s seats. 

Although somewhat premature seeing as it was only Matchday 3 in the Champions League, Real Madrid and Inter Milan at the Estadio Alfredo Di Stefano was billed as a must-win game for both clubs on Tuesday. 

The match didn’t disappoint with Real taking a two-goal lead through Karim Benzema and Sergio Ramos before Lautaro Martínez and Ivan Perišić leveled for Inter. In the 80th minute, substitutes Vinícius Júnior and Rodrygo combined to hand Real a much-needed first win in group play.

It’s one of those types of goals you see all the time in the youth game but hardly ever see in professional football, and we just love to see it. As soon as we saw this Ajax indirect free kick goal, we knew we had to share it with you, our dear readers.

In the 12th minute with Ajax already up one, FC Midtjylland was penalized for the goalkeeper handling a pass back. Referees know this is a rare instance where the offensive team is awarded an indirect free kick in the box, not a penalty kick. Here’s what ensued.

We’ve got a new leader in rowdy UEFA Champions League Group B, and Real Madrid and Inter Milan should really just be thankful that Borussia Mönchengladbach isn’t dashing off into the sunset at this point.

After drawing 2-2 with both Real and Inter by way of conceding 90th-minute equalizers, Gladbach travelled to Shakhtar Donetsk on Tuesday in a violent mood inspired by French forward Alassane Pléa.