We all know that Pele loves nothing more than a bit of Pele. There’s nothing wrong with that. If you spent over 50 years fielding questions exclusively about yourself to an adoring audience, you’d probably think you were the world’s greatest too. It's either that or you have a massive mental breakdown in the face of the enormity of the lie that is your life.
The start of major European leagues looms and fans are anxious to see how their teams fare on opening weekend. But how much does the first match even matter? After all, it's a long season and teams have plenty of time to rebound from week one losses. Or do they?
Looking at the statistics, it appears that the first game can set the tone for an entire season. It can either give a burst of confidence or present an omen of troubles ahead.
Chances are, if you’ve done soccer, you’ll know about goals. But what are they? How does a goal become a goal and not something else? When will you know if you’ve actually seen a goal?
These are all good, valid questions. You see, all goals are created equal, but not really. Goals come in all shapes and sizes, and you never really see the same goal twice.
At the most basic level, a goal is a goal when the ball crosses the goal line in its entirety. That’s really what a goal is. That’s really the science behind it in a nutshell, I guess.
The year is 1931. Ghandi has been released from prison. The Empire State Building has just been completed in New York City, and France has just earned its first-ever international victory over England.
The two nations faced off in Paris with England representing the big bully and France the underdog. Despite the odds, Les Bleus pulled off the upset, recording their first win against their rivals with a commanding 5-2 result. The French were jubilant after the win — they had literally beaten the Three Lions at their own game.
As the first words were placed onto this page, Antonio Cassano had rethought his recent decision to retire. He was set to play another season at Hellas Verona, reuniting with Giampaolo Pazzini for a Serie A farewell tour. By the time we got to the final words of this very paragraph — barely the third sentence — he was going to retire again.
If you saw the bellboy wheeling a few of these metallic cases down the hall, each clearly denoted as hands off material with a dozen locks keeping its contents guarded, you’d probably react like Ludacis in “Rollout (My Business)”: what in the world is in that bag, what you got in that bag?
For the FC Barcelona roadies, it’s a pair of one of a kind adidas Nemeziz 17s handcrafted especially for Lionel Messi, the latest range of Blaugrana training gear and Andre Gomes under lock and key.
The greatness of Lionel Messi may never be understood. If you’ve seen him run circles around defenders like they're cones or just taken a glance at the numbers that define his career, you're probably asking yourself “How does this man do it?”
Though we may never fully know the answer, when a specimen like Messi comes around, we want to analyze every aspect of his or her existence to figure out what makes them unstoppable. How do they train? What were their parents like? Do they like flipping their pillows onto the cold side before they go to bed?!
Kristine Lilly, a midfielder/forward for the USWNT for 23 years, holds the world record for most international appearances made by a man or woman. To give you some perspective on just how incredible the feat of 354 caps is, the male player with the most international appearances (Egypt’s Ahmed Hassan) has 184.
Kristine Lilly played on the national team over 4 different decades. She witnessed the permed and teased hair of the 1980s and the sidebangs of the early 2010s, the peak of the Michael Jackson era, the rise of Taylor Swift and everything in between.
Right this minute, El Salvador and the USMNT are gearing up to play in a crucial Gold Cup quarterfinal match. The U.S. are clear favorites for this game, ranked the 35th best team in the world while El Salvador is 101st. In the 21 times the two have met, El Salvador have never beaten the U.S, losing 17 and drawing four.
The CONCACAF Gold Cup quarterfinal match-ups are set. Only eight teams remain. Let's check them out:
July 19: Costa Rica vs. Panama
Time: 6:00 p.m. EST
Location: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
TV: FOX Sports 1, Univision
Match-up: Costa Rica finished first in Group A, and Panama finished second in Group B. Costa Rica thrives on an organized defense and the creativity of Benfica midfielder Bryan Ruiz on offense. Panama's top players include Porto forward Ismail Diaz and NYCFC midfielder Miguel Camargo.