With Real Madrid having won its third Champions League title in four years, pundits and fans alike continue to make the case that La Liga has overtaken the other major European leagues as the most elite division in the world.
On Saturday, during halftime of the USMNT’s 1-1 draw with Venezuela, the preliminary 40-man roster for the 2017 Gold Cup was revealed. Manager Bruce Arena now has about three weeks to narrow that list down to the final cut of 23 players. The United States will open the tournament on July 8 against Panama.
This 40-player pool came with several surprises. MLS dominates the list with 32 of the selections being domestically-based. Here are a few of the more interesting decisions from Arena for the 2017 Gold Cup.
In 2015, a battling Juventus side fought its way to a Champions League final. Overachieving in Max Allegri’s first season as manager, they were roundly beaten by Barcelona. Domestically, the club was enjoying a renaissance. Winning back-to-back-to-back titles, the 2015 final put them well ahead of their post-Calciopoli schedule (the 2006 Italian football scandal that saw Juventus relegated to Serie B).
We've reached the final match of the 2016/2017 Champions League, which means it's the end of The18's UCL Pick 'Em.
It's been a long and daunting season, but our lively bunch has done a decent job of giving you, the readers, an idea of who will win each Tuesday and Wednesday. Below are some simple answers that you can totally steal and use as your own to make your friends think you know it all. If you need to know how to watch the match, check out this story.
The 2016-17 European club season brought many surprises. There were several teams that nobody expected much from, but they managed to prove us all wrong by either winning a title, qualifying for European competition or doing something notable in the Champions League. Let’s take a look at five clubs that provided a bit of magic this season.
This week, most people will be reading, talking and writing about Francesco Totti, who has now retired after playing his final game for Roma. But while everyone’s focused on Totti, let’s consider the rest of the season, indulging in one of the favorite pastimes of the calcio connoisseur: going over every detail of the previous 38 matches and putting people and teams in ranked lists.
There will be plenty of time to dissect Totti’s career in the future. Right now, we need to think about who has really impressed us this season and (more importantly) who has failed to impress.
According to the ScotlandsDNA project, only 0.6% of the world’s population has red hair. Chances are, you’ve known a few gingers in your life, and maybe you’ve even taken a moment to stop calling them Carrot Top, Mr/Ms Weasley, Chucky, Big Red, Ginger Balls and/or Strawberry Shortcake and gotten to know them as unique individuals that aren’t defined by the color of their drapes, you damn bully.
There’s still another round of matches to play in Serie A. Sure, Juventus have won the title. Sure, they printed some pretty cringe-worthy ‘LE6END’ merchandise and plastered it everywhere. Sure, Napoli and Roma seem set in their Champions League spots. Sure, every position in the league is seemingly sorted, bar Crotone and Empoli bickering about who gets to be the third worst team. Sure, the league is pretty much done and dusted. But we still have one round of fixtures left.
It hasn’t exactly been rosy times for Valencia CF and their fans of late. Since qualifying for the Champions League in 2015, the club has completely gone downhill. In the last two seasons, they’ve finished mid-table in La Liga, flirted dangerously with relegation, sold their best players and have had a total of five managers: Nuno, Gary Neville, Pako Ayestaran, Cesare Prandelli and Voro. However, things may finally be changing at Valencia after three important announcements were recently made by the club.
You could say it’s been an abnormal season for Cristiano Ronaldo. We’ve all gotten used to the Portuguese star playing almost every single competitive match and reaching outrageous totals of 50 or 60 goals a campaign.
This season, however, Ronaldo has scored 37 goals across all competitions, and he’s appeared in 43 of Real Madrid’s 57 official games — a total of only 75%. This is a significant change from last season when he scored a total of 51 goals and played 48 of Real’s 52 matches — a total of 92%.