A foul in any sport is almost always detrimental to the team that committed the infraction. In soccer, a single foul can decide the outcome of a match. Mexico can tell you all about it after the infamous Arjen Robben flop at the 2014 World Cup.
It’s really quite dumb that the Spanish LFP decided to hold the Supercopa de España in Saudi Arabia. Almost as dumb as Valencia keeper Jaume Doménech after a clever Toni Kroos olimpico as Real Madrid won 3-1 on Wednesday.
It’s been nearly 14 years since Zinedine Zidane felled Marco Materazzi with a forehead to the solar plexus, but that moment from the 2006 World Cup Final still reverberates through time.
If he continues like this, Martin Ødegaard will be playing for Real Madrid next season. It’s been nearly five years since he made his first and only LaLiga appearance for Los Blancos at the age of 16 years and 157 days, but now aged 21, Ødegaard is finally shining in Spain’s top division while on loan at high-flying Real Sociedad.
Barcelona and Real Madrid played to a scoreless El Clásico draw for the first time in 30 years with the match largely failing to live up to the extreme prematch hype.
Tuesday’s Champions League Group A encounter between Real Madrid and PSG at the Santiago Bernabéu was pretty much meaningless. Both teams entered the match with Round of 16 qualification secured, and even a Real victory would do little to wrest top spot from PSG due to the Parisians’ perfect record thus far.
It was a surreal moment on Saturday when Gareth Bale entered Real Madrid’s 3-1 victory over Real Sociedad in the 67th minute to a torrent of boos and jeers from the Santiago Bernabéu. Los Blancos supporters are a notoriously demanding bunch — even Cristiano Ronaldo received his share of whistles inside the legendary stadium — but nothing comes close to the reception that Bale was given upon replacing 18-year-old Brazilian phenom Rodrygo.
Four days ago, Liverpool manager Jürgen Klopp ruled out a move for PSG’s Kylian Mbappé while lamenting the fact that no club could possibly afford the 20-year-old phenomenon. On Tuesday, Real Madrid reportedly said hold my beer and began preparing a $440 million bid for the World Cup winner.
Scoring a hat-trick in Europe’s premier club competition is no mean feat, especially so as an adolescent teenager between the ages of 13 and 19. The list of players to have accomplished the goalscoring achievement reads like a who’s who of the world’s greatest talent since the tournament’s adoption in 1992.
In fact, only 19 players have multiple Champions League hat-tricks to their name, with both Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo having accomplished the task a staggering eight times. Nobody else has recorded more than three.
Granada is top of the LaLiga table. No, not the country. Granada CF, the football team from Granada, Spain. The same Granada that appointed Tony Adams in 2017 and was relegated.