Money

Upon hearing the announcement of a new professional soccer team in San Diego, you’d probably expect to see Landon Donovan and Don Garber chumming it up. Donovan has been a main force behind bringing a MLS franchise to San Diego over the past six months. However, it’s the NASL and a group of European-based stars, led by Eden Hazard, returning soccer to the beach city. 

Two-time Europa League winner Parma Calcio 1913 sold to Jiang Lizhang on Wednesday, adding to the growing trend of Chinese businessmen buying European socer clubs.

The following first and second division teams in Europe are now all principally owned by Chinese investors.

With the FIFA Confederations Cup in full swing, the opening match of the 2018 World Cup in Russia is officially less than a year away. 

For fans who are planning on making the trip to cheer on their country, they can expect to spend about $2,500 on travel, lodging, tickets, food and other miscellaneous expenses for a week-long trip. Although only three teams have officially qualified for Russia 2018 (Brazil, Iran and Russia), it'd be a smart move to start saving up now for fans of nations positioned well in qualifying.

Taking such a strong team to the Under-21 European Championships was meant to be a key moment in the development of Italy’s next generation of talent. Players such as Bernardeschi and Chiesa would gain experience in a tournament environment, easing them into contention for next year’s World Cup. Among the exciting array of talent, however, there was one real jewel in the crown.

2017 Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup action resumes today and tomorrow with the fourth round, and I'll forgive you for not knowing that, but I'll never forget. Founded in 1914, the competition has overcome some turbulent times in American soccer, as evidenced by the fact that the tournament’s two most successful sides, Bethlehem Steel FC and Maccabi Los Angeles, no longer really exist.

Lionel Messi has recently unveiled his plans to personally and painstakingly design, build and operate his own theme park in Nanjing, China. It will be called the Messi Experience Park (MEP), which is infinitely lamer than Messi World, Magic Messi Kingdom or Messi's Wonderous Adventureland. With over 20 attractions on a sprawling 42,000 square meter space, the biggest question remains whether or not Mateo Messi will be old enough or tall enough to have any fun.

With the 2016-17 Premier League season in the books, we wanted to take a deep dive into how each team performed based on its payroll.

The final table reflected the spending gap between the top six teams and the rest. In fact, the eight teams that spent over $100 million in wages this season all finished in the top 8 of the table.

Although that might seem entirely too predictable, there was significant performance variance among those teams. Also, ninth place Bournemouth had one of the lowest payrolls, suggesting that they found some good players at a discount.

Andrea Pirlo was left out of the NYCFC lineup for the third straight week despite receiving a salary ($5.915 million) that’s greater than his entire club’s actual salary cap ($3.85m).