13 h. ago Barcelona’s rebirth and one last job for Szczesny: La Liga season review

It’s the Sids! Barça reclaimed the title as Madrid’s giants faltered while Athletic, Celta and Rayo shook up the European placesThe day La Liga 2024-25 began, Wojciech Szczesny was sitting on the beach in Marbella lighting up a cigarette, enjoying his retirement. The night it ended, he sat in the dressing room in Cornellà, 1,000km round the coast, and lit up a cigar instead. He had walked away in August, at 35 years old, unwanted and his heart no longer in it, or so he thought. Nine months on, here he was surrounded by kids half his age, a footballer again and winner of every trophy his new home country had to offer. He had not lost a single league match en route to becoming a champion.“I’ve arrived where even my imagination wouldn’t even dare to take me,” Szczesny had said when he retired. And if he hadn’t dared imagine that, there was no way he could imagine this: a Copa del Rey, a Super Cup and a Champions League semi-final to go with the title. Continue reading...

Politics

26 h. ago What really happened to Rangers 'football review' as new three pillars at Ibrox make vision clear

Major changes have taken place at Ibrox - and more are to come this summer

Politics

61 h. ago The year of Napoli and Scott McTominay: the Serie A season review

The Scottish influence inspired title winners in Naples, Inter blew up and Claudio Ranieri enjoyed his Roman returnThe season has barely ended and already it is clear Serie A will look very different next term. Five of the league’s top 10 sides have parted ways with their managers and a sixth, Claudio Ranieri, is moving upstairs at Roma. More changes may soon follow, with Igor Tudor’s future at Juventus uncertain and Como’s Cesc Fàbregas drawing attention from richer clubs – including the runners-up, Inter, who need a replacement for Simone Inzaghi.Could we equal the turnover of last summer, when 14 out of 20 teams got a new coach? It’s not impossible, especially with several lower-half teams and their tacticians still exploring the options available. Continue reading...

Politics

3 d. ago Bayern back on top as Schick shines brightest: the Bundesliga season review

Bayern Munich’s domestic dominance returned and Arminia Bielefeld’s remarkable cup run provided the shocksIt’s Bayern Munich, despite Mainz and Freiburg, unexpected troublers of the European places, deserving praise for their stratospheric improvement from 2023-24. The Rekordmeister is rarely more provoked than when presented with serious opposition, and Xabi Alonso’s Bayer Leverkusen had done just that with last term’s domestically unbeaten double-winning exploits. Leverkusen were still excellent but could simply not match Bayern’s pace in the end. They played with dazzle but Vincent Kompany also did the one thing that was beyond Julian Nagelsmann and Thomas Tuchel in beginning to sort out Bayern’s leaky defence, conceding their lowest total in the Bundesliga (32) since Hansi Flick’s treble-winning season of 2019-20. He also made them competitive in the Champions League, in which they were unlucky to lose to Inter. Continue reading...

Politics

6 d. ago Viva Vitinha: how PSG’s deep conductor proved Lionel Messi wrong | Barney Ronay

Midfield fulcrum was not rated by the Argentinian maestro or Wolves but was central to Champions League triumph“Not only are you bad, but you’re hurting me.” The words, there, or so it was claimed, of Lionel Messi; and however you spin it, a fairly tough six-month performance review from the greatest player of all time and your own footballing idol.Back in February 2023 Vitinha was very quick to deny that any such training ground altercation had taken place between himself and Messi, whatever the reports in the French football press at the time (another version of that conversation has Messi saying: “Do you see? This is why you’re shit.”). Continue reading...

Politics

1 week ago What really happened when Luka Modric was asked about Rangers by Davide Ancelotti from man inside the story

It's the story of the day and Guillem Balague knows for a fact what really happened when Modric was asked about Rangers

Politics

1 week ago Match of the Day review: There was no sign of Gary Lineker's off

HARRY BAMFORTH: Many wondered what tone Gary Lineker would strike in his last-ever Match of the Day, given the circumstances of his departure.

Politics

1 week ago Mikel Arteta shares details of Arsenal review after another trophyless season

Arsenal fell short in their hunt for glory this season as they missed out on the Premier League title and reached two cup semi-finals and now Mikel Arteta is ready to conduct a review on what went wrong

Politics

3 w. ago Despelote review – a beautiful, utterly transportive game of football fandom

Panic; PC, PS4/5, XboxSet during Ecuador’s 2002 World Cup qualifying campaign, this fascinating, semi-autobiographical game gives you control of the life of a soccer-mad eight-year-oldVideo games have been simulating football since the 1970s, but they have rarely ever thought about simulating fandom. You can play a whole international tournament in the Fifa titles, but what they never show is the way the competition seeps into the everyday lives of supporters, how whole towns are overtaken, how a World Cup can become a national obsession. The way most of us experience the really big matches is through stolen moments of vicarious glory on televisions and giant pub screens, surrounded by friends and family and the sounds and images of real life.This is the territory of Despelote, a beautiful, utterly transportive game about childhood and memory, set during Ecuador’s historic 2002 World Cup qualifying campaign. Football-mad eight-year-old Julián – a semi-autobiographical version of the...

Sport

3 w. ago Make It to Munich review – uplifting story of a young footballer cycling to recovery

Touching film recounts the teenage Scottish player Ethan Walker’s 745-mile pilgrimage to the Euros and his comeback from a devastating accidentThis is an uplifting film about a miracle of ordinary life: the lightning-fast recovery of the teenage Scottish footballer Ethan Walker after being hit by a car, and the 745 mile (1,200km) bike ride he undertook from Hampden Park, Glasgow, to Munich just nine months after the accident to deliver the match pennant for the opening game of Euro 2024.Walker – on a football scholarship in New York when he was struck at 60mph – suffered cataclysmic injuries, including two brain haemorrhages, multiple fractures, the dislocation of his right knee and a lacerated lung. Continue reading...

Sport

last month Champions League review: a journeyman hero, a crucial miss and a stone

PSG and Inter will play for the crown at the end of the month but there were plenty of twists and turns before the finalists were decidedInter Continue reading...

Sport