The Frenchman’s assist has put Real Madrid on course for the title, but it wasn’t even the most dazzling piece of skill on an extraordinary weekend in SpainSometimes there’s so much brilliance you don’t even know where to begin, let alone which words to use. Stendhal Syndrome, they call it, which is a disappointingly functional phrase to define those moments when you feel overwhelmed by beauty, and Karim Benzema expressed it better. On the pitch most of all, but off it too. Not when he said pfff – because what else was he supposed to say – but when he smiled, shrugged a little and said: “that’s football.” The afternoon before, Fyodor Smolov had said it too without uttering a...
Out came the accusations and the warriors. After months away, a pandemic, it’s back, alrightOn the weekend that Spain moved into the “new normal”, Real Madrid returned to the top of the table and everyone got back to what they missed most: the referees. On Sunday the state of alarm finally ended after 14 long weeks and a more traditional moral panic reappeared in its place. That, and some stuff that was more fun and less noticed. Like a golito from Nolito, the emergency striker Celta signed to replace an injured goalkeeper; a ridiculous golazo from Valencia’s Gonçalo Guedes; another from Leganés’s Óscar Rodriguez; and no goals at all from Barcelona. Not least because when Lionel Messi called, Sevilla stuck...
Statements barely addressing an unarmed black man’s death are closer to obligation than any commitment to social justiceOn Saturday, five days after the killing of George Floyd by police in Minnesota, the NFL spoke out. It released a short statement by its commissioner, Roger Goodell, offering his condolences to the Floyd family, stating the “urgent need for action” without identifying what that action might be, addressing “systemic issues” without specifying what those issues were. The words “police”, “black” and “racism” were not mentioned. It was a word salad, reading like the cryptic statement of a surly 61-year-old teenager, fed through the yoghurt pot of a corporate communications department, and spat out on to the internet in a shareable meme format.The...
The resignation of six directors is the latest instalment in a soap opera in which boardroom squabbles have become the normThe resignation letter six Barcelona directors handed to a notary on Thursday night, deepening the club’s crisis, included a demand that the external investigation into what has become known as “Barçagate” be completed, with anyone responsible punished and any money repaid. The allegations, first reported by Cadena SER Radio, are that payments totalling €900,000 were made to the company I3 Venturesto run social media accounts and websites that attacked opposition figures, players past and present, and defended the reputation of the president Josep Maria Bartomeu.Barcelona, Bartomeu and I3 Ventures have strongly denied wrongdoing, with the president describing the allegations as...
Real Madrid, Barcelona, PSG, Juve and others have become short-termist as domestic success has bred complacencyJust wait for the knockout phase of the Champions League. That’s when the season really gets going, that’s when the real football begins. That’s when you get the festival that justifies the tedium of the group stage, the greatest football ever played, the glorious pay-off for the grotesque iniquities of the game’s financial structure.Ah. Related: Pep Guardiola expects 'incredibly aggressive' Manchester United in derby Atalanta’s story is romantic but this is the first season in which the last 16 all come from the richest five leagues Continue reading...