Sport gives us an opportunity to see people at the greatest moments of their lives, but also at their sometimes-tragic worstOne of sport’s many affirming beauties is its intimacy: we get to see people experience the most ecstatic and most mortifying moments of their lives, live. Yes, they’re seeking fulfilment and validation in the wrong places and yes, this is your super soaraway Joy of Six about to volunteer an unsolicited self-help tip but, immeasurably wise though The Awakened Family is – if you’re a parent or a person, read it – how many titles, belts or majors has Dr Shefali Tsabary won? Exactly. Continue reading...
It is easy to forget the Norwegian is only 22, travels with his dad and has never won a major trophyAs the players left the pitch at half time, the Etihad Stadium’s in-house big screen began to replay, in slow-mo close-up, the moment that had just passed, Manchester City’s third goal in what would eventually become a 7-0 (seven) victory.There was something ludicrously lovely about the imagery, the basic human design, the cold, cold beauty of the sky blue shirts, the snowflakes falling in slow, fat, perfect flakes, Erling Haaland scrolling past the faces in the crowd and gliding in a single movement into the perfect Olympic-grade knee slide, a footballer who expresses power, edge and certainty more clearly than...
The Italian sent on Davinson Sánchez when a goal was needed on a night of trapped rage and basic patternsBefore this last-16 second leg, Son Heung-min had announced that Tottenham Hotspur intended to “make a statement” And so they did. That statement was: this is not a very good Tottenham Hotspur team. Rather this felt like a Spurs team reaching the end of something, without clarity or craft or any real sense of life; a team that is facing up now to another season of chasing another season of chasing another season of … well, what exactly?There are good 0-0 draws. There are heroic exits, games where you chase the sun and come up short. This wasn’t any of those...
There were moments against Dortmund when manager seemed doomed but VAR and Kai Havertz came to the rescueFour minutes before half-time, with Borussia Dortmund still 1-0 up from the first leg, with Chelsea still playing in a way that was both careful and frantic, a team that is always trying to leave the house and constantly forgetting its keys, there was a sense of something being settled, some elemental question filtering across the Stamford Bridge pitch.That question was not simply: can Chelsea actually score a goal? Although it was also, and to a very large degree, can Chelsea actually score a goal. But on a more basic level, it was: which way is this thing going to fall? What does...
Paris police attacks on Liverpool fans at the Champions League final was yet another example of the hosts’ big game failuresUefa’s report on last season’s Champions League final is impressively uncompromising. It was, it said, “through no merit of those in charge” that another Hillsborough was avoided. “The Préfecture de Police were in effect acting unilaterally to direct supporters toward an entry point that would be unable to cope with the level of demand placed upon it … several key stakeholders have not accepted responsibility for their own failures but have been quick to attribute blame to others.”The report is thorough and unsparing in criticising Uefa and the French authorities. There were supplementary factors, such as the rail strike, problems...