The Bayern midfielder increasingly looks a candidate for the title of most startlingly strange meteoric 24-month first-team career ever. Wonderkids bewareAmong the many doomed and dreadful writing projects I occasionally pretend to be working on is a Bret Easton Ellis-style football novel about a hip, talented, existentially glazed and clueless wonderkid being passed around Europe’s super-clubs by the shady financial powers that run the world game.The lead character is an interchangeable young star, probably Portuguese, called something generic like Rui Pinto or José Costa. Tattooed and glossed, garlanded with premature honours, his entire private and professional life is owned by a Gestifute-style talent agency. He wears sunglasses and huge headphones and speaks mainly in emojis, while being shuttled from elite...
There were countless sub-plots, players and stories to highlight after Barcelona’s 3-2 win at Real Madrid. But above all – way, way above all – there was MessiLionel Messi had a black eye, a bloody mouth and his Barcelona shirt in his hands. The board had gone up signalling two minutes left in the clásico: not enough for anyone – this was the game that should have gone on for ever – but just enough for another twist, even later and more dramatic than the first. It was 2-2, James Rodríguez putting Real Madrid within touching distance of the title five minutes from time, and Barcelona had a throw-in down in the south-east corner of the Bernabéu. The clock had...
Sixth place is just about all that Inter or Milan can aspire to after the Nerazzurri went down 5-4 at Fiorentina and the Rossoneri lost at home to EmpoliFor Serie A’s 20 clubs, the finish line is in sight. The two representing the city of Milan, however, might be starting to wonder what race they have even been running. They had presumed for many months to be part of that elite group chasing after a Champions League berth. Instead, at the end of this gruelling marathon, they find themselves contesting a prize that hardly seems worth winning.Sixth place is just about all that Inter or Milan can aspire to, after a weekend in which they each hit new depths of...
Nobody is expecting Max Kruse to really become an angel, but seeing him in the white of Germany doesn’t seem that daft any morePerhaps, in years to come, it will be looked upon as one of the anomalies in the history of collectible football toys. When the DfB commissioned Lego figures of Germany’s Euro 2016 squad, the list was compiled months before Jogi Löw made his final choices. So alongside Manuel Neuer, Thomas Müller and Mario Götze was a figure of the injured Marco Reus, for example.There is also one in the collection that sticks out if you look at Lego’s squad today, or if you’re browsing for spares on eBay – that of No23, one Max Kruse. Dropped by...
Barça coach takes his team to face Real Madrid at the Bernabéu having lost the initiative in battle for La Liga title and a gory goodbye awaits him if they loseLuis Enrique’s final days at the Camp Nou are dark ones and they could get even darker yet. That is how he sees it, at least – a dystopian vision of his immediate future, a gory goodbye as his time at Barcelona comes to a grisly end. After their superb 3-0 victory over Sevilla on 5 April, hope briefly emerging after an impressive run, the Barcelona coach said that he’d had a great time but insisted that if and when they lost “a cannibal holocaust” would be released.Three days later,...