Indholdsfortegnelse for October 2023 i World Soccer

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850 Number of career goals scored by Cristiano Ronaldo after he netted in Al Nassr’s 5-1 thrashing of Al Hazm in September. 10 Goalkeepers nominated for the Yashin Trophy – Yassine Bounou, Thibaut Courtois, Ederson, Dominik Livakovic, Mike Maignan, Emiliano Martinez, Andre Onana, Aaron Ramsdale, Brice Samba and Marc-Andre ter Stegen. 2 Bicycle-kick goals scored by Aurelien Francois in consecutive group games from corners as Mauritius reached the semi-finals of the 2023 Indian Ocean Island Games football tournament, which was won by hosts Madagascar. 1 Erling Haaland became the first foreign player since Ruud van Nistelrooy in 2001-02 to win the PFA Player of the Year award in his debut Premier League season. 7 Goals Atletico Madrid scored on their visit to Rayo Vallecano at the end of August to…

Early season games are often overshadowed by absence, by the players who have left and the players who are yet to arrive. Chelsea’s 1-1 draw with Liverpool on the first weekend of the Premier League season, breezy and open as it was, was defined by the fact that both sides lacked a player at the base of midfield – a shortcoming shared by so many clubs that the price of central midfielders has risen to unprecedented levels. At the final whistle of that game, as Enzo Fernandez and Alexis Mac Allister embraced, it came almost as a shock to be reminded that, between them, Chelsea and Liverpool have the central midfield that won the World Cup for Argentina – a useful corrective to anybody who thinks that all midfields must…

Carlo MAZZONE (1937-2023) “Carletto” oversaw 900 games in charge of various clubs in Italy, including Ascoli, Fiorentina, Lecce, Bologna, Brescia and his beloved Roma, where he also began his career as a player in the 1950s. Kalman GERENCSERI (1945-2023) Having made his Ligue1 debut at the age of 15 in August1960, the ex-Lens and Auxerre midfielder remains the youngest player in French top-flight history. Bobby NOBLE (1945-2023) A full-back in the Manchester United side that won the league title in1967, Noble’s career was ruined by injuries sustained in a car crash just before Matt Busby’s side lifted the title. Bertrand MARCHAND (1953-2023) French-born coach who won the African Champions League in 2007 with Tunisia’s Etoile Sahel. Played most of his career as an offensive midfielder at Rennes, before coaching Guingamp…

The Italian football world was taken completely by surprise when Roberto Mancini, the man who led Italy to a memorable Euro 2020 triumph in England, resigned as national team boss in mid-August. Few observers had had any idea that Mancini was unhappy in the Italy job. Mancini’s resignation was a shock, given that his position had just been strengthened by the Italian Football Federation’s (FIGC) decision to make him co-ordinator of the U21 and U20 sides, as well as the senior team. However, his decision quickly became the object of bitter controversy with Italian football media speculating that Mancini had quit in order to take a €25 million annual salary as head coach of Saudi Arabia. In the days after his resignation, Mancini said that Saudi Arabia had had “nothing…

All the West Asian focus in the summer was on the start of the Saudi Arabian league season on August11, but a week later the United Arab Emirates kicked off their campaign with some very interesting new signings of their own; not least that of Omer Atzili. The attacker has made headlines before, on and off the pitch, and is now in the international public eye like never before as the first Jewish player from Israel to join a club in the Arab world. On August18 he made his competitive debut, playing 88 minutes of the opening game of the season; his new club, last year’s runners-up Al Ain, came back from a goal down to defeat Bani Yas 3-2. Atzili has joined one of West Asia’s biggest and most…

The Europa League may have yet to find a place in the hearts of most football supporters, but it has helped Tottenham to unearth their brightest young star for many years. The plaudits have come thick and fast. Les Ferdinand, having observed Harry Kane at close quarters, believes “he can go right to the top.” “I would compare his football intelligence with Teddy Sheringham and his finishing with Alan Shearer,” says Ferdinand. “I worked with Harry when he was a young lad and could see straightaway that he was a goalscorer – left foot, right foot, head – he could finish any way you wanted.” Kane has to pinch himself sometimes that he has made such great strides in less than a year. “2014 was a great year for me,…

“I’m on the air right now,” said Aitana Bonmati moments after Spain won the Women’s World Cup in Sydney in August. For those watching the performances of the sinuous midfielder, it appears she has long since been floating on a higher plane. Such were Aitana’s performances for both club and country that Alexia Putellas, the two-time Ballon d’Or award winner, was left on the substitutes’ bench in the finals of both the Women’s Champions League and World Cup while Aitana starred. With Putellas sidelined through injury for the majority of the past season, Barcelona did not attempt to replace her. Instead, they signed England defensive midfielder Keira Walsh and released Aitana further forward to devastating effect. Only one player had more shots than her at the Women’s World Cup (20)…

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“Before you became Honved’s head coach in 2012, you coached some small Italian clubs. How did the Hungarians find you? It happened almost by coincidence. It was a quite lucky situation. I visited a friend of mine, who has a restaurant in Budapest. At that time, I was without a club. He said to me: “Why don’t you call Fabio Cordella, the sports director of Honved?” I’d never called anyone to ask for a job before. I don’t like to offer myself. I’m not born in that way. However, both my friend and my wife spent the whole day suggesting that I should call him. Eventually I was so exhausted by the whole thing that, in the end, I called him. We met, had dinner, he spoke with George Hemingway…

Portugal, European champions in 2016, more or less have qualification in the bag after maintaining their100 per cent record with a hard-fought1-0 win over Slovakia in Bratislava and a 9-0 home romp against hapless Luxembourg – their biggest-ever victory in102 years of international football. With maximum points from their first six fixtures in Group J, 24 goals scored and none conceded, the Portuguese have gone about their business with a steely single-mindedness, though, as they must realise, much sterner tests await. Another nation flying high at perfect altitude is France, who made it five wins out of five in Group B with a comfortable 2-0 victory against the Republic of Ireland at the Parc des Princes. Such was the gulf in class between the teams that the outcome was never…

Preview Less than a year after Australia, South Korea and Japan reached the knockout stages of the 2022 World Cup to give Asia its best-ever showing, the continent is ready to start all over again. On October12, 20 of the lowest-ranked teams will meet for the first of two legs with the winners going through to the group stage. Many eyes will be on the clash between Yemen and Sri Lanka. The former has had success at youth level this year and after years of devastating conflict need something to celebrate. Sri Lanka were suspended by FIFA at the time of July’s draw, but are now free to play the first-round clash after football’s governing body lifted the suspension at the end of August. Pakistan and Cambodia also stands out.…

Gozo may have failed to get out of the group stage on their first-ever appearance at the Island Games football tournament, but Mark Buttigieg’s side showed promise. The draw was not kind, with Gozo facing three-time gold medallists and eventual winnersJersey in their opener. They lost 1-0, but then went on to beat St Helena 3-0 and Menorca1-0, before running hosts Guernsey close in the fifth place play-off, losing by a solitary goal. The Games was Gozo’s most successful performance since making their first foray into representative football back in1999 as Malta’s representatives in the first edition of UEFA’s Regions Cup, a competition for amateur and non-contract players. All three games were lost and a decade passed before Gozo entered the Viva World Cup (a competition for teams unaffiliated with…

WORLD 2023 FIFA CLUB WORLD CUP Finals Draw First Round Dec13: Al Ittihad (KSA) v Auckland City (Nzl) Second Round Dec15: Leon (Mex) v Urawa Red Diamonds (Jpn); Al Ahly (Egy) v Al Ittihad (KSA) or Auckland City (Nzl) Semi-finals Dec18: Al Ahly (Egy) or Al Ittihad (KSA) or Auckland City (Nzl) v CONMEBOL winner Dec19: Leon (Mex) or Urawa Red Diamonds (Jpn) v Manchester City (Eng) Third Place Match Dec 22: Semi-final losers Final Dec 22: Semi-final winners EUROPE 2023-24 UEFA CHAMPIONS LEAGUE Play-Offs Aug 22-23: Rangers (Sco) 2-2 PSV (Ned); Antwerp (Bel) 1-0 AEK Athens (Gre); Rakow Czestochowa (Pol) 0-1 Copenhagen (Den); Maccabi Haifa (Isr) 0-0 Young Boys (Sui); Molde (Nor) 2-3 Galatasaray (Tur); Braga (Por) 2-1 Panathinaikos (Gre) Aug 29-30: Panathinaikos (Gre) 0-1 Braga (Por) (agg1-3); Galatasaray…

No summer transfer window is complete without along-running saga hanging over it, and this year’s Harry Kane plotline was more thought provoking than most. Is it better to chase trophies or goalscoring records? To remain a legend at one club or compete with the elite? Stay at home or test yourself abroad? In the end, of course, Kane elected to join Bayern Munich in a deal worth over €100 million, pausing his pursuit of the Premier League goal record in exchange for a tilt at lifting the Champions League. While it’s still early days, he appears to have settled in immediately at his new home, completely at ease in this world-class environment. Kane’s rise from a series of uninspiring loans in English football’s lower reaches to one of the biggest…

The fall-out from the Luis Rubiales affair will roll on far beyond the immediate embarrassment incurred by the Spanish Football Federation. Just when Gianni Infantino must have thought he had sailed out into clear blue water. Up until Rubiales, the one-time Hamilton Academical full-back, wiped the positivity of the 2023 Women’s World Cup out of the global headlines, Infantino had been enjoying the best half-year of his FIFA presidency. First box ticked was at the start of March when Swiss prosecutors shut down an allegation that Infantino had breached company regulations over his use of a private jet to fly back to Switzerland from Suriname in 2017. Red flags had been raised because Infantino’s original version failed the test of veracity. Infantino claimed he undertook the flight to keep a…

Gabri VEIGA (Al Ahli) In last month’s issue, we described Al Nassr’s Seko Fofana as the Saudi Pro League recruit with the most to offer Europe’s top leagues, but it would be fair to say that that title now belongs to Gabri Veiga. “Embarrassing”, was the verdict of Real Madrid midfielder Toni Kroos after seeing the news on social media that Al Ahli had recruited the 21-year-old Spanish midfielder, who practically had his pick of clubs to choose from in the summer. An impressive La Liga season with Celta Vigo–11 goals and four assists in 36 games – had seen the Spain Under-21 international linked with a host of Premier League clubs and Italian champions Napoli, but instead he signed a three-year deal in Saudi Arabia worth a reported €30…

“It is a very delicate situation to trivialise this issue… Obviously, we can only talk about football…He is a footballer of a very high level, who arrives at Getafe with enormous enthusiasm”Getafe coach Jose Bordalas on the controversial signing of Mason Greenwood on loan from Manchester United…

The small Faroe Islands fishing town of Klaksvik was far from an obvious destination to be generating football headlines across Europe this summer. With a population of just 5,000 and from one of European football’s genuine outposts, it is easy to see why opponents underestimated them. When Ferencvaros – Hungary’s most successful club – were paired with KI Klaksvik in the Champions League first qualifying round with the winners to face Hacken of Sweden, their social media pages wrote: “The Swedish champions await us in the next round…because it is certain we are going through!” After a scoreless draw on the Bordoy island – in the northeast of the Faroes – it was widely expected that Ferencvaros would complete the job in Budapest, but they crashed to a shock 3-0…

HUNGARY Reviving Honved, preserving Kispest Right beside Honved’s new Bozsik Arena in south Budapest, lifelong fan Istvan Gazso draws an imaginary line. “It was here,” he says, delineating the exact space around him, “where the house was”. He and his fellow supporters who run the independent club museum should know, for they used satellite imagery to detect the exact location of the long-demolished childhood home of Ferenc Puskas and his best friend Jozsef Bozsik, stars of the legendary Honved side of the1950s. Many talk about Celtic’s triumphant “Lisbon Lions” team of 1967 being born within 30 miles of the stadium – at Honved, it’s measured in metres. As Gazso explains during a later tour of the Kispest Football House three tram stops away, nine first-team players, Puskas included, and six…

PREMIER LEAGUE GOLDEN BOOT WINNERS 2015-16 HARRY KANE (Tottenham Hotspur) 25 GOALS 2016-17 HARRY KANE (Tottenham Hotspur) 29 GOALS 2017-18 MOHAMED SALAH (Liverpool) 32 GOALS 2018-19 SALAH/MANE/AUBAMEYANG (Liverpool/Liverpool/Arsenal) 22 GOALS 2019-20 JAMIE VARDY (Leicester City) 23 GOALS 2020-21 HARRY KANE (Tottenham Hotspur) 23 GOALS PFA TEAM OF THE YEAR 6 Appearances in the PFA Team of the Year (2014-15, 2015-16, 2016-17, 2017-18, 2020-21 & 2022-23) PREMIER LEAGUE RECORD SCORERS PLAYER Goals 1 Alan SHEARER 260 2 Harry KANE 213 3 Wayne ROONEY 208 4 Andy COLE 187 5 Sergio AGUERO 184 ENGLAND 86 CAPS GOALS 59 MOST EXPENSIVE ENGLISHMEN £105m DECLAN RICE 2023 (West Ham to Arsenal) £100m HARRY KANE 2023 (Tottenham Hotspur to Bayern Munich) £100m JACK GREALISH 2021 (Aston Villa to Manchester City) £88.5m JUDE BELLINGHAM 2023 (Borussia Dortmund to Real Madrid) £80m HARRY MAGUIRE 2019 (Leicester City to Manchester United) BUNDESLIGA’S ALL-TIME…

Ahead of the Croatia v Morocco third place play-off game at last year’s World Cup, most of the people in the Croatian capital, Zagreb, were – as elsewhere in the country – glued to their TV screens. However, at the biggest open market in the heart of the city one shop was open as if it was just another regular day. Tihomir Gvardiol came to his small shop as he did for the past 41 years; hailing from a small coastal town of Novigrad, he eventually settled down up north, plying his fish-selling trade. But the World Cup brought different clientele than the usual one, as Tihomir was now facing a long line of journalists, eager to find out why he isn’t in Qatar himself. It isn’t as if his…

The year 2003 was a notable one for the sporting rivalry between England and Australia. In cricket, Australia retained the Ashes at the start of the year with a 4-1 series home win before beating England en route to the World Cup two months later; Leyton Hewitt and Mark Philippoussis dispatched their opponents from Great Britain on the way to winning tennis’ Davis Cup; while Jonny Wilkinson kicked the drop goal that gave England the rugby union World Cup trophy over the Wallabies in Sydney. In comparison, the football match that took place between the two nations at Upton Park on a drizzly February evening was an entirely inconsequential affair, yet 20 years on – and with the sides due to meet again in October – it is a game…

The women’s season ought to have opened on a wave of anticipation in the wake of a record-breaking World Cup, yet the toxic fall-out from the behaviour of Spanish Football Federation president Luis Rubiales (see panel opposite) left many within the game wondering if the fight for respect will ever be won. Even the constant linking of coaches, such as Sarina Wiegman and Emma Hayes, with jobs in the men’s game grates. “I already coach elite players; it is not a stepping stone,” said Hayes. Eventually though, the football will become the focus and for Hayes and other coaches the challenge is easing the post-World Cup hangover. The late finish in Sydney, with the final on August 20, did not provide much of a break for the players involved. It…

Over the course of August in the knockout phase of the Copa Libertadores, 16 teams from seven different countries were whittled down to a last four of Boca Juniors against the Brazilians. This is a familiar pattern. The last four titles have gone to Brazil, and the last three finals have been all-Brazilian affairs. Argentina have been coming a distant second, but well ahead of the rest of the pack; for six years now the rest of the continent have provided just one semi-finalist. That is not to say that August came up with no surprises. The biggest shock was the elimination of reigning champions Flamengo, who let a two-goal advantage slip against the aerial power of Paraguay’s Olimpia. And last year’s beaten finalists Athletico Paranaense fell on penalties to…

There is better to come, it has been promised, but October’s kick-off of the new African Football League (AFL) – the continent’s efforts at launching a super league – can only be described as a face-saving exercise. It arrives almost four years after FIFA president Gianni Infantino first urged African football leaders at the Confederation of African Football (CAF) to start a super league, suggesting 20 permanent clubs in a 24-team league and promising riches of more than $200 million. It was a vision bought into by his acolyte Patrice Motsepe, when he became CAF president thereafter, also expressing the theory that the riches gained from such a league would spill over to the wider good of the African game, keep the best players on the continent rather than at…

“As far as I know, Mbappe and Haaland don’t dream of Saudi Arabia. I don’t believe that the best players at the pinnacle of their careers would go to Saudi Arabia”UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin dismisses the threat of the Saudi Pro League to European football in an interview with L’Equipe EUROPE Record-breaking summer window Another record-breaking transfer window saw clubs in Europe’s top five leagues spend €5.68 billion this summer, according to analysis by Deloitte, with the Premier League contributing almost half of that total (€2.74bn). The figure sees the Premier League break the £2bn barrier for the first time, with the £2.36bn gross spent in total considerably up on last summer’s previous record of £1.92bn. Net spend in the Premier League was €1.18bn, dwarfing the rest of Europe’s top…

60 YEARS OF THE WORLD CUP By Brian Barwick (Pitch Publishing, £16.99) Sixty Years of the World Cup is a fun, nostalgic and frank reflection on the author’s six-decade association with football’s biggest showpiece event. Barwick guides the reader through16 World Cup tournaments with a remarkable set of unique personal and professional memories, shaped by his experiences in major broadcasting and football executive roles, as former BBC and ITV executive and former CEO of the Football Association. THE CONQUERORS By Dev Bajwa (Pitch Publishing, £18.99) The Conquerors charts the rise, fall and rejuvenation of AC Milan across one of the club’s most legendary eras, under manager and former club favourite Carlo Ancelotti. Returning to a then disjointed Rossoneri dressing room as first team coach in 2001, this is a story…

“I can’t see how we really can deny it, what can we do? We can say ‘no’ but the difference between the contracts here and the contracts there are that big that it causes problems”Jurgen Klopp on the Saudi Pro League amid Liverpool rejecting a £150m bid from Al Ittihad for Mohamed Salah “Father, coach, teacher. Simply, Carlo Mazzone. Eternally grateful, Mister”Francesco Totti pays tribute to Carlo Mazzone, the coach who helped launch the Roma legend’s career IN EUROPE Nottingham Forest completed loan deals for World Cup winner GONZALO MONTIEL from Sevilla and ANDREY SANTOS from Chelsea, before raiding Corinthians for centre-back MURILLO for around £12.8m. West Ham United signed MOHAMMED KUDUS from Ajax for £38m. Elsewhere, Sheffield United splashed out a reported £18.5m to sign England Under-21 striker CAMERON…

Phil Foden has five Premier League titles to his name, along with two FA Cups and four League Cups. He has won the Champions League too. He has made more than 220 appearances for Manchester City, scoring upwards of 60 goals, all by the age of 23. This represents a formidable achievement, make no mistake – yet the curious truth also is that the proper football career of Foden is only just beginning. A huge season lies ahead for him. A strong and widespread feeling is that now is the time for Foden to develop from a brilliantly skilful but sometimes peripheral star for Manchester City into an essential cog of their slick machine. It is time to show why Pep Guardiola once described him as the most talented player…

“This is the dream I had when I was a child,” Santi Cazorla said. Now 38, the former Arsenal midfielder has played 768 professional games across three countries, spent a decade in the national team, won (and scored) at Wembley in the FA Cup final, and was twice a European champion with that Spain team. He came back from the injury that might have not just cost him his career but his leg, returning two years after doctors told him he should have settled for being able to walk round the garden, but there was one thing he hadn’t done and he wasn’t going to retire until he did. “I have dreamed many times of making my debut for Real Oviedo. It’s an image that goes through your mind a…

ARGENTINA Football at the end of the world Venture far enough, way down from Buenos Aires, Cordoba, Rosario and the other major Argentinian cities, and you’ll reach the end of the world. Or, as some know it, the beginning of everything. Located near South America’s tip, Ushuaia is the southernmost city on the planet and closer to Antarctica than Argentina’s capital. And those arriving from the country’s north can only get there by crossing the icy waters linking the Pacific and Atlantic oceans through neighbouring Chile. Argentina’s serene Tierra del Fuego region, around 6,000km from the equator, is home to glacial landscapes, penguin colonies and some of the longest nights on Earth. It doesn’t quite evoke Diego Maradona, Lionel Messi and celebratory Albiceleste fans parading through sun-kissed streets – as…

Only in a parallel universe will new Bayern Munich striker Harry Kane face the sort of Bundesliga wall of antagonism that awaited another England captain, Kevin Keegan, when the latter swapped Liverpool for Hamburg in the summer of1977. Keegan, then at the peak of his powers, should have been welcomed with open arms by the Hamburg dressing room. Yet instead found himself isolated, treated with scorn and envy by team-mates who, for the bulk of his first season at the Volksparkstadion, only passed to him under duress. Once the bad blood had subsided, Keegan would go on to become a legendary figure in northern Germany, an inspirational talisman as HSV won a pair of German league titles (although by their second crown in 1982 he had departed the club) and…

[EFL GRADUATES] Alex SCOTT Bournemouth In a sentence The latest English talent to emerge from the English Football League with a wealth of experience for a 20-year-old. What they say “I think he’ll play for England, for sure, and he’s got the potential to play for one of the top five or six teams in the Premier League.” Bristol City technical director Brian Tinnion “We are delighted to welcome Alex to the club, who is one of the most exciting young players in Europe. He’s a player that has vast experience at such a young age with strong technical ability and a really good footballing brain.” Neill Blake, Bournemouth chief executive The story so far By joining Bournemouth for £25 million in the summer, Scott returned to the club he…

We also preview the U17 World Cup in Indonesia and the A-League season in Australia, review the 2023 US Open Cup – including a deep dive into the competition’s long history – and focus on Braga, the ambitious club trying to turn Portugal’s “Big Three” into a “Big Four”. Plus, don’t miss our interview with Croatia’s Josip Juranovic, dispatches from the Cook Islands, the return of ESM XI, and regular features such as World Service, eyewitness, headliners and 6 of the best. Print £5.99 | Digital £4.99 ORDER NOW shop.kelsey.co.uk/WSC23 Or Call: 01959 543 747 You may have missed… SAVE 10% when you spend £25 or more VOUCHERCODE: WSCSHOP23 shop.kelsey.co.uk/WSC23 +44 (0) 1959 543 747 Offers subject to availability. Prices for goods delivered to destinations outside of the UK may…

“What’s it like to be playing in the US after arguably the greatest player of all time, Lionel Messi, signed for Inter Miami in the summer? It’s exciting. There are inevitable conversations between everyone in the changing room about his performances, stuff that’s happened in their games and when we might play against him and Miami. We’d both have to make the MLS Cup final in December for that to happen this year, but next year it’s potentially likely we will play them. It’s something you can’t get away from, we definitely talk about it and we’re also excited about it. It is very good for our league and brings a lot of attention to MLS and we can’t help but be excited when he does some amazing things. It…

Review Tiny Gambia, who wreaked havoc at the last Africa Cup of Nations finals in Cameroon, will be back for another tournament after qualifying for the finals in the most extraordinary circumstances, both on and off the field. They were among nine countries who filled the last available slots for January’s tournament in the Ivory Coast when the final round of qualifiers were hosted in September. There was also nervy progress for Cameroon, plus a place for other past champions, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Ghana, which ensures that half the 24-team field will be made up of previous winners. Gambia went into their decisive final Group G qualifier needing only draw at home to Congo, but had to switch the match to Marrakesh in Morocco because their own…

At the headquarters of the Oceania Football Confederation (OFC) on the outskirts of New Zealand’s capital Auckland, 13 flags, including associate members Kiribati and Tuvalu, fly. The Maori flag is not one of them. The Maori Football Aotearoa (MFA) is not a member of the confederation. Just like the Hawaiian Football Federation and the Australian Indigenous Football Council (AIFC), the MFA wants self-determination and more control but, in the maze of football politics and because of the FIFA statutes, the road to self-empowerment is difficult. The associations argue that FIFA has the obligation – enshrined in Article 3 of the FIFA Statutes – to uphold all internationally recognised human rights, including the 2007 Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. During the recent Women’s World Cup, the rights of First…

2026 WORLD CUP QUALIFIERS SOUTH AMERICA SECTION • 6 direct slots available, plus1 play-off slot Sep 7 – Ciudad del Este Paraguay 0 Peru 0 Paraguay: Coronel – R. Rojas (Piris 78), Balbuena, G. Gomez, Riveros; Villasanti, Cubas, D. Gomez (Romero 66); Almiron, Avalos (Gonzalez 78), Sosa (M. Rojas 88). Peru: Gallese – Advincula, Araujo (Corzo 46), Abram, Trauco (Castillo 71); Tapia, Yotun; Polo (Ascues 90), Gonzales (Cartagena 46), Carrillo (Lopez 46); Guerrero. Sent off: Advincula 45. Sep 7 – Barranquilla Colombia1 (Borre 46) Venezuela 0 Colombia: Vargas – Munoz, Mina, Lucumi, Machado; Uribe (Barrios 85), Lerma, J. Arias (James 75); Cuadrado (Carrascal 46), Borre (Duran 75), Diaz (Sinisterra 88). Venezuela: Romo – Gonzalez, Osorio, Angel, Del Pino (Rosales 78); Jose Martinez, Rincon, Herrera (Josef Martinez 59); Savarino (Soteldo 59),…

Real Madrid 3 Schalke 4 2014-15 Champions League last16, Bernabeu Schalke headed to Madrid in March 2015 trailing 2-0 after the first leg, 12 months after a 9-2 aggregate defeat to Real at the same stage the previous season. Yet on a remarkable night, they gave the Spanish giants a huge scare in an end-to-end thriller… “As a professional footballer, you want to win every time you set foot on the field but you’re also a realist. What can you expect when you’ve just lost the first leg 2-0 at home and then you’ve got to go to the Bernabeu? It was clear that we were the underdogs and had nothing to lose. That’s where we got our strength. We were able to play freely and just enjoy the moment.…