Innehållsförteckning för November 2024 från World Soccer

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“The national team and the Greek Football Federation bid farewell to George Baldock. There are no words to describe the human pain by the news of the unexpected loss of one of our own, young, man”The Greece national team pays respect to George Baldock, who tragically passed away at the age of 31 Salvatore SCHILLACI (1964-2024) “Toto” Schillaci was the ultimate example of a shooting star, in more ways than one. He had played only one season in Serie A with Juventus, scoring 15 goals and winning the UEFA Cup, when he was named in the hosts’ 1990 World Cup squad. As Italy struggled to break down Austria in their opening game, coach Azeglio Vicini sent on Schillaci who duly scored the winner. Schillaci finished as the finals’ six-goal top…

SEASON RANKINGS Cumulative votes through the season GOALKEEPERS David Raya (Arsenal) 3 Michele Di Gregorio (Juventus) 2 Alisson (Liverpool) 1 Peter Gulacsi (RB Leipzig) 1 Franco Israel (Sporting) 1 Vanja Milinkovic-Savic (Torino) 1 Jan Oblak (Atletico Madrid) 1 Yann Sommer (Internazionale) 1 DEFENDERS Gabriel (Arsenal) 5 Bremer (Juventus) 4 Virgil van Dijk (Liverpool) 4 Riccardo Calafiori (Arsenal) 3 Eder Militao (Real Madrid) 3 Alex Grimaldo (Bayer Leverkusen) 3 Dani Carvajal (Real Madrid) 2 Giovanni Di Lorenzo (Napoli) 2 William Saliba (Arsenal) 2 Trent Alexander-Arnold (Liverpool) 1 Alessandro Buongiorno (Napoli) 1 Juan Cabal (Juventus) 1 Ruben Dias (Manchester City) 1 Federico Gatti (Juventus) 1 Raphael Guerreiro (Bayern Munich) 1 Josko Gvardiol (Manchester City) 1 Achraf Hakimi (Paris Saint-Germain) 1 Caio Henrique (Monaco) 1 Ibrahima Konate (Liverpool) 1 Jules Kounde (Barcelona) 1…

Since a deserved triumph at the 2019 Africa Cup of Nations, Algeria have been battling to grasp the new dawn that their success hinted at. An increasing pool of players from the diaspora in France promised to be the mainstay of continued success under coach Djamel Belmadi, himself the embodiment of the passionately committed French-born son of migrants from north Africa. It all looked to be going to plan as Algeria went to defend their title at the next finals in Cameroon, held in early 2022, taking with them to the tournament a remarkable 35-game unbeaten record. But after a goalless draw with Sierra Leone and a 1-0 defeat to minnows Equatorial Guinea, Algerian expectations came crashing down with a first-round exit, followed by a dramatic last-gasp reversal in their…

In the Three Lions pub on South Bristol’s West Street, there is no place for decorative subtlety. To glance around the room is to be affronted by a bright and bursting exhibition of Bristol City fan culture. Wallpaper is made entirely from historic newspaper headlines and the grinning faces of club legends. Memorabilia and City-based art hangs from ceilings and clings to walls. From the pub’s raised garden, the Robins’ Ashton Gate stadium is the centre point of the view, standing tall against a backdrop of rolling West Country hills. It is a pub with a partisan reputation, and for good reason. Positioned above the door is a boastful display of an old Millwall team bus sign, proudly snatched from the East Londoners during the heyday of football hooliganism and…

After retiring from football, you initially had no intention of becoming a coach or a manager. Why did that change? I couldn’t understand where my reward was as a coach. You don’t get the thrills you do as a player. But then a friend of mine, Harry Kewell, was an Under-21s coach at Watford and asked if I’d mind coming in and helping him. I was doing one-on-one finishing work with this striker. All of a sudden, he started scoring a lot of goals. His mum came over to me and said: ‘Thanks for working with him. He really likes it and appreciates it.’ I thought: ‘Okay, so this is my reward. I’m passing on my knowledge and this lad is improving.’ That’s when it grabbed me. You worked with…

African champions Al Ahly of Egypt have been handed a tough examination of their potential to retain their CAF Champions League crown – and extend their record number of triumphs in the competition – after being paired with Algerian outfit CR Belouizdad and Orlando Pirates of South Africa in the group phase, which gets underway at the end of November. Al Ahly have struggled to get through the group stage of the competition in recent seasons, making life difficult for themselves, only then to find their form in the knockout stages and go on to take the trophy. The Cairo club have won four of the last five titles in a dominant show that defied their results in the earlier stages, but they can ill afford to be slow starters…

We’re coming up to the tenth anniversary of one of the maddest decisions in Liverpool’s history. I’ll never forget being in the Bernabeu, looking at the Real Madrid versus Liverpool teamsheet and sharing the widespread shock that Brendan Rodgers had left Steven Gerrard and Raheem Sterling on the bench. They were understandably seething. Playing against Real, especially in their citadel on the Castellana, is what players dream of. Liverpool usually crave such challenges. “A crime against the club’s history,” the Spanish sports daily AS called Rodgers’ decision. November 4 marks ten years since that controversial moment and the shock still hasn’t completely worn off. Rodgers claimed he dropped Gerrard and Sterling in response to Liverpool’s loss to Newcastle United three days earlier. Bizarre. Gerrard pretty much decided that night that…

Football has reached a television saturation point. The only person who doesn’t seem to have appreciated the fact is the president of FIFA. Gianni Infantino was enraged when he had to bang the table to inveigle reluctant European channels into stumping up a few extra million dollars to cover the 2023 Women’s World Cup in schedule-unfriendly Australia and New Zealand. Now he has come face to face with similar reticence over his pet project, next year’s Club World Cup in the United States. The tournament itself is an oddity: club football’s identity is all about annual competition Nonsensically the finals of the CONCACAF Gold Cup will be staged almost simultaneously and also in the United States (and Vancouver), between June 14 and July 6 (plus the Under-21 European Championship from…

“Ciao Toto” read the banners at every stadium from Rome to Milan to Naples in the days after Salvatore Schillaci passed away too soon at the age of 59. The Golden Boot winner at the 1990 World Cup wasn’t just an idol in his native Sicily; he was adored by every Italian football fan for his joyous, wild-eyed goal celebrations and his unbridled passion scampering around in the Azzurri shirt. It was never in doubt that Italian football lovers, the Tifosi, would say an emotional farewell all over the land to honour a unique sporting hero. “Toto” Schillaci only scored seven international goals, with all but one of them coming at Italia ’90. He was a blazing comet for one memorable and unforgettable tournament played to the operatic soundtrack of…

“Finally the nightmare is over. I can look forward to the day when I can follow my dreams again. I always stated that I never knowingly breached World Anti-Doping Agency regulations”Paul Pogba after his four-year doping ban was reduced to 18 months by CAS, meaning he can return to football in March 2025 Victor OSIMHEN Thanks to the Turkish transfer window staying open longer than Europe’s major leagues, Osimhen was able to secure a loan move from Napoli to Galatasaray in early September. Claude MAKELELE A year after leaving a coaching role with Chelsea, the former France midfielder took charge of Greek top-flight side Asteras Tripolis, his third senior managerial role. Miralem PJANIC The former Bosnia & Herzegovina, Juventus and Barcelona midfielder joined CSKA Moscow after spending the last two…

One semi-final of the Copa Libertadores is a meeting of recent competition heavyweights. Winners in 2013, Brazil’s Atletico Mineiro put in a strong challenge in each of the previous three seasons, while Argentina’s River Plate were the last non-Brazilian champions, in 2018. Since then, they have reached finals and semi-finals and taken part in the knockout phase of every campaign. The other semi-final is different. Penarol of Uruguay and Botafogo of Brazil are famous old names of South American football, proudly boasting of glorious traditions, but it is a long time since either threatened to win South America’s premier club prize. Penarol were the first champions, in 1960, and have five titles to their name. But the last one was all the way back in 1987, just before the global…

Roma took the Italian football world, including many of their own fans, by surprise when they sacked their coach and much loved club icon Daniele De Rossi in mid-September, just four games into the new Serie A season. In theory, 41-year-old De Rossi was sacked because of the club’s relatively disastrous start, drawing three games and losing the other at home to Empoli. Media speculation and sources close to the club, however, claim that De Rossi’s sacking also owes something to the role of club CEO, Lina Souloukou, formerly CEO with top Greek club Olympiacos and a close advisor to the owning Friedkin family. Adding intrigue to the story is the fact that, just a few days after the sacking of De Rossi, Souloukou herself resigned. Roma ultras were so…

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Usually by this stage of World Cup qualification, Indonesia are playing friendlies and planning for the next Southeast Asian Championship, a biennial big deal in the football-loving region of 650 million. This time, though, the Merah Putih (Red and White) are still in the hunt for a first place on the global stage since 1938 – when they appeared as Dutch East Indies – and are now talking of using the regional tournament for development purposes. How times have changed. Until recently, the team was known across the rest of Asia as one of the continent’s biggest underachievers. The popularity of the game in the country of 270 million is undoubted and attending a game at Jakarta’s Gelora Bung Karno Stadium along with 80,000 red-clad fans is one of world…

Does the quality of Iran’s top flight match its passionate fanbase? Iran is a proud football nation that produces more talented footballers than anywhere else in Asia with the exception of Japan and South Korea. While the league is well respected and clubs are usually competitive, Iranian domestic football punches below its weight. Most clubs are owned directly or indirectly by the state, which leads to plenty of politics and not enough decisions made for football reasons. Commercial revenue is virtually non-existent, facilities around the country need investment – including the iconic Azadi Stadium in Tehran – and professionalism is lacking. US-led financial sanctions make it more difficult for clubs to operate in the global transfer market, to collect fees and prize money and much more besides. The devaluation of…

Two famous names of South American football stand in the way of a sixth consecutive Brazilian victory in the Copa Libertadores. Curiously, they are, respectively, the first-ever winners of the competition and the last team to win it before the start of the Brazilian domination: Penarol of Uruguay and Argentina’s River Plate. Marcelo Gallardo, who took River to that triumph in 2018, is back in charge. But he has yet to stamp his mark on the current team, which still bears the imprint of Martin Demichelis, who replaced him at the end of 2022 and then gave way to him at the end of July. Where Gallardo seeks to open out the field, Demichelis sought to stay compact, winning the ball high and bursting through with quick-passing moves. Gallardo had…

The A-League will move into its 20th year in 2025. Its survival in a rather hostile landscape is something to be celebrated – yet the feeling remains the competition is yet to reach anything like its full potential. The latest round of austerity cuts on the back of some disastrous decisions (the sale of the Grand Final venue – later rescinded – being one), have hit hard. Revenue distributions to the clubs have been reduced to a bare minimum, and so it’s somewhat surprising that the league has been able to attract some genuine marquee names for 2024-25. Leading the way is Juan Mata who, even at 36, has the sort of star quality that will attract some of the casual fans the A-League has long looked to win over.…

While the finale of the 2024 Canadian Championship brought a familiar conclusion, the route to that point was anything but as the dominance of Toronto FC, CF Montreal and Vancouver Whitecaps was tested more than ever. And it was not just Canada’s domestic top flight, the Canadian Premier League (CPL), that produced surprise packages. There has been plenty of discussion about the fact that the league does not have a club from Quebec, and CS Saint-Laurent took their opportunity to add to those conversations. The team, which plays in the Ligue 1 Quebec division, part of the third tier of Canadian football, came up against CPL outfit HFX Wanderers in the preliminary round, and defied their semi-professional status with a penalty shootout victory after a 2-2 draw. Demonstrating the value…

Club Football EUROPE 2024-25 UEFA CHAMPIONS LEAGUE Matchday1 Sep 17 – Bern Young Boys (Sui) 0 Aston Villa (Eng) 3 (Tielemans 27, Ramsey 38, Onana 86) Sep 17 – Turin Juventus (Ita) 3 (Yildiz 21, McKennie 27, Gonzalez 52) PSV (Ned)1 (Saibari 90+3) Sep 17 – Milan Milan (Ita)1 (Pulisic 3) Liverpool (Eng) 3 (Konate 23, Van Dijk 41, Szoboszlai 67) Sep 17 – Munich Bayern Munich (Ger) 9 (Kane19 pen, 57, 73 pen, 78 pen, Guerreiro 33, Olise 38, 61, Sane 85, Goretzka 90+2) Dinamo Zagreb (Cro) 2 (Petkovic 49, Ogiwara 50) Sep 17 – Madrid Real Madrid (Spa) 3 (Mbappe 46, Rudiger 83, Endrick 90+5) Stuttgart (Ger)1 (Undav 68) Sep 17 – Lisbon Sporting (Por) 2 (Gyokeres 38, Debast 65) Lille (Fra) 0 Sep 18 – Prague Sparta…

I covered a Shakhtar Donetsk game in Kyiv during the invasion. I was lucky, dashed in from Poland, watched the game in the Olympic Stadium, car waiting outside, rushed back to the border, home, safe. But imagine being a kid growing up in Ukraine, playing football and then the air-raid siren goes. They run to the bunker and hunker down until the danger clears. For now. And then they return to the game. Or try to. They need help. And that’s where the Sir Bobby Charlton Foundation (SBCF) steps in. October 21 marked one year since the great man passed away but he continues to change lives. Charlton’s charity has partnered with Shakhtar to fund coaches, pitches, kits and balls for the kids in Kyiv. They also provide on-site psychologists…

RISE OF THE UNDERDOGS By Bence Bocsak (Pitch Publishing, £14.99) Rise of the Underdogs is the ultimate guide to the changing landscape of modern football. With stories like Croatia – a nation of just four million people – reaching the World Cup final and Morocco writing African football history, to icons such as Erling Haaland, Khvicha Kvaratskhelia and Mohamed Salah, it explores how football clubs and associations are breaking down barriers through features and insight from coaches, players and other professionals. THE LIFE OF TOTAL FOOTBALL By James Jackson (Pitch Publishing, £18.99) The Life of Total Football tells the story of the origins, history and inspiration behind one of the purest styles of football. Made famous by Johan Cruyff, Ajax and the Netherlands national team in the 1970s, its story…

When Mauricio Pochettino was appointed manager of the USA, he joined a growing tradition. In recent years, football coaches have become one of Argentina’s great exports. With the former Chelsea man’s appointment, there are now ten Argentinian head coaches of FIFA member nations. This is not actually the most – Spain and Italy have 11 each, as do England depending on how you categorise Lee Carsley – but no other nation so dominates one confederation and none has so many coaches of what might be termed major nations. It’s true that there are Italian coaches managing the likes of Turkey, Hungary and Belgium, and that there are Argentinians coaching Cambodia and the Dominican Republic, but seven of the CONMEBOL nations are coached by Argentinians. Were the World Cup qualifiers to…

“Being on the pitch is over. I can’t stay away from football, it’s my life and will continue to be my life…All these tears we have shed these days are tears of emotion, of pride. They are not tears of sadness”Spain and Barcelona legend Andres Iniesta announces his retirement at the age of 40 during an emotional press conference 14 Age of Arsenal academy starlet Max Dowman when he scored for the club’s Under-19s in the UEFA Youth League against Atalanta, becoming the competition’s youngest-ever goalscorer. 1 Appearances made by French centre-back Raphael Varane at new club Como before he was forced into retirement by a knee injury at the age of 31. 5 Number of 2026 World Cup stadiums that will host matches at the 2025 CONCACAF Gold Cup…

FIFA’s lawyers will almost certainly need to rewrite the small print in the world federation’s transfer regulations after a European Court of Justice ruling in the long-running case brought by Lassana Diarra. The former France, Chelsea, Arsenal, Real Madrid and Paris Saint-Germain midfielder incurred a suspension and €10 million fine for breach of contract after exiting Russian club Lokomotiv Moscow in 2014. However, a year later FIFA denied him the essential international transfer certificate (ITC) when he sought to revive his career in Belgium with Charleroi. The Belgian club insisted they owed Lokomotiv nothing by way of a FIFA-imposed compensation fee for the midfielder. The move collapsed and eventually, after he had served his suspension, he joined Marseille before brief spells with Al Jazira in the UAE and PSG before…

LA LIGA STATS & FACTS 2023-24 SEASON 10 SENT OFF There were only ten seconds between Williams’ first and second yellow cards for the only red card of his career: one for a foul, and another for dissent 3 PENALTIES WON Williams won three penalties in La Liga last season, more than any other player 16 GOAL INVOLVEMENTS Williams had a hand in more than a quarter of Athletic’s La Liga goals in 2023-24 (26 per cent in total) with five goals and 11 assists SPAIN 22 CAPS GOALS 4 SUCCESSFUL DRIBBLES TOP FIVE LEAGUES 2023-24 LA LIGA BROTHERS’ COMBINED APPEARANCES…

Full-time professional football in Auckland has an inauspicious past, but Auckland FC are hoping to change that with the club’s entry into the A-League for the 2024-25 season. Based in Auckland, the Football Kingz were New Zealand’s first full-time professional football club and played in Australia’s National Soccer League until being replaced by the New Zealand Knights when the A-League was founded in 2004. The Knights were then dissolved in 2007 after finishing last two seasons in a row and were replaced in the A-League by Wellington Phoenix as New Zealand’s only full-time club. While Auckland City would go on to dominate New Zealand’s part-time domestic football scene, New Zealand’s biggest city – home to 1.7 million people – was left as the largest in Australasia without a professional football…

Vivianne Miedema scoring for Manchester City on her return to Arsenal was the headline from the Women’s Super League opening weekend, but the star performer was Brighton forward Kiko Seike as the Japan international became the first WSL player to hit a hat-trick on debut. By scoring in the 4-0 defeat of Everton, she highlighted the Nadeshiko’s growing influence in the WSL: more than half of Japan’s Paris Olympic squad now play in the league with Seike joined by 11 compatriots, including four at title contenders Manchester City. As recently as 2020, only three Japanese players had appeared in the WSL, and none since 2014. Then, Mana Iwabuchi joined Aston Villa and, while English football rarely saw her best football, as a trailblazer her influence was significant – especially after…

Everyone else has fallen by the wayside, leaving a double helping of Argentina versus Brazil in the semifinals of the Copa Sudamericana, the continent’s Europa League equivalent. The big disappointment was Ecuador, whose teams won this competition in the last two years and in three of the last five, but their participation ended in the last 16 when reigning champions LDU of Quito were knocked out by Argentine outfit Lanus. At the same stage, the remaining two teams from Chile – Huachipato and Palestino – were easily dispatched (8-1 and 6-2 on aggregate, respectively, by Racing of Argentina and Colombia’s Independiente Medellin). Paraguay fought on, with a domestic battle for a place in the quarter-finals between the recently dominant Libertad and little Sportivo Ameliano, enjoying their first international adventure. It…

The Lamar Hunt US Open Cup didn’t become one of the longest continuously running cup competitions in world football without overcoming the occasional obstacle. Throughout its 111-year history, the national domestic cup competition for men’s soccer in the United States which, unusually for American sport, includes teams from up and down the US league system, has navigated a sporting landscape as challenging and as diverse as the terrain of the country in which it is played. In 2024, it faced one such obstacle that threatened its very existence, this time put in place by the country’s top tier, Major League Soccer. In the end, the 2024 trophy went to an MLS side, Los Angeles FC, who defeated another MLS side and four-time US Open Cup winners Sporting Kansas City in…

The group stage of the 2024 CONCACAF Caribbean Cup proved a great showcase for clubs from the Dominican Republic’s top flight, the Liga Dominicana de Futbol (LDF). Ten clubs from five Caribbean Football Union members qualified for the region’s premier club tournament. The winners qualify for the last 16 of the 2025 CONCACAF Champions Cup, while the runners-up and third-place sides go into the first round. Reigning LDF champions Cibao (who have won the last four domestic league titles) and Moca (LDF runners-up in 2023 and semi-finalists in the recently concluded 2024 season) both strolled through Group B of the Caribbean Cup, guaranteeing the Dominican Republic of at least one club in CONCACAF’s premier club tournament in 2025. The performance is a marked improvement for Cibao, who went into the…

BRYNE INVITE SPECTATORS TO BRING THEIR TRACTORS Norwegian second-tier outfit Bryne are best-known to most European football aficionados for being Erling Haaland’s hometown club, but they are now attracting attention on social media for a different reason. In a nod to their agricultural roots, Bryne are inviting spectators to bring their tractors – there is space for up to ten at the ground – to home games, park them by the side of the pitch and watch the team’s promotion push from the comfort of their vehicles. The tractor ticket has mistakenly been labelled as a VIP option online but actually costs a bargain 250 Norwegian Krone (£18) per vehicle and permits entry for one driver and up to four passengers, who can then decide how they want to watch…

Austria v West Germany 1978 World Cup, Cordoba Austria’s meeting with their neighbours in Argentina was not only an historic victory, it also proved to be the prequel to one of the most controversial matches in World Cup history. Austrian goal-getter Krankl had a front-row seat for both… In my international career with Austria there were many memorable games but, of course, the high points were the World Cup participations in Argentina1978 and Spain 1982. In Argentina, our team was sensational. We were in a tough group with Brazil, Spain and Sweden, and each of those nations probably thought they would have an easy task against us. But it all turned out differently. We beat Spain and Sweden, lost 1-0 to Brazil in an even game and finished top of…