Worldcrunch
El Pibe de Oro, Barrilete, El Dios, Cósmico, D10S, Dieguito, El 10, El Diez … The quantity of nicknames is just one more sign that fútbol legend Diego Armando Maradona was in a category of his own. His death Wednesday from a heart attack at the age of 60 was a bonafide global event. Here […]
CAIRO — Trapped in the ordinary life of waking up early to get on with daily housework or visiting with extended family, a group of young upper Egyptian girls had a simple dream: to play soccer. But they were uncertain whether the traditional society in which they live would allow them to realize their goal. […]
Egyptian soccer star Mohamed Salah has been turned into a symbol of pride, modesty, and good morals. But what is at the heart of the hero worship?
“In Japan, white is the color of mourning.” So wrote Samuel French in his play All the Way Home. Or at least that’s the line as I remember it from my high-school theater days. White is also the color that the Brazilian national soccer team was wearing in the infamous “Maracanazo” match, a decisive showdown […]
PARIS — Twice a year (for the Academy Awards and the Super Bowl), I renounce my 6-hour beauty sleep and fight timezones to tune in to a bit of live transatlantic spectacle. Blame it on three reasons, ranked by order of importance: my americanophile wife; a chance to take the temperature of U.S. cultural hegemony; […]
Rowdy fans added to the annals of soccer stupidity by forcing organizers to cancel the hugely anticipated Copa Libertadores final in Buenos Aires.
“Sport … is more powerful than government in breaking down racial barriers. It laughs in the face of all kinds of discrimination.” Ever relevant words for 2018 from one of the great figures of the past century. Nelson Mandela, the man who spent 27 years in prison for his fight against South Africa’s Apartheid system […]
Proportionally, the World Cup has more followers in the Latin American marketplace than any other region. It’s a unique opportunity to tap into pure emotion of potential consumers.
CAIRO — In the year of Mohamed Salah’s rise to fame as one of the world’s best soccer players, his every move and success has been well documented across the globe, no more so than in his native Egypt. Here, the cult of personality around him runs much deeper, hitting at the heart of struggles […]
-OpEd- BERLIN — It’s a strange state of affairs. Two madmen are leading two of the three greatest world powers: Donald Trump, who has turned his former TV show The Apprentice into a governing method in the White House, and Vladimir Putin, who lets himself be photographed hunting bare-chested, showing off his muscles, who eliminates […]
-Analysis- The fraught drama of politics landing in the arena of sports has popped up recently in several different places around the world. It also happens to date back (at least) as far as Ancient Rome, as historian Sarah Bond recently explained in Forbes. In the U.S., the NFL is currently roiling in controversy over […]
-OpEd- PARIS — Can a leather ball turn into a bubble? After the extravagant sums of money spent by French soccer team Paris Saint-German to sign Brazilian star Neymar Jr, as well as other splurges by British, Spanish and Italian teams this summer, there’s no avoiding the question: Has soccer become a speculative bubble? The […]
The absence of Christian players at the professional level can be traced to discrimination that begins young.
High ticket prices and fancy stadiums are making the games of the national pastime off-limits for most of Brazil’s population.
GENEVA — A high stack of papers dominates the desk of this president of a Swiss soccer club. “These are resumes from players. We get 50 of them every week, together with video cassettes of their feats. Sorting the good from the bad is an enormous task. And when the concerned party finally arrives from […]
JERUSALEM — In front of Zion Gate in the heart of the Old City of Jerusalem, just a short walk from the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, lies a soccer pitch. Standing on the field, nestled beside an Armenian church, you can see the city walls and the rising minarets of mosques. This pitch and […]
-Analysis- PARIS — Call it the “glorieuse incertitude du sport” — the glorious uncertainty of sports. During the finals of soccer’s just completed 2016 European Championship, Portugal saw its singular star Ronaldo taken out of the game after an injury, but won anyway against a favored host French team that had overcome its eternal nemesis, […]
Jornal de Notícias, July 11th “IT’S OURS!” reads Monday’s front page of Lisbon daily Jornal de Notícias, featuring Portugal’s national soccer team celebrating their victory at the Euro 2016 tournament, with coach Fernando Santos lifting the cup. Claiming its first ever European title, Portugal beat host country France 1-0 at Paris’s Stade de France, on […]
Tuesday’s edition of Icelandic daily Fréttablaðið features the national soccer team celebrating their historic win over England in the European Championship: “Iceland 2 – 1 England, where will this end?” Monday night’s victory sends Iceland to the quarterfinals, where they’ll face host nation France. The Icelandic victory against one of the iconic football teams continues […]
MARCA, June 1, 2016 “Didier Deschamps has bowed to the pressure of a racist part of France,” French soccer player Karim Benzema told Spanish sports daily MARCA, less than 10 days before the beginning of the European championship in France. Benzema’s remarks echo comments made a few days ago by French soccer legend Eric Cantona, […]
Leicester Mercury — May 3, 2016 They were a 5,000-1 longshot to win England’s Premier League at the start of the season, but the fairytale came true last night as Leicester City FC clinched the title when Chelsea and Tottenham drew, making it impossible for the latter to overtake Leicester with two games left. The […]
nrc.next, March 25, 2016 “J.C. Superstar” reads the front page of Dutch-language daily nrc.next on Friday, paying tribute to soccer legend Johan Cruyff who died Thursday in Barcelona, following a long battle with cancer. He was 68. The newspaper’s headline — a pun on the 1970s Broadway musical Jesus Christ Superstar — conveys the icon […]
KABUL — Inside the Afghan capital’s soccer federation stadium, dozens of Afghan women, some of them recently returned from a training camp in Japan, are practicing their skills. “From 2006 up to now, the Afghan women’s national soccer team has conducted several different trips abroad, for training and matches,” says Zohra Mihree, chief of the Afghan women’s soccer committee. “The team participated in SAFF (South Asian Football Federation) tournaments in Bangladesh and Pakistan. Our team came in third place in 2014.” Currently, more than 100 women soccer players are training in different clubs around Afghanistan, up from just a handful […]
MARCA, Jan. 5, 2015 “The soluZZion,” reads the front page of Madrid-based sports daily MARCA Tuesday, a day after Real Madrid announced that former French soccer star Zinedine Zidane would replace the unpopular Rafael Benítez as team coach. Zidane, 43, is new to the coaching game. A 1998 World Cup winner with France and a […]
LUXOR — It’s hot in the minibus that takes us to a village about 10 kilometers from Luxor’s city center. We ask the driver to drop us off at the house of Hajj Tarek* on the main street. Dotted with farmland, sugar cane and modest concrete houses, the village looks like many other Upper Egyptian […]
Suspended for three months by FIFA’s Ethics Committee for a 2 million Swiss franc payment from Sepp Blatter, the former French soccer star denies any wrongdoing, and still says he’s the right man to be the next president of the global soccer org
On the island of Sardinia, asylum seekers rebuild their lives on the football pitch.
Photo: Li Jing/ZUMA TURKEY TO BOOST SECURITY POST ISIS ATTACK The Turkish government is set to bolster its security along the border with Syria after a suspected ISIS bombing in the town of Suruc killed 30 people, mostly students, yesterday. At a news conference, Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said “measures on our border with […]
The Confederation of Independent Football Associations (CONIFA) recently organized its first-ever European soccer championship. Could it be a credible alternative to the scandal-plagued FIFA?
With the backing of Pope Francis, himself a lifelong fan, supporters of San Lorenzo are fighting to rebuild in the neighborhood where their original stadium once stood.
While attention was focused on alleged corruption at FIFA, another kind of drama was playing out between the Israeli and Palestinian soccer delegations.
All eyes are on legendary Argentine striker Lionel Messi ahead of Saturday night’s Barcelona-Juventus final of the Champions League. Here’s our world tour of gasps and shouts of amazement for the best soccer player of his generation. Olé! Lionel Messi: Lovin” Leo In 7 Languages par Worldcrunch
Blatter resigns: watch the world react by Worldcrunch
After Swiss banking scandals shook global finance, arrests at the Zurich-based world soccer body shine a light on what’s wrong with business as usual in Switzerland.
Racism in soccer hit a new low over the weekend when black players from AC Milan’s Under-10 team say they were booed and heckled by other parents during a Universal Cup match. The youngsters were playing their Paris Saint-Germain equivalents for a place in the semi-finals of the Tuscany tournament that features 48 international teams, […]
Looking to build their branding and attract a more global audience, Chinese companies are increasingly eyeing the major European soccer leagues.
Paraguay’s Ministry of Culture says the real birthplace of the game the English named football, and gave rules to, was not in fact England. The Jesuits may have the proof.
The Mannschaft’s World Cup winning team was the perfect embodiment of what Germany hopes to be perceived as — a mix of artistry, perseverance, solidarity and individual freedom.
Germany’s 1-0 win over Argentina was front-page news around the world. Here are some highlights: Argentina: Belgium: Brazil: Germany: Mexico: Spain: UK: Uruguay: U.S.: Venezuela: