For any football club with lofty aspirations, signing the right type of players for a coach’s tactics is absolutely critical. There are also different paths that can be taken, in terms of winning league titles and making a run in a cup competition. For Liverpool and manager Jürgen Klopp, a Champions League triumph feels within…

It’s been 409 minutes – across all competitions – since Real Madrid last managed to score a goal. Real Madrid has gone through the past four and a half matches without scoring a goal. And while failing to score against defensive juggernauts like Atlético Madrid would be acceptable, Real Madrid has failed to find the…

A few months ago, I was explaining to a Colombian classmate the topic of this paper — how key stakeholders can push aside the wreckage of U.S. soccer’s World Cup qualification failure, and stimulate meaningful soccer development in America. She laughed at the premise that soccer could ever become a major sport in America, noting…

Public relations are a difficult thing to master, but they’re fairly simple to handle if one uses their common sense. Yesterday, Juventus completely dropped the ball and embarrassed themselves with their comments regarding Cristiano Ronaldo. For those who have been out of the loop, Kathryn Mayorga has come forward to claim that she was raped…

The phrase “footballing Gods” has been circulated among the wielders of football clichés for decades, now. It, of course, refers to the higher powers of football; an act asserting some control over what is an innately chaotic game. But what if the Gods were the players themselves? Lionel Messi reigns over all as the God…

The great Leonardo Da Vinci once said, “Poor is the pupil who does not surpass his master.” It is often stated that the relationship and the bond developed between the apprentice and the master has always been special. The master’s infinite wisdom is met through the apprentice’s naivety. Often times, the relationship that gets forged…

Football’s top awards have long been prestigious and admired, but FIFA have somehow turned one of the sports’ most decorated award shows into a laughing stock. In this year’s edition of FIFA’s “The Best” awards, we saw the end to Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo’s dominance in FIFA’s Men’s Player of the Year race. While…

Real Betis and manager Quique Setién injected a sense of excitement and life into LaLiga last term, finishing sixth in the table with an entertaining brand of attacking football. This was bound to be a difficult achievement to repeat, especially with the added responsibility of the UEFA Europa League. However, few would have expected such…

As we enter another season in which the amount of players that are on loan from Chelsea (40) completely dwarfs the number of players in their named 2018/19 squad (28), various questions are beginning to get thrown around. Firstly, is it worth stockpiling all this talent if it never actually materialises into quality on the…

On the slopes of the Cherepanov hill, on the right bank of Dnieper River, there’s a 70,000-capacity edifice overlooking the entire city of Kiev. This is the heartbeat of football in Eastern Europe, but at the turn of the decade, this historic sporting venue became more significant to Spaniards than to Andriy Shevchencko and 45…