Jose Mourinho makes his European bow for Real Madrid on Wednesday leading his new charges out against Dutch side Ajax at the Santiago Bernabeu in the Champions League Group G opener.
Mourinho s last European game was at the Bernabeu in May when his Inter Milan side defeated Bayern Munich 2-0 in the Champions League final and his new employers hope he can repeat the feat at Madrid and deliver a 10th European Cup.
The Portuguese coach is one of only three men, along with Ernst Happel and Ottmar Hitzfeld, to win the Champions League with two different clubs (FC Porto and Inter) and he now has the chance to make history by lifting the title with a third team.
The Spanish titans have not won the trophy since 2002 and have crashed out at the last 16 stage for the past…
Philipp Lahm has challenged Bayern Munich to show they are a better team than Arsenal on Wednesday after the Premier League side revived their European prospects with victory in the reverse fixture a fortnight ago.
Arsenal breathed life into their hopes of progressing from Champions League Group F by picking up their first points of the campaign against the Bundesliga champions with a 2-0 victory at the Emirates Stadium.
Another triumph in Bavaria will see third-place Arsenal join leaders Bayern on six points having avoided defeat at the Allianz Arena on their last two visits.
Arsenal won 2-0 at Bayern in the second leg of their last-16 clash in 2012-13 and drew 1-1 at the same stage a season later, although neither result was enough to see them through to th…
Paco Alcacer does not consider his previous two seasons at Barcelona as lost after rediscovering his form on loan Borussia Dortmund.
Alcacer joined Barca from Valencia in a €30million deal in 2016 but made just 14 LaLiga starts in two seasons in a backup role at Camp Nou.
He was loaned to Dortmund in August and has flourished under Lucien Favre s tutelage at Signal Iduna Park, scoring eight goals in just five games. Dortmund have a €23m clause to make the deal permanent and are expected to activate it.
But asked about his time at Barca in an interview with Marca, Alcacer said: Some may want to think that I might have lost the past two years from their viewpoint, I don t think I ve lost two years.
In terms of the number of minutes I had it s clear th…
Lionel Messi looks set to leave Barcelona and a select few clubs are preparing to make a move.
Manchester City? Paris Saint-Germain? Inter?
Keep an eye on this saga…
TOP STORY – PSG TALKING TO MESSI
Paris Saint-Germain have opened talks with wantaway Barcelona superstar Lionel Messi, according to Ole.
Messi has handed in a transfer request at Barca, and the six-time Ballon d Or winner has already been linked with Manchester City, Manchester United, Inter, Juventus and PSG.
The frontpage of Thursday s Mundo Deportivo claims City are circling to bring Messi to the Premier League with the 33-year-old believed to be keen on reuniting with former Barca boss Pep Guardiola. Meanwhile, Marca claims City have offered a three-year d…
Bayern Munich are interested in swapping James Rodriguez for Paulo Dybala, according to the Bild.
Reportedly, the Colombian recently had a angry outburst in the dressing room at the expense of manager Niko Kovač, though Kovač apparently wasn t present at the time, during which he angrily pointed out that this was not Frankfurt, alluding to Kovač s previous club Eintracht. Various outlets spoke about the Croatian coach being on the verge of being sacked, but the club then came to his aid and refuted such rumours decisively.
It now seems they ve decided to dispense with the services of James instead, and they are ready to offer him to Juventus and ask for Dybala to go the other way.
As with James in Germany, a number of reports have claimed Dybala was unhappy w…
Eric Maxim Choupo-Moting earned plaudits from Bayern Munich boss Julian Nagelsmann after playing a starring role in Sunday s 5-0 demolition of Freiburg.
Facing a team who were unbeaten in their past 11 games, Bayern picked apart Freiburg as Choupo-Moting led the attack, finishing with one goal and one assist for his endeavour.
The former Mainz, Schalke and Paris Saint-Germain player featured for 66 minutes until Jamal Musiala was given a run-out.
It had been the 33-year-old Choupo-Moting s first game in the starting XI for Bayern this season. By the time he left the field, the Cameroon international had convinced coach Nagelsmann there could be plenty more starts for him this season.
Choupo did very well, he brought his success in practice into the pitch…
Robert Lewandowski earned the Gerd Muller Trophy by scoring 57 goals for club and country last season and is not about to shirk the challenge of reeling in Erling Haaland in the 2022-23 campaign.
Lewandowski was presented with France Football s award for world football s leading marksman for the second year in a row on Monday, before Karim Benzema landed the Ballon d Or for the first time.
The honour – previously the Striker of the Year – has been renamed after Muller, the legendary Bayern Munich forward whose 40-goal single-season Bundesliga record Lewandowski broke en route to claiming the trophy.
But if the Barcelona man is going to retain the prize once again in 2023, he is going to have to overcome Manchester City s scoring sensation Haaland.
The…
While most of Inscryption is spent battling through its deck-building card game, every so often, your wins and losses will give you new insights into solving the puzzles scattered around the cabin around you. If you want to escape the spooky opponent you’re facing in the game–and the grisly fate that awaits if you lose–you’ll need to make progress in investigating the room around you between matches.
Once you’ve unlocked the safe and solved the slide puzzles, your next goal is to uncover the mystery of the Caged Wolf. You’ll see the Caged Wolf statue on one of the shelves in the cabin, and figuring out how to uncage it leads you to a new item, the Knife, and one step closer to your escape.
Here’s everything you need to know about how to find the Caged Wolf, what to do with…
Jose Mourinho will be eager for Chelsea to end their Premier League campaign in style and heap more misery on Cardiff City on Sunday.
The Portuguese, who was fined £10,000 by the Football Association on Thursday in relation to comments he made after the home loss to Sunderland, saw his hopes of winning a trophy in his first season back at Stamford Bridge disappear in the space of a week with a defeat to Atletico Madrid and a draw against Norwich City.
Chelsea would have fancied their chances of reaching the UEFA Champions League final when they held La Liga leaders Atletico to a goalless draw at Vicente Calderon, but they were beaten 3-1 in the second leg.
There was more frustration for the London club four days later as Championship-bound Norwich left Stamford Bridge…
Steven Reid believes he can look back with pride on his time at The Hawthorns after playing his final game for West Brom.
Reid has not been offered a new contract by the Midlands club, with his current deal set to expire.
Although West Brom struggled in the Premier League this season, narrowly avoiding relegation, the versatile 33-year-old is happy with the progress made since he joined the club towards the end of their promotion-winning Championship season in 2010.
Reid initially moved on loan from Blackburn Rovers, before completing a permanent switch after West Brom were promoted.
Looking back at the amount of games I ve played and the results we ve got in those games, I can look back with pride that I ve had an impact in the games I ve played, Reid told the c…