soccer – Page 479

Chinese Club Buys Oscar For Ungodly Sum Of Money And Nothing Makes Sense Anymore

The insanity of the Chinese Super League’s all-out assault on the traditional soccer hierarchy continues apace. All of it is shocking and none of it makes sense but this does indeed appear to be the new reality.

Alan Pardew Sacked At Crystal Palace After Not Doing Jack Shit With Lots Of Money

After two years of up-and-down management of Crystal Palace (the “up” referring to his swashbuckling midseason heroism of his first few months at the club which brought the Eagles out of danger and led them to 10th place in the table, and the “down” the current campaign that has them teetering on the edge of the relegation zone), Alan Pardew has been fired today.

Mario Balotelli Takes Break From Doing Good Mario Things, Does Bad Mario Thing

Mario Balotelli is still thriving out in France, scoring eight goals in nine league appearances for out-of-nowhere Ligue 1 leaders Nice, so things aren’t all bad. What is maybe a little bad is that yesterday, for the first time this season, Good Mario gave way to Bad Mario, when the Italian striker was shown a straight red card for this:

Julian Green To Officially Begin His Career By Leaving Bayern Munich

Julian Green was never going to make it at Bayern Munich. He is a fairly promising homegrown prospect at a club that (at least historically) values integrating players developed in-house, but he’s also a not all that talented player—not enough to consistently earn developmental minutes at one of the four or five biggest clubs in the world—who still hasn’t found his natural position and hasn’t shown much of anything on the pitch to justify his continued place on Bayern’s roster. The longer Green stayed at Bayern, the more he delayed truly starting his professional career in earnest, and the lower the odds became of him eventually hitting a talent ceiling high enough to merit a surefire starting spot at a mediocre-to-good European club and a regular place in the USMNT.

Real Madrid's Transfer Ban Reduced To One Window

Real Madrid’s appeal of a FIFA-imposed two-window transfer ban for violations in the signing of foreign youth players has been successful, as the Court of Arbitration for Sport today reduced that initial penalty to a single window, citing errors in FIFA’s investigation as justification for why they reduced the sanction.

Messi And Suárez Return To Japanese Game Show To Do More Wacky Shit

Japanese game shows remain the best exhibitions of crazy soccer skills.

Lionel Messi Is God

Seriously, there’s nothing more to say. Just look at what he did to Espanyol’s whole team yesterday:

The Arsenaling Of Arsenal's Season Has Begun

“It’s a horrible week,” Arsenal manager Arsène Wenger admitted after losing to a short-handed and off-form Manchester City team on Sunday—this just a few days after losing to an off-form Everton team in similarly depressing fashion. As expected, this season that looked like it might be The One is beginning to reveal itself to be just like all the others.

Can Anyone In The Premier League Catch Chelsea?

Chelsea had a rough September. After starting out their first EPL season under Antonio Conte with three up-and-down wins, they tied lowly Swansea, then lost two in a row to Liverpool and Arsenal. With both of those teams resurgent and Manchester City rounding into form under Pep Guardiola, it appeared that Chelsea’s goose was more or less cooked two months into the season. The Premier League is outlandishly competitive and coaches can get shitcanned over a bad two weeks without hesitation.