List of All Articles with Tag 'll'

Erling Haaland has set his sights on history as Manchester City chase the treble. The striker remained focused on City’s finals as he collected the Football Writers’ Association’s Footballer of the Year award in London on Thursday. Haaland has scored 52 goals in 51 games for City – ahead of Sunday’s Premier League finale at Brentford – following his £51million move from Borussia Dortmund last summer. City face Inter Milan in Istanbul in the Champions League final on June 10, a week after they play Manchester United in the FA Cup final, having already won the Premier League. They are aiming to emulate their city rivals’ achievement of 1999. Haaland said: “There are two finals left, we have to stay focused even though we won the Premier League. “We have to stay focused to achieve what we can achieve in the next two finals. I will do everything I can to achieve good things in the finals and hopefully win both. “It’s a good thing being favourites (against Inter Milan) because it means we have qualities, we have to attack the game in our way, play our football and in the end we’ll see who wins it.” Haaland earned 82 per cent of the votes to win the FWA award, 75 years after Sir Stanley Matthews won the first trophy, ahead of Arsenal’s Bukayo Saka and Martin Odegaard. “I feel good, it’s a special moment,” he added, speaking to the FWA. “I expected to do good things but, to do this, I didn’t expect.” He has broken the record for the most Premier League goals in a season with 36 as Manchester City wrapped up a third straight title with three games to spare, having trailed Arsenal by eight points at one stage. I expected to do good things but, to do this, I didn't expect. Haaland on being named the FWA Men's Footballer of the Year “It’s really just about taking it game-by-game, to be honest, and to focus on what we can focus about,” said the 22-year-old. “I don’t like to focus on the future or the past. I like to live in moment and I like to take it game-by-game – exactly what he (Pep Guardiola) said we were going to do and that’s what we did. “We focused and we achieved exactly what we wanted to achieve. In then end it’s unreal what we did, being behind all season and we came like a unit together. It was amazing and an amazing feeling.” Chelsea’s Sam Kerr took the women’s award, making the Australian the first player to win the trophy in consecutive seasons. The striker scored the winner in Chelsea’s 1-0 FA Cup final triumph over Manchester United earlier this month. Chelsea, who have a two-point lead over Manchester United, know victory at Reading on Saturday will seal the WSL title on the final day of the season. Kerr said: “It’s amazing. It’s something that I’m very proud of. Off the back of the Euros women’s football has grown a lot. Walking down the street, the crowds are bigger. Everything’s just increased over the last year. “I think to some people it might look easy but every year it gets harder and harder (to win the league). Anyone that’s involved in football knows how hard it is to come back year after year and to stay at the top. So we’re doing everything to win on Saturday.” Read More Charity boss speaks out over ‘traumatic’ encounter with royal aide Ukraine war’s heaviest fight rages in east - follow live Izzy Christiansen calls it a day – Thursday’s sporting social Ben Earl hopes to make England case by leading Saracens to Premiership glory Dave Challinor always confident Stockport could secure promotion

Darren Waller making a splash for the Giants

US weekly wages fell in 2022, according to new Bureau of Labor Statistics figures, revealing widespread softness that

Republican presidential candidate Sen. Tim Scott once said his 2020 police reform bill would "defund" local police departments from federal grants for non-compliance, but he later attacked Democrats for proposing the same policies.

Lush fields in Illinois are proving to be a rare bright spot for the US wheat crop after

A man is said to be barricaded inside an office after the alleged attack that killed a woman and two policemen.

Boeing Co. refused to give the Pentagon cost data for almost 11,000 replacement parts over a year, according

The Philadelphia Phillies have not had the start to their 2023 season that they would have expected after winning the National League Pennant in 2022.Nonetheless, they'll be able to find some momentum this weekend if they can have any level of success against the NL East leading Atlanta Bra...

Green Bay Packers fans have to be wondering why these four former players are still available in free agency this late into the offseason.There is obviously one former Green Bay Packers player who the Cheeseheads will have a close eye on throughout at least the 2023 season with Aaron Rodgers now...

Stockport boss Dave Challinor always believed his side would be fighting for promotion as the Hatters prepare to face Carlisle in the Sky Bet League Two play-off final. County are bidding to make it back-to-back promotions on Sunday and booked their place at Wembley after coming from behind to beat Salford 3-1 on penalties after the two sides were locked at 2-2 on aggregate after extra time over two legs. Challinor took over at Edgeley Park in November 2021, just five months after he guided Hartlepool into League Two and the County boss repeated that feat with his current club – this time finding himself one game away from his first English Football League promotion. The 47-year-old admitted they suffered a poor start to the season but never stopped believing he could guide the club to successive promotions. He told a press conference: “The start of this season was tough but we have got over that and we have built. “Now it’s come up to this point where we have to back ourselves and we all hoped of having the shot of getting into League One because that was our ambition at the start of the season. “It was a big ambition some would say, now we have the opportunity to take it. Promotion was always the plan, the hope, the ambition and that’s the big thing.” Stockport ended the season unbeaten in 13 games but narrowly missed out on the automatic promotion places, finishing just four points behind Northampton in third place. Challinor admits the Wembley stage is a far different atmosphere to many that greet his players on the pitch on a weekly basis in the fourth tier, as around 40,000 fans are expected to descend onto Wembley Way. He continued: “You can have an impact in front of 10,000 at Edgeley Park, a bigger impact elsewhere in front of 2,000, it’s going to be difficult in front of the Wembley crowd. “What we do everyday on the grass outside gives us bigger belief and trust that the players are good enough and that’s not going to stop me from wanting to kick a bottle or an advertising board. “We are in a really strong situation, the fact we have got two players in (Antoni) Sarcevic and (Chris) Hussey that have played in a play-off final, so in terms of that, they can pass on completely different feelings and emotions, and we need to use those experiences in a positive way.” Striker Paddy Madden has scored 10 league goals this season so far, and was also a part of the side which won promotion to League Two last year. The 33-year-old made the switch to non-league from League One Fleetwood in the 20-21 season, and Madden insists his move was always based around the vision of the football club when many thought it was for financial reasons only. He said: “At the time there were a lot of eyebrows raised about dropping down the leagues but I knew what kind of plans were in place here. “I had the chance to watch a couple of game at Edgeley Park, heard the atmosphere and that played a massive part in me coming here because I knew how well the team was followed. “We always backed ourselves that we would get into a good position, we are annoyed with ourselves that we did not get top three but at the same time getting promoted through the play-offs is better.” Read More Charity boss speaks out over ‘traumatic’ encounter with royal aide Ukraine war’s heaviest fight rages in east - follow live Javier Tebas wants LaLiga to have power to eradicate racism in Spanish football Jason Roy looks Los Angeles-bound but says ‘I never will walk away from England’ Callum Smith’s ‘excited’ about his Canada bout

The Chicago Cubs are about to get long-awaited reinforcements on the mound.At 22-26, it would be difficult to categorize the Chicago Cubs' season up to this point as anything other than a disappointment. There have been rumors of potential roster shake-ups and there is a palpable angst plag...

LaLiga president Javier Tebas claims with the correct legal framework he can eradicate racism in Spanish football within six months. The problem has been an issue for some time but hit the headlines on Sunday when Real Madrid winger Vinicius Junior spoke out after being abused at Valencia, saying Spain was a racist country because of “continuous episodes across several cities”, and his club filed a hate crime complaint with the Spanish State Attorney General’s Office. That prompted a tetchy response to Vinicius on social media from Tebas, for which he subsequently apologised, but after complaining the league’s hands were tied by the country’s law which means LaLiga can currently only identify and report incidents and punishment is rarely handed out, the outspoken president is adamant he can rapidly eliminate the problem. “What we want is the power to do more things. With the power we are convinced within months this would be solved,” he told a specially-arranged press conference. “We are going along the legal route and I think in six months’ time this will be at zero and we will be the best league in the world. “The competencies we want are for those intolerable behaviours – racism, homophobia.” When challenged on his six-month solution claim, Tebas added: “We have been able to have economic control to stop our clubs gong bankrupt so if we are given the competencies we can put an end to this because it is easier to stop than financial control. “Tomorrow, a communique will go to the head of government and political parties requesting the law is urgently modified against racism, xenophobia and intolerance and requesting the (Spanish Football) Federation and LaLiga to have competencies.” Asked why LaLiga had not made such a request before, Tebas said: “That was probably a mistake of ours too but we thought we were making progress in the courts when we made complaints directly. “We have seen it is not enough and we need greater agility and more speed to solve these problems more quickly.” We are going along the legal route and I think in six months' time this will be at zero and we will be the best league in the world LaLiga president Javier Tebas on tackling racism In the interim, Tebas said Vinicius would have his full backing should he decide to walk off the pitch in the face of further racist abuse. “If he feels affected of course I’d encourage him to leave the pitch,” he said. “He and the whole team could abandon it. That is the decision of the referee but I’d encourage him to leave the pitch – he will be supported by me personally and LaLiga.” LaLiga has set up dedicated reporting channels, via email and its website, in order to speed up the identification of people who engage in racist behaviour but since the creation of LaLiga’s integrity and security department in 2015, there have only been, according to documentation provided by LaLiga, more than a dozen racist incidents linked to matches reported. However, LaLiga also lists nine separate incidents relating to Vinicius since December 2020, four of which have been resolved but with only two found to have featured racism, with the clubs involved allowed to issue sanctions themselves. Tebas denied Spain was a racist country but admitted he was concerned about the league’s worldwide image in the light of the latest accusations, although he did not think it would deter black players from signing for LaLiga clubs. “If I weren’t concerned I’d be crazy. Of course I am concerned and we will work to find a solution to turn this image around. Spanish football is not racist,” said Tebas, who said he would speak to Vinicius when things had “calmed down” but had contacted sponsors to offer reassurances. “We think it doesn’t reflect reality. This is unexpected and difficult but something we have to face up to, we can’t just hide and cry in the corner. “We do protect black sportspeople from any racism. We will continue to protect them from any insults they receive on the field, in their professional career and outside their professional career.”