Argentina’s FIFA World Cup winners arrive home from Qatar to hero’s welcome

Argentina's captain and forward Lionel Messi (C) holds the FIFA World Cup Trophy on board a bus as he celebrates alongside teammates and supporters after winning the Qatar 2022 World Cup tournament in Ezeiza, Buenos Aires province, Argentina on December 20, 2022. (Photo courtesy: AFP)
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Updated 20 December 2022

Argentina’s FIFA World Cup winners arrive home from Qatar to hero’s welcome

  • The Argentine capital has been in party mode since their dramatic victory over France in Sunday’s final
  • The series gave the country its first World Cup win since Diego Maradona hoisted the trophy 36 years ago

BUENOS AIRES: Thousands of ecstatic fans gave Argentina’s football squad a hero’s welcome in Buenos Aires in the early hours before dawn on Tuesday after the plane carrying Lionel Messi and his World Cup-winning team mates touched down at Ezeiza airport.

The Argentine capital has been in party mode since their dramatic victory over France in Sunday’s final in Qatar, which gave the country its first World Cup win since Diego Maradona hoisted the trophy 36 years ago.

The players, wearing their gold winners’ medals around their necks and taking turns to hold the World Cup trophy aloft, waved at fans from an open-top bus as the lights from thousands of mobile phones sparkled and flags fluttered in the crowd.

Joyous fans sang to the beat of a drum and fireworks lit up the sky as the bus slowly wound its way through the crowd.

Thousands had tracked the plane, the state airline Aerolineas Argentinas AR1915, all the way from Doha and a stop-off in Rome.

The players are expected to spend a few hours at the Argentine Football Association (AFA) facilities near the airport before heading at noon to the huge Obeliso monument in the center of town, where hundreds of thousands are likely to gather.

Argentina beat France 4-2 on penalties after a scintilaing 3-3 draw, with Messi scoring twice France’s Kylian Mbappe netting three times.

Messi, 35, announced that the final would be his last match in the World Cup though he intends to play a few more games for the national side.


McIlroy: Saudi, PGA Tour deal ‘good for golf’

Updated 07 June 2023

McIlroy: Saudi, PGA Tour deal ‘good for golf’

LOS ANGELES: Rory McIlroy on Wednesday welcomed the PGA Tour’s merger with the Saudi Arabia-backed LIV Golf.

According to the Northern Ireland star, Tuesday’s deal would secure the financial future of the sport.

“I think ultimately, when I try to remove myself from the situation and I look at the bigger picture and I look at 10 years down the line, I think ultimately this is going to be good for the game of professional golf,” McIlroy said.

“It unifies it and it secures its financial future.”

McIlroy was speaking on the eve of this week’s PGA Canadian Open in Toronto in his first comments since Tuesday’s agreement was revealed.

Under the new deal, the PGA Tour and Europe’s DP World Tour said they had signed an agreement with LIV’s Saudi backers that will lead to ‘a new collectively owned, for-profit entity.’

McIlroy is widely reported to have turned down an offer in the region of $400 million to switch to LIV but on Wednesday denied ever receiving a bid for his services.

“I was never offered any money,” McIlroy said. The Northern Irishman, however, said he understood anger from fellow professionals against PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan — but insisted he still had confidence in the under-fire tour chief.

“I’ve dealt with Jay a lot closer than a lot of those guys have,” McIlroy said.

“From where we were a couple of weeks ago to where we are today, I think the future of the PGA Tour looks brighter as a whole, as an entity.”


Lionel Messi: ‘I’ve decided to go to Inter Miami’

Updated 48 min 6 sec ago

Lionel Messi: ‘I’ve decided to go to Inter Miami’

BARCELONA: Lionel Messi will sign for Major League Soccer side Inter Miami, the player said Wednesday in interviews with Spanish media, choosing the United States as his next destination over a Barcelona reunion or blockbuster deal to play in Saudi Arabia.
The Argentine forward, 35, has spent the last two seasons at Paris Saint-Germain, playing his final game for the club on Saturday, after moving from Barcelona in 2021, where he spent the majority of his career.
Messi said that he did not want to have to wait for Barcelona to find a formula to be able to sign him given their financial situation — they were unable to keep him before his move to PSG, leading to a tearful departure.
“I was afraid that it would happen again,” Messi told Spanish newspapers Diario Sport and Mundo Deportivo.
“I’ve taken the decision that I am going to Miami, I don’t have (the deal) 100 percent sealed or maybe there’s something left to do, but we decided to continue our path there.
“(I decided) to leave Europe, it’s true that I had offers from another European team but I didn’t even think about it because in Europe, my idea was only to go to Barcelona.
“After winning the World Cup and not being able to go to Barca, it’s time to go to MLS to live football in a different way and enjoy my day to day life more.
“Obviously with the same responsibility and desire to win, and to do things well, but with more calm.”
Messi is a seven-time Ballon d’Or winner and is expected to earn the individual accolade once more after leading Argentina to World Cup glory in Qatar in December 2022.
The football world was eagerly awaiting Messi’s decision after PSG confirmed this week the playmaker, widely considered the best player in the history of football, was departing.
Inter Miami, co-owned by former England international David Beckham and founded in 2018, sacked coach Phil Neville last week with the team bottom of the Eastern Conference — with Argentine Javier Morales taking over on an interim basis.
The romance of a Barcelona return and prospect of eye-watering riches in Saudi Arabia fell by the wayside as Messi opted to join MLS, with sun-soaked Miami a city he has holidayed in on previous occasions.
Some reports say key MLS sponsors including sportswear brand Adidas and Apple TV, who own the league’s domestic broadcasting rights, may be contributing to his deal.


Czech police: Fiorentina fans attack West Ham supporters ahead of Europa Conference League final

Updated 07 June 2023

Czech police: Fiorentina fans attack West Ham supporters ahead of Europa Conference League final

  • Three West Ham fans and one police officer were injured in the incident while 16 people were detained, police said

PRAGUE: Fiorentina fans attacked West Ham supporters in a bar in downtown Prague ahead of the Europa Conference League final, Czech police said on Wednesday.
Three West Ham fans and one police officer were injured in the incident while 16 people were detained, police said.
An investigation was ongoing, and no more details were immediately provided.
Thousands of West Ham and Fiorentina fans have arrived in Prague for the final of the third-tier European competition at Slavia Prague’s Eden Arena.
Both clubs are aiming to end long European trophy droughts.
Organizers prepared two separate fan zones for the fans of both clubs who don’t have tickets for the match.


Germany under-17 national team racially abused on way to winning European title

Updated 07 June 2023

Germany under-17 national team racially abused on way to winning European title

  • General manager Joti Chatzialexiou said racist comments on social media made for “unpleasant circumstances” around the team's run to the European title

FRANKFURT, Germany: Players on the Germany under-17 national team faced racist abuse on social media on their way to winning the European Championship, a team official said Wednesday.
General manager Joti Chatzialexiou said racist comments on social media made for “unpleasant circumstances” around the team’s run to the European title, won on penalties against France on Friday.
“Under particular posts on our social media channels there was a strong accumulation of racist comments. Our boys saw those and that really bothered them,” Chatzialexiou said on the German soccer federation’s website.
“Together they decided, however, not to give any space to these distractions during the course of the tournament, and so they came even closer together as a team. As a team which fully identifies with Germany and with the eagle (badge) on the chest, which lives its shared values and stands for diversity, tolerance, community and integration.”


Beatriz Haddad Maia upsets Ons Jabeur to reach French Open semifinals

Updated 07 June 2023

Beatriz Haddad Maia upsets Ons Jabeur to reach French Open semifinals

  • After playing nearly four hours to beat Sara Sorribes Tormo in the fourth round, Haddad Maia won only one of her service games in the first set
  • The 27-year-old Brazilian started the deciding set with a double break and a 3-0 lead

PARIS: Beatriz Haddad Maia scored another comeback win at the French Open, upsetting Ons Jabeur 3-6, 7-6 (5), 6-1 on Wednesday to become the first Brazilian woman since 1968 to reach a Grand Slam semifinal.
The 14th-seeded Haddad Maia, who in 2019 was provisionally suspended for failing a doping test, shook off a slow start against the seventh-seeded Jabeur on Court Philippe Chatrier and will next face either Iga Swiatek or Coco Gauff.
After playing nearly four hours to beat Sara Sorribes Tormo in the fourth round, Haddad Maia won only one of her service games in the first set. But she saved the only two break points she faced in the second set — both in the 11th game to go up 6-5 — and won the tiebreaker.
The 27-year-old Brazilian started the deciding set with a double break and a 3-0 lead. A frustrated Jabeur flipped her racket in the air after sending an easy backhand wide on a break-point opportunity while down 4-1. Haddad Maia won the game and served out the match.
Jabeur was the runner-up at Wimbledon and the US Open last year.
Haddad Maia is the first Brazilian woman to reach the semifinals at Roland Garros in the Open era. Maria Bueno reached the last four at the 1966 French Open and made the 1968 US Open semifinals.
Haddad Maia’s fourth-round win over Sorribes Tormo, 6-7 (3), 6-3, 7-5, was the longest WTA match of the year — clocking in a 3 hours, 51 minutes.
The top-seeded Swiatek and sixth-seeded Gauff were up next on Chatrier — a rematch of last year’s French Open final won by Swiatek in straight sets. The 22-year-old Swiatek has been ranked No. 1 for more than a year.