Pep Guardiola’s response when asked “Are you going to buy Messi?” #mcfc pic.twitter.com/PbP3Xaojwg
— Liam Blackburn (@liamblackburn) July 3, 2016
Pep Guardiola was introduced to Man City fans for the first time on Sunday and it didn’t take long for one of them to shout at him about signing Lionel Messi.
Dani Alves has left Barcelona after eight tremendously successful years with the club to join Italian champions Juventus and to celebrate, he’s kicking the caps off of beer bottles.
Why is he doing this? Well, why does Dani Alves do anything that Dani Alves does? It’s not a question that can be answered. Just enjoy his zest for life and be thankful he’s not putting his foot to the beer that may or may not be in your hand right now.
The day after Italy’s agonizing shootout loss to Germany in the Euro 2016 quarterfinals, it was time to go home. As the team boarded the bus outside their hotel, the gathered fans remained ardent with their support. So to show his gratitude, goalkeeper and captain Gigi Buffon stopped just before boarding, went over to them and gave out a few world-class hugs.
Germany beat Italy in one of the most hilariously horrible penalty shootouts to reach the Euro 2016 semifinals. Here’s a sampling of the madness this match produced:
Wales beat Belgium 3-1 to become the smallest nation to ever reach a Euros semifinal, setting up a tasty showdown between Real Madrid teammates Gareth Bale and Cristiano Ronaldo.
It looked like Wales’ fairytale run in their first ever Euros appearance might come to a predictable end with the far more talented Belgium scoring early, but Wales went on to score three unanswered goals over the final hour of the match to advance. The performance elicited underdog sports cliches about heart and teamwork that have carried them through this tournament. And after the match, they really drove that point home.
It should come as no surprise that Iceland kitmaker Errea has been unable to keep up with global demand for the shirts of Euro 2016’s undisputed darlings. It should also come as no surprise that the place where demand is highest for the shirt of the nation that stunned and embarrassed England by beating them 2-1 in the round of 16 is Scotland, the place where trolling England is a national pastime (especially when they’re the only nation of the British Isles not to qualify for a major tournament).
Long-time Spain goalkeeper and captain Iker Casillas was not happy about being benched in favor of the younger David De Gea at Euro 2016. So unhappy, in fact, that he wasn’t very nice to his coaches, including manager Vicente Del Bosque, with whom he also worked at Real Madrid for four years. As a result, the outgoing Del Bosque says he has written thank you letters to all his players —except Casillas — in what has to be the most passive aggressive football feud of all time.
Time to let the world know. My next destination is @ManUtd pic.twitter.com/DAK7iYlrCq
— Zlatan Ibrahimović (@Ibra_official) June 30, 2016
Following prolonged speculation, Zlatan Ibrahimovic has announced on his social media accounts that he’s joining Manchester United. As thoroughly unsurprising as this declaration was, it oddly was not accompanied by an official announcement from the club. As of this writing, it’s been 13 hours since Zlatan definitively stated that he’s joining Man United and the club hasn’t so much as retweeted his message.
When you reach the penalty shootout in the quarterfinals of a major tournament without winning a single match in 90 minutes, ideal scenarios lose importance. This was the situation Cristiano Ronaldo and Portugal found themselves in against Poland, after three draws in the group stage and needing 117 minutes to score against Croatia in the round of 16.
Like the World Cup, the Euros have a history of turning little known players into highly sought after stars with a few dazzling performances over the course of a several weeks. But Euro 2016 has proven different in that the player it has launched to international stardom didn’t actually play a single minute at the tournament.
