Tag Futebol

Manchester City are reportedly in pole position to pip Liverpool to the signing of an “excellent” player in the summer transfer window.

Busy summer of transfers expected at Man City

By City’s high standards, this season has been a huge disappointment, even though there is an FA Cup final against Crystal Palace to look forward to later this month. Pep Guardiola’s side’s defence of their Premier League had faded by Christmas, and they also failed to reach the Champions League knockout rounds.

For that reason, a big summer is needed when it comes to new signings, as City look to bring in fresh faces who can take them back to the top of the league, with older heroes such as Kevin De Bruyne moving on.

Monaco youngster Eliesse Ben Seghir has been linked with a move to the Etihad ahead of next season, with the 20-year-old winger already scoring 15 times in 80 appearances for the Ligue 1 side.

Meanwhile, Hugo Larsson has been mentioned as an option to bolster City’s midfield, with younger legs required after a tough campaign for the likes of De Bruyne, Bernardo Silva, Ilkay Gundogan and Mateo Kovacic. The Eintracht Frankfurt ace has been a key man this season, averaging 1.4 tackles per game across 30 Bundesliga outings as well as providing goals from midfield.

Man City leading race to sign "excellent" defender

According to a new report from Football Insider, Manchester City are leading the race to sign Juventus full-back Andrea Cambiaso this summer, sitting in pole position ahead of Liverpool, who attempted to hijack the deal in recent days.

The update states that Guardiola’s men are “in the driving seat over the deal as things stand and have been working on the deal behind the scenes since January”.

The £73,000-a-week Cambiaso could be a fantastic signing for City, given his ability to play in either full-back position, as well as being able to drift into midfield and affect games.

The 25-year-old Italy international has a 91.8% pass completion rate in 30 Serie A appearances this season, with his quality on the ball ideal for Guardiola, and journalist Zach Lowy has described him as “world-class”.

Full-back is a position that must be targeted by City in the summer window, with Kyle Walker’s best days behind him on the right and Josko Gvardiol not necessarily a natural left-back despite his brilliance, and Cambiaso fits the bill to perfection.

Pep must axe Grealish by unleashing Man City's "explosive" star

Pep Guardiola must drop Jack Grealish and start Manchester City’s “explosive” winger.

May 2, 2025

He is technically superb, versatile and at a good point in his career, and if Guardiola can sign him over Liverpool, it would be a statement of intent ahead of next season.

Sheffield United’s automatic promotion dream is now over with Burnley and Leeds United confirmed as Premier League-bound on a disappointing Easter Monday for the Blades.

Earlier in the day, before United’s pivotal showdown with the Clarets, Leeds resoundingly thumped Stoke City 6-0 in the Championship, with Daniel Farke and Co then needing Chris Wilder’s men to slip up and lose to seal a return to the top-flight.

Their wish would come true to the dismay of the away side at Turf Moor, with their pain only intensified when you consider the hosts also clinched a dramatic passage back up to the top-flight when beating the visitors 2-1.

Anel Ahmedhodzic suffered from a rare off-day in Lancashire, with his clumsiness right before the half-time whistle gifting Josh Brownhill the decisive spot-kick that sent the Clarets up a league.

Ahmedhodzic's off-day at Turf Moor

Ultimately, United’s dismal run of four losses from their last five Championship outings has cost them the glory of automatic promotion, but the Bosnian brute certainly didn’t help matters when putting in a rare bad performance.

The number 15 was definitely fired up for the crunch contest, but it resulted in his overall game looking rash and hot-headed rather than focused, culminating in him clattering into Hannibal Mejbri to gift the home side a golden penalty.

Brownhill would calmly tuck away the opportunity to juxtapose Ahmedhodzic’s reckless approach, with the out-of-sorts 26-year-old going on to commit four fouls in total, on top of uncharacteristically winning just 33% of his duels.

Wilder will need his usually reliable colossus to be more switched on ahead of some huge playoff clashes to come, but whilst Ahmedhodzic did cost his team dear, there was one underperformer for the Blades who was just as bad as the defender in offering very little throughout.

The Blades dud who was just as bad as Ahmedhodzic

It was always going to be a tough ask for the Blades to get the better of a dogged Burnley side, considering the stern hosts have only shipped 15 strikes all season long.

Tom Cannon did manage to break his goalscoring duck at Turf Moor to raise a smile, but it was the efforts of Ben Brereton Diaz down the right wing that would have worried away spectators, irrespective of the ex-Leicester City man managing to salvage some personal pride.

Brereton Diaz’s performance in numbers

Stat

Ben Brereton Diaz

Minutes played

60

Goals scored

0

Assists

0

Touches

16

Shots on target

0

Accurate passes

5/9 (56%)

Total duels won

0/4

Stats by Sofascore

The numbers from the table above do make for some dire reading, with the Chilean only managing a meagre 15 touches of the ball from his forgettable 60-minute stint.

On top of that, Brereton Diaz also failed to register a single on-target effort at James Trafford’s formidable goal, alongside only managing to muster up a weak five passes of the ball that found their intended target.

Whilst Ahmedhodzic was notably poor, he did manage to at least win three of his duels during the contest, with Brereton Diaz then unsurprisingly hooked off by Wilder for Jesurun Rak-Sakyi to gain a run-out.

After all, Rak-Sakyi had at least bagged in United’s last away contest before this miserable outing to Lancashire, with his late efforts at Turf Moor seeing him conjure up one successful dribble among other promising moments.

If the Blades are to bounce back from this agonising promotion near-miss, Wilder could now have to axe Brereton Diaz from his forthcoming lineups, knowing full well that lethal displays are needed in the lottery of the playoffs.

Related Sheffield United sold a star for £2m, now he's way better than Cannon

The former Sheffield United striker is now way better than Tom Cannon.

Posts ByDan Emery Apr 16, 2025

They beat Sri Lanka and Bangladesh respectively, but not in the most convincing ways

Valkerie Baynes05-Oct-20244:01

Takeaways: Australia and England off to winning starts

Australia and England safely navigated their opening contests of the Women’s T20 World Cup 2024 but the path ahead shimmered into perspective in the Sharjah heat with neither side fully exerting their dominance and both left with some work to do.India’s shock loss to New Zealand on Friday night had fuelled Australia’s status as trophy favourites and England’s as their closest challengers.And while Australia defeated Sri Lanka by six wickets with 34 balls to spare, they were less polished in the field than has been their trademark for eons and Beth Mooney’s unbeaten 43 off 38 balls represented the bulk of their successful 94-run chase.Related

• October 8 at the T20 World Cup: Can NZ produce another upset against trans-Tasman rivals Australia?

• Sharjah's lack of pace key to England, South Africa's fortunes

• Linsey Smith on being recalled: My mindset has completely flipped from six years ago

• Schutt and Molineux set the tone for Australia, Mooney gets the job done

• Wyatt-Hodge, Smith to the fore as England grind past Bangladesh

England enjoyed the better of the conditions in their night game against Bangladesh, who restricted them to 118 for 7 before succumbing to a four-pronged spin attack in which Linsey Smith and Charlie Dean took two wickets each and Sarah Glenn one with spearhead Sophie Ecclestone going wicketless.England’s 21-run victory put them at the top of Group B with a superior net run rate to South Africa, who thumped West Indies by 10 wickets on Friday. Australia remained behind New Zealand on net run rate at the top of Group A.England team in a huddle ahead of the chase•ICC/Getty ImagesIt took England until the fourth over to find the boundary at the vast Sharjah Stadium. But when Danni Wyatt-Hodge struck two fours in three balls from Fahima Khatun and Maia Bouchier added back-to-back fours immediately before she was dropped on 16 slicing Marufa Akter to point, it looked like England’s attacking style was coming to the fore.By the end of the powerplay, England were looking good at 47 without loss but Bouchier fell in the seventh over. And while Wyatt-Hodge’s 41 at slightly better than a-run-a-ball propped up the innings, the loss of 5 for 37 in 8.2 overs gave Bangladesh a chance.Left-arm spinner Smith, in her first appearance at a World Cup since 2018, took 2 for 11 from her four overs and ran out Bangladesh captain Nigar Sultana while off-spinner Dean accounted for top-scorer Sobhana Mostary, who made 44, and opener Dilara Akter.”First game out, a few nerves with the bat, I thought we adapted quite early, which was good,” Wyatt-Hodge said. “Then with the ball, I thought the girls did a fantastic job. Linsey Smith was outstanding, her first game for England in a World Cup for a while, really happy for her.”Hopefully we can kick on, learn from tonight and put out another display the next game.”

“It was warm out there, it’s tough. And we probably could have done that a little easier with the bat, but conditions were tough out there.”Megan Schutt

For Australia, Megan Schutt opened with a maiden and by the end of the third over, Sri Lanka had only six runs on the board – half of them because Schutt overstepped twice – for the loss of one wicket, Vishmi Gunaratne pinned in front on the last ball of Schutt’s second over.Then Ashleigh Gardner struck with her eighth ball of the match to remove great hope Chamari Athapaththu, whose lean tournament with the bat continued when she fell lbw for just 3, having scored only 6 in Sri Lanka’s first loss to Pakistan.Australia’s start wasn’t blemish-free. Having opted for the pace of Darice Brown over another spin option, she endured a torrid first over with three front-foot no-balls, a wide and clubbed for four through extra cover by Harshitha Samarawickrama.After seven overs, Sri Lanka were 27 for 3 and it could have been more after 12 had Alyssa Healy not missed a chance to stump Samarawickrama and had Brown not put down the same batter running in from extra cover.Schutt led the way with 3 for 11 including back-to-back wickets in the final over but it was a less-than clinical performance in the field by Australia’s standards in an innings punctuated by soft dismissals.The early loss of Healy, and Georgia Wareham had Australia looking shaky but then Mooney marshalled their pursuit expertly, although she was dropped on 22 to Athapaththu’s disgust.Megan Schutt now has the joint-most wickets in Women’s T20 World Cups•ICC/Getty ImagesSchutt described New Zealand’s win against India, which came off the back of Australia’s 3-0 sweep of their series with New Zealand last month, as “pretty cool”. Australia play New Zealand next up on Tuesday back in Sharjah.”It opens up the tournament completely and shows if you have a lot of intent at the start, what that can do in the powerplays,” Schutt said. “It’ll be a great match. Obviously we’ve just come off a series against them in Australian conditions, so it’ll be even a tougher match-up here.”Defending champions doesn’t really mean anything in a new tournament. The slowness of the pitches brings in every single team to this tournament. It actually evens it out really nicely.”It was pretty exciting to go out there. We were pretty nervous to play at 2pm in terms of the heat and I think we handled that really well. We probably worked ourselves up a little bit more than what it was out there. The breeze was lifesaving. So I think we’ve acclimatised nicely to that and now we’ve moving into night game, which should be much more pleasant.”Australia also understood they had work to do ahead of their next game.”We probably could have been cleaner in the field,” Schutt said. “It was warm out there, it’s tough. And we probably could have done that a little easier with the bat, but conditions were tough out there and credit to them for getting the job done.”

India’s replacement opener entered the record books when he hit a 131-ball 210 against Bangladesh – here’s the story in numbers

Sampath Bandarupalli10-Dec-2022126 – Balls Kishan needed for his double-century, the fastest in ODI cricket.The previous fastest in men’s ODIs was 138 balls by Chris Gayle, against Zimbabwe in 2015 World Cup, while the quickest double in all ODIs [across men and women] was Amelia Kerr’s 134 ball effort against Ireland in 2018.0 – Players to convert their first ODI century into a double century before Kishan. The previous highest score for the first century was 194* by Charles Coventry, against Bangladesh in 2009 in Bulawayo.24y 145d – Kishan’s age on Saturday, making him the youngest player to score a double-hundred in men’s ODIs. The previous youngest was Rohit Sharma, who was 26 years and 186 days old at the time of his first double in 2013 against Australia.ESPNcricinfo Ltd1 – Kishan is now the first batter to score a double-century in ODI cricket against Bangladesh. The previous highest score against Bangladesh was the unbeaten 194 by Coventry.0 – Number of individual ODI scores in Bangladesh higher than Kishan’s 210. The previous highest score on Bangladesh soil was by Shane Watson, who scored an unbeaten 185 in 2011 in Dhaka.34.6 – Team overs when Kishan reached 200 in Chattogram, the earliest point any batter has completed the landmark in ODIs. The previous earliest was in 43.3 overs by Virender Sehwag when he scored 219 against West Indies in 2011.156 – Runs scored by Kishan in boundaries during his 210-run knock. Only two batters have scored more in boundaries in an ODI innings – 186 by Rohit against Sri Lanka in 2014 and 162 by Martin Guptill against West Indies in 2015.The 290-run stand between Ishan Kishan and Virat Kohli also made it to the record books•Associated Press103 – Balls Kishan needed to reach the 150-run mark – the fastest individual 150 by an Indian in men’s ODIs. Sehwag held the record for bringing up his 150 in 112 balls against West Indies in 2011.290 – Partnership runs for the second wicket between Kishan and Kohli, the highest for any wicket in ODIs against Bangladesh. The previous best was the unbeaten 282-run opening stand between Hashim Amla and Quinton de Kock in 2017.68.6 – Percentage of runs scored by Kishan during the 290-run stand with Kohli, the highest contribution by a single batter in a 200-plus runs partnership in men’s ODIs (where data is available). The previous highest was 65.6% by Tom Latham, who scored 145 out of 221 with Kane Williamson against India last month. The Kishan-Kohli stand is also the second-fastest 200-plus stand by run rate in men’s ODIs.409 for 8 – India’s total in Chattogram, is now the first 400-plus ODI total against Bangladesh and the first by any team in Bangladesh. The previous highest against Bangladesh was 391 for 4 by England in 2019, while India’s 370 for 4 in 2011 was the previous highest in Bangladesh.

Their new additions in the bowling department make them look a well-rounded unit

Varun Shetty05-Apr-20212:23

Do top-heavy Punjab have finishing firepower?

Where they finished in 2020 Sixth, best of three teams tied on 12 pointsPotential XI 1 Mayank Agarwal, 2 KL Rahul (capt. and wk), 3 Chris Gayle, 4 Nicholas Pooran, 5 Mandeep Singh, 6 Shahrukh Khan, 7 Chris Jordan/Fabian Allen, 8 Jhye Richardson, 9 M Ashwin, 10 Mohammed Shami, 11 Ravi Bishnoi/Arshdeep SinghBatting Not a lot has changed about Punjab Kings’ batting line-up. They continue to be a top-heavy side, with a blistering top four of Mayank Agarwal, KL Rahul, Chris Gayle and Nicholas Pooran. This is largely the line-up that helped them be one of the most consistent teams in the powerplays last year – they averaged 48.35 during that phase and lost only one wicket on average.Related

KL Rahul looking forward to Riley Meredith's 'proper pace' in IPL 2021

Damien Wright: 'You've got to be able to throw a few curveballs at the other teams, get ahead of the game'

Injury gave Shami 'more time to be ready' for IPL 2021

Shahrukh Khan's 'sprint' from big hits to big bucks

'It's life-changing to be honest' – Jhye Richardson on IPL auction

The area they had issues with is their batting beyond these four, and while things came together during the end of IPL 2020, there hasn’t been a huge change in their roster. Glenn Maxwell and James Neesham are no longer with them, and potential replacements for them are Moises Henriques, Dawid Malan, and Fabian Allen. A change in strategy will either revolve around the stability that Henriques and Malan could provide – hence freeing up someone like Rahul early on – or the more ballistic option of banking on big-hitters like Allen and Shahrukh Khan. The reliance on uncapped top-order Indian batsmen in middle-order roles is likely to persist given the riches at the top and the fact that they have two breakneck overseas fast bowlers.All in all, it’s unlikely the flavour changes with their batting; it could be more of the same system, with the hope that their new personnel will fit better.Bowling They’ve spent huge amounts to acquire fast bowlers Jhye Richardson and Riley Meredith, in what was a clear and purposeful move to strengthen their bowling. Last year, the Kings were joint-second with Delhi Capitals for fast bowling economy, going at 9.15, and their games often turned around when their new-ball efforts were neutralised at the death. Richardson should bring far more consistency to them and that means they have at least five bowlers settled in for regular roles – Shami, M Ashwin, Arshdeep Singh, and Ravi Bishnoi being the others.ESPNcricinfo LtdWe could see a lot of Henriques this season, as a sixth bowling option, and Allen as a spin-bowling allrounder could be battling directly with Chris Jordan for a place in the side; for cases when they want both Richardson and Meredith in the line-up, that bowling-centric strategy can be aided by the likes of Jalaj Saxena or Utkarsh Singh as No. 7 batsmen.Young player to watch out forLeft-arm spinner Saurabh Kumar flies so far under the radar that even at domestic level, he isn’t often in headlines despite being one of Uttar Pradesh’s most important players. The 27-year-old is among the most consistent cricketers in the domestic circuit, with bowling plans often built around his tight control of line and lengths. He matches the guile that’s given him 192 first-class wickets at 23.44 with a strong game sense that’s given him economy rates of 4.38 and 7.04 respectively in List A and T20 cricket. In another season of balancing their top and bottom, Kumar could prove a handy option for PBKS.Coaching staff Anil Kumble (director of cricket operations), Andy Flower (assistant coach), Wasim Jaffer (batting coach), Jonty Rhodes (fielding coach), Damien Wright (bowling coach)Poll