List of All Articles with Tag 'al'

Manchester City signed Belgium international Kevin De Bruyne from Wolfsburg, on this day in 2015. City paid a then club-record fee, reported to be in the region of £54million, for a man who has been at the heart of what they have achieved since. The 24-year-old, who arrived in the Premier League as Germany’s footballer of the year, signed an initial six-year contract to launch the latest, spectacularly-successful phase of his career. Born in the Drongen district of Ghent, De Bruyne began his professional career at Genk and was a Belgian title-winner in 2010-11, prompting Chelsea to invest £6.7million in his services in January 2012, although he remained at his first club for the remainder of that campaign before joining Werder Bremen on a season-long loan deal. The midfield schemer finally made his Blues debut in a 2-0 Premier League victory over Hull in August 2013, providing the assist for Oscar’s opening goal in an impressive display. However, that proved to be one of only nine senior appearances for the club and he was sold to Wolfsburg in the January of the following year. I just want to win Kevin De Bruyne Speaking shortly before his £18million departure for the Bundesliga, then Chelsea boss Jose Mourinho said: “We know that Kevin didn’t adapt very well to the difficult life a Chelsea player has.” If English football had proved testing for the blossoming Belgian, he found his feet in style in Germany and returned to the Premier League as one of the most promising talents in the world game when he arrived at the Etihad Stadium. He said at the time: “I just want to win. I won two cups at Wolfsburg and I just want to keep on winning and I think here’s a good chance to win some titles with a team who have a lot of quality players.” That has proved something of an understatement. Since making his City debut as a substitute in a 1-0 league win at Crystal Palace on September 12, 2015, De Bruyne has helped the club win the Champions League, five Premier League titles, two FA Cups and the League Cup on five occasions. Twice named PFA footballer of the year, he has also been capped 99 times and scored 26 goals for Belgium, whom he has represented at three World Cup finals tournaments. Read More Charity boss speaks out over ‘traumatic’ encounter with royal aide Ukraine war’s heaviest fight rages in east - follow live Andy Murray leads perfect day for Brits at US Open Injury withdrawal hands Carlos Alcaraz quick route into US Open second round Venus Williams knocked out by Greet Minnen in first round of US Open

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Day 5 of the 2023 FIBA World Cup brought an end to groups A, D, E, and H. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Dennis Schroder, and Karl-Anthony Towns led their teams to 3-0 first-place finishes.

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Colorado football is officially about to begin the Deion Sanders era, and his former Cowboys teammate is all in on the Buffaloes.

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Jordi Alba is calling it quits on his international career.

Leicester manager Enzo Maresca hailed the contribution of veteran striker Jamie Vardy as the Foxes continued their flying start to the season with a 2-0 Carabao Cup victory at Tranmere. Second-half strikes from Wilfred Ndidi and former England international Vardy proved the difference as the Championship side ran out 2-0 victors against their League Two opponents. It was a sixth win out of six for Leicester in all competitions this season and saw 36-year-old Vardy open his account for the campaign after returning to the starting line-up. Maresca said: “I’m happy to continue in this competition and I’m happy for the players, especially the young players who don’t play every week. “I’ve been really happy with Jamie Vardy because when a striker scores they are always happy for them as well as the team. “He’s been performing well when he starts and as well when he’s been on the bench and his contribution has been amazing.” The Foxes enjoyed large amounts of possession in the opening stages of the second-round clash at Prenton Park and had a number of chances to open the scoring with Harry Winks coming the closest after seven minutes. But the 2016 Premier League champions did not have it all their own way with Rovers growing in confidence and, after defending resolutely for half an hour, created some decent openings through Dan Pike and Josh Hawkes. The deadlock was finally broken nine minutes after the break when Ndidi’s effort from the right side of the box found its way into the net via both posts, and just four minutes later Vardy put the result beyond doubt with a close-range header from an Ndidi cross. Further chances fell to the visitors as Rovers pushed forward with Vardy and Ndidi who were both foiled by Joe Murphy, a veteran of the meeting between these two in the final of this competition at Wembley 23-years ago. Maresca added: “I was not happy at half-time so made some changes and we’ve played six games in around 20 days and we have one more to go before the international break. “We’ve won six from six now and all the attention now turns to the game on Saturday before the international break when some of the players can conserve their energy.” Despite the defeat, Tranmere manager Ian Dawes was keen to focus on the positives from the encounter. He said: “We knew going into the game today that they don’t make many changes, they go really strong and the manager takes the competition seriously. “We knew we had to get our defensive organisation right and we knew we needed to limit their chances on goal and push up as the game went on. “We had to stifle the game a little bit, keep possession and then make opportunities ourselves and I thought we did that really well and it all went to plan and they probably scored the first goal when we were on top. “We’ve got to be positive at the end of it, it still hurts getting beat and we obviously wanted to go through, but you’ve got to look at what they’ve got on the pitch. “You look at their team and they’ve still got Premier League players in their team and taking things into context we can be nothing but positive and we have to take that into Saturday against Wrexham.”

Republic of Ireland women’s coach Vera Pauw will not have her contract renewed when her current deal expires this week. The Football Association of Ireland board has decided it does not want to retain the Dutchwoman’s services despite leading the country to their first World Cup this year. “On behalf of the Football Association of Ireland, we would like to thank Vera for her hard work and commitment over the past four years and wish her well for the future,” said FAI chief executive Jonathan Hill. “In particular, I wish to acknowledge the role she played in leading Ireland to the FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023 where our women’s team made history and inspired a nation.” Ireland failed to make the World Cup knockout stages after defeats to co-hosts Australia and Canada and a goalless draw with Nigeria. There were also reports of a strained relationship with captain Katie McCabe and in the build-up to the tournament Pauw was forced to address – and deny – long-standing allegations of “abusive and inappropriate” methods during her time as manager of Houston Dash. “The future is bright for women and girls’ football and our focus now is building upon the work done by Vera and the historic achievements of our women’s team, which we see as a platform to support the next phase of the journey for the team, and more broadly the development of women and girls’ football in this country,” added Hill.

West Ham are working to finalise a deal for Corinthians forward Yuri Alberto, with Paris Saint-Germain's Hugo Ekitike also an option.

Luton boss Rob Edwards knew the result was all that mattered as the Hatters went through to the third round of the Carabao Cup by beating League Two Gillingham at Kenilworth Road. The hosts led 2-0 at half-time thanks to goals from Jacob Brown and Alfie Doughty, before Jayden Clarke pulled one back early in the second period. Cauley Woodrow then put Town 3-1 in front before Tom Nichols scored late on, only for Luton to hang on. Edwards said: “We could only win by winning the game, the expectancy was obviously on us, it’s a little bit different to the last couple of games we’ve had, so I feel very pleased. “We had quite a lot of changes, tweaked the shape a little bit, and I liked a lot of what I saw. “It was a good start and I thought we built on it as well. “We controlled pretty much all of the first half, going 2-0 up was great, a brilliant goal from Alfie and we spoke at half-time about the next goal. “The next goal was really important and the game could really hinge on that. “They got it, they probably had five or 10 minutes then when we had to deal with it, but we still looked OK. “Cauley’s goal settled us down but then we controlled it again until the very last couple of minutes. “There’s probably a reason we lacked a bit of fluency tonight, but there were a lot of good things I saw.” Brown opened his Luton account after just two minutes with a low drive into the bottom corner, before Doughty hammered in a brilliant 25-yarder following a clever free-kick routine. After the break, Clarke raced away to pull one back, as Ashley Nadesan and Macauley Bonne missed great chances to level the scoring. Woodrow’s terrific volley restored Luton’s two-goal lead after 66 minutes, before Nichols’ header led to a nervy finale, Jonny Williams denied an equaliser by Tim Krul in stoppage time. Gills boss Neil Harris said: “I’m really proud of the group, that was a fantastic second half against a Premier League side and to put them under pressure shows the character and personality as at 2-0 down after 35 minutes, teams may have crumbled against this level of opposition, but we didn’t. “We regrouped at half-time and had a right go second half. “I’m disappointed with the first goal, the second goal is a worldie, Premier League standard from Alfie, and the third one is against the run of play, again Premier League standard. “To get back it at 2-1, 3-2, having pressure at the end, we just didn’t have that next goal in us. “We could have scored but they’re the margins that you need when you go against the top sides.” Read More Charity boss speaks out over ‘traumatic’ encounter with royal aide Ukraine war’s heaviest fight rages in east - follow live Andoni Iraola lauds David Brooks as Bournemouth make Carabao Cup progress Thomas Frank hails Ellery Balcombe after Brentford beat Newport on penalties Alex Neil delight as new signings help Stoke hammer Rotherham in Carabao Cup