The USMNT defender has been buoyed by heartfelt messages from his family as he prepares for the 2025 CONCACAF Gold Cup
حقق فريق الاتحاد، فوزًا قاتلًا على نظيره النجمة، بهدف دون رد، في المباراة التي أقيمت بينهما اليوم السبت، ضمن منافسات بطولة الدوري السعودي “دوري روشن”.
وتواجه فريقا الاتحاد والنجمة، في الجولة الثالثة من عمر مباريات الدوري السعودي، ذلك على ملعب الملك عبد الله ببريدة.
وسجل هدف الفوز لفريق الاتحاد، لاعبه الفرنسي نجولو كانتي، في الدقيقة الأخيرة من الوقت بدل الضائع للمباراة، وتحديدًا في 90+6.
وجاء هدف كانتي، بتسديدة قوية من داخل منطقة الجزاء، ليحصد لفريقه 3 نقاط ثمينة ويواصل انتصارته في الدوري السعودي للموسم الحالي. هدف فوز الاتحاد القاتل على النجمة في الدوري السعودي
هدف! ⚽
هدف قاتل يمنح الاتحاد النقاط الثلاث عن طريق كانتي 🔥 #النجمة_الاتحاد pic.twitter.com/4buoRdelB5 — رياضة ثمانية (@thmanyahsports) September 20, 2025
وبتلك النتيجة، يواصل فريق الاتحاد صدارته لـ ترتيب جدول الدوري السعودي، برصيد 9 نقاط من 3 انتصارات متتالية.
طالع | ترتيب الدوري السعودي
بينما على الجانب الآخر، فريق النجمة، الصاعد حديثًا لدوري روشن، يحتل المركز السابع عشر (قبل الأخير) بدون نقاط.
يذكر، أن نادي الاتحاد هو صاحب آخر لقب لبطولة الدوري السعودي في الموسم الماضي 2024-2025.
What she lacked in natural flair, she made up with grit to become an India allrounder and an officer with the Indian Air Force
Annesha Ghosh20-Aug-2017Cricketer. Blogger. Air Force officer. Engineer. Astronaut. World Cup winner. Shikha Pandey aspired to be all of the above in one lifetime. So far, at 28, she has achieved four out of those six titles.Following her childhood idols Sunita Williams and Kalpana Chawla into space might today be a distant dream, but she missed winning the World Cup by a narrow nine runs last month.”Nothing is as bad as unfulfilled potential,” Pandey says, reflecting on India’s defeat to England in the Lord’s final. “Sarah Taylor missed a stumping. Heather Knight, their best fielder, grassed a catch. Jenny Gunn dropped a sitter. When you get so many chances and yet you don’t do it, it hurts. You realise that the 80% output doesn’t correspond to the 100% input. But that is how it is.”Batting in the 47th over, with India needing another 14 to win, Pandey and Deepti Sharma took three runs off the first two balls, after which Pandey hit a short ball to point and started out for a single that wasn’t there. She had to turn back halfway down the pitch and couldn’t make it home, though the throw back to the keeper wasn’t accurate.”I could have done it for India,” she muses. “Perhaps the pressure of playing in the final, perhaps, as my father said after the match [over the phone], I should have taken it easy.”A lot has happened in the three weeks since that dismissal and defeat. For one, her Twitter bio now contains a personal email contact in place of her jersey number. Days after the game, a photograph of her wearing her Indian Air Force uniform surfaced for the first time in the public domain. It accompanied a tweet from the IAF handle, congratulating Flight Lieutenant Shikha Pandey, the first female officer from the Services to represent the national cricket team, on being awarded the Chief of Air Staff commendation on her first day at work after the World Cup.The adulation and increased media interest around the team appear to be ceaseless, but there’s little indication that Pandey’s objectivity will be clouded by it all. “I don’t believe much in destiny,” she says. “Whatever I’ve achieved in life till now, my hard work has got me to it.”When handed a plastic bat and ball as a six-year-old, Pandey didn’t know much about the Indian women’s team. The names of two female fast bowlers, however, weren’t unfamiliar to her. Australia’s Cathryn Fitzpatrick and Jhulan Goswami – the latter then an idol, now also a colleague and friend.”To open the bowling with Jhulu has been a dream come true, but to see her work so hard in the nets, even at 34, amazes me,” Pandey says.Goswami, who handed Pandey her India cap on debut, says the same about the younger bowler. “She’s one of the most hard-working cricketers I’ve played alongside in my career. Whatever feedback I give her, Shikha will think it through and try to implement it to the best of her ability.”Shikha Pandey was run out when India needed 11 runs from 15 balls to win their first Women’s World Cup•PA ImagesThe two have played 45 international matches together, their seam-and-swing pairing most memorably twice in this World Cup – first to knock out New Zealand in the league phase and then Australia in the semi-final.After going for 48 runs for two wickets in the first two games of the World Cup, Pandey was dropped for the next two. Against South Africa, she swung herself back into form with a three-for, following it up with the wicket of captain Suzie Bates off her first delivery in the next game.”My bowling against New Zealand and Australia probably helped validate my belief I was doing justice to my selection in the side,” Pandey says, having worked to move the ball both ways so that she didn’t stagnate as a “unidimensional medium-pacer”.”The quality of a comeback tells you something about a sportsperson’s temperament,” India coach Tushar Arothe says. “Hers made me proud.”Arothe echoes what many of Pandey’s coaches – past and present – have pointed to as being the key to her steady rise despite a late entry into competitive sport. “Her passion for the game is immense. She wants to contribute to the team in some way or the other.” To Goswami, it is in Pandey’s “drive for self-improvement” that her passion shines through.Goswami is unlikely to continue playing till the next 50-over World Cup, and she believes Pandey’s “sense of responsibility” could help her become the next leader of India’s bowling attack, a role she briefly played at the World Cup Qualifiers earlier this year in Goswami’s absence.Mansi Joshi, the 24-year-old medium-pacer who made her debut during the Qualifiers and later replaced Pandey in the XI for those two World Cup games, recounts a piece of advice Pandey gave her before her debut.”I’d been going for runs in our warm-up game against South Africa. Shikha di explained how important it is to have a plan B in place against batsmen when they go after us. That came good for me in the World Cup too.”Pandey’s Twitter handle – @ShikhaShauny – reveals one of her role models in the game. “Growing up, I liked Javagal Srinath and Andrew Flintoff, but especially looked up to Pollock because he was a fast-bowling allrounder who could bat.”But more than Pollock, Srinath or Flintoff, she attributes her choice of being a medium-pacer to Sachin Tendulkar. When nine, she read in a magazine that Tendulkar’s lack of height thwarted his aspirations of becoming a fast bowler. Four and a half feet tall then, she pledged to bowl quick some day.Tendulkar was a precocious talent, Pollock a thoroughbred with fine cricketing genes, but Pandey is neither. She inherited a love for the sport from her father, Subas, a Hindi school teacher with the central-government-run Kendriya Vidyalaya. Originally from Uttar Pradesh in north India, Subas had to routinely move towns because of his job. Pandey was born in Ramagundam, in Andhra Pradesh (now Telengana), but her earliest cricketing memories are from when the family moved to Vasco da Gama, in Goa, in 1997. Most of these revolve around her father engaging her in catching practice for hours. At times, she recounts, he would throw over a thousand catches in a session.Shikha Pandey meets her idol and future India team-mate Jhulan Goswami at a camp in Guntur in 2010•Shikha PandeyGoa has been home to the Pandey family for over two decades now, and it was there that she took her first steps to becoming a professional cricketer.”Goa gave me opportunities – including that of representing the state team – I may not have got elsewhere. I owe this place a major part of my achievements.”At 15, Pandey made her foray into leather-ball cricket and went on to become the first player affiliated with the state board to represent India. Within months of her initiation into the formal set-up, she caught the eye of former Mumbai player and selector Surekha Bhandare, who was then touring the state with her team.”The girl had all the makings of a future India player. The raw talent in her was hard to go unnoticed,” remembers Bhandare, who urged Subas to send his daughter to Mumbai, promising to nurture her skills and assuring him of a job for her thereafter.After Pandey won the state-wide third rank in the class-ten board (secondary school) exams, studies took precedence over cricket for the next three summers. It was only in her second year as an undergraduate in electronics and electrical engineering that she began pursuing the sport with serious intent.During a prolific 2007-08 domestic season, she picked up a four-wicket haul in the then Rani Jhansi Trophy, the inter-state two-day tournament, on her Goa senior women’s debut. Her first wicket was a caught-and-bowled to dismiss Tamil Nadu’s Thirush Kamini, then already an India international. She also scored three half-centuries for the Goa Under-19 side, which fast-tracked her selection into the zonal squad the same season.After that Pandey juggled cricket and college, spending her mornings doing gym sessions and course work, and in the afternoons travelling 12km to Mapusa, where she trained with former Goa cricketer and Sports Authority of Goa coach Nitin Vernekar.The only girl at the boys’ facility, Pandey describes the phase as being vital to her growth as a cricketer. “Facing U-16 and U-19 boys honed my reaction time against pace bowling. I also picked up a few vital lessons on negotiating spin.”Her focus on the game did not affect her academic performance, for which she particularly credits her lecturer in Applied Mathematics, Ujwala Phadte, who helped ensure Pandey’s grades were not inversely proportional to her on-field returns. On completing her engineering degree in 2010, Pandey declined placement offers from three multinational companies in favour of taking a year off to further her cricketing ambitions.The decision, backed both by Subas and her older sister, Vibha, paid off when her first “international wicket, albeit unofficial” was Charlotte Edwards – in a 2010 tour game for the Board President’s XI against the visiting England side. The same year, in the inter-zonals, she bagged the wicket of Mithali Raj, “a yardstick for every bowler’s mettle”, and was included again in the Board President’s XI against West Indies in 2011.Mithali Raj and Shikha Pandey seal victory at Wormsley•Getty ImagesVibha, herself an electrical engineer, believes that her sister’s refusal to give up on her dreams allowed her to take a path different from most middle-class career tracks. “Finish engineering, land a job and get a good salary; I took the conventional route, as most people would. But Shikha had higher aspirations, and she took them very seriously.”In July 2011, Pandey’s disappointment over not making the India squad for the England tour, despite being among the 20 probables, was offset somewhat by another long-cherished dream, to serve as a fighter pilot, nearly coming true. She passed the common entrance exam and joined the Indian Air Force as a trainee, and in June the following year was commissioned as an air traffic control officer.During her two years at her first fighter base, in north India, the shortage of cricket turfs made her move base down to Palam in New Delhi. With the support of the Services Sports Control Board and the Air Force Sports Control Board, however, she has been able to sustain her cricketing dream.”I could continue playing in the domestic tournaments because my seniors approved my leave applications. Their cooperation has been the reason I am able to join my teams in time and get adequate preparation.”The 2013-14 domestic season offered her the most realistic chance of getting closer to achieving the dream of playing for India, but she had played for only 30 to 40 days that year. To make up for the lost time, after training with her team-mates till six in the evening, she would hit the indoor nets at the Goa Cricket Association. The extra work paid off and after taking 22 wickets and 209 runs in the season, international debuts across formats followed, first in the World T20 and then on India’s 2014 tour of England.Pandey hit the winning runs in India’s unexpected win in the Test in Wormsley – their first five-day game in eight years – and received a stump as souvenir from her captain, Mithali Raj, with the inscription: “It was nice to have a match-winning partnership with you. Here’s to the many more.”Called up as last-minute cover for batsman Punam Raut, Pandey made 28 not out in an unbroken 68-run stand with Raj, chasing 181, and got first-hand knowledge of “what it feels like to be batting overnight in Tests, especially when you’re sent in as a nightwatchman!”Later that year, she became the first India women’s player to take three wickets and score a fifty in an ODI.”Sudha Shah, then India coach, suggested I go in at No. 4.” The innings, Pandey says, made her believe she was ready for the grind of international cricket. “It gave me the reassurance I have the potential to serve the team with the bat too.”She has had her share of highs and lows in her subsequent performances but regards the tour of Australia in January-February 2016 as a test of character for herself and the team.”If you work hard for something, it will come to you – probably it will take a little time, but the wait will be worthwhile”•AFP/Getty ImagesPurnima Rau, the former India and Goa coach, who was the South Zone selector when she first saw the promise in Pandey, believes her journey as a medium-pacer began with this series. “The role she took up in Australia, even in Jhulan’s presence, was a serious statement of intent. She got those wickets regularly because she was penetrative.”Pandey was India’s leading wicket-taker on the tour, with nine wickets at 20.77, a performance that put her on the radar of WBBL franchise Sydney Sixers, although contract negotiations eventually didn’t work out.In the months that followed, Pandey finished as India’s second-highest wicket-taker in the ICC Women’s Championship, the second highest overall in the World Cup Qualifiers, and the highest in the Quadrangular series in South Africa.”I have worked a lot with Devika di [Palshikar, former India allrounder and current Goa coach] in the past year. She’s the one who has instilled confidence in me through her coaching last season.”Like others, Palshikar says that the source of Pandey’s success lies in her willingness to work hard. “But there are holes that need to be plugged,” she says. “Consistency with the bat is one of them.””Right now I consider myself a bowling allrounder,” Pandey says. “But if you work hard for something, it will come to you – probably it will take a little time, but the wait will be worthwhile.”Will she add “World Cup winner” to her considerable list of achievements? Take note of the words she recorded in a 2011 entry on her blog, which encapsulate her journey so far: “I dream higher every time I fall.”
كشفت تقارير صحفية مدة غياب لاعب فريق آرسنال، ويليام ساليبا، عن الملاعب، إثر الإصابة التي تعرض لها في مباراة ليفربول، في وقت سابق من شهر أغسطس الماضي، في بطولة الدوري الإنجليزي الممتاز.
وواجه ليفربول خصمه آرسنال على ملعب “أنفيلد” في قمة منافسات الجولة الثالثة من الدوري الإنجليزي، 2025/26، حيث حقق فوزًا بهدف دون رد.
وتعرض المدرب ميكيل أرتيتا لضربة مبكرة في تلك المباراة، بعدما عانى ويليام ساليبا من إصابة أجبرته على الخروج في الدقيقة الخامسة من عمر الشوط الأول.
اقرأ أيضًا.. آرسنال مهدد بفقدان نجمه بسبب قضية قانونية
وحسبما ذكرت صحيفة “ليكيب” الفرنسية، فإن ويليام ساليبا عانى من إصابة على مستوى الكاحل خلال عمليات الإحماء قبل انطلاق المباراة ولكنه قرر المشاركة، قبل أن يتجدد ألمه ليضطر إلى الخروج.
وأوضحت أن ساليبا سيضطر إلى الغياب عن آرسنال لفترة تتراوح ما بين ثلاثة إلى أربعة أسابيع، مما يمثل ضربة قوية لـ آرسنال على مستوى الدفاع.
وسيخوض آرسنال عدة مباريات خلال شهر سبتمبر، حيث يلتقي مع نوتينجهام فورست، مانشستر سيتي، نيوكاسل يونايتد في الدوري الإنجليزي، أتلتيك بلباو في دوري أبطال أوروبا ونورث فايل في كأس كاراباو.
Rahul’s absence further complicates matters for India, who also didn’t pick Shreyas Iyer for the remaining three Tests
ESPNcricinfo staff12-Feb-2024India have been dealt a blow in the lead-up to the Rajkot Test against England, with KL Rahul ruled out of contention due to a sore knee. Devdutt Padikkal, Rahul’s Karnataka team-mate, has been called in as a replacement.Rahul had earlier missed the second Test in Visakhapatnam due to a quadricep injury, and was included in the squad for the last thee Tests only subject to fitness. *A BCCI release on Monday evening said he “has reached 90 per cent of match fitness” and that “he will continue his recovery process at the National Cricket Academy (NCA) in Bengaluru to be completely match-fit for the fourth and fifth Test.”Already light on batting experience with Virat Kohli missing due to personal reasons, Rahul’s absence further complicates matters for India, who also didn’t pick Shreyas Iyer for the remaining three Tests.Related
India's selection puzzle for Rajkot: is there room for both Kuldeep and Axar?
Padikkal hits the high notes after some quiet seasons
Iyer left out for remaining three Tests vs Eng; Kohli unavailable
Padikkal looks to bounce back by 'staying stable through highs and lows'
That aside, it isn’t confirmed yet whether Ravindra Jadeja has recovered from the hamstring injury he had suffered during the first Test in Hyderabad. Jadeja is in the squad to play the third Test, which will take place on his home ground, but his participation is pending fitness clearance.Meanwhile, this is a maiden Test call-up for Padikkal, who is expected to link up with the squad on Tuesday from Chennai, where he struck 151 and 36 against Tamil Nadu in the fifth round of the Ranji Trophy fixture that finished on Monday.Padikkal, the 23-year-old left-hand batter, has so far aggregated 556 runs in six innings at an average of 92.66 this Ranji season. He has scored three centuries, with a highest of 193 in the season opener against Punjab. Prior to his most-recent Ranji outing, Padikkal impressed with scores of 65, 21 and 105 for India A against the touring England Lions in Ahmedabad. The century in the second unofficial Test was part of a massive first-innings batting effort that helped set up an innings victory.He was also part of the shadow tour to South Africa with India A in December, where he had an opportunity to train alongside India’s Test regulars prior to an intra-squad fixture.So far in this Ranji season, Devdutt Padikkal has 556 runs at an average of 92.66•PTI
“South Africa was a great experience for me, in terms of having the chance to train with the seniors,” he had told ESPNcricinfo last month. “Being in and around them, playing that level of bowling prepares you well for the Ranji season. I looked at it as an opportunity to get volumes in, in terms of my batting. I’m grateful for that experience.”Having started off as an opener, Padikkal has slowly transitioned into a predominantly top-order role that requires him to bat at No. 3 – and at times even at No. 4 – for Karnataka. With Mayank Agarwal and R Samarth opening the innings for his state side, Padikkal has established himself lower down. This change of role is something he has learnt to embrace after a middling IPL 2023 for Rajasthan Royals. The tipping point, he said, was his trade to Lucknow Super Giants, where he’ll be playing under none other than Rahul.”I don’t look at it in terms of just being an opener anymore,” he had said. “I’m enjoying my opportunities, wherever they may be. Each position you bat in offers a different challenge. I’m trying to learn new things, [and] adapt to situations. It helps me grow as a cricketer, [and] helps me understand the game a lot more – not just in terms of my batting but [also] how the game works across different phases.”Overall, Padikkal has solid first-class credentials, having averaged 44.54 across 31 matches. He has played two T20Is for India, both of which came against Sri Lanka in July 2021.In Visakhapatnam, India handed a Test debut to Rajat Patidar. Sarfaraz Khan is the other uncapped batter in the mix along with Padikkal. Jadeja’s potential unavailability could well pave way for another Test debutant in Rajkot. It’s also likely India could still pick one of Sarfaraz and Padikkal even if Jadeja is available and they play their usual three spinners and two quicks.India have two full days of training leading into Rajkot, with the series locked at 1-1.India’s squad for the third Test: Rohit Sharma (capt), Jasprit Bumrah (vice-capt), Yashasvi Jaiswal, Shubman Gill, Rajat Patidar, Sarfaraz Khan, Dhruv Jurel (wk), KS Bharat (wk), R Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, Axar Patel, Washington Sundar, Kuldeep Yadav, Mohammed. Siraj, Mukesh Kumar, Akash Deep, Devdutt Padikkal.GMT 1450 hrs This story was updated with information from a BCCI press release
It’s a precautionary measure, taken after Rauf felt “a little discomfort in his right flank” on Sunday
ESPNcricinfo staff11-Sep-20231:13
How will Pakistan cope without Haris Rauf?
Haris Rauf hasn’t taken the field against India on Monday’s reserve day in the Asia Cup Super Four game in Colombo after feeling “a little discomfort in his right flank” on Sunday’s scheduled match day. Only 24.1 overs were bowled on Sunday before rain pushed the game into the spare day.The extent of Rauf’s injury is not clear. The PCB statement that confirmed the injury said, “He was subsequently taken for a precautionary MRI, which revealed no tear. He is under the observation of the team’s medical panel.”Morne Morkel, Pakistan’s bowling coach, said on the official broadcast that Rauf had “pulled an oblique muscle” and with the ODI World Cup around the corner, “we’re going to put him on ice” for the moment. Morkel also said that Rauf had started feeling discomfort when he bowled his second over on Sunday.As a result, for the rest of the India innings in Colombo, Pakistan will have to make do with the three pace options in Shaheen Shah Afridi, Naseem Shah and Faheem Ashraf, with Shadab Khan their lead spinner and a combination of Iftikhar Ahmed and Agha Salman’s part-time offspin.Rauf bowled five wicketless overs and conceded 27 runs on Sunday but brought some sense of control to an innings in which India’s openers Rohit Sharma and Shubman Gill scored half-centuries and put on 121 in a flying start. Pakistan fought back to dismiss both and control the run rate but India were 147 on board for the loss of two wickets.Rauf’s absence will be a cause of concern for Pakistan, given how significant a part he has become of Pakistan’s bowling attack. He has been Pakistan’s in-form bowler, and crucial at first change after Afridi and Naseem. He is also the tournament’s joint-leading wicket-taker with nine wickets in four matches.
Wolverhampton Wanderers head into their next Premier League contest confident they can upset the AFC Bournemouth apple cart on the road, having been very unlucky to come away from their last clash at Anfield empty-handed.
Indeed, Vitor Pereira’s Old Gold ended up accumulating a mightily impressive 16 shots on goal against Arne Slot’s complacent Reds, with Matheus Cunha unfortunately the only goalscorer in the narrow 2-1 loss.
When Cunha isn’t sparkling for his still relegation-threatened outfit, there isn’t too much firepower in the rest of the striker spots, with both Jorgen Strand Larsen and Hwang Hee-Chan currently out injured.
Even when the latter of those two names is fit, he isn’t always firing on all cylinders, as the South Korean suffers from a lack of confidence in front of goal whilst the Brazilian seemingly always has that midas touch.
It has been another stop-start season for the 29-year-old at Molineux so far, with 55 days of action missed by the injury-prone number 11 to date due to stays in the Wolves treatment room.
Whilst Pereira has confirmed he could be back to full fitness soon, his drab goalscoring form when he has been available means he is unlikely to break back into the starting lineup anyway.
Across 17 Premier League appearances to date, Hwang has only managed to bag a lacklustre two strikes, which will be a disappointing return for the ex-RB Leipzig man, when you consider his standout output during the 2023/24 campaign saw him fire home an impressive 13 goals.
But, the 5 foot 10 ace – away from this sterling individual season in isolation – has regularly struggled to be a consistent source of strikes for the Old Gold, with only ten more goals coming his way across his other two forgettable campaigns.
|
Hwang’s numbers at Wolves by season |
|||
|---|---|---|---|
|
Season |
Games played |
Games missed through injury |
Goals scored |
|
24/25 |
21 |
7 |
2 |
|
23/24 |
31 |
16 |
13 |
|
22/23 |
32 |
6 |
5 |
|
21/22 |
31 |
10 |
5 |
|
Sourced by Transfermarkt |
|||
To help boost his overly reliant side, Pereira could be tempted to gift this raw starlet some unexpected first-team minutes, hopeful that he might be the best long-term replacement for Hwang.
The Premier League side have unearthed some real gems through their academy structure in recent years, with Morgan Gibbs-White’s name sticking out as one notable Molineux alumni.
Whilst Gibbs-White would have to depart the West Midlands to kickstart his senior career, 18-year-old ace Dani Ángel will hope he can explode into life in the senior set-up at Wolves soon without having to seek out pastures new.
After all, Angel won’t be fearful of a bout in the main men’s team having already experienced a “meteoric rise” to be at Wolves today – as football analyst Tom Williams labelled it – with the Spanish hotshot on the books of London-based non-league outfit Clapton FC in 2023.
He hasn’t looked back since, with the teenager finding himself in a rich vain of goalscoring form for both the U18s and U21s in the Midlands, alongside also winning himself an U18 international call-up.
|
Angel’s G/A record at Wolves |
|||
|---|---|---|---|
|
Age bracket |
Games played |
Goals scored |
Assists |
|
U21s |
17 |
5 |
1 |
|
U18s |
19 |
10 |
1 |
|
Senior team |
0 |
0 |
0 |
|
Sourced by Transfermarkt |
|||
Angel has picked up a healthy 15 strikes from 36 appearances to date, meaning his time to shine in the first-team picture could soon be on the horizon if Pereira is prepared to be brave in the striker department.
Whilst it’s unlikely that he would make an instant impact if he was gifted this chance, the 18-year-old is definitely one to keep an eye on from a Wolves persuasion, especially if Pereira’s patience with the stricken Hwang becomes thinner.
Wolves' £16m flop is now outperforming Larsen & Ait-Nouri after leaving
This major Wolverhampton Wanderers flop has now found his shooting boots.
1
By
Kelan Sarson
Feb 18, 2025
Celtic supporters are still licking their wounds after a rare, shock defeat but fear not, for Brendan Rodgers’ side still virtually have two hands wrapped around the Premiership title.
On Saturday lunchtime, the Hoops were beaten 2-1 by Hibernian at Easter Road, a goal down inside two minutes, unable to fight back.
The match was not without its controversy, given that Daizen Maeda had a late equaliser disallowed by VAR, who adjudged that the ball had gone out of play, even though all the replays are, at best, inconclusive.
This Celtic side is certainly strong, but how good would they be had they not let a player go, who’s now being touted as one of the best in the Premier League south of the border?
He’s remarkably now better than the club’s record-signing too..
Arne Engles' debut Celtic season in numbers
Back on deadline day in August, Celtic signed midfielder Arne Engels from Augsburg for a reported £11m, breaking their club-record transfer fee in the process, with the Belgian recruited to be Matt O’Riley’s replacement.
The price tag meant ‘an extra layer of expectation rests on the midfielder’s shoulders’, as outlined by Joe Donnelly of the Glasgow Times, leading to Engels making a mixed start to life in hoops.
However, more recently, former Scotland forward James McFadden labelled him “a class act”, with Graeme McGarry of the Herald exclaiming that Engels had a ‘coming of age’ performance in the Champions League against Bayern Munich.
Jacek Kulig of Football Talent Scout adds he “could easily play for a strong club in the top five leagues”, with Engels taking his tally to nine goals and ten assists for the season, thanks to a brace against Dundee earlier this month.
So, the Belgian has certainly started to impress, but is a former Celtic midfielder, now plying his trade in the Premier League, out-shining him?
Former Celtic midfielder starring in the Premier League
A certain Ryan Christie joined Celtic for a reported fee of £500,000 in September 2015, and this certainly proved money well spent, considering he scored 42 goals and provided 44 assists in 151 appearances for the club, winning seven major honours.
He then departed for £2.5m to join Bournemouth, then of the EFL Championship, in the summer of 2021, now earning rave reviews for his performances in the Premier League, currently valued at £10m via Transfermarkt.
Ed Elliot of the Independent labels him one of the ‘stars’ of this high-flying Bournemouth team, while Sky Sports Dave Jones believes he is now one of the most ‘unheralded’ players in the Premier League.
Gregor Robertson of the Times believes him to be the Premier League’s ‘best ball-winner’ and that’s certainly proven by the numbers.
Attempted passes
934
83rd
Pass completion %
80%
150th
Assists
3
48th
Tackles
48
39th
Tackles won
30
35th
Interceptions
25
34th
Blocks
40
10th
Ball recoveries
155
=1st
The final row of this table is the most-telling, given that Christie’s 155 ball recoveries are the joint-most in the Premier League, alongside Moisés Caicedo, who cost Chelsea a record-breaking £115m, while the Ecuadorian has played 374 more minutes than the Scot.
Alex Keble of the Premier League believes Christie is Bournemouth’s ‘most important player’, with Andoni Iraola having transformed him into a more defensive midfielder.
Arne Engels is much more of a creative, attacking midfielder, akin to how Christie was at Celtic, but the now 30-year-old is, possibly, even better than any Celts supporter may have thought he would ever become.
Celtic have secured their biggest bargain since Maeda in "amazing" star
Celtic have secured a fair few bargain signings in recent seasons, but one “amazing” star continues to shine.
ByBen Gray Feb 20, 2025
Florida, Morrisville, Dallas and New York among shortlisted venues inspected by ICC, with USA set to co-host tournament with West Indies
Nagraj Gollapudi28-Jul-2023
Large crowds pack the West Grandstand at Florida’s Broward County Stadium•Peter Della Penna
The 2024 Men’s T20 World Cup is scheduled to be played from June 4 to 30 next year in the Caribbean and the USA, across 10 venues, ESPNcricinfo has learned.It is understood that this week an ICC team inspected some shortlisted venues in the USA, which will be hosting an international global cricket event for the first time. These include Lauderhill in Florida, which has hosted international matches already (and is set to host West Indies vs India in the coming fortnight), Morrisville, Dallas and New York, for tournament matches and warm-ups.Morrisville and Dallas are currently hosting the inaugural edition of Major League Cricket in the USA. The grounds in Dallas (Grand Prairie Stadium), Morrisville (Church Street Park) and New York (Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx) are yet to get international venue status, which is mandatory as per ICC rules. A final decision on the venues will be taken by the ICC together with Cricket West Indies (CWI) and USA Cricket (USAC) in the next few months.This week Ireland, Scotland and Papua New Guinea qualified for the 20-team T20 World Cup via the regional qualifiers pathway put in place by the ICC. While PNG topped the East Asia-Pacific Qualifer, Ireland and Scotland finished in the top two positions in the Europe Region Qualifier. Qualifiers from the Americas (for one spot), Africa (two spots) and Asia (two spots) regions will be determined in the coming months.Construction workers put the finishing touches on Grand Prairie Stadium, Dallas, ahead of this year’s MLC•Peter Della Penna
Twelve teams had already qualified for the tournament before the regional qualifiers, including hosts West Indies and USA, and the top eight teams at the 2022 T20 World Cup – Australia, England, India, Netherlands, New Zealand, Pakistan, South Africa and Sri Lanka. Afghanistan and Bangladesh qualified by virtue of their spots in the T20I rankings, completing the 20-team roster.The format for the 2024 World Cup will be different to the last two editions (2020-21 in the UAE and 2022 in Australia), where the first round was followed by Super 12s. Next year, the 20 teams will be divided into four groups of five each for the first round, with the top two teams from each group qualifying for the Super 8s. The Super 8 teams will be split into two groups of four each, with the top two in each group reaching the semi-finals.The 2024 T20 World Cup is the first of the eight men’s global events in the ICC’s next commercial cycle from 2024-31, which was finalised in 2021. The decision to appoint the USA as a co-host was part of a strategic move by the ICC with twin goals in mind: one, the North American market was identified as a strong market for growth of the game. And two, the ICC’s ambition to have cricket feature in the 2028 Los Angeles Olympic Games (LA28).The USA being pencilled in to co-host a major cricket event, the ICC felt, would only help in the push for cricket’s inclusion in LA28. The ICC made a presentation to the LA28 team, with a final decision to be taken by the International Olympics Committee later this year.
England have fired the first shots, or attempted to, in time-honoured fashion ahead of the men’s Ashes, now Issy Wong has joined in the salvo, saying it’s not a bad time to take on Australia Women with their multi-format series beginning next month.Wong made her debut in all three formats during South Africa’s tour of England last summer and is hoping to be part of the England side kicking off their Ashes campaign in a five-day Test at Trent Bridge from June 22.”I think it’s a pretty good time to play them, you know, just quietly,” Wong said. “They are undoubtably, in my opinion, one of the greatest sports teams in history, of any sport, of any gender. Their record over the last 10 years is absolutely outrageous.Related
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“But it feels like that kind of golden era they’ve had is… you’ve had Rach Haynes retiring, [Meg] Lanning stepping away, obviously coming back in ridiculous form, but there’s a lot of new faces in that group that are unbelievably talented but haven’t necessarily played the biggest part for them over the last couple of years. I think it’s a really good time to actually go at them and say, ‘right, you are the best team in history, but you’ve a couple of new faces in here and let’s see if you’re as good as you were five years ago.’ I think it’s great time to play.”I’ve never played them though,” she added, bursting into laughter. “I’ve watched them on the telly a lot, they look great.”Wong wasn’t part of England’s T20 World Cup squad which fell to hosts South Africa in the semi-finals before Australia won the title for the third time in a row, captained by the returning Lanning after five months away from the game last year. But Wong did return to action in the inaugural WPL, winning the trophy with Mumbai Indians and finishing as the third-highest wicket-taker with 15 at 14.00, which included a hat-trick in the eliminator against UP Warriorz.Part of her reasoning about the Australians relates to her experience in India, having played against a number of her potential Ashes foes there, believing that also playing with and against them at the WBBL and in the Hundred – where she will again represent Birmingham Phoenix when the 2023 edition commences in August – demystifies them somewhat.”I’ve never played them but I don’t view them as ‘the Australians,'” Wong said. “They’re going to have Beth Mooney and Alyssa Healy opening the batting, Meg Lanning’s going to bat at three, then in that middle order you’re going to have [Tahlia] McGrath, [Phoenix team-mate Ellyse] Perry, [Grace] Harris. You’ve played against these guys so much that you get to know them and, not necessarily even know their games, but they’re humans at the end of the day and humans do good things and humans do bad things.”That landscape changing, the more franchise stuff, is actually going to even out the playing field on an international level because people are playing against each other a lot more.”People say, ‘Oh, don’t you think it’s going to make international cricket less good if David Warner’s best mates with Jonny Bairstow because they open the batting for Sunrisers Hyderabad?’ I think that’s rubbish because actually it’s going to make the competition a lot better. You’ve got these guys playing against people that they know and those are the best battles because each person’s having to adapt their game and do things a little bit differently. When they’ve played against each other a lot, they’re working each other out and that’s how the game is evolving.”Wong celebrates after dismissing Alyssa Healy in the WPL eliminator•Getty Images
Wong’s comments come within a week of Stuart Broad’s contention that Australia’s 4-0 victory over England Men in their ill-fated Ashes tour of 2021-22 didn’t count as “a real Ashes”, with the Covid-19 restrictions it was played under making it a “void series” in his view, and six weeks after Ollie Robinson said the side which has reinvented itself under Brendon McCullum and Ben Stokes since could “give Australia a good hiding” this time around. But they are no less bold against an Australia Women’s side which lost just one match – to India in a Super Over – in 2022, also holds the ODI World Cup and has not lost an Ashes series since 2013-14.Asked whether now was a good time for her to play against the Australians in the Ashes personally, Wong responded: “My opinion, yeah. I also think it’s a great time for me to play up front for Liverpool. Does Jurgen Klopp share that opinion? No. There’s some things that you’ve got power over there’s some things that you don’t. I’m always going to be up for it, that’s my personality, but I’ve got to control those things that are in my control. I’m in control of if I’m up for it. I’m up for it. But you never know I guess.”Wong earned her first England cap in the drawn Test against South Africa in Taunton last June. She ended the match with three wickets, including two in two overs on a rain-affected penultimate day. She also featured in the white-ball section of South Africa’s tour before playing all of England’s matches at the Commonwealth Games, where the hosts finished a disappointing fourth.She sat out the most recent WBBL with a minor back complaint and amid ECB concerns over workload management before a quadriceps injury forced her to miss England’s tour of the Caribbean and therefore a chance to press for T20 World Cup selection in front of new coach Jon Lewis. In terms of the WPL providing a platform to prove a point after her omission, Wong agreed that it did, although not in the way one might expect.”They picked their squad and unfortunately for me this time I wasn’t in those plans,” Wong said. “I probably had a half-hour of sulking, or not sulking but feeling sorry for myself, licking my wounds, then I had to get up and go to training. So there’s not a whole lot I can do about it now and that period before the WPL I had probably three weeks at home where I could put in some good yards, come on a bit in training hopefully and then fly out to India.”I was keen to show the progress I’d made, not necessarily that I should have been out there because if I’d picked the squad, I’d have been out there and probably my 14 best mates would have been because that’s just how I’d pick the squad, isn’t it? But it was very much show the progress that I’d made over the last four months and hopefully the potential of progress that I’ve got for the future.”