Jonathan Liew's Blog, page 92
June 11, 2021
After delays and dashed hopes, wait is over and Euro 2020 party is here | Jonathan Liew
Italy, the first country in Europe to be hit by Covid, host Turkey in the tournament’s opening match, with both hoping to go far
The first thing you notice about Rome on the eve of Europe’s biggest carnival is that it does not exactly feel like a place on the verge of a carnival. Instead, like every other major city in these straitened, saddened times, it’s simply trying to survive: to get by, to salvage what’s left of what we used to call normality. The piazzas and cobbled alleys that would normally be thronged with tourists at the height of summer are populated mostly by smoking teenagers and waiters touting for business that isn’t there. If the start of Euro 2020 is intended as “a sign of rebirth and hope for all of Europe”, as the tournament commissioner Daniele Frongia insists, then in another sense it stands as a reminder of what we’ve all lost.
And so to the Stadio Olimpico on a sweltering Friday night, and an occasion that has been five years in the making. Italy’s national stadium will be only a quarter full for their opening game against Turkey, and yet the hope is that the 16,000 masked and tested fans in attendance will provide something all too painfully absent in recent months: a sense of gathering and celebration, a country and a continent slowly rediscovering their voice.
Related: At the Euros, winning teams can start badly. It’s how they respond that matters | Pernille Harder
Related: Euro 2020 team guides part 1: Italy
Related: Euro 2020: your complete guide to all 622 players
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June 8, 2021
Daniel Levy the common denominator in Tottenham’s endless managerial farce | Jonathan Liew
The chairman operates a small circle of loyal nodding dogs and his unchecked power is draining away the hope at Spurs
Like the proverbial tree falling in the forest, or the sound of no hands clapping, the prospect of Antonio Conte not joining Tottenham Hotspur has a certain paradoxical quality to it. Conte joining Tottenham: on some level, I suspect we all knew how this would pan out. The initial fire-streak of success; a brief title challenge; the inevitable implosion and acrimonious divorce, leaving only bittersweet memories and a squad packed with unshiftable 29-year-old wing-backs.
But Conte not joining: somehow this feels meaningful and epic in itself, a mini-tale of clashing egos and competing ambitions and insecurity and longing all packed into a week-long heavily briefed news cycle. And for all the disputed details of their courtship – are we really to believe Tottenham pulled the plug on one of the world’s best coaches out of concern for the development of Oliver Skipp? – there is a sense that even this apparent nonevent has subtly wrinkled the fabric of the universe.
Related: Tottenham call off move for Antonio Conte after talks with coach break down
Continue reading...June 5, 2021
Barnstorming Jude Bellingham sets a midfield puzzle for Gareth Southgate | Jonathan Liew
Swapping young Dortmund midfielder for the very different Jordan Henderson would bring a vector of risk the England manager must carefully weigh up
Whenever England exit a major competition, you often find newspapers and websites – just for a bit of fun – trying to guess what the next tournament squad might look like. Leafing back through the predictions from three years ago, offers a pretty decent snapshot of which players were expected to kick on: those whose ascent was foreseen and those who came largely out of nowhere.
Most correspondents correctly expected England’s Euro 2020 squad to be based around the core who went to Russia. The near‑unanimous inclusion of Dele Alli is an indication of just how far his stock has fallen. There were high hopes for Ruben Loftus-Cheek, Joe Gomez, Ryan Sessegnon. Quite a few took a punt on Phil Foden, Mason Mount and Jadon Sancho. But there is one name absent; largely because he had just turned 15 years old.
Related: Euro 2020: your complete guide to all 622 players
Related: England’s Euro fate is preordained but I’ll still support them all the way | Max Rushden
Continue reading...June 3, 2021
Never leading by example: why do England struggle after scoring first? | Jonathan Liew
England have a far worse record than other big sides at holding on to a lead. Can Gareth Southgate fix an endemic problem?
Trent Alexander-Arnold clears his lines. And as Austria gingerly gather possession and work the ball backwards, you can see Harry Kane rushing up to start the press, waving the rest of the England team forward to join the charge, which they do. After a series of tentative passes in their own half, Austria’s goalkeeper, Daniel Bachmann, is hastily forced to clear to touch, pursued by a swarm of white shirts. An hour has been played at the Riverside Stadium, and England have just gone 1-0 up.
In the alternative history of Wednesday night’s game, this is the point at which England, energised by Bukayo Saka’s fine goal and the exhortations of their captain, seize the moment and with it control of the game. With Austria forced to commit numbers forward in search of an equaliser, England feast on the open spaces, tear into the middling Austrians and run out comfortable winners in front of a rocking Teesside crowd.
Related: Das Team offer bruising, bothersome test on weird evening for England | Barney Ronay
Continue reading...May 31, 2021
We’re not the good guys: Osaka shows up problems of press conferences | Jonathan Liew
Young athletes are expected to answer the most intimate questions in a cynical and often predatory environment
Regular attendees of Arsenal press conferences at the Emirates Stadium – in the before-times, when these things still happened – will tell of a mysterious character by the name of First Question Man. Nobody ever discovered who FQM worked for, or if he was even a journalist at all. His only real talent, if you can call it that, was to sit in the front row and make sure he asked the first question, usually by barking it while everyone was still taking their seats.
Why FQM did this was never clear. It can’t have been ego: I never met anybody who knew his real name. Nor was it an attempt to glean some sort of privileged insight: indeed, most of his questions were actually statements: banal bromides beloved of press conferences the world over. “Arsène, you must be happy with the win.” “Unai, a point seemed like a fair result.” “Mikel, a tough afternoon, your thoughts.”
Related: Naomi Osaka withdraws from French Open amid row over press conferences
Continue reading...Chelsea rule Europe again and who will make England cut? – Football Weekly
Max Rushden is joined by Barry Glendenning, Jonathan Liew and Barney Ronay to discuss Chelsea’s big win in Porto, Gareth Southgate’s squad trimming and the European managerial merry-go-round
Rate, review, share on Apple Podcasts , Soundcloud , Audioboom , Mixcloud , Acast and Stitcher , and join the conversation on Facebook , Twitter and email .
Chelsea have won the Champions League for the second time. The panel analyse their performance including where it all went wrong for Pep Guardiola, and where it went right for Thomas Tuchel.
Continue reading...May 30, 2021
Thomas Tuchel’s faith in Kai Havertz helps Chelsea believe the hype | Jonathan Liew
The young German’s winning goal in the Champions League final announces him as a generational talent in the making
The last of the daylight retreated over the back of the stand and tiptoed over the banks of the Douro River. It was shortly after 8.30pm in Porto, and the fun and frolics of the first half hour were over. As dusk fell over the Estádio do Dragão, as the roar of the socially distanced crowd began to harden into a tight, desperate growl, somehow you got the sense that the serious part of the Champions League final was about to begin.
Like many of his generation of young German prodigies, Kai Havertz is a serious sort of player. He has an intense gaze and a purposeful stride and a sort of restless, unrequited yearning: as if this game here is his last chance to win the golden ticket off the island and see mama and papa again.
Related: Chelsea win Champions League after Kai Havertz stuns Manchester City
Related: Chaotic conductor Pep Guardiola sees his Champions League dream fall apart | Barney Ronay
Continue reading...May 29, 2021
Foden and Mount: local heroes renewing rivalry on grandest stage
The two brilliant talents first faced each other at academy level in 2017 and are now poised for the biggest match of their lives
Even now, knowing what has happened since, there is something fresh and shocking to them. As you watch footage of the FA Youth Cup final between Chelsea and Manchester City, what strikes you above all is just how comfortable these miniature humans look with a ball at their feet, how effortlessly they bend the game to their will. The year is 2017, and Mason Mount and Phil Foden are facing each other on a football pitch for the first time.
Related: Domènec Torrent: what it is really like to be Pep Guardiola’s right-hand man
Related: Kevin De Bruyne has the stage in Porto to make his case for Ballon d’Or | Barney Ronay
Continue reading...May 26, 2021
Inert, fearful Manchester United miss chance to escape their suspended reality | Jonathan Liew
Ole Gunnar Solskjær’s side left their fate to spot-kicks and remain a big team who so often lose the big matches
In the end it all came down to this: goalkeeper against goalkeeper, winner takes all. For more than two hours Manchester United and Villarreal had circled each other like staggering boxers: tired limbs throwing tired punches and running through thick mud. The 61st game of Manchester United’s season and the 57th game of Villarreal’s unfolded in a manner we should probably have predicted. But as of 11.54pm in Gdansk, as David de Gea stood over his fateful kick, all possibilities remained ridiculously open.
It was a game in which United began as favourites, went into half-time as underdogs, looked to have it in the bag by the hour and ended up losing in flabbergasting circumstances. In many ways it was an evening that summed up their season: oscillating wildly between extreme competence and extreme lethargy, sometimes in the same game, occasionally even in the same attack. By the end, it felt as if United were grateful simply to still be there. For Ole Gunnar Solskjær’s team, the means justified the soul-crushing end.
Related: Villarreal beat Manchester United 11-10 on penalties to win Europa League final
Continue reading...May 24, 2021
Darren Stevens has cult following but 45-year-old is still underappreciated | Jonathan Liew
The Kent all-rounder is beloved by many followers of English cricket but also unfairly cited by others as a symptom of its ills
As with so much else in his life, fame came late in the day to Darren Stevens. The Kent all-rounder’s extraordinary innings of 190 against Glamorgan last Friday created a very modern sort of buzz, one that has really been possible only in recent years. For decades, an innings like Stevens’s would have existed largely in the imagination: a blur of numbers on a screen and two columns in the newspaper, rather than an actual lived memory. Now, via social media and the miracle of the YouTube livestream – hey, psst, stop what you’re doing and watch this – it can live in plain sight.
And what an innings it was: remarkable not so much for its technical excellence (he was dropped three times) but for its sheer, sleeves-up, bollocks-to-you audacity. Michael Neser, a 90mph Australian international seamer, is smashed over his head. Andrew Salter, a lovely classical off-spinner, has resigned himself to being hit for six before he even delivers the ball. At the other end, Miguel Cummins shares a ninth-wicket partnership of 166 in which his own contribution is one.
Related: Football-mad Barcelona votes to build cricket oval
Related: County cricket talking points: Notts and Darren Stevens shine in gloom
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