Category: Football (Soccer)

Brennan Johnson, Micky van de Ven and Guglielmo Vicario were the heroes as Tottenham won their first European trophy in 41 years with a dogged display in Bilbao

Our man David Hytner is watching all of the red-carpet arrivals in Cannes San Mamés. “Just got to the ground to see Ian Wright being serenaded on his way into the VIP entrance by a large group of Spurs fans. Which certainly made him smile. David Dein, too, who was with him, along with Theo Paphitis. Bumped into Thomas Tuchel moments before and it really is one of those occasions when the stars are out. The anticipation is building!”

Ruben Amorim talks to TNT. “I am relaxed now … I did my job … now it’s with my players and I am really confident … I really enjoyed the last two trainings … when you have these kind of trainings you feel relaxed, so I trust in the guys … so I have that feeling and I’m really confident … Mason Mount in this moment gives us a balance … really good attacking but one extra midfielder … also to have speed on the bench … legs to change the game … in the beginning it is really important to feel the game and we are getting better at that … the result is not going to change so much [regarding transfers] … it can help to add one more if we need … the most important thing is the feeling of winning … we need to deliver that feeling … I am not thinking about the money … we will arrange money because we are a big brand … we are a club that needs that feeling … without trophies it’s really hard to get a connection … we are getting better … this team can step up … I truly believe my players are going to do it.”

Continue reading...

• John Textor-owned Lyon could also reach competition
• Uefa’s club financial control body set to look into case

Crystal Palace are confident they will be cleared to play in next season’s Europa League even if Lyon also qualify despite concerns that they could contravene Uefa’s rules about multi-club ownership.

No individual is permitted to control two clubs that are competing in the same Uefa-run competition, with Lyon owner John Textor also listed as Palace’s largest shareholder at 45%, through his company Eagle Football Holdings. Victory for Paris Saint-Germain against Reims in the French Cup final this weekend would confirm that Lyon qualify for the Europa League after finishing sixth in Ligue 1.

Continue reading...

Plus: more strange player-of-the-match awards and shot-shy winners; and did Brian Clough deliberately go down to 10 men?

• Mail us with your questions and answers

“In terms of aggregate league position, will Tottenham v Manchester United be the worst European final ever?” asks Phil Taylor (and dozens of others).

Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester United, who meet in Bilbao tonight, put all their eggs in the Europa League basket sometime before the clocks went back. They are 17th and 16th in the Premier League respectively, giving them an aggregate position of 33. It is, to take a couple of unashamedly gratuitous examples, equivalent to Oldham Athletic playing Southampton in the Uefa Cup final of 1992, or Sabadell meeting Racing Santander in the same competition in 1987.

Continue reading...

Sign up now! Sign up now! Sign up now? Sign up now!

With more than 80,000 English football fans expected to descend on Bilbao for the Bigger Vase final, it’s safe to assume that approximately half of them will return home in despair, while almost all of them will be seriously out of pocket. But despite its status as a fine location with a proud football heritage, Bilbao doesn’t have the infrastructure to cope with the myriad demands that come with hosting a game between the 16th and 17th best teams in England. With “budget” flights costing well north of a grand and even the most low-rent accommodation priced up at £500-plus a night, one can but hope for the sake of those Spurs and Manchester United fans who use plane, train, automobile or boat to arrive in northern Spain for this season-defining match that Bilbao has no shortage of doorways and park benches. Expect plenty to be occupied on Tuesday evening by green-around-the-gills landlubbers who set off on Sunday evening’s Portsmouth ferry, a vessel which docked in Bilbao earlier.

A very beautiful career is coming to an end, a very full life. I feel very fortunate for what I’ve experienced. I didn’t expect it, but I think the time has come and I feel like bringing it to a close here” – former Barcelona, Liverpool and Spain vibes-man, Pepe Reina, is hanging up his gloves aged 7842 after Como’s final game of the season on Friday. He might have a busy last day at the office given Inter will be desperately fighting for the title. Look out for any loose beachballs, Pepe!

Trust the Germans to have a word to describe every situation or feeling. Liverpool’s current performance (or lack of) can be defined as Erfüllungsleere” – Krishna Moorthy.

Given this appears to be the year of the underdog in cup finals, Tottenham and Manchester United must be really optimistic” – Martyn Shapter.

Re: Memory Lane (yesterday’s Football Daily, full email edition) – that mascot got a bit more than they bargained for” – Jim Hearson.

I’d question the wisdom of publishing both of Michael Glogower’s pun-laden Eredivisie missives in recent letters sections. Remember, two De Jongs don’t make a right …” – Derek McGee.

Continue reading...

Winger enters Europa League final as his club’s top scorer this season after showing application alongside ability

“It’s easy when things aren’t going well to come up with excuses,” Brennan Johnson says and, with things not going well for him at Tottenham, there was plenty of stuff that he could have hidden behind.

The weight of the £47.5m fee which took him from Nottingham Forest in September 2023; Spurs have paid more for only three players in their history. The sky-high expectations of being at one of London’s glamour clubs. Apart from a loan to League One Lincoln in 2020-21, Johnson had known life only in Nottingham and at Forest, whose academy he joined at the age of eight. And then there was the social media abuse; kryptonite for confidence.

Continue reading...

• Europa League would be club’s first silverware since 2008
• Van de Ven: Postecoglou has ‘proved all you guys wrong’

Micky van de Ven remembers being told that he would never win a trophy in his career after he moved to Tottenham. But the centre-half, who was signed by Ange Postecoglou from Wolfsburg in the summer of 2023, says the collective determination within the club to break the silverware curse will fuel them in Wednesday’s Europa League final against Manchester United in Bilbao. Spurs have won nothing since the 2008 League Cup.

“It will be a big thing, of course, because everybody knows that when you join Tottenham, you get the words through of: ‘Ah, you’re not going to win a trophy, you will be trophyless for the rest of your career,’” Van de Ven said. “All the guys that came up here were like: ‘We’re going to change something about this club.’

Continue reading...