Barcelona vs. Inter Milan Champions League live updates: Timeline, how to watch
Barcelona vs. Inter Milan Champions League live updates: Timeline, how to watch
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Tyler Adams on AFC Bournemouth season, USMNT struggles, 2026 World Cup
Soccer star Tyler Adams talks about AFC Bournemouth's season and the Premier League Summer Series coming back to America.
Six days after an electrifying 3-3 draw in the first leg of their UEFA Champions League semifinal, Inter Milan hosts Barcelona at the San Siro to decide which team will advance to the final of the world's most prestigious club tournament.
Barcelona overcame a 2-0 deficit from the first half, fighting back to earn the draw with an outstanding performance from teen phenom Lamine Yamal. Inter Milan defender Alessandro Bastoni likened Tuesday's showdown to a "Game 7 of the NBA finals".
"It's 50-50, all open, and I think it will be a similar game from the first leg," Bastoni told reporters Monday. "We are two games away from winning the Champions League ... we are sure that our fans will give us a big hand at the San Siro, we live for moments like this."
The winner of the match will advance to the May 31's final in Munich against the winner of the Arsenal vs. Paris Saint Germain semifinal.
What time is Barcelona vs. Inter Milan game?
The match is scheduled to kick off at 3:00 p.m. ET on Tuesday.
Barcelona vs. Inter Milan TV channel, live stream
Tuesday's match will air on CBS and can be streamed via Paramount+.
Champions League schedule
Semifinals
First leg:
PSG 1, Arsenal 0
Barcelona 3, Inter Milan 3
Second leg:
Inter Milan vs. Barcelona, 3 p.m. ET on Tuesday, May 6
PSG vs. Arsenal, 3 p.m. on Wednesday, March 7
May 31 in Munich, Germany
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San Francisco Chronicle
33 minutes ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
The Club World Cup is finally up and running -- and soccer may never be the same
MIAMI GARDENS (AP) — After more than a year of uncertainty and criticism, the Club World Cup kicked off in Miami on Saturday and soccer may never be the same. At least that's what FIFA president Gianni Infantino has been telling anyone who would listen. 'This tournament will be the start of something historic that will change our sport for the better,' he said this week as part of an exhausting schedule of public engagements to drum up interest in the month-long event staged across 11 cities in the United States. Soccer's newest tournament is what the sport has been waiting for, Infantino says, and on Saturday, despite considerable pushback and obstacles, he turned his personal passion project into a reality. The Swiss lawyer, who holds one of the most powerful positions in the world as head of soccer's governing body, was on hand at a largely full Hard Rock Stadium to watch Lionel Messi's Inter Miami draw 0-0 with Egyptian team Al Ahly in the opening game of his super-sized Club World Cup. Influence The match may have been underwhelming, but the occasion — kicked off with a lavish opening ceremony featuring music, dance routines and fireworks — was a moment of immense pride for Infantino and conclusive proof of his influence over the most popular sport on the planet. Despite his assertions, it's not clear how much soccer really wanted another elite tournament. But this was his baby — so much so that his name is etched not once, but twice, onto a giant golden trophy crafted by Tiffany & Co. that will be lifted by the winner on July 13. It has gone ahead against the backdrop of legal challenges in Europe, threats of strike action from players and fears of injury and burnout for the biggest stars. There have been concerns about overreach by FIFA - which has traditionally focused on national team soccer — and the detrimental impact a new club competition would have on domestic leagues. But nothing was going to stand in the way of Infantino's plans to expand the Club World Cup from its previous guise as a seven-team mid-season mini tournament to a 32-team extravaganza that could one day rival the Champions League and Premier League as one of the most popular and wealthiest competitions in the world. The tournament is now locked in Time will tell if it lives up to Infantino's billing, but he has navigated the biggest hurdle of all by getting this inaugural edition off the ground. It is locked into the calendar — every four years — and teams such as Champions League winner Paris Saint-Germain have already qualified for the next edition in 2029. "Maybe not now in its first edition, but it will become an incredibly important competition to win,' PSG coach Luis Enrique said. He may have a point. Peculiarly, and despite the global nature of soccer, the club game has largely been restricted to continental competition, aside from the previous guise of the Club World Cup, which was often looked on as little more than a exhibition. Do fans really want it? Still, it remains unclear how much of an appetite there is for another soccer tournament in a calendar that has reached saturation point. So a crowd of more than 60,000 at the Hard Rock Stadium likely came as a relief to FIFA, though it is not known how many of those in attendance paid anything like the $349 being quoted for seats in December. FIFA has not offered definitive numbers on the amount of tickets sold for the tournament as a whole and prices were slashed as the opening game approached. But there were only pockets of empty seats in the stands, with many red-shirted fans of Al Ahly in attendance. 'We've been looking forward to it for a long time,' said Peter Sadek a fan originally from Egypt and now living in Orlando. 'At least 50 more just from our area (are coming). It's been bubbling up for a long time and you can see how many are here.' Other Al Ahly fans had traveled directly from Egypt, with red shirts outnumbering the pink of Miami in parts of the stadium. Messi magic He certainly tried. His stunning curling effort from long range, deep into extra time would have been the perfect finish. Instead, Al Ahly goalkeeper Mohamed Elshenawy tipped the ball onto the crossbar to deny the Argentine great and Infantino that prize moment. Not even Infantino can have everything, it seems. ___ ___
New York Times
43 minutes ago
- New York Times
PSG are still spending a lot of money – but they're doing it very differently
Desire Doue's second goal just past the hour sealed it. Paris Saint-Germain would be European champions at last. At the forefront of it all was Doue, 19 years young and the poster boy of PSG's new era. That win over Inter in the Champions League final last month ended a near 15-year journey that began when Qatar Sports Investments (QSI), a subsidiary of the Qatari state's sovereign wealth fund, purchased a majority stake in the club in June 2011. Advertisement The season before QSI's arrival, PSG spent just €9million on new signings; a year later, that annual figure had shot up to €107m. That same season, the other 19 clubs in Ligue 1, the top division of French football, paid out just €140m combined on transfers. The money kept flowing. Over the next decade, PSG's new owners spent billions. The team won the Ligue 1 title almost every year, often by a wide margin. European-level glory, though, always eluded them. That ended in Munich's Allianz Arena just under two weeks ago, amid apparent irony. The expensive forward trio of Kylian Mbappe, Lionel Messi and Neymar deployed in previous seasons had come to symbolise PSG's largesse. Last summer, the last of those three still at the club, Mbappe, also left. The narrative shifted: PSG have finally found Champions League success by stepping back from the splurges of the owners' first decade, by spending less and by being smarter. The likes of Doue and central midfielder Joao Neves, both aged under 21, had replaced Mbappe, Messi and company. This view is not without some truth to it. That group achieved little in Paris other than extending the club's domestic dominance. In each of the two full seasons Mbappe, Messi and Neymar were together (2021-23), PSG were eliminated from the Champions League in its first knockout round. Between them, Mbappe and Neymar cost €401.9million (£342m/$465m at current rates) in transfer fees alone. Messi arrived on a free transfer after it ended, um, messily for him at Barcelona, but leaving it at that would be a gross misrepresentation; PSG were one of the only clubs in the world who could afford his wage requirements. Given all that, once those three had departed, it would be nigh-on impossible for PSG not to be spending less now than they once did. Yet a look at their recent transfer activity shows any suggestion of a move toward thrift is overblown. Across the past two seasons, according to Transfermarkt (figures from the club's published accounts are not yet available), PSG have spent €694million on new players — a figure which still comes to €344m on a net basis. Advertisement That €694million puts them second in world football for the largest outlay across those 2023-24 and 2024-25 campaigns, only eclipsed by Chelsea (reported new-player spend: €746m). On a net basis, PSG were also the second-highest spenders, behind Al Hilal of Saudi Arabia. In other words, the idea of the Qataris shutting off the monetary supply line to the French capital is pretty misguided. PSG are still spending, and still spending lots, continuing a theme that has been present at their Parc des Princes home ever since that mid-2011 takeover. From that time, €2.282billion has been spent by PSG on new players. Among Ligue 1 clubs, only Monaco, at €1.187bn, have also topped a billion euros on signings in the same period, and their net spend was actually negative — helped in no small part by the €180m they received from PSG for Mbappe (€145m in 2018, then a further €35m when Mbappe renewed his PSG contract in 2022). What has changed is how they are spending. Mbappe provides a decent reference point here. That €180million fee of seven years ago — we have kept the whole fee in 2018 as part of our analysis — was, even by modern football standards, a huge sum, only beaten by the €222m PSG paid Barcelona for Neymar a year earlier. It is also the highest fee ever paid for a teenager, well ahead of the €126million Atletico Madrid spent on Joao Felix of Portugal's Benfica in summer 2019. Spending so much on someone so young was very much out of kilter for PSG back then; before Mbappe, the club had only signed six players aged under 21 for fees, and they wouldn't do so again until 2021. Excluding the Mbappe fee, across 10 seasons from 2011 to 2021, PSG spent just €138.4million on under-21s, out of a total transfer spend in that time of €1.171bn. Just 12 per cent of the club's spending on new players went on youngsters not named Kylian Mbappe. In six of QSI's first 10 seasons in Paris, the club didn't pay fees on any players aged under 21. Advertisement There's been evidence of a shift since. Nuno Mendes' €7million loan fee to Sporting CP of Lisbon in August 2021 was hardly bank-busting, but it did set off a chain whereby a growing proportion of the club's spending — at least on transfers — has been directed at the game's youngest players. Including Mendes' loan, and then his permanent move a year later, seven players aged 21 or under have joined PSG for fees over the past four seasons, with those totalling €243.9m. That comprises 26 per cent of the club's gross spend on new players — a doubling of the previous decade's (non-Mbappe) proportion. Neves and Doue have been the most expensive. Arriving from Benfica and fellow French side Rennes respectively last summer for a combined €110million, neither move can be described as a sign of PSG reining things in. Instead, they are a sign of the new strategy: keep spending big, but spend more of it on youth. The other end of the age scale has shifted, too. In QSI's first decade at the helm, €734.2million (54 per cent) of PSG's transfer spending went on players aged 25 or more. In the past four seasons, though, that figure has slumped to €171.5m out of €930.9m — 18 per cent. A source with knowledge of PSG's dealings, granted anonymity to protect relationships, told The Athletic the recent shift was undertaken with another motive beyond simply reducing the age of the first team: the improved ability to sell players at a future profit. Across much of QSI's reign, PSG's player profits have been low, at least relative to other big European clubs; signing older players limits resale value. PSG's whopping €181.4m player profits in 2023-24 were heavily aided by the €90million departure of Neymar to Al-Hilal, though that's plainly not the sort of transaction the club can rely on regularly. Advertisement More instructive was the recent €50million sale of then-21-year-old Xavi Simons to RB Leipzig, a deal which could ultimately total €80m. PSG had exercised a €6m buy-back clause to retrieve Simons from PSV Eindhoven, a year after selling him there, before banking a big profit. Reinforcing the youthful shift in transfer strategy has been a significant investment in the club's academy, with €350million sunk into a new training facility, Campus PSG. Last summer saw 17-year-old Joane Gadou sold from the youth ranks to RB Salzburg for €10m. The impact has been clear, and is in part why the curious narrative around their Champions League triumph was able to form. PSG really do have a much younger squad than before, and they really have stepped away from the strategy of signing more experienced, household names that dominated QSI's first 10 years in charge. It's just that after this shift in approach, their recruitment has remained extremely expensive. Luis Enrique's starting XI that routed Inter 5-0 in that final had an average age of 25.3 — over three years younger than the team which had lost to Bayern Munich in PSG's only previous appearance in the fixture five years ago. Their team beaten by Bayern in the competition's round of 16 in March 2023 had an average age of 27.9. The new transfer strategy has naturally flowed through to a younger team on the pitch. If PSG are signing players at lower ages, have they also changed who they're signing them from? The evidence suggests yes. In each of the past three seasons, the share of money spent on players from other Ligue 1 teams has grown; previously, PSG had only purchased players from their domestic rivals for a fee in four of 11 seasons under QSI. Mbappe, who they got from Monaco for massive money, once again skews things here. Excluding him, between 2011-12 and 2021-22, PSG spent just €72.2million (six per cent) on signings from fellow French clubs. Advertisement In terms of player quantity, the shift hasn't been huge. Doue was the only player recruited from within Ligue 1 this season, but the chunky fee spent on him was enough to comprise over a fifth of PSG's transfer spend for 2024-25. In the past three years, only Renato Sanches, Bradley Barcola and Hugo Ekitike have also been signed from French clubs, but their fees, alongside Doue's, comprise 15 per cent of PSG's spending in that time, a notable increase. Whether that trend continues remains to be seen. They continue to enjoy a level of dominance over their domestic peers unrivalled anywhere else in Europe's 'Big Five' leagues — an ongoing crisis enveloping the French league's television rights deal serves to further weaken the bargaining position of most Ligue 1 sides. PSG, stated-owned and, at least domestically, unencumbered by much in the way of financial regulation, are in a position of strength if they look to shop local. As reported in The Athletic's Transfer DealSheet earlier this week, they are keen on Bournemouth's 22-year-old central defender Illya Zabarnyi. That fits the trend we've already covered, both through Zabarnyi's relative youth and in terms of the fee it will take to get him — he won't come cheap. PSG have generally stayed away from the Premier League as a source of players previously during the QSI era, with only six players signing for fees from England's top flight. Angel Di Maria, at €63million from Manchester United in summer 2015, was both the most high-profile and most expensive. Despite that, across these 14 seasons, the club have spent most of their money on recruiting players from their fellow 'Big Five' leagues, with Spain's La Liga, the German Bundesliga and Serie A in Italy completing the set. That was still the case in the past two seasons, with nearly half of PSG's transfer spend being disbursed across those three countries mentioned above. Yet just as there's been a slight shift homeward in identifying new additions, so has there been a broadening of horizons and an added desire to dip into apparently less glamorous waters. Advertisement In five of seven seasons between 2013 and 2022, PSG didn't spend a penny on players from outside Europe's five biggest leagues; in 2022-23, the fees spent on bringing in Mendes and Vitinha from Portugal's Primeira Liga made up over half of their total spend that season, and a third of what they've paid has gone on non-'Big Five' divisions in the two seasons since. That said, the idea of broad horizons comes with the caveat that the vast majority has been spent in Portugal, and PSG's recent focus there followed the arrival of Luis Campos as an advisor in mid-2022. Transfer fees grab the media headlines, but wages continue to be a club's biggest cost, and it is here where we find the great unknown in assessing how much PSG continue to spend. On a historic basis, there's little uncertainty. Over the past 13 seasons, not including the recently finished 2024-25, for which we don't yet have reliable figures, clubs in France's top tier paid a combined €16.819billion in wages. Of that, PSG contributed €5.025bn — 30 per cent of Ligue 1's total wage spend in the period. For a while now, comparing clubs' wage bills in Ligue 1 has called for two different scales: one for PSG, one for everyone else. In each of the past three seasons, the gulf between theirs and the second-highest wage bill in France has topped €460million, and it nearly hit €600m in 2021-22. On an average basis, the gap between PSG's salary costs and those of other Ligue 1 clubs has widened from €31.8m in the season before QSI's takeover to €587.6m in 2023-24. With such a chasm to bridge, how do other Ligue 1 clubs compete? They largely don't. PSG have won Ligue 1 in 11 of the past 13 seasons, with an average gap to the side in second place of 13 points. In 2015-16, they finished a ludicrous 31 ahead of runners-up Lyon, having won 30 of their 38 matches and drawn six. Before the 2011 takeover, they had only won two domestic titles in their (albeit short, having been formed in 1970) history. Advertisement There is a huge wage disparity at play in Ligue 1. And PSG's wage dominance, if we can call it that, isn't just limited to domestic football. The gulf is far smaller if we look at Europe as a whole, but in three of the four seasons before 2024-25, their wage bill was the highest at that level, too. These included their world record €729million spend in 2021-22, which was the first season Mbappe, Messi and Neymar were at the club together. PSG's wage bill for 2023-24 was again top of the continental chart, coming in at €658million — over €100m higher than second-placed Manchester City's. Real Madrid, who won both La Liga and the Champions League that season, spent over €150m less on wages than the French side. Of course, that was also the final season in which Mbappe played in France's capital rather than Spain's. It would be of little surprise if Madrid usurped PSG in the wage table once the figures for 2024-25 are released. Mbappe's arrival at the Bernabeu has reportedly cost his new club at least €45million in annual payments to him (split between a minimum €15m salary, and the €30m annual cost of a €150m signing bonus spread over his five-year contract), while the saving to PSG will be hefty. Mbappe's basic salary in Paris cost PSG €75m annually after taxes and social security, while bonuses due to him, and the associated taxes on those, put their total cost of employing him in 2023-24 over the €200m mark. Exactly how much went into the club's overall €658m wage bill that year is unclear; Mbappe and PSG remain in an ongoing dispute, with the club's former striker claiming he is due €55m in unpaid wages and bonuses. Where their wage bill for this season will land is unknown, especially given the Champions League victory will have crystallised a slew of bonuses among the squad. Even if PSG's number here has fallen from last season, it's a stretch to label them any kind of beggars among Europe's elite. Chances are, the new European champions will remain one of football's biggest payers in terms of salaries. Advertisement This is not to say they have not impressed on the pitch, of course. They had a record-breaking margin of victory in the Champions League final and could achieve another first by winning the Club World Cup next month. But while the megastars have gone, the wealth is still there. Paris Saint-Germain continue to be one of the most handsomely backed teams in world football.
Hamilton Spectator
an hour ago
- Hamilton Spectator
The Club World Cup is finally up and running — and soccer may never be the same
MIAMI GARDENS (AP) — After more than a year of uncertainty and criticism, the Club World Cup kicked off in Miami on Saturday and soccer may never be the same. At least that's what FIFA president Gianni Infantino has been telling anyone who would listen. 'This tournament will be the start of something historic that will change our sport for the better,' he said this week as part of an exhausting schedule of public engagements to drum up interest in the month-long event staged across 11 cities in the United States. Soccer's newest tournament is what the sport has been waiting for, Infantino says, and on Saturday, despite considerable pushback and obstacles, he turned his personal passion project into a reality. The Swiss lawyer, who holds one of the most powerful positions in the world as head of soccer's governing body, was on hand at a largely full Hard Rock Stadium to watch Lionel Messi's Inter Miami draw 0-0 with Egyptian team Al Ahly in the opening game of his super-sized Club World Cup. Influence The match may have been underwhelming, but the occasion — kicked off with a lavish opening ceremony featuring music, dance routines and fireworks — was a moment of immense pride for Infantino and conclusive proof of his influence over the most popular sport on the planet. Despite his assertions, it's not clear how much soccer really wanted another elite tournament. But this was his baby — so much so that his name is etched not once, but twice, onto a giant golden trophy crafted by Tiffany & Co. that will be lifted by the winner on July 13. It has gone ahead against the backdrop of legal challenges in Europe, threats of strike action from players and fears of injury and burnout for the biggest stars. There have been concerns about overreach by FIFA - which has traditionally focused on national team soccer — and the detrimental impact a new club competition would have on domestic leagues. But nothing was going to stand in the way of Infantino's plans to expand the Club World Cup from its previous guise as a seven-team mid-season mini tournament to a 32-team extravaganza that could one day rival the Champions League and Premier League as one of the most popular and wealthiest competitions in the world. The tournament is now locked in Time will tell if it lives up to Infantino's billing, but he has navigated the biggest hurdle of all by getting this inaugural edition off the ground. It is locked into the calendar — every four years — and teams such as Champions League winner Paris Saint-Germain have already qualified for the next edition in 2029. 'Maybe not now in its first edition, but it will become an incredibly important competition to win,' PSG coach Luis Enrique said. He may have a point. Peculiarly, and despite the global nature of soccer, the club game has largely been restricted to continental competition, aside from the previous guise of the Club World Cup, which was often looked on as little more than a exhibition. Do fans really want it? Still, it remains unclear how much of an appetite there is for another soccer tournament in a calendar that has reached saturation point. So a crowd of more than 60,000 at the Hard Rock Stadium likely came as a relief to FIFA, though it is not known how many of those in attendance paid anything like the $349 being quoted for seats in December. FIFA has not offered definitive numbers on the amount of tickets sold for the tournament as a whole and prices were slashed as the opening game approached. But there were only pockets of empty seats in the stands, with many red-shirted fans of Al Ahly in attendance. 'We've been looking forward to it for a long time,' said Peter Sadek a fan originally from Egypt and now living in Orlando. 'At least 50 more just from our area (are coming). It's been bubbling up for a long time and you can see how many are here.' Other Al Ahly fans had traveled directly from Egypt, with red shirts outnumbering the pink of Miami in parts of the stadium. Messi magic If only Messi could have crowned Infantino's big night with a moment of magic. He certainly tried. His stunning curling effort from long range, deep into extra time would have been the perfect finish. Instead, Al Ahly goalkeeper Mohamed Elshenawy tipped the ball onto the crossbar to deny the Argentine great and Infantino that prize moment. Not even Infantino can have everything, it seems. ___ James Robson is at ___ AP soccer:
