Former Premier League manager Ivan Juric, 49, rushed to hospital after ‘serious inflammation of upper airways'
The 49-year-old is currently in charge of Serie A big boys Atalanta having replaced Gian Piero Gasperini as manager last month.
1
But he wasn't present for the club's first pre-season training session after a bacterial infection caused part of his airways to become seriously inflamed.
An Atalanta statement read: ""talanta BC announces that coach Ivan Jurić was hospitalized in recent days at the Bolognini Hospital in Seriate, in the ENT department headed by Dr. Davide Panciera, following a serious inflammation of the upper airways, complicated by a bacterial infection of the epiglottis, which was treated with intravenous antibiotics."
The condition of Croatian Juric is, thankfully, improving.
Atalanta's statement continued: "The current clinical picture is significantly improving, and a protected discharge is expected in the next few days."
Juric has yet to issue a statement on his hospitalisation.
The Croat inked a two-year deal with Atalanta in early June.
His appointment as La Dea chief came just over three months after he was sacked by Southampton following their relegation to the Championship.
Juric was in charge of Saints for just 107 days and admits he won't, from a sporting perspective, look back on his time at St Mary's with any fondness.
Following confirmation of his return to Serie A management, he said: "[It was) a negative year on a sporting level.
"[From a] human and knowledge level, it was fantastic.
"I think I feel much stronger than a year ago, because [at] Roma I saw great clubs, great players. I learned a lot.
"In Southampton, I appreciated a fabulous Premier League. "People who are in the club, who know how to work.
"I saw really beautiful things. In the Premier League, I also remember the level of the players, [it's] very high.
"I think two negative experiences on the one hand, and on the other, [it was] very positive for me and my growth."
THIS IS A DEVELOPING STORY..
The Sun is your go to destination for the best football, boxing and MMA news, real-life stories, jaw-dropping pictures and must-see video. Like us on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/TheSunFootball and follow us from our main Twitter account at @TheSunFootball.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Guardian
22 minutes ago
- The Guardian
Oleksandr Usyk wraps Ukraine's flag around himself and his fists around Daniel Dubois
Perhaps the most striking part of the surge of controlled fury that ended this heavyweight title fight wasn't the short right or the clubbing left that took Daniel Dubois down midway through the fifth round. It was Oleksandr Usyk's smile before the second of those shots. More of a snarl perhaps, or a baring of the gumshield, as Dubois let his arms drop, giving Usyk time to freeze the moment, load up, take aim and unleash a fully extended left hand to the side of the jaw that made Dubois crumple, legs folding under him as his father, Stan, threw in the towel. This was always huge occasion for both fighters. For Dubois it was a chance to do something unprecedented, uniting the the heavyweight belts on British soil in front of 90,000 people. For Usyk it was another opportunity to assert his own greatness, to walk in with three belts and leave with four, and at the same time complete his constant secondary arc of representing Ukraine in a time of war. Usyk is now the two-time undisputed heavyweight world champion. Most astonishing of all he seems to find with each of these fights new depths of will, control and finishing venom. Perhaps the best part here was Dubois got to execute his own gameplan, to look sharp, edge a couple of rounds and leave with his reputation, if not enhanced then at least preserved, and to do all this while also being violently outmatched. Facing Usyk at this level must feel like being battered off your feet while being simultaneously triple check-mated, thrashed at Cluedo and losing a game of dominos. At the end, Usyk said: 'I want a rest.' He didn't look like he wanted a rest, or needed one, or even really understands what one is. He mentioned Tyson Fury, Derek Chisora and Anthony Joshua. Do them all in one night, Oleks. In different ways. With a different walkout, and maybe just a single toilet break. This was another night when Riyadh season came to Wembley. Fight nights have a kind of festival vibe here, the pitch lassoed into a series of zones and stages, gangways thronged. The crowd was starry in the plush seats. Here is Jake Paul doing a peace sign. Here is Jason Statham in sunglasses. Closer to the ring it was the familiar royal court of influencers, oddballs, showmen faces, movers, shakers, Mr fix-its, Mr pay-for-its. As the main event approached Wembley had the feeling of a vast, humid, tropical shed, seized with an ever-rising field of event-glamour and title-flash. It felt like a blend of Vegas and a mass celebratory Saturday night out, Sweet Caroline, pints in the air, and all of this mixed with legacy issues, hall-of-famer ascent, the flags of war, the $200m purse, the Saudi project staging. Michael Buffer appeared, gravely tuxedoed, to do his town crier act. Nadya Dorofeeva, a kind of Ukrainian Cheryl Cole, sang a very affecting champions anthem. God Save the King got the full singalong treatment. Wembley looked magnificently alive, light show thrilling, crowd bobbing along to Chase & Status as Dubois emerged to flames and fireworks, dressed in a stark black T-shirt cut to reveal the vast expanse of his neck, swarming up from the foothills of his tiered and slabbed shoulders. Dubois waved a fist and looked focused. But there is always going to be a basic imbalance in the energy fields around these two fighters. Usyk is a one-man cause. He's a battle standard, a living embodiment of his nation's defiance of the Russian invasion. No boxer has ever represented his country to this degree, travelling the world draped in the flag while a bloody invasion continues in real time. It is an extraordinary state of being. What does Dubois represent? How does he confront this one-man instrument of war? What is his narrative? Even Tyson Fury manage to concoct a kind of base, a following, the mental-heath activism, the deep male, Iron John, man-of-the-forest vibes. Dubois can't be the bad guy. He's a nice guy. He is in effect a one-man project, a sole trader. He represents hard work, clean living and paternal control. He represents the ability to do five thousand press-ups. Sign up to The Recap The best of our sports journalism from the past seven days and a heads-up on the weekend's action after newsletter promotion Usyk emerged to boos from the home crowd and cheers from his Ukrainian followers. He doesn't actually need music and storytelling. He just needs to exist in the middle of all that noise, a cold, still centre, with a beautifully contained sense of menace just in the way he moves. At the weight in Dubois had flared his neck muscles like a giant salamander. Usyk just stood there, 16lb lighter in his jewellery, all legacy, presence, certainty. Dubois started as promised, taking the centre of the ring, working behind his jab, following it in a little more. It was an even start, and thrillingly intense from both men. Dubois was working hard, making Usyk think. This is always a high-wire act. Usyk is learning you while you come forward, decoding your moves, building his own own set of counter-patterns. Dubois brought challenger work rate and disruptive aggression. But there was also a sense of a fighter expending his energy, of Usyk absorbing it, and moving into ever-more dangerous territory. By round five Dubois had slowed. He was being encircled clockwise, picked off with combinations. Usyk is a small heavyweight by modern super-sized standards (he is the exact same dimensions, height and weight, as Muhammad Ali), but the mistake is to see this as a disadvantage, as opposed to his defining super-strength, bringing with it with it speed, agility, startling power. Here it was the viciousness of his finishing, the sense of a little genuine champion anger, that really stood out. Dubois deserves credit for being willing to fight everyone in front of him. There is a kind of freedom in this. Defeat here will still leave him in the top tier, with other pathways back towards this level. Usyk, meanwhile, remains in his own distinct space, endlessly adaptable, physically undiminished, a man fighting with a kind of light around him.
Reuters
an hour ago
- Reuters
France's European run ended by familiar foe Germany
BASEL, Switzerland, July 19 (Reuters) - Heartbroken France were left lamenting another European exit at the hands of Germany on Saturday in a stunning 6-5 penalty shootout loss in the Euro 2025 quarter-finals, leaving Les Bleues still searching for their first major tournament title. The loss came despite having a player advantage for most of the game, after Germany's Kathrin Hendrich was sent off for a tug on the hair of Griege Mbock Bathy in the box in the 13th minute. Grace Geyoro's ensuing penalty kick in the 13th minute was France's only goal in a bruising match that was tied 1-1 at the end of extra time. "It's very cruel, it's very difficult," Geyoro said. "We don't realize it yet, and there's a lot of disappointment and frustration at going out like that tonight. We're wondering when it's going to be smiling for us at last. It's difficult, frankly it's hard, that's football. I'm disappointed." The loss conjured memories of Euro 2022 when Germany dispatched France 2-1 in the semifinals before losing to England for the title. Despite the man advantage, France seemed to wither as the minutes wore on against the eight-times European champions. "We're sorry because when you're eleven against ten, you know that your set-pieces, numerical superiority do not exist anymore, so we had to avoid giving them those situations," coach Laurent Bonadei said. "We didn't manage to find the back of the net except for two goals that were flagged offside. It's a shame, we didn't need much. Especially after what we'd done in the group phase, I thought we were getting stronger." France indeed had their chances, with goals by Delphine Cascarino and Geyoro chalked off for offside in each half. Melvine Malard clanged a rocket off the crossbar in the dying seconds of extra time. "I'm obviously disappointed," France goalkeeper Pauline Peyraud-Magnin said. "They were down to ten against 11, so even more disappointed. Finishing on penalties and going out like that is always the worst way to go. "It was a complicated game, they were behind for almost 90 minutes and they were sending warheads up front. "We're a bit down, we've just taken a blow to the back of the head." France's Amel Majri and Alice Sombath had their penalties saved in the shootout, with Sombath's spelling the end of France's tournament, as the heartbroken players collapsed on the pitch. "There's obviously a lot of disappointment," Geyoro said. "We really wanted to go all the way, but unfortunately we stop at the quarter-finals. Leaving the tournament just before the semi-finals is a real blow."
The Guardian
an hour ago
- The Guardian
Ann-Katrin Berger follows up biblical miracle with penalty heroics for Germany
Ann-Katrin Berger is flying. The ball is flying. A few yards away, near the penalty spot, Clara Mateo of France already has her arms raised in celebration. A heroic German defensive rearguard is about to end in a misdirected defensive header, a looping own goal and a heartbreaking defeat. But a 34-year-old double cancer survivor, largely written off by her own country's media before this quarter-final, has other ideas. The mechanics of the save itself are easy enough to explain. Berger is about five yards out of her goal, and so has to back-pedal furiously while also keeping her eye on the flight. At the last moment, it looks like the ball is about to beat her. Which is the point at which Berger flings herself backwards and upwards, finding every last gram of strength, straining every last muscle, the sort of moment you spend a lifetime training for. She claws it away with her fingers. Falls heavily on her shoulders. Accepts the congratulations of her teammates, who look like they have just seen a biblical miracle. And, you know, perhaps they had. Was this the moment Germany wrote their destiny? It certainly didn't feel that way at the time. Twenty minutes still remained. France still had all the possession and an extra player. But maybe it was the moment when Germany's mission sharpened to the finest of points, when they determined above all that a save of such cosmic brilliance must not be for nothing. It had been an epic night, an excruciating night, and for the depleted, exhausted Germany a night of sheer refusal. Forced to play for almost two hours (including added time) with 10 players after the early dismissal of Kathrin Hendrich, boasting a passing accuracy of just 51%, they withstood one of the deadliest attacks in the tournament with their bodies and every last breath in them. By this point the game had long since ceased to take any recognisable form or shape: just two tired teams finding increasingly creative ways to collide with each other. At one point in extra time the sensational Jule Brand went on a dribble past halfway and, seeing three blue shirts congregating on her, basically changed her mind, let the ball go and decided to get back into position. As for France, it was a night for reverting to type. For confirming every pre-existing stereotype of them. For demonstrating why this team of such incredible individual talent have never been able to fulfil that talent as a collective. Forced to break down a team with no intention of giving them the space in behind they love to exploit, they were utterly devoid of ideas, of creativity, of passing guile, of any real strategy beyond giving it to the wingers and seeing if the next stepover might work any better than the last. Perhaps you could argue that Hendrich's red card for pulling the hair of Griedge Mbock actually simplified Germany's task. Even so, it would have taken a brave seer to predict anything but a French victory at that point, especially after an injury to Sarai Linder at right-back. But her replacement, Sophia Kleinherne was immense, as were the two big pre-match selections by Christian Wück: Giovanna Hoffmann up front and Franziska Kett at left-back. Kleinherne completed just two passes all night, Brand just eight. But of course these were not the key milestones. Try Rebecca Knaak's 13 clearances, Janina Minge's 11, the 16 tackles, Sjoeke Nüsken's first tournament goal. And of course there were nine saves from the hands of Berger, a goalkeeper who could have been cherry-picked for this assignment, one relying less on silky ball-work than on sheer, gravelly defiance. Sign up to Moving the Goalposts No topic is too small or too big for us to cover as we deliver a twice-weekly roundup of the wonderful world of women's football after newsletter promotion Berger had come in for considerable criticism after some misplaced passes in the 4-1 defeat by Sweden. And of course her old-school style sometimes feels at odds with the more progressive, possession-based kind of football the modern Germany want to play. But give her a goal and she will protect it with her life. She's beaten thyroid cancer twice. She can probably deal with your inswinging cross. As the minutes leaked away, as France had a goal disallowed, as Germany missed their own penalty, the German fans behind Berger's goal slowly began to warm to their task. Increasingly the French players were bearing forlorn expressions, negative body language, crushed by the burden of having to win this match several times over simply to win it once. Or perhaps not at all. Because after two hours and 13 penalties, Berger was flying again. Amel Majri had been the first to fail, then Berger had scored a penalty of her own, and now Alice Sombath had put her kick at a pleasant height, and once more Berger was the commander of angles and time. She palmed the ball away. Rose to her knees. And in the moments before her victorious teammates mobbed her, Berger was simply kneeling there: imploring us to adore her, a woman who through everything had never stopped believing in herself.
