Milan set Okafor asking price after brace against Liverpool
According to what has been reported by the Gazzetta dello Sport, via MilanNews24, Milan are hoping for offers in the region of €12-15 million for the Swiss international.
HONG KONG, CHINA – JULY 26: Noah Okafor (C) celebrates after scoring his goal with Alexis Saelemaekers (L) and Rafael Leao (R) during the Pre-Season Friendly match at Kai Tak Stadium on July 26, 2025 in Hong Kong, China. (Photo by Yu Chun Christopher Wong/Eurasia)
The former Basel and Salzburg player spent the second half of the 2024-25 season on-loan with eventual Scudetto winners Napoli, with whom he played just four times.
Okafor a casualty of sensible Milan strategy
Milan are undergoing pragmatic changes in the way the club operates. The Rossoneri are prepared to sell any player considered surplus to the requirements of new head coach Massimiliano Allegri, allowing the club to generate revenue to bring in additional reinforcements where needed.
OCTOBER 22: Tijjani Reijnders (R) celebrates his second goal with his team-mate Noah Okafor during the UEFA Champions League 2024/25 League Phase MD3 match between AC Milan and Club Brugge KV at Stadio San Siro on October 22, 2024. (Photo by)
Okafor played well against Liverpool but is still outside of the plans of Allegri for the upcoming season and therefore the Rossoneri are ready to entertain offers for the Swiss forward.
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Indianapolis Star
14 minutes ago
- Indianapolis Star
LOST GYMS: 'This was Hoosier Hysteria.' Tyson Auditorium was temporary home for one of Indiana's most famous teams
This is the eighth of a 10-part series featuring some of Indiana high school basketball's "Lost Gyms." VERSAILLES – Rob Moorhead does not have to close his eyes to feel the memories. He can look around Tyson Auditorium and see them like the chapters of his life. As a kindergartner, Moorhead carried the homecoming crown on the court to South Ripley basketball player Kelvin Comer. He can point to the spot where he sat in the front row behind the basket as an elementary kid in the 1970s, hoping the ball would roll to him so he could pounce on it and hand it back to the referee. He can hear 'Sweet Georgia Brown' blaring from the corner of the gym where the South Ripley band — led by director Gary Holdsworth and wife Patsy — as he floated up the ramp from the locker room to the court for the first time as a freshman. 'That gave me chills,' Moorhead said. 'It still gives me chills when I think back to it.' Tyson Auditorium was a magical 'palace' for Moorhead and hundreds of others from the night it was dedicated on Nov. 1, 1950, with a game against rival Milan, to its current state as an activity center 75 years later. 'Whether I come in here and watch the little kids play or for a reception, whatever it is, you can almost smell the popcorn, you can almost hear the band playing,' said Bob Meyer, a coach and administrator at South Ripley for more than 30 years. 'It's a place where the community would gather — and not just our community but all the communities in Ripley County — to gather and watch basketball on Friday and Saturday night. This place was just awesome. This was 'Hoosier Hysteria.'' Moorhead had more of a personal connection to Tyson Auditorium than most. His father, William 'Gus' Moorhead, came to Versailles right out of Hanover College in 1951. The Versailles basketball program, known as the Frenchies until the students voted in 1950 to change the name to Lions, had previously played in the wood frame community building built in 1924. Versailles hosted — and won — the sectional championship in 1928. But two years later, the gym was already too small to host the sectional tourney. A sparkling new gym was built in 1950 at a cost of $178,000 and with a seating capacity of 2,200. More than half of the of the cost was covered through the trust fund of Versailles native James Tyson, one of the founders of the Walgreens. The capacity of the gym more than doubled the population of the Ripley County community when it was built in 1950 (about 900 residents at the time). But Gus Moorhead's arrival signaled a change in fortune for Versailles basketball — even if the Lions were not the most famous team to play in their own gym. The underdog Milan team that inspired the movie 'Hoosiers' was a county rival of Versailles. At the end of the 1952-53 season, Milan defeated Osgood, Holton and Batesville at Tyson Auditorium to win the sectional championship. Bobby Plump, Ray Craft and the rest of the Indians then shocked the state by winning the regional and semistate, making it all the way to the state finals at Butler Fieldhouse. 'We'd never won a regional game in the history of the school and there we were all of a sudden with a new coach (Marvin Wood), 25 years old, and we were going to the Final Four,' Plump said in 2014. With most of its players returning, the buildup for the 1953-54 season caused Milan to move its home games to Tyson Auditorium. Milan won the sectional there again, defeating Cross Plains, Osgood and host Versailles in the championship to start its famous run to the state championship that ended with Plump's last-second shot to beat Muncie Central. Plump later joked that Moorhead told him he was 'damn sorry he loaned us that gym.' Plump thanked him for the homecourt advantage. But Moorhead enjoyed a significant homecourt advantage at Tyson in the ensuing years. After demoralizing sectional championship losses to Milan in 1955 and '56, the Lions won the 1957 sectional championship at Tyson — its first in 29 years. Versailles went on to win sectional titles the next three years, forever solidifying Moorhead's coaching legacy at the school. He coached at Versailles until it consolidated to form South Ripley in 1966, then coached the new school for two more years before becoming the school's principal for 23 years until his retirement in 1991. 'I grew up on stories of Tyson Auditorium,' said Rob Moorhead, who graduated from South Ripley in 1983. 'Dad talks about when he first got the job here that this place was a palace. It was the nicest gym of its kind anywhere in the area and largest gym of its kind anywhere in the area at the time.' Moorhead grew up just down the street from Tyson Auditorium, where he could often find his father scouting other Ripley County teams — like Milan — that would use the gym for home games. 'He talked about how he could run home and get a sandwich and then scout right here at Tyson,' Moorhead said. The consolidation originally brought the schools of Versailles, New Marion and Cross Plains together in 1966. When the nearby Holton Warhorses were absorbed in 1969, the combination brought a magical undefeated season. Coach Dale Ricketts, a member of the 1959 Versailles team, returned five starters that season and brought on three more from Holton, including leading scorer Comer. South Ripley knocked off Batesville in double overtime in the sectional championship at Batesville, then defeated North Decatur and Lawrenceburg to win the regional. The road ended there with a loss to Crispus Attucks in the first game of the semistate at Hinkle Fieldhouse, but the 25-1 season and tournament run by a school of 418 students at the time is still remembered fondly. 'We idolized those guys who were out there on the playing floor,' Moorhead said. Even years later, by the time Meyer arrived as an assistant coach in 1979 to Ted Ahaus, the fans of the communities that made up South Ripley would sit together in Tyson Auditorium. 'The Holton people sat close to the bench, the Versailles people sat here on the end and the Cross Plains and New Marion people sat over here,' Meyer said, pointing to different sections of the bleachers. '… The thing to do at South Ripley was to go the basketball games.' By 1981, the sectional had moved to East Central. But there was more magic that season. IndyStar reporter Bob Williams called 'old Tyson Auditorium one of Southern Indiana's best known hardwood arenas' in his report on South Ripley after the Raiders knocked off Greensburg and Lawrenceburg — two teams that beat them during the season — by a combined three points in the Connersville Regional. After the 63-62 win over Lawrenceburg, Tyson was packed with celebrating fans. 'We were supposed to stay in Connersville after we won the regional,' said Stanley Lay, a senior that season. 'We all came back. We left that little hotel we were in and came back and when we came back (into Tyson Auditorium) there were so many people here. Sitting out in front of everybody, there was just this feeling that, 'This is what stardom looks like.' After that, every business in town was like, 'Come see us and we'll give you free candy bars.'' Mike Meisberger, also a senior that season, said the caravan of cars to and from Connersville — followed by the semistate the following week at Hinkle Fieldhouse — brought comparisons of the 1954 Milan team, just a few years before 'Hoosiers' was released. 'There was an eerie resemblance from the movie that brought back special memories,' said Meisberger, whose three-point play with 6 seconds remaining was the difference in the 76-74 comeback win over Greensburg in the regional. For Meisberger and nearly all of his teammates, Tyson Auditorium was like a second home. Through elementary school, recess in the winter and other rainy days were often spent on the gym floor. 'You can imagine 100 to 120 kids in the gym and we're attempting to play full-court basketball,' Meisberger said with a laugh. Meisberger's father, later a principal at nearby Sunman, played at New Marion prior to the consolidation. His family moved from a rural farm into Versailles prior to his freshman year. '(My dad) never pushed me into basketball,' Meisberger said. 'But growing up in a small community, I had a love of basketball as early as I can remember. Like the movie 'Hoosiers' we had an old wooden backboard and shot in the gravel. That was our court. All the neighborhood kids would get together and play games on the weekends.' Meisberger was a freshman in 1977-78 when South Ripley won its first sectional in eight years under coach Stan Weber, who would go on to coach at Brownstown Central and won more than 400 games in his long career. Jeff Buchanan, a senior on that 1978 team, wore No. 24 before Meisberger. Buchanan pulled Meisberger aside after the season outside the gym doors. 'He said, 'I guess it's time for you to know where the basketball team key is,'' Meisberger said. 'He said, 'It's over here under the shrubs outside the door.' You could take the coat hanger and hook it through the door and open the door. If you wanted to come in here on the weekends, or come in on break, you could come in here and play basketball, unbeknownst to most and not condoned.' Dale Hankins, the school custodian, would occasionally 'catch' Meisberger and others shooting or playing in the gym. 'Just make sure you turn the lights off and lock the door,' Hankins told them. 'So many weekends were spent in here just shooting and working on our game,' Meisberger said. 'I guess it was a tradition passed down to a few from the upperclassmen. That was a pretty cool deal.' Coaching against South Ripley in Tyson Auditorium could be a nightmare for opposing coaches. Rob Moorhead experienced the other side as the coach at South Dearborn in the early 1990s. In late January of 1987, undefeated East Central visited South Ripley with a 14-0 record and state ranking. It left with a 47-41 loss in Meyer's second season as coach. 'I'm standing over here and (East Central coach Steve Brunes) walked by me and he said, 'I just hate this place — I can't win here,'' said Meyer, who played in the gym as an opposing player at Aurora. 'And they didn't win that night either. Area coaches loved to play here, even though they said they didn't. They didn't because they knew they were probably going to walk out of here with a loss.' It was not always fun for the home team. Moorhead remembers commenting to Meyer, then an assistant, about how cold the gym was before a practice over Christmas break. He had barely finished his sentence when Meyer blurted out 'On the line!' 'We got him warmed up real quick,' Meyer said. Another time, in a game against Madison Shawe that South Ripley led handily, Moorhead got a steal on the press with nothing between him and the basket. 'Dunk time,' he thought. He went up with a left hand and … boom. Except the ball went off the back of the rim and soared into the air for what seemed like an eternity. 'The only thing that went higher was the folding chair that my dad was sitting in as he turned and kicked it against the wall,' Moorhead said of his father, who was then the school principal. 'He was not happy with my choice to try and dunk the basketball. By the time the ball and the chair hit the ground, coach Ahaus had a sub waiting for me.' Moorhead called home from the school that night to ask his mom if his dad had gone to bed. 'He's not going to bed until you get here,' his mother told him. They had 'Oscar Robertson conversation' that night. 'You take the easiest shot you can get in any situation,' Gus Moorhead told him. When Rob contested that the crowd would have loved it, the ol' coach responded: 'Yeah … if you would have made it.' South Ripley continued to play its games at Tyson Auditorium through the 2007-08 season before moving into a new gym at the high school. 'They did a really nice job of sending Tyson out in style,' Moorhead said. 'They had several nights where they recognized past teams that had played here that won sectional championships. A lot of us were back for the final home game here. It was bittersweet, but I think people realized this place had served its purpose for our schools for a number of years … but the nostalgia and the memories here at Tyson just can't be replicated.' Tyson — a gym Plump once called 'one of the marvels of the world' — mostly sat empty in the ensuing years. It was named one of Indiana Landmarks' '10 most endangered historic places in Indiana.' But a group of three couples, led by Jeff and Aimee Cornett, started a non-profit called the Tyson Community Advancement Foundation after purchasing the gym from the school and renamed it the Tyson Activities Center. Jeff Cornett, a 1991 South Ripley graduate, said the gym has served many purposes for the past decade-plus, including camps, parties, weightlifting, volleyball and various other community events. In 2021, high school basketball returned to Tyson Auditorium for the 'Ol' Coach Classic', a junior varsity tournament in honor of Gus Moorhead, who was inducted into the Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame in 1980. Two of the JV teams were coached by grandsons of the former coach — Brad Moorhead of Edgewood and Trent Moorhead of Hauser. 'A lot of the older folks that I remember going to games love to come in here,' Cornett said. 'It's a joy to see them in here. It's a joy to see the young kids in here, too, because they are going to experience a little bit of what it was.' There are tentative plans to play a varsity game at Tyson Auditorium, perhaps as early as this season. Through grants — primarily from the James Tyson fund — the non-profit group has been able to make necessary upgrades to the exterior and interior of the gym, which still sparkles after 75 years. Hopefully, it can serve the community for at least 75 more. 'I think that's what Mr. Tyson's vision was for this place,' Lay said. 'A community facility for people to share with one another and talk with one another. It's another awesome piece of what he meant to this town and this place … I'm so glad it's still here.'
Yahoo
41 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Everton in danger of false start in new home
By his own admission, David Moyes is not immediately drawn to Snoop Dogg's music. But there is a sentence in one of the best-selling and influential rap artists of all time's most famous songs that probably sums up Moyes' mood at the moment. Halfway through Drop It Like It's Hot, Snoop declares "I can't fake it". Moyes saw Snoop perform at the Super Bowl on his previous visit to Atlanta in 2019. The event was memorable - the game, according to the Scot, was not, as the New England Patriots beat the Los Angeles Rams, Snoop's team, 13-3. On Sunday, at the magnificent Mercedes Benz Stadium, a 2-2 draw with Manchester United was better as far as Moyes' Everton side were concerned. It meant they finished with one point, and bottom of the Premier League Summer Series table. Having lost their previous three pre-season matches, the results are starting to be a concern - Moyes can't fake it. It certainly is not what most Evertonians felt the situation would be as they prepare for their eagerly awaited final test event in their new home against Roma on Saturday. With a new stadium, ambitious new owners and a manager who understood them, this was meant to be the start of a new era. Yet Moyes' final press conference at the Premier League Summer Series centred on a familiar theme. "I think there'll be deals next week," he said. "I think we're getting much closer. But I felt that four or five weeks ago as well. "Obviously, we're getting near the tickly bits and we've got to get some things done." How to join BBC Sport's FPL league Lack of movement on the transfer front has been a running commentary in Moyes' engagement with the media throughout Everton's 12-day trip. From saying he needed up to nine new players - he has got three so now it is down to six - to expressing concern that when they do eventually arrive it will be too late for a proper integration before the opening Premier League game at Leeds on 18 August. There has been movement. Thierno Barry has joined from Villarreal for £27m and Adam Aznou, 19, completed his switch from Bayern Munich for about £8m last week. But both are new to the Premier League. Moyes privately feels it is asking a lot for either to make an immediate impact. Southampton's exciting talent Tyler Dibling is one of those Moyes expects Everton to land this week. Dibling clearly has Premier League experience and his arrival would be a positive, yet, at 19, he is also one for the future. It was impossible not to see Moyes in animated conversation with Tomas Soucek, someone he knows so well from his time at West Ham, at Chicago's Soldier Field last Wednesday, and think that is exactly the kind of player Everton need; solid, experienced, dependable. Soucek is not a target but Moyes will be on the lookout for a player with similar attributes to the Czech Republic skipper, who he signed permanently for West Ham in 2020 for £19.1m. When he was introduced into the second half of the West Ham game after recovering from injury, centre-half James Tarkowski made an immediate impact by covering a dangerous attack and simply shrugging Jarrod Bowen off the ball to win possession for his team. Tarkowski is another of those players Moyes can trust, albeit he gave a penalty away in the final game of the US trip by sticking his arm into Manchester United's Amad Diallo - even if the actual contact was minimum. Moyes believes Jarrad Branthwaite might be fit enough to join the main group for training this week after the 23-year-old missed the US trip with a minor niggle. Having Branthwaite and Tarkowski back in defence will make Everton more solid. But Moyes knows it is not enough, which is why all the talk of Jack Grealish heading to the club might be premature. Grealish would undoubtedly be an exciting addition, albeit with significant caveats around his form - he has not been the same player since Manchester City's 2023 Treble season and Moyes is not one to easily dismiss Pep Guardiola's assessment of the 29-year-old - and cost, even of a loan. However, if it is to happen, it will be much later in the window. Everton have far more fundamental issues to address just now. It wasn't supposed to be like this. Getting Farhad Moshiri out was felt by many supporters to have come at the perfect time, with ideas of new investment to coincide with the long-anticipated move to the magnificent Hill Dickinson Stadium. Yet Moyes wonders whether the vision has got in the way of reality. "There could be teething problems at the start," he said. "Whether it be the stadium, whether it be with new owners, whether it be all sorts of things coming in. "All Evertonians are looking to the future now. They don't want to look back on the past. We want to believe that something better is ahead of us. "I think it will be better. My job is to give them a team to enjoy coming to watch. I thought we might have been a bit further down the line by now, but we're not." Latest Everton news, analysis and fan views Get Everton news sent straight to your phone
Yahoo
41 minutes ago
- Yahoo
How to watch Liverpool vs Athletic Club for FREE: TV channel and live stream for pre-season friendlies today
Liverpool conclude their pre-season matches tonight with a double-header against Athletic Club at Anfield. The Reds began their Premier League title defence preparations away to Preston North End last month, winning that match and a subsequent outing against Stoke City before being beaten by AC Milan. Arne Slot's side then wrapped up their pre-season tour of Asia with a 3-1 victory over Yokohoma in the World Challenge, a match which brought a debut for Hugo Ekitike and a maiden Liverpool goal for Florian Wirtz. Now, fresh from unveiling their new adidas kit and the squad numbers of summer signings including Wirtz (No 7) and Ekitike (No 22), and as the club's latest transfer saga continues, Liverpool will host their La Liga opponents for a pair of back-to-back friendlies, kicking off at 5pm and 8pm BST. With the chance to field two different starting line-ups against the Basque outfit, who finished fourth in the Spanish top flight and reached the Europa League semi-finals last season, Slot could provide clues as to his first-choice XI ahead of next weekend's Community Shield, held at Wembley against FA Cup winners Crystal Palace. After that the start of the 2025-26 Premier League season will be upon us, kicked off by the Reds welcoming Bournemouth to Merseyside. How to watch Liverpool vs Athletic Club for FREE TV channel: In the UK, the game will be televised live on LFCTV. Coverage is due to begin at 4pm BST on Monday, August 4, 2025, ahead of the 5pm and 8pm kick-offs. Live stream: Subscribers will be able to watch on a live stream via All Red Video (formerly LFCTV GO). A monthly subscription starts at £4.99, however the service offers a one-month free trial, allowing you to watch tonight's game at no cost. Live blog: You can follow all the action on matchday via Standard Sport's double live blog!
