Latest news with #JoséMourinho
Yahoo
9 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
📺 Champions League winner: This pro kickstarted his career on TV
This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇩🇪 here. From dishwasher to millionaire? Anyone can do that. From substitute player to regular team member? Many can do that. Advertisement But from TV show participant to Champions League winner? Only one person has achieved that so far – Ben Greenhalgh. The following story is something nobody will believe you when you tell it at the next pub evening. The Brit Ben Greenhalgh already knew in 2009 that he was quite good at playing football, when he applied for the TV show Football's Next Star. And yet, the then 17-year-old had never managed to get into a youth academy of a professional club. So why not go on the show – if the winner would get a six-month contract with a Champions League club? Easy decision. Ben Greenhalgh came, saw, and conquered. Eight episodes after his first appearance, the left winger had actually made it through. Against 20,000 other applicants. We repeat: 20,000. In the end, he held a contract for Inter Milan's youth department in his hands. The logical consequence? Advertisement Just half a year later, the Englishman actually won the Champions League with the Nerazzurri. Before that, he had convinced coaching legend José Mourinho so much that he included him in the Champions League squad. At the age of 18, Greenhalgh was thus at the very top of the football world – and the fairy tale continued. Without having played a single game for the professionals, Inter gave the TV star a one-year contract and then loaned him to Como. With the lakeside team, he mainly played in the youth team, before returning to England. Was that it? Not quite: until 2025, the current manager of non-league club Margate FC still played for several semi-professional clubs – mostly in the fifth tier of English football. And because a sports career rarely comes alone, Greenhalgh suddenly made a name for himself in another discipline in 2015. Advertisement He joined the PGA Tour and became a professional golfer for several months. A man who has convinced José Mourinho of his abilities can apparently do anything. 🤯 📸 CHRISTOPHE SIMON
Times
6 days ago
- Sport
- Times
Joyful Scott McTominay — a title-chaser made and discarded by United
Almost from the moment that Scott McTominay pulled on the red jersey of Manchester United's first team, there was a perception of him as a certain type of player: humble, attentive, and above all, unfailingly obedient. In 2018, his breakthrough season under José Mourinho, a source told the Independent that he was 'an ideal blank canvas' to whom Mourinho 'can give specific tactical instructions that will be rigorously carried out'. The next season, he was described in another report as 'a player whose greatest skill seems to be doing exactly what the manager tells him to do'. In 2021, with Ole Gunnar Solskjaer now in charge, another article quoted a dressing-room insider as saying: 'He follows instructions. He doesn't ask loads of questions but he's
The Guardian
7 days ago
- Sport
- The Guardian
Come Dine With Ange: Tottenham's tasty prophecy
You won, [Ange]. Enjoy [Bigger Vase], I hope it makes you happy. Dear lord, what a sad little [final]. You ruined my night completely so you could have [Bigger Vase] and I hope now you can spend it on lessons in [tactics] and [recruitment]. Because [your team] had all the [season] of a reversing dump truck without any tyres on. So Ange, take your [Bigger Vase] and get off my [TV screen]. Watching the Bigger Vase final might have been more painful than Charlie Nicholas' Sky Sports News b@nter, but you have to hand it to Ange Postecoglou. In one swoop, with one absolutely abysmal goal, the Australian has won Tottenham Hotspur's first trophy in 17 years, secured Bigger Cup qualification and delivered on his promise that he 'always wins a trophy in my second season'. Being bold and coming good on a footballing prophecy is bada$$, whichever way you cut it. We loved Brian Clough for his bravado and brash quotes but only because he could back it up. When José Mourinho announced he was 'the Special One', shortly before laying waste to the rest of the Premier League, we all nodded along afterwards with a begrudging respect. Heck, even when Sean Dyche suggested on co-commentary for this year's FA Cup final that Crystal Palace should 'hit it up to the big man' to beat Manchester City's press, 10 seconds before they went long to Jean-Philippe Mateta who set up their winning goal, Football Daily sat back in awe. So fair play to Big Ange. 'All I've done in my career is win,' roared Postecoglou, as he channelled the vibes of Carlo Ancelotti atop a rooftop bus, wearing sunnies and smoking a cigar. 'Even Daniel [Levy, Spurs' chairman] said: 'We've gone for winners [in the past] and now we have Ange.' Mate, I'm a winner. All I know is I'm going to go back to my hotel room, open a bottle of scotch, have a couple of quiet ones and prepare for a big parade on Friday. I don't feel like I've completed the job yet, we're still building. The moment I took the job, I wanted to win something. We've done that. It's the toughest thing I've ever done.' Watching that final was genuinely one of the toughest things Football Daily has done, but at least the celebrations and shenanigans were worth staying up for. James Maddison had a lovely pop at Roy Keane in his post-match interview. Archie Gray showed exceptional ball knowledge by doing the Ronaldinho/Bigger Cup anthem lip-licking meme (Gray was three when Ronnie originally did that). You'd have to have a heart of stone not to be touched by Son Heung-min sobbing uncontrollably into the shoulder of his father and renowned taskmaster, Dad Heung-min Son Woong-jung, after the final whistle with the first club trophy of the South Korean's career. Just as they have been all season, Manchester United were dreadful and deserved nothing from the contest, with Ruben Amorim admitting afterwards his head was on the chopping block. 'I have nothing to show to the fans,' shrugged the Portuguese. 'If the board and fans feel I am not the right guy, I will go in the next day without any conversation about compensation, but I will not quit.' Football isn't always the beautiful game. Sometimes you just need to win, and that's what Spurs did. Congratulations to them and good luck next season in Bigger Cup. Based upon whatever that was in Bilbao, they might need it. 'Obviously it's hard for everyone. Our season was sh!t. We didn't beat anyone in the league. We lacked a lot of things' – Alejandro Garnacho brings some understatement to his funky analysis of Manchester United's season. Re: yesterday's Football Daily letters. It doesn't seem to have occurred to your other 1,056 readers that, far from making the Premier League a laughing stock, the fact that that the 16th and 17th 'best' in the Greatest League in the World™ competed in the final for the second best Euro trophy shows the strength in depth and talent within that league. In fact, if one wants to be unkind, you could say that all of the other 'European' clubs in the competition must have been rubbish if they couldn't prevent this from happening' – Martin Bleasdale (and no others). Someone please give me the Manchester United manager job please. If I do nothing, absolutely nothing, they will still finish better than this year. And I get to watch 38 games from the dugout, chewing gum, throwing tantrums, fighting with the officials, gesticulating wildly, giving interviews. And I am ready to take 20% of Ruben Amorim's salary. That is a huge amount saved for Big Sir Jim' – Krishna Moorthy. For Spurs, a trophy. For United, atrophy' – Mark McFadden. Not sure if I've been in an alternate dimension, but bravo to the Magpies, Eagles and now the, erm, C0cks on ending their respective avian trophy droughts. Special mention to Spurs (and Manchester United) for their part in the most awful, inept match I've seen in some time. As someone watching Luton all season (and thus being a connoisseur of such things) that's quite the achievement' – Kevin Goddard. Send letters to Today's letter o' the day winner is … Martin Bleasdale, who lands some Football Weekly merch. We'll be in touch. Terms and conditions for our competitions, when we run them, can be viewed here. The Football Weekly pod squad are back for an extra dose of aural entertainment as they pick over Bigger Vase final. A year ago, Southend United seemed trapped in a years-long doomloop of winding-up hearings, financial crisis, failed stadium projects and footballing decline. Then in July salvation finally came when a consortium led by the Australian IT millionaire Justin Rees completed a takeover from the long-distrusted Ron Martin. Fast forward 10 months and the Shrimpers are off to Wembley for the National League playoff final after squeaking past Forest Green on penalties at the New Lawn on Wednesday. Having led through Ben Goodliffe's header early in the second half, Southend found themselves staring at defeat after Ryan Inniss scored to take the tie to extra time and Emmanuel Osadebe promptly put Forest Green ahead on 94 minutes. Step forward Jack Bridge, who levelled with four minutes remaining after a neat move to set up penalties. Gus Scott-Morriss then proved the match-winner, keeping his cool after two missed Forest Green penalties to slot home and seal a 4-2 shootout win. It was all a rich reward for Southend's manager, Kevin Maher, who has been in charge since 2021 and stuck with the club through numerous crises. Not that he saw the winning moment. 'I watched most of [the penalties] but I couldn't watch the last one,' he exclaimed. Maher's side will meet Oldham, another club who have emerged from financial crisis in recent years, on 1 June in what could be one of the season's more feelgood finals. Five Valladolid fans who abused Real Madrid forward Vinícius Júnior have been given suspended prison sentences, in what La Liga described as a landmark ruling that condemned racist insults hurled in a stadium as a hate crime. You had one job dept: Uefa has offered its 'sincerest apologies' after Aleksander Ceferin ran out of medals during Spurs' ceremony. Three players, including captain Son Heung-min, had to wait to receive their baubles later on. Ruben Amorim will be handed almost £100m to rebuild Manchester United, although most of that could be spent on signing Wolves attacker Matheus Cunha and striker Liam Delap from Ipswich. It's no Mickey Mouse competition – but Women's Bigger Cup will be shown live on Disney+ from next season in the UK and across Europe. Police and hospital staff in Liverpool have urged fans not to bring flares to the club's title parade, after a number of children suffered burn injuries following the victory over Tottenham last month. AFC Whyteleafe have been crowned champions of the Combined Counties Premier South, despite finishing third in the table. Whyteleafe, who lost the FA Vase final earlier this month, earned top spot and promotion after Jersey Bulls and Redhill were both docked three points for fielding an ineligible player. And TV's Jeff Stelling has resigned as honorary president of Hartlepool United in protest at owner Raj Singh's handling of negotiations to sell up. The club issued a lengthy statement on Wednesday evening in which they claimed an agreement with one potential buyer was reached in March, but that proof of funds for next season had yet to be deposited, while also revealing a plan to poll season-ticket holders over whether or not Singh should resume control. 'Supporters have been left in an intolerable position with a perceived threat to the future of the club should they not support the current owner,' sniffed Stelling. 'Let's remember it was him who wanted to stop funding the club. Yet now he seems almost affronted that others want to take over … I will always love this club and wish all our fans the best.' Barcelona are big favourites to beat Arsenal in the Women's Big Cup final, but this season hasn't been all plain sailing. Alex Ibaceta has more in this extract from the latest edition of Moving the Goalposts. What happens to a one-man team when that player goes missing? Jamie Jackson reflects on a miserable night for Bruno Fernandes in Bilbao. Meanwhile, Max Rushden soaks up a Tottenham trophy from the other side of the world, Jonathan Wilson looks back at a baffling final and David Hytner casts his eye into the future for Ange. 'When I got the diagnosis they asked me how many footballs I headed': Dean Windass talks to Nick Ames about dementia, charity work and his most famous goal. Extremely loud and incredibly scouse: a contender for headline of the year, and an enjoyable long read on Jamie Carragher's rise to the top of the punditry pyramid. Smoke cannons! Rolling substitutions! Goals, goals, goals! Tom Garry was in Estoril to see World Sevens kick off in a big moment for the women's game. And what's at stake on the final day? Andy Hunter outlines the race for Bigger Cup places, a complicated twist and how 10 Premier League teams could be in Europe next term. Nurse! It's that victory parade time of year, so here's a glimpse back to May 1987 as Coventry fans use the Lady Godiva statue as a vantage point while awaiting the team's celebratory jaunt around the city following their famous FA Cup win.
ABC News
22-05-2025
- Sport
- ABC News
Ange Postecoglou always wins a trophy in his second season, silencing his Tottenham Hotspur doubters
To some, it was a meaningless boast. To others, it was a delusional symptom of the failure virus that has infiltrated everything associated with Tottenham for the past two decades or more. To Ange Postecoglou, it was belief. "People misinterpreted me," the Spurs coach told TNT Sports, minutes after holding the UEFA Europa League trophy aloft, a grin of the likes many among the football community had forgotten existed beneath the gruff, cantankerous exterior of this stranger from the Antipodes — if they ever believed it was there at all. "It was not me boasting, just me making a declaration and I believed it." He was, of course, talking about his statement, delivered in that familiar, dead-pan drawl back in September following a 1-0 Premier League defeat against Arsenal. He had been asked about another statement he had made at the start of the season, his second with the lumbering, Lilywhite giants of north London when he said: "Usually in my second season I win things." Said by anyone else, at almost any other club, and the statement would have been met with the standard response to any pre-season bluster of a man desperate for success. At Spurs though, it was just jarring. An anachronism. Spurs don't win things. Antonio Conte, at that stage a winner of 11 major trophies in Italy and England couldn't do it. Nor could José Mourinho, a multiple trophy winner at almost every club he's ever managed couldn't get Spurs over the line either. Not even Spurs' most beloved manager of the modern era, Mauricio Pochettino, could take that final step towards silverware. Tottenham's almost lycanthropic aversion to silver was becoming legendary. So when Postecoglou doubled down, the scorn was palpable. "I'll correct myself — I don't usually win things, I always win things in my second year," Postecoglou told Sky Sports. "I've said it now. I don't say things unless I believe them." Fast forward eight months, with Spurs hiding near the bottom of the Premier League table after a torrid domestic season, it turns out Postecoglou was right after all. "I know our league form has been unacceptable, but coming third was not going to change this football club," Postecolgou told TNT Sports in Bilbao following Spurs' gritty 1-0 victory over Manchester United. "Winning a trophy would, that was my ambition and I was prepared to wear it if it did not happen." The only thing Postecolgou was wearing following 90 minutes of desperate football was a grin the size of Port Phillip Bay — and a winners medal around his neck. "He has done his job," match winner Brennan Johnson told TNT post-match "He said he wins in the second year and he has, if there's ever a time for a mic drop, it's now." Mic drop or not, Postecoglou could be excused for wearing a cloak of smug satisfaction in addition to his winners medal. For so long and to so many, Postecoglou has been considered a novelty, a miscarriage of the work he has done across so many footballing landscapes over his lengthy career. "Even Daniel [Levy, Spurs chairman] sort of said, we went after winners, it didn't work, now we've got Ange," Postecolgou said in his press conference. "Mate, I'm a winner. I've been a serial winner my whole career. "All I've done my whole career is win things." From the semi-pro NSL and under-appreciated A-League in Australia, the alien environment of Japan right through to the hostile sectarianism of Scotland, Postecoglou has won. Two NSL Championships and a Premiership with South Melbourne, plus the OFC Club Championship. Two A-League Championships and a Premiership with Brisbane Roar. The AFC Asian Cup with the Socceroos, plus six under-age OFC titles and an AFC crown with various junior Socceroos teams. The J-League with Yokohama F. Marinos. Two Scottish Premierships, a Scottish Cup and two Scottish League Cups with Celtic. And now he's done it with Spurs. "This club has had some unbelievable world class coaches, world class players, and they haven't had a night like this," he said. "I know people dismiss my achievements because they didn't happen on this side of the world, but for me they were all hard earned." None were more hard earned than this one. Spurs had to defend resolutely throughout a match they had just 27 per cent of the ball in. They allowed Manchester United 16 shots, five of which forced a save from Guglielmo Vicario and one a stunning overhead clearance off the line from Micky van de Ven. Postecoglou had selected a midfield of Pape Sarr, Yves Bissouma and Rodrigo Bentancur, all defensively minded players — albeit one that was born out of necessity more than anything else due to injury. Late in the match Spurs had three centre backs on the pitch, Kevin Danso joining Cristian Romero and van de Ven as Spurs shut up shop, a dramatic and glaring change from the attack at all costs line Postecoglou has pedalled in the league all year. "Knockout football is always different," Postecoglou said, pointing to his experience in Australia of playing finals to win championships. "All my teams have always played a little different in knockout games. "Big games come down to moments, you've got to limit the moments of the opposition." Spurs may not have limited United too much, but in the moments the Red Devils did create opportunities his defenders stood up, defenders that have missed so much of this domestic season, adding credence to Postecoglou's assertion that Spurs' woeful league position is not a fair reflection. Postecoglou said there were no meetings planned with the club hierarchy before the end of the season. His immediate future at the club still in doubt despite him inking himself indelibly into its history. But whatever happens, Postecoglou has answered his critics. Again. If his destiny lies away from North London, then so be it, but wherever the Aussie ends up next, he can walk down the Tottenham High Road with a spring in his step and his head held high. "Que Sera, Sera," as Postecolgou said leaving the press conference. Whatever will be, will be.
The Guardian
21-05-2025
- Sport
- The Guardian
Spurs prevail with Mourinho blueprint and ultra pragmatism in baffling final
Finals are not for the playing; they're for the winning. Who cares about the spectacle? Who cares about the quality? At some level football is always more about the narrative and the drama than technical mastery. Tottenham certainly will cheerily ignore what a shambolic game of football this was as they bask in their first trophy since 2008, their first in European competition in 40 years. Glory comes in many forms, and just because this might not be how Danny Blanchflower sanctioned it, does not mean this was not, in its own way, glorious. But it was a baffling game. For the third round in a row, Tottenham prevailed with a sort of ultra pragmatism. Ange Postecoglou always wins a trophy in his second season, a fact of which he has delighted in reminding everybody. It just seems odd that it took him that long to move away from his characteristic attacking, high-pressing style to a blueprint José Mourinho might have left behind in a drawer. Ange stared into the Barclays, but the Barclays stared back far harder into him. This is Tottenham, the club of Arthur Rowe and Bill Nicholson, the masters of push-and-run, and they won a major final with a 61% pass completion rate. They completed just 115 passes in the entire game, none of them key. That's one accurate pass every 52 seconds. But they won, and that, for now, is all that matters. However unsatisfactory the game, there was no mistaking the joy at the final whistle, the players cavorting in the goalmouth, the great roar form the fans in white at that end of the ground. From the off, the game was bewilderingly frenzied. There was little pattern, little composure, no sense of feeling the opponent out, just a manic intensity as though neither side could quite believe they were in a European final. Perhaps they'd looked at the Premier League table recently. Goodness knows what the rest of the world thought: you spent all that money buying the best we had, for that? There has been a theory as each side has won only one of their past 10 league games, that their position in the table is false, a reflection less of their ability than of the fact that the league had ceased to be a priority. But this looked an awful lot like 16th v 17th in the Premier League. There were mistakes everywhere, perhaps most alarmingly from a Spurs point of view from Guglielmo Vicario, who made fine saves from Alejandro Garnacho and Luke Shaw but had a fretful, skittish game. His flap at a corner midway through the second half presented Rasmus Højlund with an apparently open net. But as Højlund's header looped towards goal, there suddenly, decisively, was Micky van de Ven, flying through the air to hook clear. It can be debated whether it's entirely wise to base a defensive policy on the implausible pace of one man, particularly a 6ft 4in Dutchman whose hamstrings practically sing with the strain every time he moves, but in the very immediate term it worked. The decisive moment was entirely in keeping with a game that was thrilling in its scrappiness, a mess of a goal to settle a mess of a game. In fairness, it began with the first bit of subtlety Tottenham had shown around the box from Richarlison, who had not until that moment seemed likely to offer the moment of inspiration. This, fleetingly, was a return to the lithe forward he had once been, before the injuries transformed him into a glowering brawler. But it was his dart infield and reverse pass to Rodrigo Bentancur that unlocked the door – if it was actually locked, which remains unclear. Only when Pape Sarr, receiving the ball from the Uruguayan, whipped in a dangerous inswinging cross did the prevailing mood reassert itself, as the ball eventually found its way past a flailing André Onana off Shaw's arm. Brennan Johnson had applied the pressure to force the mistake, but it was not good goalkeeping and it was not good defending, an absolute clown-car of a goal. If anything, that should intensify the urge for Spurs to win more in the coming years, if only so their pre-match montage at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium doesn't have to end with such a ludicrous goal. Sign up to Football Daily Kick off your evenings with the Guardian's take on the world of football after newsletter promotion For Johnson himself, it was a moment of the sweetest vindication. He had become the target of sections of the Spurs fans' frustration earlier in the season, deactivating his Instagram account in September because of the amount of abuse he'd received. When he then scored against Coventry a few days later, he barely celebrated. The sense was of a disillusioned player questioning his position in the game. As he has been credited with the goal in the final, it was his 18th of the season in all competitions. And of course Tottenham will not care at all about the nature of their display or the game. At least not tonight or tomorrow. But at some point soon a decision will have to be made on whether they really want to commit their future to this new Barclaysball Postecoglou.
