Latest news with #Valencia
Miami Herald
5 hours ago
- Sport
- Miami Herald
Done Deal: Rodrigo De Paul to reunite with Lionel Messi at Inter Miami. Details here
Rodrigo De Paul is one of Lionel Messi's closest friends and his teammate on Argentina's national team. A charismatic central midfielder with a fashion flair, De Paul also happens to be a big fan of David Beckham's, so much so that he emulated the English star's hairdos, from the braids to the pulled-back half-ponytail to the hairband to the bleached blond look. So, it makes perfect sense that if he was going to leave Atletico Madrid, it would be for a chance to join Messi and Beckham at Inter Miami. And a year before the World Cup, no less. Inter Miami has agreed to terms with De Paul for a four-year deal that will be structured as a loan from Atletico Madrid through 2025 with the option to purchase, per a source with knowledge of the negotiations. Inter Miami managing owner Jorge Mas spent last week in Madrid finalizing the deal, with an announcement expected in the coming week. The transfer/buyout fee was in the $12 million to $15 million range, with potential for a higher fee with incentives. If all goes as planned, De Paul could make his Inter Miami debut during the Leagues Cup, which kicks off July 30 with a home game against Mexican club Atlas. The next two Leagues Cup games are against Necaxa Aug. 2 and Pumas Aug. 6, both at Chase Stadium. The 31-year-old, who is nicknamed 'El Motorcito' (Little Motor) for his boundless energy and work rate, will now get to train and play alongside Messi every day in the buildup to the 2026 World Cup, which is being hosted by the United States, Mexico and Canada. De Paul has been a mainstay for Atleti for the past five years, and before that played in Italy for Udinese. He is a box-to-box midfielder who played a crucial role for Argentina in the 2022 World Cup and the 2024 Copa America. He also did a stint with Spanish club Valencia from 2014 to 2016, when Gary Neville was the coach there. Phil Neville, Gary's brother and the former Inter Miami coach, was an assistant coach with Valencia at that time and has fond memories of De Paul. 'He was a very talented young player with great energy and enthusiasm to play football,' Neville told the Miami Herald, when asked about the possibility of De Paul joining Miami. 'He worked so hard every day, and you could tell he was going to have a really great career. He had an infectious personality in the locker room and was loved by all his teammates.' Messi has the same type of on-field telepathy with De Paul as he does with Inter Miami teammates Luis Suarez, Sergio Busquets and Jordi Alba. De Paul always knows where Messi is, provides delivery to the Argentine icon and takes on the role of enforcer/bodyguard when the two are on the field together. Messi already has a professional bodyguard, Yassine Cheuko, and now he will have a second. Suarez, 38, and Busquets, who turns 37 this month, have not renewed their contracts, which expire at the end of this season. Busquets will make $8.8 million this season, second-highest salary on the team behind Messi ($20.5 million), and Suarez makes $1.5 million. The addition of De Paul ensures that Messi has a world-class midfield partner and a close friend on the team for potentially his final season in 2026, especially if Suarez and Busquets decide to retire. MLS rules allow just three Designated Players with salaries exceeding the league maximum. Right now those are Messi, Busquets and Jordi Alba, who recently signed a contract extension through 2027. Messi has not signed his contract extension yet, but negotiations have been ongoing for months, and the De Paul signing indicates that Messi's deal will follow, which certainly would boost ticket sales for the new Miami Freedom Park Stadium, due to open in Spring 2026.
Qatar Tribune
a day ago
- Sport
- Qatar Tribune
Valencia defender Cristhian Mosquera closes in on Arsenal switch
LondoncTypeface:> Valencia defender Cristhian Mosquera has arrived in London ahead of his expected move to Arsenal. The 21-year-old Spaniard is set to provide cover for William Saliba and Gabriel at the heart of the Gunners' defence as manager Mikel Arteta continues to bolster his squad. It is understood Arsenal are hopeful a deal for Mosquera, who played 41 times for Valencia last season, will be completed before they depart for their tour of Singapore and Hong Kong on Saturday. Chelsea forward Noni Madueke's transfer is also in the closing stages. Mosquera and Madueke would become the club's fourth and fifth summer signings. (PA Media/dpa)
Rhyl Journal
a day ago
- Sport
- Rhyl Journal
Valencia defender Cristhian Mosquera closes in on Arsenal switch
The 21-year-old Spaniard is set to provide cover for William Saliba and Gabriel at the heart of the Gunners' defence as manager Mikel Arteta continues to bolster his squad. It is understood Arsenal are hopeful a deal for Mosquera, who played 41 times for Valencia last season, will be completed before they depart for their tour of Singapore and Hong Kong on Saturday evening. Chelsea forward Noni Madueke's £52million transfer is also in the closing stages. Mosquera – who is expected to sign for an initial fee of £13m with performance-related add-ons – and Madueke would become the club's fourth and fifth summer signings. Denmark midfielder Christian Norgaard, Spain international Martin Zubimendi, and goalkeeper Kepa Arrizabalaga have already been confirmed. Arsenal also remain hopeful of signing striker Viktor Gyokeres from Sporting Lisbon, although it is not believed that a deal – which could be worth as much as £65m – is imminent. New sporting director Andrea Berta has wasted no time in improving Arsenal's squad as Arteta eyes a first Premier League title in more than two decades. Gabriel and Myles Lewis-Skelly have also put pen to paper on new contracts in the off-season, with a long-term extension for teenager Ethan Nwaneri believed to be in the pipeline as well.
Miami Herald
a day ago
- Miami Herald
17-year-old calls mom for help as man he met on dating app kills him, FL cops say
A jealous 23-year-old shot and killed a 17-year-old he met on a dating app, Florida authorities said. Henry Jonathan Valencia is charged with second-degree murder in the death of Nosiah Santos on May 30, the Marion County Sheriff's Office announced July 14. Valencia met the teen on Grindr, an online dating app, about four months earlier, and they started talking and spending time together, deputies wrote in an arrest affidavit. A week before the fatal shooting, Valencia went through the teen's phone and found out he was talking to other men, and he became jealous, deputies said after viewing their text messages. The jealousy escalated the day of the shooting when Valencia found out Santos was with a friend Santos had initially met on Grindr, according to deputies and Santos' mom. Valencia went to the teen's family's apartment in Ocala and was upset to find the two together, then he and Santos left in Valencia's car and drove to a gas station, according to investigators. Lydia Albino said after her son left, she got a call from him asking her to come pick him up, saying he didn't want to 'deal' with Valencia anymore, deputies said. She started racing to the gas station about 15 miles away and overheard part of the altercation, she told WOFL. 'He's telling this man, who is older than him, 'I don't want to be with you no more. I'm only 17. This is too much emotional distress. And my mom's on her way to come get me,'' Albino told the outlet. 'And he just kept repetitively telling this man, and this man's like, 'Get in the car. Let's go.'' While they were on the phone, she heard him swear, then he stopped talking, she told investigators. Video surveillance from the gas station showed Valencia and Santos pull up to a pump and stop, then Santos popped the trunk and started taking his belongings out, according to the affidavit. Valencia drove to a different part of the gas station and parked the car, then walked back over to the pump and started getting 'aggressive' toward Santos as he was on the phone, deputies said. Valencia again walked away and came back, yelling at Santos as the teen turned his back on him, according to witnesses and surveillance footage. The teen sat down on the ground, and a witness told deputies he was shaking his head and covering his face as Valencia yelled at him, according to the affidavit. Then Valencia shot Santos in the upper torso, and the teen fell backward as people at the gas station ran for cover, deputies said. Valencia is then accused of repeatedly punching Santos in the head before running back to his car and driving away, according to investigators. By the time Santos' mom got to the gas station, her son had been shot. 'He was already laid out at the pump,' his mom told WOFL. 'I couldn't recognize his face. I started asking, 'Is he alive?' They wouldn't tell me anything.' Santos still had a pulse when fire rescue arrived, but he died at a hospital, deputies said. There was so much blood on his face, detectives said they couldn't tell if he had also been shot in the head. Valencia drove back home to Jacksonville, where law enforcement saw him loading belongings into his vehicle and his mom's vehicle, as if they were 'going to be gone for a significant amount of time,' investigators wrote in the report. Deputies said they stopped Valencia's vehicle once he left home and took him into custody, along with his mom. The mom told investigators her son called her the day before 'crying and upset,' and after their discussion, she told him he needed to contact law enforcement and an attorney, according to the affidavit. During his interview, Valencia said he wasn't the 'aggressor' the day Santos died, but he didn't provide additional details without an attorney present, deputies said. Albino told WOFL her son was fun and 'loved by so many people.' 'He was a very loving young man who had all this stuff he wanted to do,' she told the outlet. 'And smart like you wouldn't even believe.' Ocala is about an 80-mile drive northwest from Orlando.
Irish Times
a day ago
- Sport
- Irish Times
Publican Cause - Frank McNally on the Spanish celebrity of Paddy O'Connell
Most Irish bars on the continent feature a surname only, as with O'Malley's of Marseille, O'Flaherty's of Perpignan, and Finnegan's of Valencia, in all of which I had a pint last week. The James Joyce in Barcelona (where I had one too), is an obvious exception. But then there is Paddy O'Connell's pub in Denia, a town halfway between Valencia and Alicante. That one is so named for an Irish football manager who, in his 1930s heyday, was probably better known in Spain than Joyce, and in some parts of it may still be. He was promoted to 'Don Patricio' eventually. And the respect he earned among Spaniards had a redemptive aspect. Because had he not reinvented himself there, he might today be best remembered for his role in an English betting scandal of 1915. By then he had won five international caps playing for a 32-county Irish team, the last of them a heroic performance as captain that helped win the British 'Home' Championship of 1914. READ MORE In the decider against Scotland, Ireland finished with 10 men and had O'Connell playing on despite a broken arm. But trailing 1-0 late in the game, they came back to draw and clinch the title amid what The Irish Times called 'a scene of enthusiasm unparalleled in the history of Irish association football'. Soon afterwards, the Dubliner – born close to what is now Croke Park – was captaining Manchester United in the English football league. The First World War loomed, however, and with it the suspension of professional sports. This explains a strange end-of-season game between Manchester United and Liverpool played on Good Friday 1915. One of England's great rivalries, the fixture would not usually lack competitive edge. But there was little riding on the result that year except an opportunity for a final pay-day before the league broke up. In a game observers found curiously tame, United won 2-0. It then emerged that bookmakers had received a high number of bets on that scoreline. This also explained why, presented with a chance to make it 3-0 from a penalty, O'Connell missed by a careful distance. Several players were banned for life, but O'Connell somehow escaped punishment. He spent the rest of the war guesting for amateur clubs in England and Scotland. Then, after his sixth and last Irish cap, in 1919, he headed for Spain. In the opposite of the situation today, British and Irish managers had a cachet on mainland Europe then, as perceived masters of the game. O'Connell justified the billing, first with Racing Santander, then briefly Oviedo, before going south to Seville and delivering the first and only La Liga title won by that city's poor relation, Real Betis, in 1935. After that, he went to Barcelona. But like many of his generation, O'Connell had been fated to live in interesting times. Another world war now threatened and its prequel would be in Spain. In 1937, badly short of revenue, Barcelona embarked on a tour of the US and Mexico, making headlines not just for their football but also their anti-fascist politics. The tour cleared their debts, for which reason, O'Connell became known as 'the man who saved Barcelona'. The phrase even featured in the title of a book a few years ago. But it's a bit of an overstatement, born from football's love of a simple, heroic story line. Probably the greatest thing O'Connell did for Barcelona was returning there as manager after the tour. Many of his players took the chance of a new life in the US. O'Connell, despite knowing the club no longer had money to pay him, went back, along with only four of the touring players, and remained there for the rest of the Civil War. A narrative of his heroic attachment to the Catalan side doesn't quite stand up either, however, because he then left Barcelona to return to Seville, where he finished his career. There followed an all-too familiar ending to an Irish biography, when he spent his last years in London and died there destitute in 1959. His grave was at first unmarked. And if his name was still famous in Spain, it was soon to be deliberately erased in his native country. O'Connell had married twice, first to Dubliner Ellen Treston, who moved with him to England; then, bigamously, to an Ellen O'Callaghan in Spain, after he abandoned his first family. One of Ellen's sons was christened Daniel and so might have enjoyed the doubly famous name of Dan O'Connell. But when his mother reverted to her maiden name, the son followed. It was as Dan Treston he returned to Ireland eventually and became a well-known radio and theatre producer. He later recalled that although his father sent occasional remittances, the family depended mainly on their mother's earnings as a cleaner. Their memory of Paddy O'Connell, meanwhile, was symbolised by the fate of his Irish caps, resplendent in green velvet with orange tassels. As recalled by Dan Treston, his mother used one of those as an oven mitt, whenever lifting the kettle off the fire.
