Latest news with #vanNistelrooy
The Star
29-05-2025
- Sport
- The Star
QuickCheck: Did Man Utd's legendary striker Ruud van Nistelrooy score his first-ever goal for the club in Malaysia?
AS one of biggest and most successful football clubs in history, Manchester United has a massive global fan base. However, not every fan has had the opportunity to watch their favourite team play a game live in person. That's the reason why the friendly matches the team plays in between seasons are a genuine treat for loyal fans – which is especially true in Malaysia. That said, is it true that the club's legendary striker Ruud van Nistelrooy scored his first-ever goal in club colours right here in Malaysia? Verdict: TRUE Yes, van Nistelrooy – whom some may say is the most clinical striker to play for the club – made his Manchester United debut at the Bukit Jalil Stadium in a pre-season friendly against a Malaysian selection back in June 2001. The Dutch striker opened his scoring account for the Red Devils with a brace – the first in the 7th minute when he put the ball past the goalkeeper after a clever little back-heeled pass from Dwight Yorke. His second goal – and the third for the match – came in the 36th minute when club captain Roy Keane put him through with only the keeper to beat, and he showed his class with a neat little chip to put the ball into the net. The game was a real treat for the club's fans in Malaysia. It was also where Argentinian playmaker Juan Sebastian Veron made his debut and featured a strong line-up with legends such as Ryan Giggs, David Beckham (who scored the second goal), Paul Scholes and Ole Gunnar Solskjaer in the starting 11. Manchester United won the match with a final 6-0 score. Van Nistelrooy went on to score 150 goals in 219 appearances for Manchester United. Although his two goals – this being a friendly match – did not count towards his final goal tally, Malaysian fans will always have the fond memory of witnessing the start of his legendary stint with the club. References:
Forbes
20-04-2025
- Sport
- Forbes
Leicester City Reveal The Ugly Truth England Refuses To Accept
Perhaps it was a blessing for Leicester City that the result sealing relegation would come in a match filled with other distractions. Liverpool could have been crowned champions at the King Power stadium had Arsenal dropped points earlier in the day. But the Gunners' routing of Ipswich meant the club had to make do with a win, putting them on the precipice of glory. The fact that Trent Alexander-Arnold scored the goal, as talk swirls of him leaving for Real Madrid, only added to the visitor's domination of the postgame headlines. There was also the fact that for Leicester City, demotion has become a matter of when, not if, a long, long time ago. The previous 20 games have yielded just one win and two draws, which the term 'relegation form' doesn't even really begin to cover. Manager Ruud van Nistelrooy reflected as much in his statements after the match. 'I'm very disappointed that it's a definite now,' he said. 'We kept hoping and fighting, but we saw the gap growing over the last weeks. 'Then you see it coming, although we never gave up and we shifted the focus towards the future to use these games and finish the season as best as possible. Next season, the Championship will start, and it is my job to do the best things possible for the club. 'I'm working in the coming weeks; it is my job to do everything in the best interests of Leicester City.' Despite a dismal run as head coach, van Nistelrooy spoke hopefully about continuing as boss. 'We have to use this time to get better,' he told broadcaster Sky Sports. 'I'm waiting on the clarity of the club and how they want to continue. It is the goal to lead the club. I have to wait on how the club sees things and take it from there. 'The club will continue and it is my job to put the club in the best place possible.' 'I hope [to find out if I will stay] soon. The new season starts very soon and preparation needs to start to move forward. The sooner, the better.' The question that van Nistelrooy's statement that time is needed to 'get better' is - for what? Leicester City ran away with the Championship title in the season before this. So, for the 'getting better' to have actual substance, it would need to be about a possible return to the Premier League in a year's time. That sounds like a bizarre state of affairs. But disturbingly, the Foxes are far from the only team trapped in the limbo of being too good for the division below but way off the top league. Southampton and Ipswich Town, promoted alongside Leicester City, are already relegated and almost down. All three sides were promoted from the Championship, looking a class above the rest of the league. Yet they have rarely looked like even coming close to surviving. The rest of the Premier League's 17 clubs have practically had to plan for another year in the top division since January, so poor have the newly elected clubs been. Even the players have felt it. 'We've got to look at ourselves as players in the mirror,' reflected Leicester City's Conor Coady postgame. 'We have to now, what's happened has happened. We have to try and put this club in a better position come the summer because we haven't been good enough. 'We've took a bit of stick and we'll continue to take stick because it's deserved. From minute one this season, we haven't been at a level to fully compete in the Premier League and you have to be because it'll chew you up and spit you out. 'It's something we have to look at because we're absolutely devastated.' The shameful thing about Leicester City deteriorating into a club trapped in purgatory is that the club has been the shining example of English soccer meritocracy for the past decade. Next season marks 10 years since the club did the impossible by turning a narrow relegation escape following promotion into an incredible title-winning campaign during the second campaign. A series of top-six finishes and an FA Cup win followed that mind-blowing achievement. If the team's success was impossible, it's hard to quantify the difficulty level now. The chasm they bridged in fairytale fashion has widened to such an extent that Premier League survival alone is starting to look miraculous for promoted teams. At the top of the division, competition has rarely been so healthy. The battle for the Champions League cascades down the table, and next season promises to have one of the most open title races in decades. But for the three new teams arriving in the league, the gap has widened, and so far, it's already hard to see how a promoted side will survive. Leicester, on the other hand, must reassess and look to rebuild. As ex-Manchester United player Roy Keane pointed out 'it's a big few months coming for them - what to do with the recruitment, which players to hold on to and what to do with the manager. 'But they are a good club. They have a brilliant training ground, and they have won the league and the FA Cup. They have had a rollercoaster ride in the past few seasons. But they can bounce back. 'The key is that if they do come back up.' It's hard to argue with the Irishman's logic-but the question remains: what does it even mean to do that anymore?
BBC News
12-04-2025
- Sport
- BBC News
Sutton's predictions: Brighton v Leicester
If you ever want a game to get back on track, just play have lost eight successive league games without scoring, and that run is not going to end van Nistelrooy was a dreadful appointment as manager but I do not blame him nor his predecessor, Steve Cooper, for the Foxes' awful season because there is a deeper underlying problem at the did not help, then, that the players seemed to think - and probably still do - that they are better than they fans were expecting too much from this season too, but I doubt that is the case any more, because their team has been so have taken only one point from their past three matches so they need a win to boost their hopes of finishing in the European places.I have absolutely no doubt they will get it - the only question is how many will they prediction: 2-0Read the full predictions and have your say
BBC News
07-04-2025
- Sport
- BBC News
'As bad as it's ever been' - Have Leicester reached a new low?
It has been 720 minutes since Leicester last scored at home in the Premier Monday's 3-0 defeat by Newcastle, the Foxes became the first side in the top four tiers of English football to lose eight successive home league games without van Nistelrooy's relegation-bound side have not found the back of the net at the King Power Stadium since 8 December - a 2-2 draw with Brighton."Nothing surprises me with this group and this manager and this football club at the minute," ex-Foxes winger Matt Piper told BBC Radio Leicester. "The anger for me is done, they are sucking the life out of me. This is as bad as it's ever been and we are a club that has dropped down to League One football." Leicester have registered 82 shots on goal this term but have only accumulated an expected goals (xG) tally of Newcastle, Leicester's possession was at a healthy 58% but that creative spark was missing once again with an xG of only from a side that have seen the tremendous highs of lifting the Premier League title, travelled Europe in the Champions League and hoisted the FA Cup high at Wembley Stadium."This season they are not good enough, there is no fight, there is no determination, there is no want to wear the shirt, there is no confidence," he said."Then there is a manager that goes missing in the dugout. There are major things wrong at this football club and it's been like this for some time. It's just not good enough. There are so many things wrong and I really fear for this football club in the coming years." 'It's a horrible moment for the club' Leicester's current run of eight games without a goal at home equals that of Manchester City in May 2007. And with table-toppers Liverpool next to visit, a new record could very well be Nistelrooy is only the second manager in Premier League history to lose eight successive home games in the competition, after Daniel Farke in September 2021 with Norwich City."What is worrying is the run of form, lack of goals, the lack of results we can produce," he told Sky Sports."Trying different things, different structures, different players in different positions and the results are not there. That is the worrying thing. This is a difficult night, especially in the run of form we're in. "It's important to analyse this, sleep on it and recover from it. That's it for now. There's no questions, it's dealing with this setback, another one, and that's for now what I can say."Foxes defender James Justin said players are struggling for confidence as the weeks pass by."It's hard to describe, to be honest, with how it's been and it makes us feel awful right at the moment," he said."It's hard to find confidence. It's a horrible moment for the club with how we're playing on the pitch and trying to regain any confidence."Despite being on a winless run of nine games, Leicester still have their Premier League status intact, but Justin did not provide much hope when pressed on the topic."There is still a chance for us and we have to fight and claw for it, but we aren't showing it on the pitch," he said. What do the fans say? Padraig: Dismal. Setting new records that nobody wants every week. Fans feel disconnected from a mismanaged club that once had the opportunity to be a regular mid-table Premier League team. We threw it away. Incredibly It's a Groundhog [Day] Season for us. Breaking [unwanted] records, can't score, can't even shoot, same players every week, same rhetoric before and after the game, we've become numb to it all Will we ever score a goal again? I'm a season ticket holder and haven't seen them score in 2025. Ruud is out of his depth, I can see us finishing Just goes from bad to worse - the whole club needs a clear out. Despair as to next season - the fans have lost faith in this bunch of players with the manager, they are clueless.
Yahoo
22-02-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Ruud van Nistelrooy sets all-time record at Leicester
Leicester City lost another game, this time on Friday night against Brentford, and that meant that the Foxes set a new all-time record. It's not been the best season for the Midlands-based side and that could go some way to explaining why Jamie Vardy could sign for another Premier League club and why Wilfred Ndidi could end up at Atletico Madrid. In fact, should Leicester fall through the relegation trap door, there's likely to be a mass exodus of players who won't want to have to play a tough Championship season in 25/26. If the Foxes do go down, that's likely to be the end of van Nistelrooy as well, unless the club hierarchy decide to sack him before then. The Dutchman has endured what has to be one of the worst runs of any manager anywhere since taking over from Steve Cooper. Since beating West Ham in his opening game on December 3 last year, and drawing against Brighton in van Nistelrooy's second game in charge, Leicester have only beaten Queens Park Rangers in the FA Cup and Tottenham in the Premier League. They've lost the other 11 games, and after the 4-0 defeat against the Bees, a match in which Yoane Wissa, Bryan Mbeumo, Christian Norgaard and Fabio Carvalho all scored, Leicester remain in 19th place. Wolves are two points and two places above them, but there's then an eight point gap to West Ham, so the likelihood is that the three that go down will come from the teams that are currently in the bottom four. If van Nistelrooy didn't have enough to worry about over the next few games, he has also set a new all-time record of having lost six home games in a row without scoring. That's never happened before in English top-flight football history and could well be the final nail in van Nistelrooy's coffin.
