FEATURES

  1. Never write off Lewandowski! Barca tighten grip on title race

    Barcelona moved one step closer to defending their La Liga crown as Robert Lewandowski came off the bench to net a late winner in Saturday's 2-1 victory over 10-man Atletico Madrid. Marcus Rashford had earlier got himself on the scoresheet for the Blaugrana as they moved seven points clear of Real Madrid at the top of the table following Los Blancos' loss to Mallorca earlier in the day.

  2. Another trophy gone for Arsenal! White & Jesus flop in FA Cup

    Arsenal were knocked out of the FA Cup by Championship outfit Southampton on Saturday, losing 2-1 at St Mary's. The pressure was on the Gunners to book a return to Wembley having been beaten by Manchester City in the Carabao Cup final a fortnight ago, but their hopes of winning a domestic cup competition were dashed for another season in dramatic circumstances.

  3. Chelsea pummel Port Vale - but Palmer goal drought goes on

    Chelsea put a week filled with controversy to one side to destroy Port Vale in their FA Cup quarter-final tie, prevailing 7-0 at Stamford Bridge on Saturday to avoid a cup upset. The Blues were plunged into crisis after head coach Liam Rosenior confirmed vice-captain Enzo Fernandez had been suspended for two games for comments made about potentially joining Real Madrid, while Marc Cucurella was also reprimanded for similar sentiments about Barcelona and criticising the club hierarchy's blueprint for success.

  4. Mbappe left frustrated in dismal pre-Bayern defeat

    Real Madrid weren't clinical enough at one end and were exposed at the other as they fell to a shock, 2-1 defeat against Mallorca on Saturday that lands a massive blow to their La Liga title hopes. Kylian Mbappe had chances aplenty, but the Mallorca defence held firm. Madrid's backline, by contrast, did not, which proved to be the difference on the day - and might be decisive in the title race, too.

  5. Hat-trick hero Haaland leads the way as City run riot

    Erling Haaland scored his first hat-trick of the season as Manchester City demolished Liverpool 4-0 in a practically perfect FA Cup quarter-final tie at the Etihad Stadium. Haaland bagged a penalty late in the first half and soon followed it with a header to complete a wonderful team move from Pep Guardiola's side, who stormed into the FA Cup semi-finals for an eighth consecutive season.

  6. Salah & Van Dijk have shockers to pile pressure on Slot

    Liverpool crashed out of the FA Cup on Saturday as they fell to a 4-0 quarter-final defeat at Manchester City that heaps more pressure on manager Arne Slot. Despite playing some nice football at times, the Reds were undone in the space of 18 minutes either side of half-time as a hat-trick from Erling Haaland and an Antoine Semenyo strike sealed City's spot in the semi-finals.

  7. Barcelona risk falling apart without injured Raphinha

    There were just a few minutes to go in the first half of Brazil's friendly with France last week when Raphinha began to experience what Carlo Ancelotti called "mild discomfort" in his right thigh. However, the mere fact that he failed to re-emerge for the second period at the Gillette Stadium immediately put Barcelona's medical team on red alert and they promptly reached out to the winger, desperately hoping to receive reassurance that he hadn't aggravated an issue that had already sidelined him twice this season.

  8. Porto's €10m teen setting Portuguese football alight

    Oskar Pietuszewski doesn't turn 18 until May, but he has already made a slice of footballing history. The talented youngster fetched the highest transfer fee ever recorded in the Ekstraklasa, Poland's top division, when swapping Jagiellonia Bialystok for the glitz of two-time Champions League winners Porto in a €10 million deal during the January window, with his release clause reportedly now set at a whopping €60m (£52m/$70m).

  9. How Khusanov bounced back to become City's new cult hero

    Hours after their side's Carabao Cup final victory over Arsenal, bleary-eyed Manchester City fans piled onto the Avanti West Coast train back from London Euston to Manchester - and there was one name on their lips. But it wasn't homegrown match-winner Nico O’Reilly. "How good is [Abdukodir] Khusanov?!" piped up one. "He is an absolute beast!" came the response. It was clear the City faithful had a new cult hero.

  10. Italy may never recover from third World Cup apocalypse

    Gianluigi Donnarumma was one of just a number of Italy players reduced to tears by Tuesday's World Cup play-off loss to Bosnia and Herzegovina - but the penalty shootout defeat in Zenica hit the goalkeeper harder than most. This wasn't the first time he'd been involved in a failed attempt to qualify - it was the third. Despite his devastation, though, Donnarumma remained defiant.

  11. Salah farewell tour will fall flat if he can't rediscover old magic

    There was always a chance that Liverpool would announce a high-profile departure during the international break and, just three days after their latest Premier League setback at Brighton, the Reds confirmed that Mohamed Salah would be leaving at the end of the current campaign. The timing of the announcement surprised some, but Salah had successfully pushed for the news to be made public more than two months before the end of the season in what felt like an obvious attempt to control the narrative surrounding his painful and unexpectedly early exit.

  12. Chelsea: The EPL's biggest losers of the international break

    The ownership of Chelsea has been a hot topic of debate ever since they were formed in 1905, with the main purpose of the club being to simply fill the redeveloped Stamford Bridge stadium. When Roman Abramovich took over from Ken Bates in 2003, he pumped in billions to buy the world's best players and improve the infrastructure. It led to the Blues becoming a force in the Premier League and across Europe, but those days are over.

  13. ICONS: How teenage Mbappe twice emulated Pele in 2018

    Kylian Mbappe was only 19 when he turned the 2018 World Cup into his personal announcement to the world - breaking French records and matching feats last seen in Pele’s era, all while powering Les Bleus to a title that felt like the beginning of something historic. For the latest edition of Icons, GOAL's podcast and feature series that revisits the last 10 World Cups through the moments, characters, and controversies that defined them, bringing the spirit of each tournament vividly back to life, we look back on how Mbappe ran the show in Russia for France...