This is not an exercise in academic rigor. I did not have someone sitting with a note pad writing down literally the first 10 facts I could recall pertaining to sports in 2017. But … it is a fairly accurate recreation of a fairly quick trip through my brain to see what stuck from the […]

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George Weah was an outstanding soccer forward from Liberia who excelled in the 1980s and 1990s with some of Europe’s biggest clubs — AC Milan, Paris Saint-Germain, Monaco, Marseille, Chelsea … In 1995, he was named Fifa Player of the Year and won the Ballon d’Or, making him the first (and still only) African player […]

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Yes, I was the guy who suggested this match could end 4-0, and added 7-0 might be OK if the UAE club held mighty Real Madrid scoreless for, say, a half-hour. I underestimated Al Jazira, the Arabian Gulf League champions, in a semifinal of the Fifa Club World Cup. And perhaps Real did, too. But […]

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The MLS Cup needs some help. Starting with the site of the championship match being decided years in advance and going to the most attractive bid city — in a place where December weather is not predictably nasty. Why? Because giving the championship match to the team with the best record can yield something that […]

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Twice, I have seen Lionel Messi play at Camp Nou. In 180 minutes of La Liga play witnessed by moi, he has scored three goals (and Luis Suarez has another) … but FC Barcelona did not win on either occasion. The first Camp Nou match for me was a 2-2 draw with Real Madrid in […]

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Italy went bonkers tonight. The national team, the azzurri, was held to a scoreless draw with good-but-not-special Sweden, and the home-and-away runners-up playoffs for the final four European berths at Russia 2010 went to Switzerland, Denmark, Croatia — and Sweden. Italy stays home. This is the biggest shock from this edition of World Cup qualifying […]

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If you think about it, not much pertaining to the 2018 Russia World Cup has been of a global nature, so far. In qualifying competition, European nations played nations from the European confederation. Asian nations played other Asian nations. And so on. The 2018 World Cup has been a regional event, to date. That changed […]

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Reaching the quarterfinals of a Fifa tournament is pretty much the definition of success, on the male side of the U.S. national soccer realm, and the Under 17 team just did it, at the U17 World Cup in India. And what does it mean for the senior side to have the kids get to the […]

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It’s time for a list. A lot of information and opinions banging around out there about the U.S. loss at Trinidad and Tobago, and subsequent failure to qualify for the 2018 World Cup. Let’s see if we can pick out a few of the most interesting notions — and maybe introduce a few new ones.

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China is the world’s most populous nation, with 1.38 billion people. India is second, at 1.28 billion. The U.S. is third, at 325 million. Indonesia is fourth, at 260 million. Further down the list, Pakistan is No. 6 with 203 million and Bangladesh is No. 8 with 158 million. Q: And what do those six […]

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