Today marks the 36th birthday of Trivela King Ricardo Quaresma. Am I using the date as an excuse to watch Quaresma highlights before subsequently sharing them with you? Absolutely.
I believe that no player represents the gulf between professional footballers and amateurs better than the Portuguese wizard.
Yesterday, fans of Moroccan side Raja Club Athletic showed the world that soccer is more than watching two teams duke it out on the field. Supporters came in droves to the home of fellow fan Mohammed Fahd Aldrafip, who has been unable to attend matches due to the severity of his cancer. The fans proceeded to sing through all the team's chants with Aldrafip conducting the whole event from a balcony above. Here’s a video of the event:
There’s no forgetting the original adidas F50 Tunit cleat: its super shiny, seaside color way; its kinda haphazard lace cover that was stuck firm with velcro. This was the boot that adidas went all in on for the 2006 World Cup in Germany, and the commercial that aired constantly on ABC, ESPN and ESPN2 is still up there with the best.
Although I’m not sure what that kid was thinking taking Djibril Cissé with the No. 1 pick in the draft.
The Best FIFA Football Awards 2019 went down in Milan today, and you can rest assured that The18 tried its best to watch on YouTube, but good lord, this stuff is mostly unwatchable. It's remarkably drawn out, full of self-aggrandizing nonsense from FIFA and the forced banter between hosts Ilaria D'Amico, Ruud Gullit and the guests makes you search for the mute button while your skin crawls.
But other than that it's pretty good!
Let’s go to the green carpet for some select photos before the ceremony. Here’s Alex Morgan and Megan Rapinoe looking fly.
Bulgarian striker Dimitar Berbatov has officially announced his retirement at 38 years old with a video and written statement, which he posted on Instagram.
Berbatov was very candid in the statement, saying that he did try to find a team to play for last year, but it didn’t happen. He finished his soccer career at Indian league side Kerala Blasters last year and has been a pundit ever since.
A Dutch youth has hit the worm harder than anyone before him.
I’ll be honest, my first great hope was that this b-boy was just really into 1980s funk subculture (and maybe he is), but I had to know one thing for sure, so I typed “Is the worm in Fortnite?” into Google. It’s with some sadness that I report the answer as yes, but the worm is still a huge improvement over the floss dance and whatever the hell Antoine Griezmann does.
We’re a week away from the FIFA 20 release across all platforms, so the majority of the questions we have surrounding the annual video game — What are the new features? What are the player ratings? How does it compare with PES? — have already been largely answered.
The North Carolina Courage celebrated the accomplishments of Heather O'Reilly as she will be hanging up her boots at the end of the 2019 NWSL season.
MLS youth academy coaching is about to get a serious revamp along with a fourth iteration of the visionary partnership between MLS and the French Football Federation (FFF).
It’s almost game time and your fridge is empty, your pantry barren and stomach grumbling. You gotta eat something fast, but you don’t have anything in your house. What do you do? Ideally, you’re not stupid enough to let this happen, but we get it, sometimes you just forget. In that case, we’ve got just the list for you: the best fast food to eat before a soccer match.
We at The18 have done our due diligence to find the best fast-food items to eat before a game, taking into account price, taste and how you’ll feel after, with a little effort toward trying to eat healthily.