Cristiano Ronaldo’s social media accounts are a strange, bulging land of ad placements. This New Year, we thought we’d reached another peak with the unveiling of his The Lonely Island-inspired turtleneck and chain look, but we had another thing coming.
We’ve got Mad Ants, Baby Cakes and Lights. There are Isotopes, Rowdies and Skyforce. And of course Steel, Go-Go and IronPigs.
When you’re not the best at something, you’ve got to come up with unique ways to promote yourself. I know this first hand from trying to find a romantic partner.
Minor league sports teams also know this well. It’s why lower-division clubs often have unique nicknames you just don’t find anywhere else.
So which of America’s top three lower divisions — in soccer, baseball and basketball — have the best team nicknames?
From playing with Paris Saint-Germain in Ligue 1 to the World Cup with France, Kylian Mbappé had himself one helluva 2018, all before turning 20 in December.
To commemorate the end of the calendar year (at least on our antiquated Gregorian calendars), Mbappé made an awesome Instagram post highlighting many of his achievements from 2018.
Welcome to 2019, where we hope every goal is commemorated as perfectly as the Jamie Vardy celebration after his goal against Everton on Tuesday.
Leicester City defeated Everton 1-0 in the first Premier League match of 2019. The lone strike came from Vardy in the 58th minute.
Neymar may be one of the best footballers in the world, but he’s not the best Teqball player. At least, he wasn’t the best Teqball player on this particular beach in Brazil.
With PSG and Ligue 1 on winter break, Neymar escaped France and returned to Brazil to spend time in the warmth of friends, family and sunny beaches. While chilling on the coast, Neymar played with Natalia Guitler in a game of Teqball, a game he’s quite familiar with.
After Real Madrid sold Cristiano Ronaldo to Juventus in the summer, Karim Benzema’s role with Los Blancos became ever more important. The club needs him to score more to fill the void of one of the game’s most prolific strikers.
So far, Benzema has had a decent season; the Frenchman has 11 goals and six assists in 26 matches in all competitions. But Benzema, 31, has scored just twice in LaLiga since a brace on Sept. 1.
Perhaps with that in mind, the striker went to Miami, Florida, to practice his, uh, shooting.
Mohamed Salah, Liverpool’s Egyptian King: incredible pace, dribbling ability and an eye for goal. Something he shouldn’t add to his box of tricks, however, is diving.
Salah has been wrapped up in a few diving cases in his Premier League career, most recently in yesterday’s match against Newcastle. Liverpool hosted Newcastle on Boxing Day, drubbing the Geordies 4-0. It was a routine win for Liverpool, but an important talking point of the match surrounded Liverpool’s second goal.
To coincide with The Guardian’s excellent list of the 100 best male footballers in the world — compiled by a panel of 225 experts from 69 nations — we here at The18 have compiled our own list over the last couple years. There are no experts involved, there’s no rhyme or reason for anything, but we do hope you’ll join us on this adventure into the bowels of the beautiful game.
I am Connordinho.
Let’s be honest, divers ruin a lot of what’s great about soccer. Flops slow the game down, they win undeserved free kicks and generally just create more annoyance than enjoyment.
But sometimes, the diver’s acting is so unbelievably poor that the dive itself becomes a work of art. Usually, it’s some of the best players in the world that are doing the diving, which seems counterintuitive.