Wolverhampton forward Adama Traoré is one of the fastest soccer players in the world. The 23-year-old Spaniard has clocked in at a blistering 23.61 mph in training and has reached speeds of 22 mph in games.
Traoré’s physique is what separates him from other speedsters like Kylian Mbappé and Mohamed Salah. The Wolves forward stands at 5-10, but weighs 159 pounds, the majority of which is muscle.
The statistic for goals in a calendar year is obviously a strange one since it combines feats from two separate seasons (the back-half of one campaign and the first half of the next), which isn’t really a useful metric. However, when looking at the top goal scorers from each calendar year over the past decade, there are a few interesting trends which speak volumes about the 2010s.
Coming off a tantalizing victory against Manchester City sealed by an 89th minute Matt Doherty winner just 43 hours earlier, fifth-place Wolves made Liverpool sweat as the Reds held on 1-0 to record their 10th straight victory in the Premier League and run their unbeaten league home streak to 50 games on Sunday.
A meeting between first and second in the Premier League was more one-sided than anyone could’ve predicted as Liverpool ran riot at the home of Leicester City on Thursday evening, winning 4-0 with a masterclass in both attack and defense.
There are many ways to define a club’s ambition. Perhaps the easiest is a straightforward look at which club spends the most money.
As the 2010s come to a close, we at The18 looked at which 18 clubs spent the most money over the last decade. No surprise, Manchester City is at the top having spent $1.71 billion. (Note: All numbers used in this article are from TransferMarkt.com.)
During Bayern Munich’s 3-1 victory over Tottenham on Wednesday, Bayern goalkeeper Manuel Neuer recorded 66 touches, which was more than any Spurs player on the day (Kyle Walker-Peters was tops with 59). With 48 accurate passes, he also outperformed all Tottenham players in that category. Oh, and his pass success rate of 89 percent (48 of 54) was also better than Spurs' best (Moussa Sissoko hit on 85 percent).
Leicester City and Jamie Vardy’s remarkable run continued on Sunday with a 4-1 away victory over Aston Villa. Vardy scored a brace to take his total to 16 goals in 16 games and to extend his goalscoring streak to eight matches.
After a disastrous 2018 FIFA World Cup qualifying campaign that ended with a playoff defeat to Sweden and the firing of manager Gian Piero Ventura, Italy’s just finished its UEFA Euro 2020 qualifying cycle in emphatic fashion: A 9-1 victory over Armenia gives the Azzurri a final record of 10 played, 10 won, 37 scored and only four conceded.
After hitting a hat-trick against Lithuania last Thursday to bring his international tally up to 98, Cristiano Ronaldo entered today’s match between Portugal and 96th-ranked Luxembourg with his eyes firmly set on becoming the second-ever footballer to reach the century mark for his country. Portugal won 2-0, but it was Bruno Fernandes who opened the scoring for the away side before Ronaldo registered number 99 following a tap-in from millimeters out.
It was always going to happen eventually — it’s just that nobody could’ve predicted how insanely long it’d take for age and the grind of professional sports to somewhat catch up to Cristiano Ronaldo. The 34-year-old has played 982 matches for club and country over the last 17 years, and although he remains decisive, indomitable and a catalyst for one of the world’s best teams, he’s beginning to show signs of what Louis C.K. referred to as “incurable shitty ankle.”