Raul Gudino, a 19-year-old Mexican goalkeeper, was handed his first start in the Portuguese Premeira Liga Friday in Medeira's 1-1 draw with Estoril.
Gudino comported himself well, from what we can tell from the numbers. There's always room for improvement, but this is a great start for a young player at a position where players don't traditionally peak until their late 20s/early 30s.
I haven’t played co-ed soccer since high school gym class. What I remember from it involves a lot of social and competitive awkwardness. I may or may not have been the kid that couldn’t figure out when it was “OK” to try hard in gym class and when you were an a**hole for doing so. I figured this out later in life, but clearly this Mr. Garruto got it from the get go. Which is incredibly ironic, because this Garruto guy got kicked out of a co-ed league.
Who knew such controversy could come from a UEFA Youth League Match? So, here's what happened. On Wednesday, several media outlets (including us) published footage of David Ruiz Pascual with what looked like one of the dives of the century in a game between Celtic and Valencia. It turns out that the young lad injured his cruciate ligament while running for the ball, and that's why he fell over so dramatically. Take a look at it here:
Today in soccer players should stick to soccer news: three youth players for German team HSV (Hannover 96, not Hamburger SV) have been suspended after botching a casino robbery asbout as badly as you can botch a casino robbery.
That's right, we said casino robbery.
It was all a disaster from the start. The would-be robbers probably thought they were going to be cool and badass like this:
So, you know how everyone was saying Manchester United needed a striker, and Van Gaal responded by selling Chicharito and Robin van Persie, loaning out Adnan Januzaj and James Wilson and refusing to replace any of them? Yeah, that was stupid. Anyways, it looks as if he may have done one thing right by recalling Will Keane from loan.
2015 is behind us and, even though El Tri shined throughout the past year, there was something missing in their matches: dominance. Even though El Tri once again reached the top of CONCACAF, many expected the team to do so in style and without hiccups. They had very few matches in 2015 in which they truly showed consistent quality. It was indeed a rollercoaster of a year for El Tri, with a dismal Copa America performance, a sluggish Gold Cup win and a nail-biter of a match against the Stars and Stripes to qualify for the Confederations Cup. El Tri saw it all in 2015.
At some point in every superstar’s life they were normal. It’s hard to imagine that someone so perfect, so often worshipped by society as an example of what we should be, could ever be normal. With being normal comes doubts and insecurities, timidity and apprehension. Maybe that’s why people so often dream about their own ascension into stardom, because it’s so hard to believe.
As if I needed another reminder of why I was never going to make it as a professional footballer, US Youth Soccer has just released the best youth soccer goals of 2015. It features 8-year-olds dribbling past entire teams in ways I never could, and 15 year-olds slotting long shots as effortlessly as I would play a wall pass. Watching it is a humbling experience.
It appears that Liverpool's youth academy in India, DSK Shivajians Liverpool International Football Academy, is turning out world-class talent. On Sunday, Chhangte Lallianzuala – a product of DSK – scored a brace in only his second-ever international cap for India.
Talk about a good end to the year. On Christmas, Lallianzuala became the youngest player ever to appear on the senior national team for India. Two days later, during India's match against Nepal in the SAFF Championships, he scored this gem:
Ajax weren’t in crisis during Jairo Riedewald’s debut, just in danger of stumbling at a critical point. They had botched some critical games at the beginning of the season, but had turned things around with a 5-game winning streak that had seen them move from 6th to 2nd. Finally within striking distance of first place Vitesse – an Ajax win and Vitesse loss would see Ajax clear into first place, while a win and a tie would have Ajax in first place on goal differential – Ajax found itself down 1-0 to 14th place Roda JC. They were in danger of missing out on first place yet again.