Asia

There was a truly frightening moment during yesterday’s 2018 King’s Cup Final (an annual international tournament in Bangkok) between Slovakia and Thailand when Slovak captain Martin Skrtel went down in the 28th minute after being struck in the face by the ball.

The 33-year-old Fenerbahce defender was immediately knocked unconscious by the impact, and a quick-thinking teammate did the right thing by ensuring that Skrtel hadn’t swallowed his tongue, an action which could potentially be fatal because of the resulting airway obstruction.

Colombian forward Jackson Martinez was one of the first Europe-based players to make a lucrative move to China. The former Porto and Atletico Madrid player was snapped up by Guanzhou Evergrande for an amount of money that seemed like far too much at the time.

We haven’t heard from Dimitar Berbatov in a while, but that’s probably because he’s at the age where all of his footballing contemporaries have now retired. After last appearing for Greek club PAOK in 2016, the Bulgarian was out of football for a year before signing a one-year deal with Indian Super League side Kerala Blasters last August.

Javier Mascherano has quickly settled in with his new club in China, Hebai China Fortune. In fact, he already has a nickname: Pony Brother.

That, we must admit, is a far better nickname than the one given to fellow Argentinian and former Shanghai Shenua striker Carlos Tevez, a.k.a. Very Homesick Boy.

The writing has been on the wall for Javier Mascherano at Barcelona for some time, and now it's official: Barcelona announced Tuesday that Mascherano would be leaving the club, with a ceremony planned for Wednesday. Mascherano has been at Barcelona for seven and a half seasons and has made more than 300 appearances.