Sports
English Clubs Disadvantaged In Europe-Guardiola
Manchester City boss, Pep Guardiola believes that English clubs have a disadvantage in Europe but is excited by the extra challenge.
Guardiola won the Champions League twice with Barcelona but has never been beyond the quarter-finals with City.
A busy schedule has been made even tighter this year due to the Covid-19 pandemic having shortened the calendar.
And Guardiola believes that the lack of a winter break and a tight fixture list already makes it harder for Premier League clubs to win the Champions League.
“Every season is a disadvantage with the rest of the leagues, this league. Not just in this special year – last season and this season for the Covid-19, for that we’ve had to adapt.
“But even when the situation is normal, no winter breaks, a lot of games, a lot of competitions, intensity, the weather condition, the pitches – many, many things. That is attractive, this is the challenge.
“On the other side when you are able to do it, that is nice. No one before could win a domestic treble or four titles in one season, so if your mind is in the right position, in the right way, you can do it.”
City need a point from Wednesday’s trip to Olympiacos to confirm qualification to the knockout stages for an eighth successive season.
Guardiola’s side were surprisingly knocked out by Lyon in last season’s quarter-finals but he believes the club will be better this season.
“It’s (winning the Champions League) not an obsession. We want to do it the best and I say it every season. We are going to try our best and we have an important chance to almost qualify, that’s so good, to be in the best 16 teams in Europe.
“We have the chance and are going to try, knowing we still have two more chances. We need one more game to be there mathematically, so that is great. With respect to the other ones, I have a feeling we will do really well this season.
“I don’t know why but I’ve felt it from the beginning. I expect a reaction after last season when we finished against Lyon in Portugal. We know what we have to do. We know we are a team who last season scored a lot but now we are struggling.
“But we have to find solutions. We have the players to find the right way to attack more fluently and I have the feeling we can score goals. The way we play is quite good, I’m quite happy”.
England captain Harry Kane netted a hat-trick to guide Bayern Munich to an impressive victory against Stuttgart.
Kane’s goals, plus one from Kingsley Coman, helped Bayern end a three-game winless run in all competitions.
They faced a tough task against a Stuttgart side who sat back and limited their chances, leading Vincent Kompany’s side to enter the break frustrated and with the deadlock unbroken.
Bayern eventually found a way past Stuttgart’s steely defence when Kane drilled a low effort into the bottom corner from around 30 yards out after Joshua Kimmich overturned possession.
Former Nigeria goalkeeper, Dosu Joseph, is full of thanks to God after he miraculously survived another life-threatening automobile accident recent at Kara, along the Lagos-Ibadan Express Way, where a heavy-duty truck ran into his SUV.
Narrating his ordeal, the 51-year-old, who guided Nigeria to gold in the Men’s Football Tournament of the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, broke the news in a statement on his social media handles on Friday.
“To God be the glory, another death escaped by Grace and Mercy of God. Me and my friend SM were at Enyo Filling Station after Ojodu Berger bus stop to get fuel on Wednesday, October 2, 2024, around 6 p.m. when this MACK truck fully loaded with iron, with registration number LND 470 XX, left the road and crushed my car beyond repairs. Thank God for life,” he stated.
This is the second time the soft-spoken club proprietor will cheat death by a whisker, having been involved in an accident in 1997 that ended his career at 23 and left his spinal cord in bad shape.
He helped Julius Berger win the Nigeria FA Cup in November 1997 shortly a memorable Olympic outing by keeping a clean sheet in the finals against Katsina United. The following year, he was involved in the auto along Ikorodu Road, Lagos, which not only cut his career short but also left him almost paralysed, ending his spell at Serie A club Reggiana.
The former Nigeria international, who also kept goal for Julius Berger FC, said the case has been reported to Isheri Police Station, Ogun State, where the driver is currently detained and the truck also seized.
According to him, the owner of the truck said he can’t fix the badly damaged SUV until after a year.
Ex – Super Eagles of Nigeria, Okwuchukwu Waobikeze has observed that sports development in Nigeria is going down.
According to him, grassroots sports is very important, without it, the administrators cannot get it right. So everybody should key into grassroots sports development, he said.
Waobikeze said this last Wednesday in an interview with sports journalists shortly after the Port Harcourt All Stars Independence football festival (OCTOBERFEST) at the Port Harcourt club, Rivers State.
He explained that for sports administrators to get it right, grassroots development is key. “They should be organising competition at the grassroots level to fish out the young ones for different sporting activities.
“Grassroots sports is very important so the administrators have to go back to the grassroots.
” Sports Development in Nigeria is going down we need to go back to the basics.
“Look at the just concluded Paris Olympics, Nigeria did not win any medal.
” Our football team did not even qualify for the Olympics. We are going down.
” If they should go back to the grassroots, they will get young ones in the games and talents will be developed.
” I started from school games, to youth games before playing for the national team. Now everybody wants to fly board to play professional football and a lot do not know the basics of the game.
” A lot of people did not know the little things about the game, they just want to play. It is not done so,” Waobikeze stated.
Kiadum Edookor