Sports
Kroos Sorry Over Pedri’s Injury
Toni Kroos has apologised for injuring Pedri in Germany’s Euro 2024 loss to Spain, insisting it was “not my intention”.
Pedri was forced off in the first few minutes of the quarter-final on Friday, having hit the turf after a foul from Kroos.
The latter avoided a booking for the tackle but received a yellow card later in the game, which Spain won in the final moments of extra time.
Pedri, 21, will not feature for Spain in their semi-final against France or be fit for the final, should his nation qualify, while Kroos, 34, was playing his final ever match on Friday.
In an Instagram post on Saturday, the Germany midfielder wrote, “Very important to me: Apologies to @pedri and wishing you a good recovery!
“It was obviously not my intention to injure you. Swift recovery and all the best. You are a great player.”
Elsewhere in his post, Kroos said: “I didn’t expect us, in such a short space of time, to be able to have a realistic shot at winning the title and to get back on par with the best teams. For that reason, I’m so proud of what this team achieved.”
Germany trailed Spain through a Dani Olmo goal, but the Euros hosts equalised in the 89th minute when Florian Wirtz scored. However, Mikel Merino struck in the 118th minute, as Spain triumphed in extra time to eliminate Julian Nagelsmann’s team.
It was the coach’s first tournament in charge of Germany, who were knocked out of the last two World Cups in the group stage and exited the previous Euros in the last 16.
Meanwhile, Spain have confirmed Pedri’s injury as a grade two knee sprain.
La Roja reached the semi-finals on Friday after they beat the hosts 2-1 in Stuttgart.
But they will now have to do without the Barcelona midfielder for the remainder of the tournament.
In a statement from the Spanish Football Federation at the weekend, they confirmed that Pedri suffered a grade two lateral knee sprain after a heavy challenge from Toni Kroos.
It means that Pedri will miss the rest of the tournament but the midfielder “will stay in Germany and support his team mates”, according to the RFEF.
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