Krisztián Manhercz, right back from Hungary, apologized with his hand: the gesture of tennis players when a ball hits the net and lands on the opponent's side. He had just scored the winning goal against Spain (12-11) in the World Cup semifinals, but he was hardly celebrating it. He was still surprised by what happened, awaiting the decision of the referees before the VAR screen.

In the last second of the game, a very difficult, desperate shot of his, without an angle, had slipped under Unai Aguirre's right arm and had decided the match.. It was a mistake by the Spanish goalkeeper. it was bad luck. In any case, it was the elimination of the team, which will have to seek qualification for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games in other events, in the next European or the next World Cup..

“The most important thing has been our defense in the last attacks. The shot was not well thought out, I saw that there was no time left, I shot and that's it”, declared Manhercz at the end of the game, already qualified for the final against Greece. The Hungarian downplayed his goal due to the participation of chance in it, but he was also partly right.

Spain let the victory be taken from them in the fourth quarter. He received up to five goals in that final set in which he was able to sentence time and time again and did not. With goals from Sergi Cabanas (8-10) and Blai Mallarach (9-11) they had a wide lead for several minutes and didn't take advantage of it.

It was the same blocking as in the quarterfinals against France, the same one that had been intuited at some moments in the group stage. Given the importance of 2024, the coach, David Martin, will have to solve this problem, although he will also have many points in favor.

Despite the slip on Thursday, Spain has shown in the Fukuoka World Cup that it is still on the heights after winning the previous World Cup, hanging a bronze in the last European Championship and dominating the most recent World Cup.

“Today is a sad day for me, today it is time to say goodbye to what I have dedicated all my life”. This is how the video published on his social networks begins with which David Silva announced his retirement from football. The Canarian midfielder decided to put an end to his career after breaking his crossbones in training this preseason with Real Sociedad.

“Today I have to say goodbye to colleagues who are like family to me, I'm going to miss you a lot,” continued the Canarian after a series of images that reviewed all the clubs that the Canarian player has passed through: Valencia, Eibar, Celta, Manchester City and, until today, Real Sociedad. Silva thanked colleagues and hobbies “for making him feel at home”.

Just two days ago, the president of Real Sociedad, Jokin Aperribay, already announced that he was aware of the decision of the Canarian player. “I'm not going to advance it. I spoke the same day of the injury, the next day, also on Saturday. I'm not going to go any further,” said the president.. no longer necessary.

A cruciate injury, whose recovery takes around 8 or 9 months, has been the cause of Silva's decision to end his career as a footballer. A career of enormous successes both collectively and individually.

Born in Arguineguín, a town that had already contributed other big names to football such as Juan Carlos Valerón, Silva trained in the lower categories of Valencia, which he arrived at at the age of 14. Subsequently, he was loaned first to Eibar and then to Celta, playing one season for each team until 2006 when he definitively joined the Valencia first team.

Silva arrives at a team with a dream striker. David Villa, a teammate in the Ché team and later in the Spanish team, was the main recipient of their passes and together they formed a historic duo in Valencia that led them to the national team.

Peak of his career

In 2008, both would be proclaimed European champions with Spain, although Silva with a less leading role than the Asturian. Two years later, they would win again with the national team, this time the World Cup in South Africa with Iniesta's unforgettable goal. That summer his arrival at Manchester City would be confirmed.

It was in the citizen team that he would achieve the greatest international fame and where he would achieve his greatest successes in a club.. Three Premier Leagues and five League Cups, among other trophies, guarantee a very successful career at City and in which he had great weight in the team, even wearing the captain's armband. In that period, he would also win his second European national team title after a great match against Italy in the kyiv final.

In August 2020, David Silva returns to Spanish football and does so by signing with Real Sociedad. The canary prioritized the txuriurdin team against La Lazio, the best positioned team to sign him. He was 34 years old and still had a lot of football in his boots.

With him in the team, Real manages to win a Copa del Rey after 34 years waiting to do so. The canary started in the final that would be decided by a goal from Mikel Oyarzábal.

At the age of 37, an untimely injury deprives Spanish football of continuing to enjoy another year of the creativity of the brilliant Canarian footballer nicknamed 'El Mago'. Surely the Imanol team and football in general will miss the star from Arguineguín.

One more year, and there are 12, Atlético de Madrid begins the preseason with Diego Pablo Simeone in charge and Cholo, more established than ever after the hesitations of the last season, has decided to be true to himself, to his style. Atético does not change and he has nothing to do it with. At the moment, at the Seoul Stadium, they have started with a 2-3 defeat against the K-League team.

The team is clearly committed to quick transitions, perhaps because it is their safest bet for this year. Several of them were the cause of the biggest chances for the rojiblanco team starting with the first goal. Theft of Samu Lino, ball for Thomas Lemar and the Frenchman, in a dizzying drive, combines with Griezmann whose shot is repelled by goalkeeper Lee Chang, ball returned to Lemar and goal. Play of three touches and 10 seconds.

Samu Lino, the Brazilian on loan to Valencia last season and who, at the beginning of this preseason, was outside Atlético de Madrid, was a cyclone on the left wing. In attack and defense, the 23-year-old was one of the most outstanding players in Simeone's team. His connections with Griezmann generated a lot of danger in the Korean team that, it must be said, was very soft in defense.

In fact, his facilities when leaving the ball were another weapon for Simeone's team. Atlético, on many occasions in the game, did not have to build, just wait for the rival to give them the ball and it was not on a few occasions. The problem is that it cost a lot to materialize them.

The rojiblancos continue to have a great lack up front that Álvaro Morata's animosity does not solve. The man from Madrid scored three times, but they were all annulled for offside. What has been said, there are things in Atlético that do not change. The number 19 also had an opportunity with a header from a corner, but it ended up repelled by the crossbar.

The issue of corners was not new. Atlético had many and finished them all. Morata, Hermoso, Savic, Mouriño… all headers with more or less difficulty, but all ended up in the hands of the goalkeeper of the K-League team. Atlético imposed their height, but that was not enough to take off on the scoreboard and closed the first half with a meager 1-0.

korean change

The Korean team, by the way, who came out with a different mood in the second half. Much more aggressive on the ball and generating more things in attack thanks to changes made by coach Sung Min Lee. The coach changed the 11 players and, on the first occasion they had, it was inside. Frontal free kick, bad start by young Antonio Gomis and goal by Kryvotsyuk. 1-1 and the entire second half ahead.

With a more daring Korean team, Atlético lacked creation in the midfield. He could not, because he did not know, because perhaps he does not have the players to build. Barrios and Saúl do not have the imagination of Griezmann or De Paul, nor their experience. And that ended up paying for an Atético who could not get past the draw against the Korean team.

Beyond the debut of some catneranos like Carlos Martín or Gismera, Cholo had little new to do on the field. At least from the medullary upwards. Although it must be recognized that Martín, the one he had, transformed it. After a somewhat lucky play by Correa, the 21-year-old was where he needed to be, scoring to put Atlético ahead with a goal from a true nine.

weak defense

However, the back of the rojiblanca defense was a drag. In the first half, Witsel, a player who this year, and even more after Giménez's injury, looks like he will repeat as a central defender, made several errors that his speed prevented them from being greater. Mouriño, on the other hand, a debutant in the Cholo team, was not so lucky.

The young Uruguayan central defender, who Cholo wanted to try as a winger, put his hand in to try to win the position after an error throwing the rojiblanca defense offside, and that hand brushed the face of Gerso Fernández, winger of the Korean team. The referee saw the action punishable. Penalty and goal from Palocevic.

But things were likely to get worse. Barely two minutes later, a ball poorly cleared by the Atlético defense reached Lee Son's boots, who beat Gomis with a shot from outside the area and overcame the adverse result.. Tough defeat for a Simeone team that clearly went from more to less.

It gives the impression that this year's squad is going to fall short for the remainder of the season. With a Joao Félix who does not count for Simeone and who was absent today due to alleged muscular discomfort, the team lacks imagination up front. The new signings are going to contribute a lot in defense, but someone is missing to help generate play up front.

Atlético, for the moment, is looking for a midfielder and remains expectant about what will happen with Álvaro Morata and Joao Félix, two players who have one foot outside the rojiblanco team. If they left, they would go for a nine, despite the flashes of young Martín. The question is: who will pass the balls to that nine?

4,053 days have passed since Jenni Hermoso put on the Spanish team shirt for the first time. It was June 21, 2012. He made his debut in a match against Turkey in which the national team won 4-0. The Madrid player took the field in the 69th minute, wearing the number 11 on her shirt. In that match he already demonstrated his talent, contributing to the play of the last goal by placing a cross that one of the players from the rival team scored on his own goal.

Well, yesterday Hermoso managed to reach 100 games. She is the second Spanish player who has played the most matches, only behind Alexia Putellas, but that is not only what she achieved in the 5-0 against Zambia. She made a double that keeps her as the team's top scorer, and that has helped her round off another figure, the 50 goals with the national team. Therefore, it is not surprising that she won the award for the best player of the match. But he not only scores goals, he also gives them. The former Atlético de Madrid player assisted Tere Abelleira in the first goal. “Giving the last pass to create chances and for my teammates to score is one of the things I enjoy the most,” she said after the game.

His first goal with the selection

With the national team, he scored his first goal in a friendly against Russia in January 2013, in the run-up to the Euro Cup, where he would have a leading role scoring against England and Norway. Very different was his career in the 2015 World Cup. It was the first time he had participated in the competition and his presence was limited to 84 minutes against Costa Rica.

With the arrival of Jorge Vilda to the bench, that same year, Jenni recovered stripes in the team. In the 2017 Euro Cup he played three of the four games, staying out against Austria, and in the 2019 World Cup he played everything, scoring three goals (two against South Africa and one against the United States).. However, his best scoring figure was achieved in February 2021, when the team faced Kazakhstan and achieved a 0-13 victory; five of the goals bore the Madrid stamp.

He could have surpassed fifty much earlier if he had not missed the Eurocup last year due to injury. Fortunately, Jenni was able to rejoin the team, and she did so just at the moment when the controversy surrounding Vilda broke out.. The player did not belong to the group of 15 rebels, and tried to stay out of the conflict, but the reality is that she was out of the call on several occasions, until February of this year, when she officially returned.

Key piece in the team

Without a doubt, he is a fundamental pillar in the team.. It has already been verified, and not only in front of the goal but because of the good combination he makes with players like Aitana or Alexia, with whom he shared a dressing room at Barcelona before going to Pachuca, in Mexico.

In fact, Hermoso herself recognized it after the victory against Zambia: “The connection I have with Alexia, Aitana or Mariona goes back many years. In the end you know yourself without speaking. Football is played with the feet and we know very well what we want at all times. I'm lucky that, even if I'm no longer at Barcelona, that stays.”

On Sunday the 30th, the World Chess Cup begins in Baku, one of the great events of the year, which will last almost a month, until August 25.. The favorite is the number one, Magnus Carlsen, although he is no longer the world champion and despite the fact that this tournament is the only important one missing from his record. Also noteworthy is the presence of Sara Khadem, a chess player born in Iran 26 years ago, number 15 in the women's ranking, who was forced to flee her country after playing without a hijab in the last Rapid Chess World Cup and who will represent Spain for the first time. time.

Installed in our country for months, last Tuesday she obtained Spanish nationality, published in the BOE and approved by the Council of Ministers in response to “exceptional circumstances”. FIDE has accepted that he will now play in the World Cup under its new flag.

The former world champion under 12 and under 16 participated last April in the Salamanca Festival, where she coincided with the Ukrainian Vasyl Ivanchuk. The grandmaster, a legend of the boards, has been on the verge of being left out of the World Cup, since his Government resisted granting him the necessary permission to travel to Azerbaijan.

The former world champion in rapid games and winner of four gold medals at the Chess Olympiads is 54 years old. As under 60, he needed a special permit to leave his country. They granted it to go to Salamanca, but the Ukrainian Ministry of Youth and Sports ignored the first requests of the International Federation and the organizers of the World Cup.

Finally, he was able to fly to Azerbaijan on Wednesday, after a bitter controversy broke out. Some of the world's best grandmasters, including Magnus Carlsen, Viswanathan Anand, Hikaru Nakamura, Fabiano Caruana, Wesley So and Boris Gelfand, had signed an open letter to Ukraine's Minister of Youth and Sports Vadym Gutzeit to try to that Ivanchuk could leave Lviv and represent his country once more.

The visa of discord

Minister Gutzeit, however, did not want the presence of Ukrainian players to be used for propaganda purposes in competitions organized by Russians and with participants from that country.. The politician went so far as to deny that he had received any official request for Ivanchuk to attend the World Cup.

Ivanchuk himself has declared in an interview with Gordon that he does not know what will happen if he has to face a Russian player. “If that situation arises, a decision will be made on the situation,” an official from his federation told him.. The grandmaster believes that all sports disciplines and the Ministry of Sports of his country should have a clear and unanimous position on the matter..

At the moment, the tournament table seems designed to postpone a Russian-Ukrainian duel as long as possible. In the case of Ivanchuck, both he and the Russian Andrey Esipenko (who has publicly criticized the invasion of Ukraine) should overcome several rounds before a hypothetical meeting in the quarterfinals..

Before granting the permission, the Ukrainian sports minister had criticized FIDE for the conflict created. “The World Chess Federation, which is led by the Russian Dvorkovich, is causing this situation by allowing the Russians to compete,” he said.

The World Cup is not only important in itself and for its prizes, a bag of 2.3 million euros. Also because it serves as a passport to participate in the next Candidates tournaments, female and absolute, from which the candidates for the World Championship will emerge.. The first three classified in each category will get a direct place in the next Candidates.

Participants

The number and category of the participants also speaks of the strength of the competition: 103 players and 206 chess players in the open section. In the latter, the favorites are, in addition to Carlsen, Ian Nepomniachtchi, Fabiano Caruana, Hikaru Nakamura, Anish Giri, Wesley So, Gukesh D and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, as well as the reigning champion, Jan-Krzysztof Duda, and the local stars Teimour Radjabov (winner in 2019) and Shakhriyar Mamedyarov.

In the women's draw, the current world champion, Ju Wenjun, Aleksandra Goryachkina, Alexandra Kosteniuk, Tan Zhongyi, Anna Ushenina and the Ukrainian sisters Anna and Mariya Muzychuk, among others, stand out.. Sara Khadem seems a step below and has played less than normal in recent months, but the World Cup format, by knockouts, could be conducive to the only Spanish representative. From the outset, he goes directly to the second round, as the seed.

Among the chess players, however, the participation is greater, since Paco Vallejo, David Antón (both seeded), Jaime Santos and Eduardo Iturrizaga will play in Baku. Lance Henderson de la Fuente from Malaga, a young promise, will play with the Andorran flag, as he has been doing since last year.

Opinions are divided among Barça fans for the new substitute kit. oh well not so new. Some consider that the shirt that Xavi's men wore in their duel against Arsenal, white with only some blue and scarlet details, is little short of a betrayal. Others, on the other hand, welcome the return of a uniform that, for many years, was by no means alien to the entity.. Although, yes, more than 44 years have passed since the last time they wore a similar one in an official match. It was on March 7, 1979, in a first leg of the 1978-79 Cup Winners' Cup quarterfinals, against Ipswich Town, which resulted in a 2-1 defeat.. In its relaunch, curiously against another English team, the Barcelona fans also knelt. In this case, by 5-3 and exhibiting many gaps at the defensive level.

White, however, continued to be very present in the Barça uniforms. The numbers, for many years, until the arrival of the multinational Nike, precisely, were of this color. Surely, the one that stands out the most over blue and scarlet. In the 1992-93 season, however, a bitter controversy broke out with a tone inextricably linked to its great rival, a Real Madrid that, with the new decade, had begun to eat up the ground. Kappa, taking over from Meyba, announced that their revolutionary new kits would have a fine white line crossing the team's usual tones.

Although many flew into a rage, curiously, that shirt would end up gaining an important place in the culé imaginary. Above all, after the former Madrid president Ramón Mendoza came up with the idea of saying, looking for ridicule, that Barça was a Dream Team, in the style of the US basketball team that won gold at the Barcelona Olympic Games almost without disheveled. The shot, however, would backfire. Unintentionally, he would end up giving that Johan Cruyff team from the early 90s of the last century the name with which he would end up going down in history.. Hristo Stoichkov, highball glass in hand, did not tire of repeating it over and over again in the celebrations of the third consecutive League title for the Catalans.

Most rounded rival

From the club, in addition, this return to white, with the vintage touch of recovering the shield prior to the current one, is presented as a tribute to the fiftieth anniversary of Cruyff's arrival at the Barça club. And it did, curiously after Ajax negotiated precisely its sale to Real Madrid. It is not difficult to find images of the Dutchman dressed in white, although with the nine instead of the 14 on the back.

On the US tour, that first number is still owned by Robert Lewandowski, last summer's star signing.. The other, meanwhile, is the one who looks, at least for the moment, the most exciting arrival of the present: Ilkay Gündogan. The Pole scored the first goal for Xavi's men this preseason, while Ferran Torres and Raphinha scored the remaining two in a duel in which they were finally beaten 5-3 by a much more driven Arsenal.

“many tactical fouls”

“Obviously we could have played better, but I think we have competed against a great opponent.. We can do better, we have made unforced errors, but it was only the first friendly of the preseason”, said Gündogan who is clear that the machine still needs to be greased. “I have to adapt to my teammates and they to me,” he added.. Xavi, meanwhile, regretted that Arsenal used too much.

“His intensity has surprised me a lot, it has not been normal for a preparation match. There have been many tactical fouls and it seemed more like a Champions League game than a friendly”, said the Barcelona coach. «The main reason for the defeat has been the difference in intensity and physical tone. For them it was the fifth game and it has been noticed. We have been timid in defense, but we have accumulated minutes and, despite the fact that the rival was more shot, we have finished well, “said the Barça coach.