Sports

“The spirit of the 1993 team will always be there for Zambia.”Kalusha Bwalya, Zambia’s former football captain, is reflecting on the day that changed his life forever.On April 27, 1993, a military aircraft taking 18 of his team-mates and their coach to a World Cup qualifier against Senegal crashed shortly after refuelling in Gabon. All 30 people aboard died.Bwalya would have been on the plane, too, but for the fact that he was playing for PSV Eindhoven at the time. Being based in the Netherlands meant he made his own way to the match from Europe and ultimately saved his life — although it did not spare him from crushing, numbing grief.“You couldn’t imagine the whole team you play with are not there anymore,” Bwalya tells The Athletic. “It didn’t feel real.”Zambian football could have been ...

Christian Pulisic is perched on a bar stool in the old clubhouse overlooking the first-team training pitch at Milanello, AC Milan’s training ground.He makes a hand gesture, one he didn’t need the past six months living in Italy to learn. Pulisic is talking about himself as one of the “older guys” on the USMNT and, as he does so, he is sure to put air quotes around it.Nearby is a portrait of Milan legend Paolo Maldini lifting a trophy, a player who retired in his forties. Pulisic isn’t that age yet. He turned 25 shortly after joining Milan from Chelsea in August. But as the United States get ready to host the Copa America as a guest competing nation this summer, the first newly-expanded 32-team Club World Cup the following year and then the biggest men’s World Cup finals yet, with 48 countr...

The only place a reverse happens in the NFL is on the field. The league rarely moves backward when it comes to increasing its media rights coffers. If you were to place a wager on whether Saturday’s first-ever exclusive, live-streamed NFL playoff game is going to be repeated in the future, you’d be wise to bet big on the same thing happening during the 2024 postseason.Hans Schroeder, the NFL’s executive vice president of media distribution, nearly said as much during a conference call with reporters three days before the game.“As it relates to the wild-card game exclusively, we’re excited to continue the conversation,” said Schroeder. “This is a deal for this year, but it’s an NFL playoff game. I expect there will be a lot of interest in it. We’re excited to continue the conversation with ...

It was late September when Naomi Osaka, the four-time Grand Slam champion and transcendent star of her sport, finally got on the phone with her former coach to talk about her next comeback. Wim Fissette is a cerebral Belgian who thinks long and hard before taking on a player, even one with a resume like Osaka’s. He had one, very serious question.Is it going to be different this time?There was then another conversation, with Florian Zitzelsberger, a 34-year-old German who is one of the most respected strength and conditioning coaches in the world. Zitzelsberger had worked with Osaka before, too. He asked her the same question, and another important one, too. Why?World-class tennis players worth hundreds of millions of dollars are not used to pushback like this. They get what they ask for, w...

It is the heartbreaking story of a talented and popular footballer, her tragic death and the investigation into a family’s complaints about what they believe caused her emotional anguish.Maddy Cusack’s death in September sent shockwaves throughout the sport and plunged Sheffield United into a state of mourning for their longest-serving player. As her parents, David and Deborah, tried to get through their first Christmas without their eldest daughter, fans launched a petition to retire her No 8 shirt as a permanent tribute.“She fell in love with Sheffield United, the fans and the city of Sheffield,” Deborah told a memorial service in October. “Maddy became Miss Sheffield United and adored every minute of it. This was her home, the place she envisioned she would hang up her boots one day.”Cu...

By Lauren Merola, Max Olson, Austin Meek, Jim Trotter and Nicole AuerbachIt’s been 26 years, but finally, no one has it better than Michigan.The Wolverines rushed for 303 yards and held flame-throwing Washington quarterback Michael Penix Jr. in check to emerge as the College Football Playoff national champion with a 34-13 defeat of the Huskies on Monday night at NRG Stadium in Houston. The win marked Michigan’s first national title since 1997 and the completion of a long-anticipated return to the top of college football under head coach Jim Harbaugh.The Wolverines, who entered the night ranked second in the FBS in passing yards allowed per game, held the Heisman Trophy runner-up Penix to 255 yards, one touchdown and two interceptions on 27-of-51 passing, well below the usual output from th...

Where does a former NFL coach with a Super Bowl title to his name go on holiday for the new year? Wrexham, of course.Paul McCord and his family swapped Florida for north Wales to take in the League Two match against Barrow after becoming passionate fans of the club through the documentary Welcome to Wrexham.It meant leaving behind the Tampa sunshine and daytime temperatures of 22C (71.6F) for highs of 9C but Paul, wife Mindy — a successful coach in women’s lacrosse — and nine-year-old son LJ couldn’t have been happier.“Being here in Wrexham to celebrate the new year meant so much,” says Paul, a member of the coaching team who took the Baltimore Ravens to Super Bowl glory in 2001. He sports the commemorative ring he received after the 34-7 victory over the New York Giants.“This is our secon...

Bleary-eyed from 16 hours on a Greyhound bus, he strolled into the stadium running on fumes. He’d barely slept in two days. The ride he was supposed to hitch from Charlotte to Indianapolis canceled at the last minute, and for a few nervy hours, Antonio Barnes started to have his doubts. The trip he’d waited 40 years for looked like it wasn’t going to happen.But as he moved through the concourse at Lucas Oil Stadium an hour before the Colts faced the Raiders, it started to sink in. His pace quickened. His eyes widened. His voice picked up.“I got chills right now,” he said. “Chills.”Barnes, 57, is a lifer, a Colts fan since the Baltimore days. He wore No. 25 on his pee wee football team because that’s the number Nesby Glasgow wore on Sundays. He was a talent in his own right, too: one of his...

LOS ANGELES — Terry Bradshaw spills a cup of coffee, but Curt Menefee doesn’t flinch. Menefee leans toward a tray not visible on television for some tissue to help clean up as Bradshaw continues to make a point about the Cincinnati Bengals.Howie Long helps with the cleanup, and Bradshaw keeps talking. Jimmy Johnson listens intently.Menefee then ribs Bradshaw about needing another cup of coffee, and Johnson uses coffee as a transition to talk about the Baltimore Ravens and Seattle Seahawks.“So Terry spills coffee on live TV … now, how do you react?” Menefee said shortly after while sitting in a dressing room at Fox Studios. “Instead of going into panic mode, we made it part of the show, and we laughed it off and had some fun with it.”It’s a funny moment in the studio. And Menefee, the longt...

The cheers rang long and loud around Valencia’s Mestalla Stadium as fans celebrated Hugo Guillamon’s late equaliser against Barcelona in their final home match before La Liga’s Christmas break.Four kilometres away, on the other side of Valencia’s old city centre, all was quiet around the site of the Nou Mestalla — where the club’s half-built new home has sat untouched for the past 15 years.Through all that time, one of La Liga’s most storied clubs has found itself stuck in this bizarre situation — unable to raise the money to finish a modern new ground, unable to sell its historic home.Meanwhile, a team used to competing at the highest level in national and European competition has found itself fighting relegation, with the club’s historic debts becoming ever more difficult to deal with.On...