Category sport-news

Liverpool are to retire Diogo Jota’s number 20 shirt in honour of the Portugal forward who was killed with his brother Andre Silva in a car crash this month.

“After consultation with his wife, Rute, and family, the club can announce the squad number will be retired in honour and memory of Diogo across all levels, including LFC Women and Academy,” the club announced on Friday.

“I believe this is the first time in Liverpool Football Club’s history that such an honour has been bestowed upon an individual,” the club’s chief executive Michael Edwards noted.

Liverpool return to action for the first time since the July 3 tragedy at English Championship side Preston in a pre-season friendly on Sunday.

A rendition of Liverpool’s anthem “You’ll Never Walk Alone” will be played prior to the 1400 GMT kick-off and Preston will lay a wreath in front of the away supporters.

Father of three Jota, who married his long-term partner Rute Cardoso 11 days before the accident, died alongside his brother after a Lamborghini they were travelling in came off the road and burst into flames in northern Spain.

FIFA president Gianni Infantino triumphantly declared the Club World Cup to be “the most successful club competition in the world” Saturday ahead of this weekend’s final between Paris Saint-Germain and Chelsea.

The first 32-team edition of the tournament faced criticism in the build-up for stretching demands on elite players and has been played out in baking temperatures in the United States that have raised concerns for the health of those involved.

“The golden age of club football has started. We can definitely say this FIFA Club World Cup has been a huge success,” Infantino told reporters at Trump Tower on New York City’s Fifth Avenue, where FIFA has just opened an office.

“We heard that financially it would not work, that nobody is interested, but I can say we generated almost 2.1 billion dollars in revenues, for 63 matches,” he said.

“That makes an average of $33 million per match — no other club competition in the world comes close.

“It is already the most successful club competition in the world.”

Former Liverpool coach Jurgen Klopp has been one of the leading voices against the tournament, calling it “the worst idea ever implemented in football” in a recent interview.

But the head of world football’s governing body dismissed suggestions that Klopp might be speaking for most observers in Europe.

“We shouldn’t say that the opinion of Europe on this is very bad because it is not true,” said Infantino, who was appearing on a stage alongside numerous footballing greats including the Brazilian Ronaldo.

“All the teams who have come here have been happy — some teams who didn’t come here because they didn’t qualify were calling us to see how they could qualify.

The next Club World Cup is due to take place in 2029, with Infantino refusing to commit when asked whether the tournament could be played every two years or be expanded to feature more teams.

Crowned Wimbledon champion for the first time on Saturday, Iga Swiatek surprised even herself by thriving on the All England Club grass after her reign as the queen of clay.

Swiatek thrashed American 13th seed Amanda Anisimova 6-0, 6-0 to win the sixth Grand Slam title of her career in historic fashion on Saturday.

Against the Polish eighth seed’s own expectations, she has added Wimbledon to the four French Open titles she won on the Paris clay and the 2022 US Open crown secured on hard courts in New York.

Swiatek won the junior Wimbledon title seven years ago, but she had never been beyond the quarter-finals in the main event until this year.

Asked if her success had come as a surprise, she said: “Yeah, for sure. Honestly I never even dreamt it was going to be possible for me to play in the final.

“I thought I experienced everything on the court but I didn’t experience playing well on grass.”

The Wimbledon title was especially sweet for Swiatek after what had been a difficult year by her high standards.

Having won at least one Grand Slam in each of the previous three years, Swiatek endured painful semi-finals exits at the Australian Open and French Open in 2025.

She did not reach a final for a year after winning the 2024 French Open.

Losing in the Olympics semi-finals last year was another blow for Swiatek, who said she cried for “six hours” following the defeat in Paris.

Blaze of glory

Her two-year reign as world number one had been ended by Aryna Sabalenka, prompting a change of coach at the end of last year as Wim Fissette replaced Tomasz Wiktorowski.

Those woes were a stark contrast to the blaze of glory that followed her maiden Grand Slam title at the 2020 French Open.

Swiatek, whose father is a former rower who competed at the 1988 Olympics, was the youngest French Open women’s champion since Monica Seles in 1992.

Three more titles followed at Roland Garros between 2022 and 2024 before Sabalenka ended her unbeaten streak in Paris last month.

But not winning the French Open for the first time since 2021 gave Swiatek more time to prepare on grass, firstly in a training camp in Mallorca before a maiden final on the surface in the tranquil German spa town of Bad Homburg.

Although Jessica Pegula took home the trophy in Germany, Swiatek had laid the foundations for her success at SW19.

“I feel like I have developed as a player and I had time to practise a little bit more,” she said.

“I’m not going to have seasons where the pressure is kind of forced on me from the expectations from outside anymore.

“Every year it’s kind of the same, but I feel sometimes I can handle it better or ignore it.”

Swiatek dropped just one set on her run to glory on the manicured lawns of southwest London.