Category World News

Xabi Alonso’s Real Madrid beat Atletico Madrid 2-1 in a tight Spanish Super Cup semifinal in Saudi Arabia to set up a Clasico final clash against rivals Barcelona.

Fede Valverde’s free-kick and a Rodrygo strike on Thursday helped Madrid claim a fifth consecutive victory across all competitions, with Alexander Sorloth pulling one back for Diego Simeone’s Atletico, who came up short in Jeddah.

Alonso was close to the sack after a run of inconsistent form towards the end of 2025, but his team have slowly found their footing.

The Spanish coach led Madrid to a win over Barcelona in his first Clasico at the helm in October, before his team began to slump.

With French superstar Kylian Mbappe out as he recovers from a knee sprain, Alonso kept young striker Gonzalo Garcia in the centre of the attack after his hat-trick against Real Betis on Sunday.

Atletico beat their city rivals 5-2 when the teams met in September in a La Liga derby, but this was a far closer affair.

Los Blancos took the lead after just two minutes when Valverde’s ferocious free-kick flew past Sorloth in a poorly positioned wall and rocketed past Jan Oblak.

The Norwegian Atletico forward might have done more to block it, and Oblak got his hand to the shot but could not keep it out because of the sheer power.

Valverde celebrated vehemently, slapping his own head, clearly delighted at netting his first goal of a difficult season to date.

By taking the lead, Real Madrid earned the right to sit deeper and force Atletico to try and attack them to pull back level.

Madrid hit the Rojiblancos when they could on the counter, with Oblak saving well from Rodrygo after he floated inside from the right.

Atletico began to create some chances and could have pulled level before the interval.

Madrid goalkeeper Thibaut Courtois tipped away Sorloth’s header, and then the target man clumsily nodded Conor Gallagher’s cross off-target from close range.

Julian Alvarez, who has just two goals in his last 11 matches, fired towards goal but was also thwarted by Courtois.

Rodrygo extended Madrid’s lead in the 55th minute with his third goal in five games, continuing a rich vein of form across the past few weeks.

The Brazilian found a gap to burst through in the middle of Atletico’s defence and kept his cool to sweep the ball past Oblak.

Sorloth strikes at last

Three minutes later, Atletico hit back, with Sorloth finally finding the net with a header from Giuliano Simeone’s cross.

The striker gave defender Raul Asencio just enough of a shove to put him off without being penalised for it before nodding in.

Atletico came close in the final stages as they tried in vain to force extra-time, with Courtois saving an acrobatic Antoine Griezmann effort, and Marcos Llorente whipping a shot agonisingly wide.

Alvarez flashed a shot across the face of goal deep in stoppage time as Atletico’s hopes of silverware in Saudi Arabia came to a quick end.

Some of Warner Bros Discovery’s biggest investors are split on Paramount Skydance’s sweetened offer for the storied movie studio owner, giving the smaller media company a fighting chance at winning over shareholders.

Investors have until January 21 to accept Paramount’s latest $108.4bn proposal, paying them $30 a share, an offer the Warner Bros board says is inferior to its agreement to sell to Netflix.

Though the creator of, Stranger Things, is offering just $27.75 a share or $82.7bn, Warner Bros says the financing is more solid and that Paramount’s deal would leave the merged company with too much debt.

Alex Fitch, partner and portfolio manager for Harris Oakmark, which held about 96 million shares, or 4 percent of Warner Bros, as of September 30, agrees with the board.

“The value still isn’t clearly superior to what has already been agreed to with Netflix. A tie goes to the incumbent,” Fitch said in an email to Reuters.

Fee and debt at risk

Though Paramount’s offer, on its face, is higher, Warner Bros said it does not cover the $2.8bn breakup fee it would have to pay Netflix, $1.5bn in fees it would owe its bankers and another $350m in financing costs.

A smaller investor, Yussef Gheriani, chief investment officer of IHT Wealth Management, which has about 16,000 Warner Bros shares, said in an email that the board’s decision to reject Paramount’s offer makes sense as the increase in total value may not be worth breakup fees and borrowing costs. The deal would leave the combined company with $87bn in debt, Warner Bros said.

But Matthew Halbower of Pentwater Capital Management, which said it owns more than 50 million shares, feels differently. He told Warner Bros Chairman Samuel DiPiazza in a letter sent on Wednesday that the board “breached its fiduciary duty” to shareholders by rejecting Paramount’s offer out of hand, saying it was a better deal and had a better chance of clearing regulatory scrutiny.

Warner Bros’s board “is choosing not to inquire about what improvements Paramount is willing to make to its offer,” he said in the letter, which was reviewed by Reuters. If Paramount does eventually further improve its $30-per-share offer, the Warner Bros board should at least talk with the suitor, or his firm will not support any Warner Bros directors at their next election, Halbower wrote.

Mario Gabelli, whose Gabelli Funds holds about 5.7 million shares of Warner Bros, according to LSEG data, said he is “likely” to sell his shares to Paramount. He said its all-cash offer is more straightforward and would have a faster path to regulatory approval.

“At the moment, Paramount has a superior bid,” Gabelli told CNBC. “Netflix has to simplify their bid.”

Harris Oakmark, which is Warner Bros’ fifth-largest shareholder, remains open to changing its position. “If they [Paramount] come back to the table with a clearly superior offer, we have full confidence that the WBD board will engage,” Fitch said.

It is not often that a marquee media asset like Warner Bros, which owns HBO Max, comes to market, sparking a bidding war. Its extensive content library includes Harry Potter and the DC Comics universe. Its HBO Max streaming service recently acquired the US and Australian distribution rights to the runaway hit, Canadian hockey romance, Heated Rivalry.

Warner Bros’s top three shareholders are the large passive fund managers Vanguard, State Street and BlackRock, together controlling some 22 percent. All three are also among the top 10 investors in Paramount and Netflix.