Archive August 4, 2025

As Santi Cazorla prepares for the final season of his career in the colours of boyhood club Real Oviedo, the words of his son Enzo still resonate with the 40-year-old.

Enzo only wanted to see his father play once more while the former Arsenal midfielder spent two years with ankle issues that nearly nearly claimed his leg.

Cazorla was prepared to quit after 636 days of operation, 11 operations, and gangrene, but only for his daughter India, 12, and wife Ursula, who is now 15 to keep him going.

“In some moments I called my family and said ‘ I will stop. I want to be with you after a year, he tells BBC Sport. Nothing, I’m by myself, I don’t have family around, and things aren’t going well.

” My son would say ‘ no daddy, please try again – tomorrow will be better and you will start to feel better. Please come back and play football again because I want to see you again and I enjoy seeing you playing for clubs like Arsenal and others.

“Finally, I succeeded,” she said. But in that moment it was difficult to say ‘ yes, I will be back’. These words are my strength and encouragement for the day.

He has been given the freedom to pursue a career. One which has gone full circle, having helped Oviedo – the team he left in 2003 without playing a first-team game – return to La Liga for the first time in 24 years after winning the Segunda Division play-offs last season.

After signing his final contract, a one-year contract, three weeks ago, it will be a fairytale ending for the lifelong Carbayones fan.

Cazorla remarked, “This will be my last season, and I must pay attention to my body, which is already asking me.”

“When I was a kid I always dreamed to play in the club and I’m here now – lucky and able to play with my club in the top division.

It is uplifting to speak with Cazorla. He beams, clearly loving the extra years he has fought hard to gain.

It has taken a long way to get here. He had ankle issues after receiving an innocent kick in a game against Chile in 2013. He continued to play for three years.

By then the pain was too much and treatment was needed, but Cazorla did not expect the multiple operations, one leading to infection which destroyed almost 11 centimetres of his Achilles and nearly cost him his leg.

His bone had softened. A reconstruction of his Achilles involved the grafting of skin from his left arm, which included a tattoo of his daughter’s name, to his right ankle.

Doctors explained he should be content with walking again, let alone playing. Cazorla recalls his defiance when asked what the conversation was like. Cazorla describes his ankle as a “jigsaw puzzle.”

He claims, “I never believed this kind of thing.” The injury was really hard. I never told the truth about the injury; I assumed it was minor.

Cazorla put off having surgery until he was no longer able to.

” It was the most difficult moment in my career, not only in football but my life, “he adds”. You have to fight if you have a dream, you have to fight every day, even if I wasn’t with my family, my wife, and my kids.

“My wife, children, my mother, and brother,” I say. I had to fight for them. For me personally, it was a very challenging time.

You arrive at the Emirates to play, and you are hospitalized for a week. It’s difficult to control these kind of emotions. “

Cazorla’s confidence in making a comeback, however, was not shared by Arsenal.

He had previously been given a contract renewal, but he was unable to persuade the Gunners to give him a new one in 2018. He eventually returned to Villarreal for three years, where he had added 86 appearances to his previous 233.

” I remember when I started to feel better after a year and a half, I came back and asked, ‘ please give me the chance to do pre-season and after I would like to sign one year more, ‘ “he says, having made 180 appearances, scoring 29 goals, in six years at Arsenal.

They said they thought I wouldn’t be able to return to the top level. When you are two years away, it’s normal.

“I was very honest with them – give me the chance because I’m ready again. I have to understand why they said no.

He still has feelings for the Gunners, though, and is close to his Emirates Stadium captain, Mikel Arteta. He is also open to a return once he retires.

Cazorla will consider his options, but what will come next will be “something in football.”

Cazorla’s perspective has naturally changed as he enters his final season, determined to enjoy it.

He continues, “I always try to enjoy the little things right now.” “When you are old you try to enjoy everything, when you are young you are not ready.

Since this is my last year, I typically suffer a lot during the pre-season, but I’ve been trying to enjoy it. Before I even considered this, the journey from the hotel to the stadium and watching the fans as they pass through the city.

Cazorla and Oviedo’s La Liga comeback next month is, coincidentally, at Villarreal. the first game at home? Real Madrid .

While he does not take the credit, Cazorla’s return was the catalyst. In their centenary year, he helped Oviedo advance to the Segunda Division play-offs in 2023-24, where they lost to Espanyol, before inspiring a historic promotion.

Oviedo fell to the fourth tier after being dropped from La Liga in 2001. Cazorla was winning his second FA Cup with Arsenal while they were in Segunda Division B in 2014-15.

He was born in Fonciello, a small village 10 minutes outside Oviedo and grew up a fan of Los Azules.

He joined the club at age eight, watched as they were promoted, and then left for Villarreal at age 18 under financial pressure.

The Spain international purchased shares in 2012 during one of the club’s numerous hours of need, and two years later he came back with the same desire to assist.

Cazorla was willing to play for free but, with league rules prohibiting it, collected the minimum wage allowed, £80, 000 a year, with 10% of his shirt sales also going to the academy.

The key is to remember that when you’re on the street, there are a lot of kids wearing Real Oviedo t-shirts, Cazorla says. The street kids’ future is in their hands. They support Oviedo – not Barcelona or Real, Arsenal or Liverpool. It was impossible to see the children wearing Oviedo shirts until recently.

The club referred to him as an emblem and symbol when he wrote his new contract.

Cazorla took the microphone to sing – surprisingly well – the club’s unofficial anthem by Melendi, an Oviedo-born musician, at the promotion party in front of thousands of fans.

Cazorla, a two-time European Championship winner with Spain, is content to ignore the spotlight as he considers his legacy despite taking center stage.

I’m just one more player, not this, because I don’t want to feel this way. I’m 40-years-old, I only try to help the young players and club to get into the top division. The humble playmaker says, “I don’t feel like a symbol.”

I don’t want my team-mates to see me like this because I know I’m setting an example for them and they treat me like a superstar.

“They are young, some have only played in the second division and when I came in, my first day, they look at me like I’ve played at Arsenal and in the national team. I have a lot of respect for them, but I don’t want to be in this position.

Iga Swiatek, the reigning champion at Wimbledon, was knocked out by Clara Tauson in the fourth round, making her the latest seed to lose at the Canadian Open.

With a 7-6 (7-1) 6-3 victory over the second seed in Montreal, Denmark’s 19th-ranked Tauson made up for her fourth-round defeat to Swiatek at Wimbledon last month.

The top seed Coco Gauff, two-time defending champion Jessica Pegula, and fourth seed Mirra Andreeva were all knocked out by Swiatek’s exit.

Tauson, who won her third WTA title in January, her first since 2021, said, “Obviously it’s really great and it shows all the work I’ve been doing is the right thing.”

I’m feeling a little more self-assured and like I belong here more, according to the author. In the crucial areas, I believe, that has really helped me today.

Madison Keys, the reigning Australian Open champion, will face Tauson in the quarter-finals after the American saved two match points to defeat Czech Karolina Muchova, 4-6, 6-3, 7-5.

Naomi Osaka, the four-time major champion, defeated Latvia’s Anastasija Sevastova 6-1, 6 0 6-0 to claim the victory.

Osaka, a Japanese Open champion who has won both the US and Australian Opens, is aiming for her first title since taking maternity leave in early 2024.

After less than a year, the 27-year-old left his job with Swiatek’s former coach Tomasz Wiktorowski and is now working with Polish coach Tomasz Wiktorowski.

Australian seventh seed Frances Tiafoe defeated Australian Alex de Minaur 6-2, 4 and 6 to advance to the quarter-finals in Toronto.

De Minaur, who won the Washington Open a week ago, is hoping to do better than he did in 2023.

Manchester City signed five new players this summer for less than £150m, but Pep Guardiola’s biggest signing did not cost any of that, and he won’t play any football either.

The second-most significant coach of Jurgen Klopp’s time, Liverpool, became Guardiola’s right-hand man at Manchester City in early June.

Really, it should have been a bigger story because Guardiola is considering undergoing a significant tactical overhaul with the addition of Pep Lijnders, who is credited with providing the majority of Klopp’s day-to-day training and a significant portion of the German’s tactical evolution post-Borussia Dortmund.

What’s even more impressive is that those tactical adjustments were made with the significant input of a coach who collaborated with Klopp on concepts like counter-pressing and attacking in vertical lines and on ideas that served as Guardiola’s renowned positional play.

Mind, that contrast is frequently overstated. Both Guardiola and Klopp borrowed from one another, and their combined victories at Liverpool and Man City almost seem to converge into one perfect fusion of Guardiola’s dynamism and control.

Guardiola used Klopp’s ideas to adapt to the rough-and-tumble of Premier League life, while Klopp’s “heavy metal” football was tempered by an appreciation of territorial dominance.

Lijnders, like Klopp, is much more concerned with the opportunities that arise when the ball changes hands and the aggressive, high-voltage attacking football than Guardiola.

Guardiola’s territorial suffocation used to sever inferior opponents, but as middle-class teams improved, those who were brave enough to press hard and disrupt the build-up play began to reap rewards.

They literally pushed back until the division was flooded with transitions made in the most effective way, and Guardiola struggled to keep things in check with their slow passing and rigid positioning.

Pep Guardiola once told TNT Sports, “Today, modern football is the way Bournemouth, Newcastle, Brighton, and Liverpool play.” Football in the modern era is not positional. You must follow the rhythm.

That’s a big statement from a man whose tactical philosophy of “positional play” has pretty much defined the sport’s past 15 years, but it’s accurate.

Guardiola was already beginning to experiment with a subtly more direct style of play when he made those remarks about contemporary football.

When City’s possession rate was compared to that of their 2023-24 and 24-25 campaigns, the total number of fast breaks increased by 36%, while City’s possession share decreased from 65.5% to 61.3%.

More notable was Ederson’s use of long balls to obstruct the opposition’s high press and the January signing of Omar Marmoush’s direct dribbling through the lines.

According to what people, Marmoush was Man City 2.0’s first signing, the rebuild that will move Guardiola, Lijnders, and City in a more Klopp-like direction. Since then, more players have followed that type.

Both signings, like Marmoush, point to more passing triangles and more neatly choreographed passing triangles due to the arrivals of Rayan Cherki and Tijjani Reijnders from Lyon and AC Milan, respectively.

To put it another way, Cherki, Reijnders, and Marmoush are the players who like to ride the rhythm.

Because Guardiola has largely deployed central midfielders or centre-backs in the full-back positions over the past two seasons, an obvious nod to control, order, and discipline, the signing of Rayan Ait-Nouri also makes an allusion to Klopp-esque or Lijnders-esque football.

One of Europe’s most vicious fullbacks is Ait-Nouri. He placed second in the Premier League last season (63) and sixth in full-backs for progressive carries (89), which is comparable to the other three 2025 signings we have discussed.

He also placed among the top three defenders in terms of touches in the opposition box (96) and expected assists (5.5%), which was even more impressive.

Ait-Nouri’s arrival indicates that Guardiola has given up on bringing midfielders into the team and is allowing for more urgent, vertical football.

Manchester City fans can stop worrying about their team’s slow, passive football in favor of a dynamic attacking pair like Ait-Nouri and Jeremy Doku working together on the left or how Marmoush and Cherki will fit into the same attacking midfield space.

Before the 2025-26 Premier League campaign kicks off, they will undoubtedly have more questions than answers because the majority of their newcomers, both on and off the pitch, don’t typically fit the Pep mold.