Archive August 3, 2025

Son Heung-min bids his final match of his Tottenham career in front of his adoring home fans in Seoul by way of an emotional farewell.

When he was substituted in the 65th minute, his Spurs team-mates and the opposing Newcastle players performed a guard of honor at his embrace.

The 33-year-old Son was greeted off the field by the backroom staff and substitutes after Ben Davies had given him the captain’s armband, and he rested his head in his hands as he fought back tears.

Eddie Howe, manager of Newcastle, said: “My players instinctively responded.

That speaks for himself. Not just his talent, but also how he has managed to succeed throughout his career.

At the Seoul World Cup Stadium, the pre-season friendly ended 1-1.

Son said, “I didn’t initially believe I was going to cry.”

“But leaving the club I’ve spent so much time with felt really tough after hearing a few words from my teammates.”

“It was a really, really happy match,” I said. I had a memorable day thanks to my fans, my teammates, and also my opponents.

James Maddison, who had only been playing for ten minutes, was taken off on a stretcher, which raised questions about his injury, according to new Tottenham manager Thomas Frank.

According to Frank, “Sometimes things in life and football can be both beautiful and brutal.”

“That’s what we have today,” the statement read. Maddison appears to have suffered a bad injury, but Son’s teammates’ unbelievable scenes and the players’ respect show up on the other side.

He was emotional when the team-mates gathered around and then we had the walkaround.

Son joined Spurs from Bayer Leverkusen for about £22 million in 2015, making him the most expensive Asian signing in Premier League history.

He was a legend at Spurs, who won the Europa League match against Manchester United to put an end to their 17-year search for a trophy in May.

Son is engaged in discussions with Los Angeles FC’s Major League Soccer (MLS) team in advanced.

After the game, Frank claimed that it was “very likely Sonny’s last game because]a move is] very close” and that saying goodbye in South Korea would “provide a beautiful ending” for Son.

Spurs will play Bayern Munich on Thursday in Germany, and they will also face Paris St-Germain in the Uefa Super Cup the following week.

Every time Son touched the ball, the eager Seoul crowd erupted in joy.

After scoring from the penalty area from the edge of the penalty area in the fourth minute, Son paid tribute to him by replicating his celebration, which he mimicked taking a photo.

Son’s stats speak for themselves: he scored 173 goals in 454 games, which is the highest total for Spurs, and he added 101 assists, which is his 16th-highest total in the history of the competition.

He also ranks seventh among Spurs’ 71 Premier League assists, and he became the first Asian player to achieve the award, which he scored 23 goals in addition to Mohamed Salah at Liverpool.

Son added 17 goals and added 10 assists to his league team’s 35 games the following season when Harry Kane, Spurs’ top scorer, moved to Bayern Munich in 2023.

Son, the club’s three-time all-star player of the year, was the first player to score twice in league goals last year as Spurs moved one place above the relegation zone.

Son’s influence should not be only measured by goals, though.

His best return to date came from having 0.38 assists per 90 minutes last season, which was his fifth-highest total in the league last season for players who played for more than a thousand minutes.

The statistics that illustrate his impact on the rest of the team are perhaps the most interesting.

Spurs won 42% of the 24 league games Son started in 2024-25, compared to 7% without him, and 13 of those games were lost to their captain.

At the 2025 World Aquatics Championships in Singapore, Olympic champions Summer McIntosh and Leon Marchand won gold medals in both the 400-meter individual medley and the women’s medley.

With a championship record of 4 minutes 25.78 seconds, McIntosh, a teenager, finished more than seven seconds clear of Jenna Forrester on Sunday, her fourth gold medal of the week.

The 18-year-old won gold on Saturday in the 400-meter freestyle, 200-meter butterfly, and 200-meter medley, and bronze in the 800-meter freestyle.

At her first Olympics last summer, McIntosh, who holds world records for the 200- and 400-meter medley and the 400-meter freestyle, won three gold medals and a silver.

Frenchman Marchand performed sluggishly in the 400-meter medley heats, but he came back to win gold in 4:14: 73, almost four seconds ahead of Tomoyuki Matsushita, who won silver.

The Paris Games hero, age 23, was just two seconds away from breaking the 400-meter world record he set at the 2023 World Championships when he won gold in the men’s 200-meter individual medley on Thursday.

The British team’s week was ended by Max Litchfield’s seventh place finish.

Marchand later helped France win the medal in the men’s 4x100m medley relay, placing sixth overall.

The GB quartet finished last in the women’s 4x100m medley relay, setting a new world record for the time of 3:49.34.

Ahmed Jaouadi, 20, won gold in the men’s 1500-meter freestyle earlier this week, adding to his 800-meter victory.

Women’s 50-meter freestyle champion Meg Harris won, while Lithuania’s Ruta Meilutyte held on to her 50-meter breaststroke record of 29.55.

Kliment Kolesnikov won gold in the men’s 50-meter backstroke with a time of 23: 68, breaking his previous record of three years.

Britain managed to escape a challenging week in Singapore, winning only five medals and one gold in the men’s 4x200m freestyle.

Although Chris Spice, the camp’s performance director, feels that illness shouldn’t be used as an excuse.

We don’t try to dwell on that,” the company says. You can only see some of the people who might have been affected by that in the last few days, he told BBC Sport.

We’ve tried to reduce the possibility of anything moving between teams by not staying close to other teams.

However, you’re in a heated environment with close friends and family members. It’s only natural that there will be illness. That is the essence. We simply try to get on with it by putting our heads down.

Spice believes that a lot has changed in Aquatics GB’s environment and the workings of the team, which has contributed to a lackluster week.

“We had two British records last year, compared to three now.” Things aren’t bad, he continued, “under the bonnet.”

We believe our junior class has had the best crop in the last four or five years. Hopefully, those two things will come together as we approach the LA [2028 Olympic Games] and produce some results.

“We have eight people competing for their first World Championships, and we have a very young team.” There are many newcomers and a lot of learning is happening.

We left two or three medals on the table because there were opportunities that were missed this week.

Men’s 50-meter freestyle silver-bean Proud

Women’s 3m synchronized diving team Silver-Yasmin Harper and Scarlett Mew Jensen

Men’s 3m synchronized diving champions Jack Laugher and Anthony Harding

After receiving a one-game suspension for a red card against Spain on Saturday, Flanker Marlie Packer will not miss England’s home Women’s Rugby World Cup debut.

In the Red Roses’ 1997-7 World Cup warm-up game against Leicester, the 35-year-old was dismissed for a clumsy clearout that caught full-back Claudia Pena’s leg.

Before England’s World Cup opener against the United States in Sunderland on August 22, Packer is forced to miss their final warm-up game against France on Saturday due to the ban.

Packer’s first cap success since being replaced by Zoe Aldcroft in January was with Spain.

She is one of head coach John Mitchell’s vice-captains and led the Red Roses to two Six Nations Grand Slam victories in 2023 and 2024.

Mitchell’s side have won 26 games and are favorites to win the 2022 World Cup, their last defeat coming in a final game against New Zealand.

Packer, who won England’s World Cup title in 2014, is still facing difficult opponents to start the first round of the competition.