Sports Poets Society

AT 25, MANCHESTER CITY’S ERLING HAALAND IS OUTSCORING SOME OF SOCCER’S GREATEST STARS ‘I HAD NOT SEEN ANYONE ARRIVE IN THE ELITE  LEAGUE IN THE WORLD AND JUST UTTERLY BEND IT TO HIS WILL.’ —ROGER BENNETT, FOUNDER AND CEO      OF THE MEN IN BLAZERS MEDIA NETWORK ‘I DIDN’T KNOW I WAS FAMOUS IN THE U.S. —EVERYONE KNOWS WHO I AM.’ —ERLING HAALAND 18 Aug 2025 TIME International BY SEAN GREGORY/ MANCHESTER, ENGLAND, PHILADELPHIA, AND BOCA RATON, FLA. TWO OF THE MOST VALUABLE FEET ON the planet are burning. It’s a stifling midjune afternoon and Erling Haaland, the superstar Manchester City striker from Norway who looks like Thor but sometimes celebrates goals by meditating in the lotus pose, is walking on the piping hot sand in Boca Raton, Fla. The heat is so intense that I start skittering to the wet sand in desperate need of relief, but Haaland, who has insisted on removing his sandals, simply saunters to a cooler stretch of seashore. “No pain,” he says, flashing a smile....

‘ ‘THE UNDERLYING MESSAGE OF THE FILM IS THAT, IN FACT, EVEN IF WE ARE COMING FROM VERY DIFFERENT CULTURES AND VERY DIFFERENT PLACES, THERE ARE SOME SIMILARITIES.”    - BILL EINREINHOFER, FILM PRODUCER 23 Jun 2025 TIME International BY MINLU ZHANG In 1971 the American table tennis player Glenn Cowan boarded the wrong bus during the world championships in Nagoya, Japan. He missed the U.S. team’s bus and got on the next one, only to find himself on the Chinese team’s bus. On the bus a Chinese player, Zhuang Zedong , saw the unfamiliar American, stepped forward and introduced himself. “They didn’t speak each other’s languages, but somehow they were able to communicate because they tried,” the film producer Bill Einreinhofer said. “And their picture was taken and traveled around the world. They started a dialogue between America and China that continues today.” Einreinhofer, a three-time Emmy Award winning producer, documented the period in his new film Your Serve or Mine . The...