Sports Poets Society

Victor Wembanyama, avec ses coéquipiers des Spurs,  le 13 janvier 2025, lors du match contre les Lakers de Los Angeles. La NBA débarque à Paris cette semaine avec deux matchs au menu et un ambassadeur de choix, Victor Wembanyama. Entre marketing et âge d’or du basket français, succès garanti. « Au-delà de tout ce qui fait que Paris est une ville extraordinaire, je n’ai pas besoin de vous expliquer pourquoi, on est vraiment dans un âge d’or pour le basket français » George Aivazoglou directeur général de la NBA Europe et Moyen-orient Christophe Remise  20 Jan 2025 - Le Figaro Je ne pense qu’à ça. C’est dur d’attendre. » Victor Wembanyama piaffe d’impatience. Il n’est pas le seul. Après avoir investi Londres de 2011 à 2019, quand l’accor Arena avait encore besoin d’un coup de pinceau pour répondre à ses standards, la NBA a choisi, depuis 2020, Paris pour y jouer ses matchs de saison régulière en Europe. Un événement à chaque fois. Cette fois, encore plus. Cette fois, il y a « We...

Amorim blasts players as team slump to 131-year low Onana howler and Brighton’s brilliance rock sorry United 20 Jan 2025 - The Guardian Jamie Jackson - Old Trafford Ruben Amorim branded his team as the worst “maybe in the history of Manchester United” after they were booed off the Old Trafford pitch following a 3-1 defeat against Brighton. The result leaves United in 13th with 26 points, 10 points above the relegation zone, on a day when fans and former players paid tribute to the late Denis Law . It was United’s sixth home league defeat of the season, the most from their opening 12 home matches of a league campaign since 1893-94, 131 years ago. Amorim pointed to his record since replacing Erik ten Hag in the autumn. “In 10 games in the Premier League, we won two . I know that. We are the worst team maybe in the history of Manchester United,” he said. “I know you want headlines but I am saying that because we have to acknowledge that and to change that. Here you go: your headlines. Im...

Olivier Létang et Benoît Millot, arbitre d’un Lens-Lille en 2021. Le président du LOSC est l’homme au coeur de la réussite de son club.  Depuis plus de 25 ans, le dirigeant s’investit dans tous les secteurs et pousse l’exigence à l’extrême, quitte à user certains de ses collaborateurs. "Il avait l’idée de l’entreprise et une vision du foot,  ce qui est rare"    - ANCIEN DIRECTEUR LEONARDO,       SPORTIF DU PSG, À PROPOS D’OLIVIER LÉTANG "Mon rôle est d’être son Lexomil,  de le calmer parfois.  Il peut être fatigant, oui,  mais quand on le connaît..."    - CHRISTOPHE CHENUT, ANCIEN PRÉSIDENT DU STADE       DE REIMS QUI A FAIT VENIR OLIVIER LÉTANG AU CLUB 20 Jan 2025 - L'Équipe NATHAN GOURDOL et HERVÉ PENOT (avec D. D.) Il s’est invité en personnage central de la qualification lilloise en 16es de finale de Coupe de France à Marseille (1-1, 4-3 aux t.a.b.). Roberto De Zerbi n’en avait que pour l’attitude d...

Kevin McKenna's Diary  19 Jan 2025 - The Herald YOU can’t really overstate what Denis Law represented for my dad’s generation and for those of us who began to love football while this great Scottish international was still playing. You often hear phrases such as “they transcended their chosen career” when someone truly gifted has died. I heard it used recently with the release of Maria, about the final days of Maria Callas.  What people mean, I think, when they say this, is that the individual came to define an era and captured the mood of society at a certain point in its history. For a while, they had embodied a cultural shift. Denis Law, along with his Manchester United teammate George Best achieved this status, as did the Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix, Andy Warhol, Mary Quant and Eva Peron. If Law had been an actor he’d have portrayed pirates or popular legends like Robin Hood, fighting the forces of the establishment to provide relief for the poor. Like Errol Flynn, his fi...

Coach has taken journey from unwanted one to special one as Champions League fairytale continues ‘The adventure with Brest happened when I did not believe it could happen any more’ 19 Jan 2025 - THE OBSERVER / Sport Philippe Auclair At the very end of 2022, Éric Roy was convinced the ship he had hoped to board had sailed a while ago. How could it be otherwise? He was now in his 57th year, and his last – his only – coaching assignment had ended more than a decade previously. He had resigned himself to carrying on working as a pundit for French television, as he had done since 2012, with a three-year spell as sports director with first Lens, then Watford from 2017 to 2020 sandwiched in between. The irony of the situation was not lost on him: he was better qualified now than he had been when, in March 2010, his home town club, Nice, had called on him to manage their first team. He had accepted the role despite having no managerial experience whatsoever – and no coaching badges either. Ni...

Nottingham Forest’s simplicity is deceptive: it looks easy because it is so well planned 19 Jan 2025 - THE OBSERVER / Sport Jonathan Wilson There was a period when datawallahs insisted confidence didn’t exist – which came as a surprise to almost everybody who has ever played sport at any level. There are days when you feel invincible, when every putt drops, when every ball pitches in the right place, when you claim every cross. And there are days when your club may as well be a Toblerone, when catching the easiest dolly seems an impossible feat of calculation and coordination, when your legs simply will not function. Vast screeds were written dismissing the “hot-hand fallacy”. Then, in 2020, the journalist Ben Cohen wrote The Hot Hand , which demonstrated a flaw in previous calculations and decided that the hot hand – a term from basketball referring to a player on a scoring streak – does exist. From a layman’s perspective, the tests employed always seemed so artificial to be highly qu...

IMMORTAL - Law with fellow Man United heroes  Bobby Charlton  and George Best. Below, statue of trio Former team-mates pay tribute to ‘unbelievable’ strike ace.. the only footballer from our nation to be crowned world’s best thoughts are with your family. thanks for the great memories. My hero Kenny Dalglish on all-time great 18 gen 2025 - Daily Record BY JOHN-PAUL CLARK TRIBUTES have been paid to Denis Law, the only Scot to have ever won the ballon D’Or, after his death at 84.  The former Manchester United and Scotland striker’s family announced the sad news last night after he lost his battle with Alzheimer’s disease and vascular dementia. A family statement said: “It is with a heavy heart that we tell you our father Denis Law has sadly passed away. He fought a tough battle but finally he is now at peace. We would like to thank everyone who contributed to his wellbeing and care, past and much more recently. “We know how much people supported and loved him, and love was ...

In 2016, The Herald ran an exclusive interview with Denis Law. After the death of the Scotland and Man United legend at the age of 84, we’ve reprinted it in full here... Being able to play and send a couple of quid home to my mum was a big thing for me. There was just this thrill every time I played and that stayed with me throughout my career. I never at any point got fed up with it 18 Jan 2025 - Herald Sport Graeme Macpherson Football writer EVEN on a midweek afternoon in the middle of the close season, the concourses around Old Trafford still echo to the sound of excited continental chattering. Groups of tourists, many clad head to toe in Manchester United merchandise, throng from one landmark to another, their passage around the outside of the stadium interrupted only by the need to stop at frequent intervals to lift their phones for the now ubiquitous selfie shots. Among the most popular attractions is the statue of the United Trinity, three of the club’s greatest players immortal...

18 gen 2025 - Daily Record ARCHIE MACPHERSON ON SCOTLAND HERO DENIS LAW »Broadcaster pays tribute to icon who plundered so many goals in the dark blue »From the highs of 1961 Czechoslovakia win to lows of 1974 World Cup and beyond any time denis represented his country, he carried the possibility of victory for us     - ARCHIE ON LAW’S IMPACT FOR SCOTLAND A GOAL by Denis law was no mere statistic. It could be like you were witnessing a comet flashing across the sky, his blond mop a beacon of crowning glory as he would turn away from the achievement, his hand raised in triumph like he had just fulfilled his side of a bargain he had set with the terracing masses with whom there was mutual devotion. I witnessed this for the first time on September 26, 1961, when Scotland were trailing a great Czechoslovakia team 2-1 in the second-half at Hampden. Denis’s two goals to win the match, particularly his searing second, was like he had endowed himself with a special responsibility...