Author: WebDesk

 A special chat with @vishy64theking on the #Qatar2022 . Who is the grandmaster supporting? Listen in   Sponsored by: Thums Up #FIFAWorldCup #Qatar2022 #Messi #Ronaldo

– Boria Majumdar in Doha The first half was goalless. And the pressure was building. Soon after the referee had called half time did the camera focus on Messi. As the stalwart was walking off, one wondered what was going through his mind. But then few have experienced the kind of pressure Messi or Cristiano Ronaldo does. The World Cup tests even the finest players in the strangest of ways. Most importantly, Messi knows what it is like to lose. He has experienced failure and is aware that it is possible he will fail on occasions, as he did against…

The speed of thought that Lionel Messi showed while taking his goal was incredible, but the hard-fought victory over Mexico also gave us a glimpse of Argentine football’s future, in the shape of the brilliant Enzo Fernandez. Much of the talk before this tournament was of Argentina’s 36-match unbeaten run, which spanned over three years. But by the end of their shock defeat to Saudi Arabia, it was another number that had their fans breaking out in cold sweats. Since losing the 2014 World Cup final to Germany, Argentina had won just one of their five World Cup matches, a…

There were echoes of Zico’s sublime finish against New Zealand in 1982 in Richarlison’s bicycle-kick goal against Serbia. If anything though, the finish from the kid who had to fight for everything was even better. If you’re a pragmatist who shies away from any kind of romance, you’ll say that the ball had 12m to travel to beat the Serbian goalkeeper. But the journey that got Brazil’s Richarlison to his position just behind the penalty spot had taken nearly eight years and many thousands of kilometres. If numbers matter to you, then it was more than 17,500km – nearly halfway…

– Atreyo Mukhopadhyay How often do you encounter a cyclone and tsunami on the same night? I did, along with some of my colleagues. On this day two years ago, on November 25, 2020, Chennai was supposed to be hit by Cyclone Nivar. I was working there for a newspaper, overseeing the production process that night. Because there was this cyclone alert, which was supposed to make landfall at around midnight, we had planned in advance to wind up work at around 10.30 pm. Only those who lived close by had been asked to come to office that day. It…

Besides being the greatest footballer of our age, Diego Maradona often showcased the best and worst of the human race. To remember him is also to recognise how flawed we are. The older you get, it’s common for younger fans to ask you to name the greatest footballer you ever watched. Though the process of sifting through dozens of mental highlights reels is a pleasurable one, there will only ever be one answer. I suspect it will be that way for most of my generation. You didn’t watch Diego Maradona play. You experienced him, and it was a roller-coaster like…

– Atreyo Mukhopadhyay Stunned? Dumbfounded? Crestfallen? Lost money if you placed a bet? Or uncomfortably numb? All at the same time in space of two days? You better be if you are watching the World Cup. Very difficult to explain how this happened, but it did. Japan outsmarting Germany in a game the European powerhouse has dominated for so long! It was a bizarre outcome, considering how the first half played out. It was all Germany and Japan nowhere close to it. On paper, both teams started out on a 4-2-3-1 note. Effectively, Japan were playing 8-2-0 for the first…

World football witnessed the first major shock of the ongoing FIFA World Cup 2022 as Saudi Arabia pinned Argentina to register a 2-1 victory at the Lusail Iconic Stadium on Tuesday. The jubilant Argentine fans, who were buzzing after Lionel Messi calmly slotted penalty in the bottom-left corner in the ninth-minute mark, were left stunned with Saudi Arabia registering a historic result courtesy of two scintillating finishes by Saleh Al-Shehri and Salem Al-Dawsari. Though Argentina would be frustrated with two goals being disallowed by offside, credit to Al-Shehri for keeping his calm and squeezing a low shot in the 48th…

– Atreyo Mukhopadhyay Who saw this coming? The wildest of dreamers? Not quite. Saudi Arabia pulled off probably the craziest of upsets in the history of World Cup football by beating Argentina 2-1 on an unbelievable Tuesday evening. There have been incorrigible results in this competition in the past. Argentina themselves losing to Cameroon in 1990 is an example, Germany succumbing to South Korea in 2018 being another one in a long list. Even then, what happened in Lusail Stadium on Tuesday was quite bizarre. Complete outsiders Saudi Arabia dominated against the title contenders led by Lionel Messi in some…

India and New Zealand put on an absolutely cracking contest on a rain-filled evening in Mount Maunganui for the second T20I of their 3-match series. India won the game by 65 runs behind an inspirational performance from Suryakumar Yadav.  The first innings started with India batting after the BlackCaps won the toss and chose to field due to the conditions. India’s batting efforts were highlighted by Yadav’s masterful performance, as he made the Kiwi bowlers scratch their heads with his batting barrage. Despite a rain delay and a scintillating Tim Southee hat-trick in the final over, the Indians managed to…