Spanish Teams Miss Their Stars
Injuries have removed some of the luster, but none of the significance, from today’s European Champions League semifinal game between Barcelona and Real Madrid.
Besides a worldwide TV audience, World Cup coaches from several countries will be watching nervously, crossing their fingers in hopes that their players will come through unscathed.
Real Madrid’s Zinedine Zidane, the world’s most expensive player, has a strained thigh muscle and is doubtful for the opener of the two-game series at Barcelona’s Nou Camp Stadium. The teams will play again at Madrid’s Santiago Bernabeu Stadium on May 1.
The loss of Zidane, whose two goals against Brazil in the final propelled France to its 1998 World Cup triumph, could be costly to Real Madrid, which already is without Spain’s national team striker Fernando Morientes, who also has an injured thigh, and Portugal midfielder Luis Figo, who not only is suspended but also has an ankle injury.
Even without that trio, Real Madrid still has Brazil’s Roberto Carlos and Spain’s Fernando Hierro and Raul to help it carry the day.
Barcelona, meanwhile, is without Brazil forward Rivaldo, who tore a knee ligament during a league game Saturday. Barcelona also is without Spain’s national team defender Carles Puyol, who suffered a thigh injury Saturday.
Real Madrid has won the European Cup eight times, most recently in 2000, but wants to cap its centennial year by winning the final in Glasgow, Scotland, next month. Barcelona has won the title once, in 1992.
The Real Madrid-Barcelona winner will play the winner of the other two-game semifinal series beginning Wednesday between England’s Manchester United and Germany’s Bayer Leverkusen.
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Italian league coaches annually award something called “the golden bench” to the coach they pick as the best of the season. On Monday, Fabio Capello won it for the third time, after leading AS Roma to its first Serie A title in 18 years. Capello also won in 1992 and 1994 while coaching AC Milan.
Latin America
Uruguay’s national team striker Sebastian Abreu set a Mexican league record by scoring his 17th and 18th goals of the season for Cruz Azul in a 2-2 tie with Toluca, surpassing the single-season total set by Mexico striker Jared Borgetti.
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Former Colombian national team striker Faustino Asprilla returned to the Colombian league after a decade in exile, only to be red-carded in his first game back.
Asprilla, whose career took him from Atletico Nacional in Colombia to Newcastle United in England, Parma in Italy, Palmeiras and Fluminense in Brazil, and Atlante in Mexico, returned to his original club and was ejected late in the game for calling the referee a clown.
Afterward, he claimed that, “one single defender kicked me more than 40 times.”
Asia
Japan’s Coach Philippe Troussier said Monday that he would name his 23-man World Cup roster May 17, shortly after warmup games against Real Madrid and Norway. Japan plays at Real Madrid on May 7 as part of the Spanish club’s centennial celebrations and plays Norway in Oslo on May 14.
Troussier named 25 players to a squad that will play Slovakia next Monday in Tokyo and Honduras on May 2 in Kobe in the annual Kirin Cup.
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World Cup co-host South Korea announced Monday they that it will play Scotland in a warmup game May 16 in the port city of Busan. Coach Guus Hiddink’s team also has warmup games scheduled against China on April 27, England on May 21 and France on May 26.
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South Korea and Japan will establish special telephone hotlines to help coordinate security and keep each other informed about possible terrorism or infectious disease threats during the World Cup.
The countries’ defense ministers agreed on the plan during a meeting in Seoul over the weekend.
Africa
Senegal, which will open the World Cup against defending champion France on May 31 in Seoul, will play Kashiwa Reysol of Japan’s J-League in a warmup game May 19 in Fujieda, a city just south of Tokyo that will serve as the African team’s World Cup base.
