Maldini’s Retirement Could Be Premature
Perhaps Paolo Maldini will not be retiring after all. The veteran defender, who has played a record 126 games for Italy in a 14-year international career, said he would step aside after the World Cup, but Italy Coach Giovanni Trapattoni wants him to reconsider.
“I hope that he will stay on with us,” Trapattoni was quoted as saying in Wednesday’s edition of Gazzetta dello Sport. “He needs to tell me how he feels and whether he has the desire or not. I won’t be sending him into retirement, though.”
Trapattoni’s interest is not entirely altruistic. He believes the 34-year-old Maldini’s experience is vital with qualifying play set to begin in September for the 2004 European Championship in Portugal.
Italy plays Azerbaijan, Finland, Wales and Yugoslavia in its Euro 2004 qualifying group.
Changes in Egypt
Carlos Alberto Torres, who won a World Cup with Brazil in 1970 and later played in the defunct North American Soccer League with the New York Cosmos and the California Surf, has been named coach of one of Egypt’s leading clubs, Zamalek. Torres, 58, replaces Otto Pfister of Germany.
Another top Egyptian club, Al-Ahly, also has changed coaches, with Portugal’s Manuel Jose being shown the door and Dutchman Jo Bonfrere taking over. Bonfrere coached Nigeria to the gold medal at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics but was fired by the Super Eagles last year after Nigeria lost a World Cup qualifying match to Sierra Leone.
AEK Goes Costa Rican
The Greek club AEK Athens has signed a second player from Costa Rica’s World Cup team, acquiring midfielder Walter Centeno from Deportivo Saprissa for an undisclosed sum.
Centeno, 27, a national team veteran with 53 games to his credit, agreed to a five-year contract. He joins Costa Rican defender Mauricio Wright, signed by AEK last week.
AWOL Forwards
At least two South American World Cup players are in trouble with their club teams for going AWOL since Korea/Japan ’02.
Gremio of Brazil said it would fine Brazil forward Luizao $174,000 for breach of contract after he failed to show up for training this week as the team prepared for a Copa Libertadores match at Olimpia of Paraguay.
In England, meanwhile, Southampton Coach Gordon Strachan is bemused by the continuing absence of Ecuador striker Augustin Delgado, who scored his country’s first-ever World Cup goal, against Mexico.
“We’re looking into it,” Strachan said. “It’s frustrating for me because it’s clear that he has the ability, which he showed with the goal he scored at the World Cup. But the club has spent millions of pounds on the player and I’ve only seen him train five times since I came here.”
Because of knee surgery, Delgado, 29, played in only two games in England last season and has said he does not want to return.
MetroStars Denied Injunction
Major League Soccer’s New York/New Jersey MetroStars were turned down in their quest to gain an injunction against the New Jersey Sports and Exhibition Authority that would have prevented the sports authority from promoting games at Giants Stadium on Aug. 8 and 21.
Nick Sakiewicz, team president and general manager, said the ruling by New Jersey Superior Court Judge Marguerite Simon would be appealed.
The MetroStars wanted to promote games of their own on the two dates and the MLS club has a suit pending against the sports authority in which it is trying to get the soccer exclusivity clause in its lease with Giants Stadium enforced.
Riquelme Joins Barcelona
Barcelona has signed Argentine midfielder Juan Roman Riquelme from Boca Juniors, but for less than half the amount originally estimated. The 24-year-old, who signed a five-year contract worth a reported $3 million a year, cost Barcelona $5.9 million, according to Joan Gaspart, Barcelona’s president. Boca Juniors had earlier said Riquelme would join the Spanish club for $12.8 million.
