Barcelona Hopes Antic Has Answer
Radomir Antic, a 53-year-old former Yugoslav international who coached Atletico Madrid to the Spanish league and cup “double” in 1995, Friday was hired to succeed Louis Van Gaal as coach of Barcelona.
The appointment is only until the end of the season, but Antic said he is “very satisfied with the agreement,” which includes an option to remain in charge depending on the results he achieves.
Van Gaal was ousted Monday after Barcelona continued to slide down the Spanish league table despite winning a record-tying 10 games in a row in the European Champions League.
Antic has been charged with bringing the club back to a position of respectability in Spain while continuing the team’s pursuit of the European Cup.
“We are convinced that he is the coach the club needs at the moment,” Francesc Closa, Barcelona’s vice president, said in Madrid, where Antic agreed to the contract.
Arson Move
Gianluca Grassadonia, the Cagliari player whose car was set afire by angry fans after he scored an own goal in a 3-0 loss to Venezia in an Italian Serie B game on Sunday, was loaned to a higher-ranked club. Cagliari sent the 30-year-old central defender to Chievo of Serie A, which will have the option of acquiring him outright at season’s end.
Costa Rica
Steve Sampson, the former U.S. World Cup coach now in charge of Costa Rica’s national team, will have to travel to Russia to keep track of one of his players.
Forward Winston Parks, 21, signed a one-year contract to play for Russian champion Lokomotiv Moscow on loan from his Italian Serie A club Udinese.
Parks was one of 19 players called up by Sampson this week to begin training for the UNCAF Copa de Naciones, to be played Feb. 9-23 in Panama. That tournament serves as Central American qualifying for the CONCACAF Gold Cup in July.
Galaxy Signature
Alex Pineda Chacon, the 33-year-old Honduran midfielder acquired by the Galaxy from the New England Revolution as part of the trade that sent former Los Angeles goalkeeper Matt Reis to the Revolution, signed a multiyear contract with the Galaxy.
Terms were not revealed, but Soccer America magazine earlier reported that Pineda Chacon would be receiving less than the $170,000 he earned at New England.
England Change
Chances are that veteran England goalkeeper David Seaman will not be in the nets Feb. 12 when England plays Australia in a friendly international in London.
“I don’t think David Seaman should be playing friendly games anymore,” Sven Goran Eriksson, England’s Swedish coach, told the Oxford Union debating society Thursday.
The 39-year-old Arsenal goalkeeper has played 75 games for the national team but came under heavy criticism after his mistake allowed Brazil’s Ronaldinho to score on a long-range free kick and defeat England in the 2002 World Cup quarterfinals.
