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Sports

The former Togo and Nigeria tactician has been honoured with a special feature on his posthumous birthday
 Multinational technology company, Google celebrates Nigerian football icon Stephen Keshi on his birthday with a doodle.
The doodle which will be viewed in all African countries, illustrates the unique achievement of the former Nigeria national team and Togo national team coach who died on June 7, 2016, at the age of 54.He started out with St. Finbarr’s College, Lagos and featured for domestic club sides ACB Football Club and New Nigeria Bank before leading a generation of Nigerian footballers abroad when he went to Cote d’Ivoire’s Stade d’Abidjan and Africa Sports. He then made his way on to Belgium where he played for Lokeren, Anderlecht, RC Strasbourg, among many others.Goal
Last modified on Tuesday, 23 January 2018 16:56

Joseph Parker says he will respond with a defiant smile if Anthony Joshua's punches cannot put a dent in his renowned chin during their world title unification clash.

The New Zealander holds a proud reputation of never being floored in his unbeaten career ahead of his heavyweight fight with Joshua at the Principality Stadium in Cardiff on March 31, live on Sky Sports Box Office.

WBA 'super' and IBF champion Joshua has found a way to stop all 20 of his opponents, but WBO king Parker has suggested he could "crush" the home favourite's confidence by standing up to his best shots.

"If he hits me in the chin and doesn't hurt me then obviously I'll smile and try my best to hit him back," Parker exclusively told Sky Sports.

"I think some fighters when they throw a punch and throw everything they have and it doesn't affect the other person, it might crush them a bit.

"In boxing, some fighters have good chins. You just have to be persistent and continue following the plan and trying to catch them nicely, and obviously hope to be knocking him out.

"I know that if I got him into the trouble (Wladimir) Klitschko got him into, I wouldn't have let him off the pedal. I would put the pedal down and have chased him around."

Parker says there were no harsh words from Joshua as they posed for the customary face-off at the end of a prickly press conference last week.

But the Kiwi believes his promoter David Higgins succeeded in unsettling Joshua, who declared it would take "more than a human" to defeat himafter responding to claims from Parker's camp about his own chin.

"I don't know how to take that," said Parker. "I might have to be 'Superman' or 'Batman' or something. I don't know? Have to be more than human? I don't know what more you can be?

"He was rattled with what David was saying. For him to defend himself, shows that he didn't like what was coming his way. I don't think he really takes criticism that well."

Sky Sports

Cristiano Ronaldo scored twice but had to leave the pitch with his face covered in blood as Real Madrid eased their domestic crisis by hammering Liga strugglers Deportivo La Coruna 7-1 at home on Sunday (Jan 21) to reclaim fourth place in the standings.

Real had lost two of their last three league games and got off on the wrong foot against relegation-threatened Deportivo when former Atletico Madrid forward Adrian Lopez put the visiting side ahead against the run of play in the 23rd minute.

The stumbling La Liga champions responded in emphatic fashion, however, and went on to record their biggest win of the season in all competitions with two goals apiece from Gareth Bale, Nacho Fernandez and Ronaldo as well as a long-range strike from Luka Modric.

Ronaldo was unable to continue playing after he was left with a bloodied face by the boot of Deportivo defender Fabian Schar as he struck his second goal, which took him level with Bale as Real's top scorer in the league with six strikes.

Real climbed back above Villarreal into fourth place on 35 points but are still far behind runaway leaders Barcelona, who top the standings with 51 points and can move 11 clear of nearest challengers Atletico Madrid if they beat Real Betis later on Sunday.

"The players needed a game like this," Real coach Zinedine Zidane told reporters.

"I don't know if much changed apart from the scoreline and that's the biggest difference. We played well against Villarreal (in our last match despite losing 1-0) and we were doing well when we were losing 1-0 today but we got the equaliser and I'm delighted with what we did in the rest of the game." Real began the season with a comfortable win away to Deportivo and could hardly have asked for better opponents than the struggling Galician side to get them out of their miserable run of form, even though Depor struck first.

In-form defender Nacho lashed Madrid level after playing a one-two with Marcelo and then Bale produced a brilliant curled finish off the post to put Real in front as halftime approached.

Bale stretched his side's advantage after the interval by leaping to head in Toni Kroos's corner, scoring a sixth goal in seven league starts which proved his persistent muscle injuries have not harmed his striking prowess.

Ronaldo had had little luck in front of goal at that point but quickly stole the headlines with two strikes in six minutes and departed the pitch using a mobile phone to examine his blood-drenched face.

Reuters

Real Madrid are gradually restoring their confidence in the LaLiga with a 7-1 demolishing of Deportivo La Coruna on Sunday.

Gareth Bale, Cristiano Ronaldo and Nacho Fernandez each scored twice as Real Madrid came from behind to thrash Deportivo 7-1 at the Bernabeu.

 

Deportivo took the lead in the 23 minutes with Adrian Lopez’s strike but they held the advantage for just nine minutes.

The equaliser came when Nacho Fernandez turned home Marcelo’s cut-back, and the Brazilian full-back claimed another assist for Bale’s first goal.

Bale scored his second just before the hour, heading home a Toni Kroos corner.

Luka Modric scored Madrid’s fourth when he met Cristiano Ronaldo flick and drove home a powerful shot.

 

The fifth goal came 12 minutes from time, this time Casemiro perfectly picking out Ronaldo at the far post to tap home his first La Liga goal in 2018.

And Ronaldo had time to grab a second as he headed home Lucas Vazquez’s cross — but he took a boot in the face from Fabian Schaer and was left covered in blood.

Madrid had already made their three substitutions so had to carry on with 10 men and Nacho netted his second from close range in the 89th minute.

 

DailyPost 

Arsenal have reportedly had a first offer of €50 million for Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang rejected by his German club Borussia Dortmund, according to Kicker magazine on Saturday.

Aubameyang, last season's top scorer in the German league with 31 goals, has been dropped by Dortmund for the last two games amid speculation he is chasing a move to the Premier League club.

Arsenal are reportedly on the verge of selling Chile striker Alexis Sanchez to Manchester United.

Dortmund will not accept less than €60 million for Gabon hot-shot Aubameyang, who is under contract with Borussia until 2021, reports say.

Dortmund CEO Hans-Joachim Watzke confirmed to SID, an AFP subsidiary, that there has now been contact with Arsenal, but said reports of a possible fee are "speculation" and "the first contact has not been about money".

Aubameyang was dropped for Dortmund's draws with Wolfsburg last Sunday and at Hertha Berlin on Friday after failing to attend a team meeting, and the club say he has lacked "focus" in training.

His father, also his agent, was said to be in London this week to try to push through a transfer to Arsenal.

Aubameyang trained hard alongside Dortmund's reserves for an hour on Saturday.

His tempo was noticeably higher than it had been having been dropped by Stoeger for Friday's draw after the head coach thought the striker had been distracted in the final session before the Bundesliga match in Berlin.

On Friday, while his club was drawing in Berlin, Aubameyang played a kick-about game indoors with his friends in Dortmund.

German daily Bild report that he wore a Dortmund shirt bearing the name of Ousmane Dembele, who transferred to Barcelona in August after going on strike to force the German club to sell him for €105 million.

Before the draw in Berlin, Dortmund's director of sport Michael Zorc said Aubameyang was still in the club's future plans, providing he changed his behaviour.

"There's a way back into the team for him, but professionalism is part of that, which includes saying you've made a mistake in one situation or another," added Zorc.

AFP

Brazil legend Pele is in hospital after collapsing on Thursday with exhaustion.

The 77-year-old was due to travel to London this weekend for a dinner held in his honour by the Football Writers Association (FWA).

Pele – the only player to win three World Cups – “has undergone a series of tests which appear to point to severe exhaustion”, said the FWA.

“He is on fluids while doctors monitor his recovery. Thankfully there is no suggestion of anything more serious.”

Pele has been taken to hospital for kidney and prostate problems in recent years.

Widely regarded as the greatest player of all time, he scored 1,281 goals in 1,363 appearances during his 21-year career, including 77 goals in 91 appearances for Brazil.

He helped his country win the 1958, 1962 and 1970 World Cups and was named Fifa’s Player of the Century.

Vanguard

 

 At the age of 39, Didier Drogba is in the twilight years of a glittering football career that has spanned two decades and six countries and brought him a harvest of trophies.

Such moments are typically occasions of nostalgia, even sadness, for many ageing football greats.

But, in an interview with AFP, Drogba showed he was brimming with passion - launching a school project for Ivory Coast's disadvantaged young and fiery about the under-performing state of the national football team.

"I say to young people who want to become Didier Drogba, Samuel Eto'o, Yaya Toure... education is very important, it's this which is going to allow you to have a good career," he said, referring to the country's trio of football heroes.

"The best way to have an impact on the future of people is to educate them. Thanks to education, we avoid a lot of socio-ethnic problems. We learn tolerance and that avoids war," said Drogba.

Drogba's seven-year-old charity is inaugurating a new school for 350 children in Guiberoua, a region of southwestern Ivory Coast whose economy is dominated by the cocoa trade.

As the world's largest cocoa producer, Ivory Coast has struggled to prevent children working in the sector, with somewhere between 300 000 and a million children doing cocoa-related work, chocolate industry figures show.

These children grow up using machetes to prise open beans for sale and most receive little, if any, education.

Six classrooms and a pitch

The new school, which will be located in Pokou-Kouamekro village, will have six classrooms, a canteen, three homes for teachers - and, of course, a football pitch.

"The Pokou-Kouamekro community, which has more than 4 000 people, until now had a small non-official school made of wood, with three classrooms for all the children," according to the International Cocoa Initiative (ICI), which teamed up with the Didier Drogba Foundation and food giant Nestle to build the new school.

Drogba's storied career has taken him to France, England, China, Turkey, Canada and the United States.

He is best remembered for his spell at Chelsea, helping them to four Premier League titles, four FA Cups and the 2012 Champions League, which he famously won through an 88th-minute equaliser and the winning penalty in the deciding shootout against Bayern Munich.

He was twice named African Footballer of the Year.

Last year, as both player and co-owner, he joined Phoenix Rising, an Arizona club in the second tier of the American league system which has hopes for joining Major League Soccer (MLS), the North American elite.

"Today I'm dedicated to my club, I still have a season with the aim of getting it into the MLS," he says.

'Elephants' in crisis

Drogba's big disappointment is Ivory Coast's national team, which he captained to runners-up in the African Cup of Nations in 2006 and 2012 and helped it qualify for the World Cup in 2006, 2010 and 2014.

But "The Elephants" failed to qualify for this year's World Cup in Russia - a setback that he bluntly says is the result of a "deplorable crisis".

"There is a discontent, there is a real malaise, it is necessary to speak about it. It must be solved, everything must be done so that Ivorian football is growing out of this crisis."

Drogba is no stranger to intervening in the problems of his country, which was gripped by political crisis and civil strife between 2002 and 2011.

In October 2005, after Ivory Coast qualified for their first World Cup in Germany, the team dropped to their knees on national television and Drogba pleaded for the different warring factions to lay down their weapons. His appeal was followed by a ceasefire.

In 2007, he pushed for an African Nations Cup qualifier to be played in Bouake, a rebel stronghold, in an attempt to unify the country.

And in 2011, he joined a Truth, Reconciliation and Dialogue Commission to try to consolidate the fledgling peace.

No political ambitions

Despite this, Drogba says he has no ambitions of going into politics like fellow African football star-turned-president George Weah, Liberia's newly-elected leader.

"This is basically not my ambition. George had this ambition for years. Today that's not the case for me," Drogba says.

"I congratulate George Weah. He's a big brother, a model for me.

"What he has accomplished demonstrates that through hard work and perseverance, you can achieve your objectives, realise your dreams for the good of the community."

AFP

Last modified on Friday, 19 January 2018 10:00

North and South Korea will march jointly under one unified flag during the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympics, the biggest sign yet of a detente after months of tensions over Kim Jong Un’s nuclear program.

The statement, made on Wednesday following the third round of talks in just over a week, said the two Koreas will form a joint women’s ice hockey team. They will also conduct some activities in North Korea, including a joint cultural event at Mount Geumgang and training for skiers from both countries at the Masikryong ski resort on the east coast.

It will be the first time the two Koreas have marched together during the opening ceremony of an international sporting event since 2007, and the ninth time overall, according to South Korea. The two Koreas haven’t competed under a single banner since 1991.

The progress came as U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson warned about the possibility of war, telling fellow top diplomats in Canada that North Korea’s nuclear advancements had brought the world to a “tenuous stage.” President Donald Trump’s administration is seeking to maintain maximum pressure on North Korea even as Seoul reaches out to make the Olympics a success.

North Korea’s athletes will come to South Korea on Feb. 1, with the rest of the delegation arriving on Feb. 7, according to South Korea. Pyongyang will also send 150 people, including athletes, a cheering squad, reporters and an art troupe to the Paralympics in March.

The sides have yet to decide who will represent Kim at the Games to be held in the ski resort of Pyeongchang from Feb. 9. Last week, they agreed to allow a 140-member North Korean orchestra to perform concerts in Seoul and Gangneung, a vacation city near Pyeongchang.

At an International Olympic Committee meeting in Switzerland planned for the weekend, officials will decide on matters such as the number and names of North Korean athletes and Olympic officials, the committee said in a statement last week. It will also decide on participation protocol regarding the flag that North Korea will compete under, as well as other matters concerning the anthem, ceremonies and uniforms.

In a sign that the Olympics may only be a temporary break from Kim’s threats and push to develop nuclear weapons capable of hitting America, a North Korean state-run newspaper called on South Korea to stop its military drills with the U.S.

Bloomberg

Last modified on Thursday, 18 January 2018 02:52

Theo Walcott has completed his move to Everton, signing a three-and-a-half-year deal which keeps him at the club until 2021.

Sky Sports News understands the fee for the forward is in the region of £20m, with the England international set to take the No 11 shirt vacated by Kevin Mirallas who has re-joined Olympiakos on loan.

"I'm very ambitious and I've come here because I want the club to push to the next level," said Walcott.

"And with the players that have come in, I feel like the next level can be reached. I'm very excited to be starting a new chapter and I felt this was the right place for me to be.

"Everton is a club with a great history. The fans are always passionate, they're great and I always used to find it very tough playing here.

"The club has won trophies but I want them to win trophies now. The manager is very hungry and it's just what I need. I've had a couple of chats with him and straightaway I felt that hunger and that desire that he wanted from me.

"It felt like it was time for me to move on [from Arsenal]. It was sad but it's exciting at the same time and I want to reignite my career and push Everton to win things as they have done before."

Everton boss Sam Allardyce, said: "I'm thrilled we've been able to secure a player of Theo's experience and quality.

"There was a bit of a chase between a couple of clubs but I think after we set out the ambitions of the Club and my ambitions for him he was motivated to come here and refreshed in his mind by the new challenge he can put upon himself.

Allardyce confirmed last week the club had entered into negotiations with Arsenal over Walcott, who carried out his medical on Tuesday after travelling to the club's training ground.

The 28-year-old leaves Arsenal as their current longest-serving player having signed from Southampton in 2006 but had fallen out-of-favour at The Emirates this season, making only six Premier League appearances.

Southampton had been keen to land Walcott, but Sky Sports Newsunderstands that Everton's spending power and the player's desire to work with Allardyce were the key reasons for his move to Goodison Park.

Walcott becomes Everton's second signing of the January transfer window, following Cenk Tosun's £27m switch from Besiktas, and Allardyce revealed last week that he believed Walcott would be another "great addition" to his squad.

Sky Sports

Last modified on Thursday, 18 January 2018 02:44

Anthony Joshua says he will command the respect of Joseph Parker after inflicting a punishing defeat on the New Zealander, but insists there will not be a post-fight handshake.

The WBA 'super' and IBF champion has been angered by a verbal attack from Parker and his promotional team ahead of his heavyweight unification clash with the WBO title holder at the Principality Stadium in Cardiff on March 31, live on Sky Sports Box Office.

Joshua suggests that Parker does not deserve to be mentioned alongside other champion sportsmen and will not offer a gesture of appreciation after he delivers a first humbling loss to the 26-year-old.

Asked about Parker's pre-fight comments, Joshua exclusively told Sky Sports: "I haven't seen them all, but I've heard some of them.

"In sports you've got the likes of Roger Federer, Andy Murray, Lewis Hamilton, Cristiano Ronaldo, [Lionel] Messi, LeBron James, and then you've got people like Joseph Parker, so he's not a respectable type of person, he can't control himself.

"But that's just how it is. You've got to accept people for who they are. If that's how he wants to plan his shot, we let him crack on.

"He'll be respectful after I whoop him. He might try to shake my hand. I won't shake his hand though."

Parker has questioned the punch resistance of Joshua, who was floored for the first time in his professional career in the Wembley win over Wladimir Klitschko, even ending his own tweets with the mocking hashtag of 'never been dropped.'

But Joshua is paying little attention to talk of Parker's renowned chin as he will instead attempt to break down the Kiwi with the same sustained body assault that grinded down the resistance of Carlos Takam in October.

"I'm going to smash him up to the body," said Joshua. "What slowed [Carlos] Takam down is when I started punching him to the stomach.

"Jab to the stomach, right hand to the stomach. If someone has got a strong head, you hit them to the body. It's quite simple so if Parker's got a granite chin, I'll weaken his body down."

Sky sports

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