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Hello! Pandemonium in Lisbon. Thank heavens for Raphinha.
Coming up:
🫠 Barca bring the chaos
📺 Raging Amorim wrecks TV
💰 The first $1m women’s player
🚪 Dortmund sack boss Sahin
Omnishambles: Glorious farce as Raphinha seals Barca’s comeback win
January 21, 2025. Remember it not as the morning after Donald Trump’s second inauguration, but rather as the date of the most incompetent tie in Champions League history. And I mean that as a compliment because incompetence can be the godfather of pure entertainment.
It was last night as Benfica and Barcelona ploughed their life savings into out-fiasco-ing each other. I’m here for total football, but I’m up all night for an omnishambles, too, and Lisbon gave us an instant classic of the genre. Don’t ask me how Barca got out of Dodge with a 5-4 win.
At various points, they were 1-0 down, 3-1 down and 4-2 down. Benfica’s Vangelis Pavlidis managed to score a hat-trick and lose. Barca were smoked — or so we thought, until Raphinha edged it spectacularly in the 96th minute (above). He’s irreproachable and he smells of the Ballon d’Or. Everything else in the (relative) warmth of Portugal smelled of glorious farce.
Breaking down the chaos
Wojciech Szczesny got the ball rolling by gifting Benfica their second goal with some sweeper-keeper action that borderline killed team-mate Alejandro Balde (above). He then got his timing wrong and conceded a penalty, wiping out winger Kerem Akturkoglu.
Barca use what we call ‘economic levers’ to keep their finances on the right side of La Liga rules. Would it be OK to humbly suggest that next time they pull one, they spend some money on a truly world-class goalkeeper?
Not to be outdone, Benfica goalkeeper Anatoliy Trubin helped Barca out by driving an easy clearance in off the head of Raphinha (above). He couldn’t repeat the blunder if he tried. That was 3-2, until Barca’s Ronald Araujo sliced a cross into his own net. And then it went off.
Robert Lewandowski and Eric Garcia pulled it back to 4-4. Raphinha decided not to settle for a point. Benfica substitute Arthur Cabral got a red card without stepping on the pitch and many rags were lost at the final whistle. Frame it.
Away from the slapstick…
The events at Benfica made the rest of yesterday’s fixtures look decidedly pedestrian. Liverpool roll on and they’re seven from seven after a 2-1 win over Lille. Jonathan David’s finish couldn’t stick a spoke in their wheel.
TAFC noted yesterday that Borussia Dortmund head coach Nuri Sahin was teetering on the brink of the sack. They lost 2-1 at Bologna and, within hours, he’d said his goodbyes. And nobody brings chaos like Diego Simeone, whose Atletico Madrid side trailed 1-0 with 10 men but found a way to turn Bayer Leverkusen over. Twice Simeone has gone within a whisker of winning the Champions League. It’s the justice we need.
- Paris Saint-Germain versus Manchester City this evening has classic potential. They’re 24th and 26th in the Champions League table and the spectre of embarrassing elimination is very real for both superpowers. We’ll bring you the full standings and implications tomorrow.
Amorim anger: Man Utd boss smashes TV after Brighton loss
Mike Egerton/EMPICS via Getty Images
‘Shooting from the lip’ was our way of describing Ruben Amorim after he publicly slated his Manchester United team. In fact, we didn’t know the half of it — because in the wake of their defeat to Brighton on Sunday, he smashed up a widescreen TV in the dressing room.
Amorim already has no f***s left to give. It’s his way or the highway and as Laurie Whitwell’s superb exclusive shows, patience is wearing thin. But him bringing small-scale violence to the table was eye-opening because football has largely moved on from the days when coaches motivated a squad by reading the riot act.
It used to be the done thing and never more famously than when Amorim’s most renowned predecessor, Sir Alex Ferguson, drew blood from the face of David Beckham by kicking a boot in his direction in 2003. Whether any of this is appropriate is for you to judge, but if nothing else, Amorim is letting us know where his head is at.
News round-up
First $1m player: Chelsea set to sign Girma from San Diego for record fee in women’s game
Yukihito Taguchi / Imagn Images
An equally cracking exclusive next from The Athletic’s Meg Linehan. Women’s football is about to see its first $1m transfer, with USWNT defender Naomi Girma lined up to leave San Diego Wave for Chelsea. The agreed fee is $1.1m (£890,000).
That breaks the previous mark ($843,000) set by Racheal Kundananji’s switch to Bay FC last year and it’s the third time the world record in the women’s game has been broken since the start of 2024.
No doubt, the money involved is a mile behind the men’s game still. The first male player to move for $1m or more was Italian Pietro Anastasi in 1968. Neymar holds the current record at $246m. But one thing we know for sure about women’s soccer: it’s expanding, fast.
Around The Athletic FC
Catch a match
(Selected games, times ET/UK)
Champions League (all Paramount+/TNT Sports and 3pm/8pm unless stated): RB Leipzig vs Sporting CP, 12.45pm/5.45pm — CBS, Paramount+, Amazon Prime/TNT Sports; Milan vs Girona, 3pm/8pm — CBS, Paramount+, Fubo/TNT Sports; Arsenal vs Dinamo Zagreb; Celtic vs Young Boys; Paris Saint-Germain vs Manchester City; Real Madrid vs Red Bull Salzburg; Sparta Prague vs Inter.
Europa League: Besiktas vs Athletic Club, 10.30am/3.30pm — Paramount+/TNT Sports.
And finally…
Just how furious was Benfica manager Bruno Lage with his players after last night’s mayhem in Lisbon? This furious. I wonder if he smashed a television, too.
(Top photo: Eric Verhoeven/Soccrates/Getty Images)
