Raphael Stevens

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    Cristiano Ronaldo Rejoins Manchester United

    After flirting with joining Manchester City, Ronaldo will instead return to the team he starred for from 2003 to 2009.After 12 years in which he has claimed a dozen or more major trophies and broken a string of records, Cristiano Ronaldo will return to the place where he first established himself as one of the finest players of this, and any, generation, leaving Juventus to rejoin Manchester United on a two-year contract.The team confirmed Ronaldo’s return on Friday, saying the deal was “subject to agreement of personal terms, visa and medical.” The rush of people logging on to read the announcement crashed Manchester United’s website. A reunion that many United fans have longed for over much of the last decade materialized only at the last minute, thanks in part to the public and private interventions of several of Ronaldo’s former teammates, his long-term mentor, Alex Ferguson, and his colleague with the Portuguese international side, and now United, Bruno Fernandes.On Thursday evening, it appeared that Ronaldo would be returning to Manchester — but to play for the team across the city. He had informed Massimiliano Allegri, the Juventus manager, that he had no intention of playing for the team again, while his agent, Jorge Mendes, was trying to negotiate a salary package with Manchester City, the reigning Premier League champion.Ronaldo was a dominant force for Manchester United earlier in his career. Andrew Yates/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesCity’s appetite for the deal, though, was said to be tepid at best; the impetus had all been from Ronaldo’s representatives. City refused to countenance paying Juventus a fee for a player it was desperate to offload as it sought to cut costs in the aftermath of the coronavirus pandemic. City’s best offer was a swap deal including Raheem Sterling, the English forward, which Juventus rejected. By Friday morning, the club was distancing itself from signing Ronaldo.United, though, had been spurred into action by the thought of one of its most beloved alumni playing for a direct rival. Several former United players, including Rio Ferdinand and Wayne Rooney, as well as Ferguson, either reached out in private or spoke out in public to urge Ronaldo not to forget where in the northwest of England his loyalties lie.Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, the club’s coach, spoke glowingly of Ronaldo in a news media conference on Friday. “He knows we’re always here,” Solskjaer said.The club, with permission by its owners, the Glazer family, agreed to a salary package for the next two seasons with Ronaldo’s representatives, and eventually offered Juventus a fee that could rise close to $40 million, depending on the 36-year-old’s success with the team during his second stint.As the details were being finalized, all Ronaldo could do was wait. He had been pictured, earlier on Friday, boarding a private jet near Turin, Italy, where Juventus is based. At that stage, his destination was unknown. A few hours later, as far as United’s fans, his former teammates and his current manager are concerned, he was heading for the only place he could: home. More

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    Mbappé, Ronaldo and the South Beach Moment

    Lionel Messi moved to P.S.G. because Barcelona couldn’t stop him. Kylian Mbappé may have to stay put because his club holds all the leverage.Real Madrid’s first offer for Kylian Mbappé arrived, in writing, on Tuesday afternoon. It did not come as a shock to anyone at Paris St.-Germain, not really. Mbappé had only a year left on his contract. Negotiations over an extension had long ago hit an impasse. It was an open secret he had eyes only for Real Madrid. Clumsily, the Spanish club had made clear it reciprocated his affection.The only source of surprise was the figure attached to Real Madrid’s opening bid. It was prepared to pay $188 million, or thereabouts, for a player who would be available for nothing — other than his astronomical wages, and a bloated signing-on fee — in a year. P.S.G.’s executives were astonished. At that price, there was no choice to make. They had to reject the offer.This summer, the summer when Lionel Messi joined P.S.G. and Manchester City spent $137 million on Jack Grealish and Chelsea made Romelu Lukaku, cumulatively, the most expensive player of all time, and this week, the week when Mbappé may join Real Madrid and Cristiano Ronaldo might sign for City, may come, in hindsight, to stand for many things.It will mark a definitive shift into an era in which the transfer of players is not a means to an end, but an end in itself, where what matters most is not what those players do or how much they win or how they perform for new club, but the act of signing them, the fact of possessing them. They are not being signed to win trophies: that is just a happy byproduct. The signing is the trophy, and the trophy is the signing.Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.Francois Mori/Associated PressReal Madrid does not have a particular vision of how it will use Mbappé, 20, one of the two most blistering talents in soccer’s new generation. Will he displace Eden Hazard on the left? Will he usurp the apparently ageless Karim Benzema, 33, as a pure, straight No. 9?Real has, quite probably, not thought that far ahead, just as nobody at P.S.G. paused and wondered where, exactly, Messi would fit into the intense pressing game preferred by its coach, Mauricio Pochettino. Real has not thought any further than the number of fans Mbappé’s name recognition will pull into an overhauled, over-budget Santiago Bernabéu.Ronaldo, of course, is an even more extreme example. He is, without question, one of the two finest players of his generation, and one of the finest of any generation. But for all that class and all that quality, it takes a leap of imagination to see how he fits into a team coached by Pep Guardiola.At age 36, Ronaldo does not lead the press. He does not subjugate himself to a system. He does not smoothly and easily interchange positions with his teammates. Instead, he is the system: To elicit the devastating best from Ronaldo now is to build a team in his service, one that allows him to roam as he wishes, to take up the positions where he feels he can be most effective.That is not to say, of course, that either move will come to be seen as a gratuitous mistake. Adding Mbappé turns an aging, somewhat listless, chronically unbalanced Real Madrid team into a force. Guardiola may well have some scheme in his mind for how to make the most of Ronaldo; even if he does not, the consolation prize is that Ronaldo remains a goal-scorer of almost unparalleled efficiency.The week’s new rumor is Cristiano Ronaldo to Manchester City. How he would fit in Pep Guardiola’s team is not entirely clear.Marco Bertorello/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThat the moves may go through anyway, though, suggests that soccer has moved into a new age, one in which the system is secondary to star power. For a decade, the game has been defined by its most prominent coaches — Guardiola, Pochettino, Jürgen Klopp, Thomas Tuchel and the rest — all of whom, at heart, believe that the idea comes before the individual.For a handful of teams, that has been inverted. Pochettino’s task at P.S.G. is no longer to outwit his peers to lift the Champions League trophy, to have a better idea than Guardiola; it is to provide a platform on which Messi and Neymar can express their abilities, lift fans off their seats, captivate an audience.That it is only a handful — P.S.G., Manchester City, Chelsea, Manchester United, and possibly, somewhat unexpectedly, Real Madrid, too — should not go unmentioned. It is not insignificant that the whirlwind chaos of this week has come after a summer in which most teams, even in Europe’s big leagues, have been trying to cut costs, rather than opting to incur new ones.It is not just on the field that a new era has been born. The financial impact of the coronavirus pandemic, and its related shutdown, has sent soccer headlong down a path it was taking anyway. As has been noted before, the financial advantage enjoyed by a handful of sides may come, in time, to make the proposed, abortive Super League look like an exercise in open competition.And that, perhaps, forms part of the most telling conclusion that can be drawn from this summer, and from this week. It will be remembered for the deals that did happen, of course — for Messi standing on the field in Paris, looking as if he had only just realized quite how far his adoration had spread; for the prospect of Mbappé in Madrid white, and Ronaldo in City sky blue — but just as significant were the deals that did not.Not long after P.S.G. turned down that first offer for Mbappé, Harry Kane declared that he would be remaining at Tottenham, rather than continuing to seek his own $200 million move to Manchester City. (City itself moved on quickly: By that night, it was already discussing whether to sign Ronaldo.)Spurs had received an offer, too, a few weeks ago, reported to be worth around $140 million. It had turned it down, despite the damage done to its finances by the pandemic. Unlike P.S.G., it did not treat the play for Kane as an opening bid. It did not use it to maintain a dialogue, to haggle, to hash out a deal. It just said no. Kane, with three years left on his contract, eventually had little choice but to stay.Harry Kane is staying at Tottenham because he traded his leverage for security.Dylan Martinez/ReutersKane, the player who did not move in the summer when everyone did, will come to be seen — by other elite players, and by the agents who steer their careers — as a salutary lesson in the danger of what happens when you lose leverage.Players have, for decades, favored longer contracts, believing that what is sacrificed in control will be more than made up for through financial security. Money, in elite soccer, is rarely money as we understand it. It is better understood not as a currency used for the trade of goods, but as a gauge of status. The more a team pays you, the more it values you.The same goes for contract length: The longer a team says it will pay you, the more you mean to that team. That view has been encouraged by agents, either because they recognize that a career is brief and fragile, vulnerable to a single injury or a loss of form, or because they earn a proportion of the player’s salary, or both.The pandemic, though, may have changed that. Only a few clubs can now afford to pay premium transfer fees. A handful of others, as indicated by Tottenham, are sufficiently financially robust to resist all but the most lavish of offers. Suddenly, a long contract looks less like security and more like a shackle.It is more than a decade, now, since LeBron James revealed that he would be “taking his talents” to South Beach. It is three years since Antoine Griezmann, then of Atlético Madrid, produced his own, somewhat anti-climactic version of the show that became known as The Decision.And yet it may well be that this summer, this week, is what changes soccer’s approach to free agency, bringing it into line with the American model, where it is an opportunity to be seized, rather than a purgatory to be avoided.For players at elite clubs, increasingly, running down your contract may be the only way to get a move. It is not a coincidence that both Mbappé and Ronaldo had only a year left on their current deals. For players hoping to get a move, it may be the only way to make that a reality: When nobody can pay or nobody will sell, when the transfer market has ground to a halt, there is little other choice.It is that, ultimately, that this summer, and this week, may come to stand for. The year when Messi moved, when Mbappé moved, when Ronaldo moved: It sounds like a transfer window to end all transfer windows. And in a sense, perhaps, as players realize that they have to take control of their careers, rather than letting clubs trade them at their will, that is precisely what it will prove to be.Change Is as Good as a ResetThursday’s Champions League draw produced a rare treat: group-stage drama.Tolga Bozoglu/EPA, via ShutterstockThe answer, it turned out, was there all along. UEFA has been fretting for years over how to make the group stages of the Champions League more interesting. Too often, the first three months of the tournament that serves as club soccer’s crown jewel was little more than a phony war, a box-ticking exercise, a predictable, idle procession for the great and the good.It has been only a few months since it arrived at last — and at the cost of a brief, furious civil war that threatened to tear soccer apart — at a solution. The Champions League as we know it has just three editions remaining. From 2024, the group stage will be replaced by a so-called Swiss Model system, one that guarantees more meetings between the elite and fewer dead-rubber fixtures.After all that work, then, it is a bit of a shame that the draw for this year’s group stage proved rather neatly that there was a workable alternative. The problem with the Champions League, it turns out, was not the format of the tournament itself. It was, instead, the nature of the leagues that feed into it.Of this year’s eight groups, only three — those involving Chelsea, Bayern Munich and Real Madrid — feel immediately predictable, and even they are not without their charm: Chelsea will face Juventus twice, Bayern will play Barcelona, and Real Madrid will meet Inter Milan.The other five, though, all contain precisely the sort of intrigue that UEFA — as well as Europe’s most vocal, most self-satisfied clubs — have been craving. Manchester City not only has to face Paris St.-Germain, Lionel Messi and all, but RB Leipzig. Liverpool has been paired with Atlético Madrid and A.C. Milan. The groups containing Borussia Dortmund and Sevilla look completely open.Lille’s Ligue 1 title affected the Champions League seeds. The competition is better for it.Ian Langsdon/EPA, via ShutterstockThe reason for this is easy: Last year, Europe had several unlikely champions. Lille lifted the title in France, Atlético in Spain, Inter in Italy, Sporting Lisbon in Portugal. Villarreal won the Europa League, rather than a team that had dropped out of the Champions League. All of them were placed in the top group of seeds for this year’s Champions League.The result is an unusually compelling group stage. Had P.S.G. claimed the Ligue 1 title, for example, both the French club and Manchester City would have had a far more straightforward path to the knockout rounds, and the next three months would have had far less to commend them.And the lesson? Well, the lesson should be obvious to everyone. Stronger domestic leagues lead to a better Champions League. The way to increase interest is not to guarantee more meetings between the elite, with little or nothing riding on them, but to ensure the “elite” is as broad a category as possible. What the competition needs is not height, but breadth. For once, for one of the last times, it has that.CorrespondenceThis week’s entire final section could have been dedicated to the proper usage of the word “prevaricate,” which several of you got in touch to discuss. That would not, though, make especially compelling content, so let’s all agree that I got it right once and could, in a certain light, have meant “equivocate” once in last week’s edition and move on.More interesting was the note from Paul Bauer, wondering what happens if the sovereign states that absolutely do not run various soccer teams as a way of embedding themselves in the global consciousness “lose interest in this grand scheme? The financial implications of Inter that you wrote about will repeat on a larger scale.”There must, presumably, be a point at which these teams have served their purpose — whether you want to dress that purpose up as an advertising vehicle or as something more sinister — and are no longer seen as pet projects. When that point is, I have no idea. What happens afterward, though, can be narrowed down to three possibilities.The Pride of the Blue Half of Manchester, and the U.A.E.Rui Vieira/Associated PressOne is, effectively, what has happened to Chelsea: The club is run with the general aim of being self-sufficient, but with a benefactor on hand to inject capital whenever it is needed/they have some lying around.The second is that the club is sold: These are not investments designed to make a profit, of course, but — because, as ever, money in soccer is not really about money — a couple of billion dollars would both vindicate all of the work put in and provide cover for a change in policy.And third? Well, the third is the one that fans of the teams to whom this applies would probably rather not contemplate: the money dries up, the interest wanes, and what has happened at Inter happens again. That is not, I think, desperately likely, but we have seen this summer that it is not impossible.That’s all for this week. I don’t know if you’ve noticed — it has been pretty subtle, after all — but this is the last time this newsletter will be available to anyone who does not have the good fortune or good sense to be a Times subscriber.I really can’t recommend subscribing to the Times enough: Of course, most readers across the world know us for our soccer coverage, but we’ve made real strides in recent years in adding other, lesser strings to our bow. Not only do we do all of the “American” sports — the one with the bat, the one with the hoop, the one with the advertising breaks — but there’s cooking, there’s politics, there’s culture, there’s technology, there’s something called Spelling Bee. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve told people: Yes, the Times does stuff other than soccer.Of course, not all of you will take up that offer, despite it being excellent value. So, to you, I’d just like to say thank you: for signing up, for opening this email every Friday — well, most Fridays; sometimes you’re busy, I get it — for reading, for replying, for sending all of your hints, tips, complaints and ideas to askrory@nytimes.com. I hope you’ve enjoyed it, and that it has occasionally given you something to think about. Even if that thing is: “Actually, it’s called ‘football.’” If this is your last edition, then thank you. And good luck with your future endeavors. If not: Thank you. See you next week. More

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    An M.L.S.-Liga MX Alliance: What's the End Game?

    Wednesday’s M.L.S. All-Star Game was the latest collaboration between the top leagues in the U.S. and Mexico. Owners and executives see profit in their partnership, and say both sides can win.One could forgive the top soccer players in Mexico and the United States if they feel as if they have seen quite a lot of each other recently.When some of the best players from Mexico’s Liga MX lined up against some of the biggest stars from Major League Soccer in the M.L.S. All-Star Game on Wednesday night in Los Angeles, it was not — for a handful of them — the first time they had played an important match north of the border this summer. Whether in a series of new cross-border club competitions or in two important national team tournaments, the Nations League and Gold Cup, U.S.-Mexico matchups — in a variety of jersey colors — are now more frequent than ever.But whatever Wednesday’s exhibition lacked in stakes — the M.L.S. all-stars prevailed in a penalty shootout, 3-2, after the team played a 1-1 tie — that the game happened at all was perhaps the best demonstration yet of where the two leagues, and therefore their two countries, believe their futures lie: together.Alejandro Irarragorri, who controls the Liga MX clubs Santos Laguna and Atlas, this week described the leagues as having arrived at an inflection point at which they could continue to go their separate ways, or choose to work together.“I am sure on a stand-alone basis we will do well if we don’t do a thing together,” Irarragorri said Monday in a Zoom interview from the well-appointed home of the Seattle Sounders owner Adrian Hanauer. “I also understand if we do something together, we will be better.”But can two rivals really win at the same game, and at the same time?M.L.S. Commissioner Don Garber, right, and Liga MX President Mikel Arriola are bullish on their leagues’ collaborations.Kelvin Kuo/USA Today Sports, via ReutersCollaboration between leagues in different countries is rare in world soccer. While teams from different countries often square off in various continental competitions, rarely do the leagues themselves interact unless there is a problem that needs fixing. The collaboration between Liga MX and M.L.S., then, represents how soccer economics are being upended globally, as well as a close relationship between the U.S. and Mexico that extends well beyond soccer.“If you remember what happened in 1994, we had a soccer championship here,” said Mikel Arriola, the new president of Liga MX. “We had the World Cup here in the U.S. And also another thing happened that year, which was the execution of NAFTA,” he said, referring to the free trade agreement between the United States, Mexico and Canada.For Arriola, whose career was mostly spent in a series of Mexican government positions, NAFTA best represents what soccer is now trying to replicate: It jump-started economic growth in Mexico, and he contends collaborations with M.L.S. will do the same for his league.Clubs from the United States and Mexico have faced each other for decades, of course, in the CONCACAF Champions League, the region’s top club competition. But in 2019 the two leagues created a new tournament, the Leagues Cup, to be contested by the best teams not to qualify for the Champions League and the Campeones Cup, another new one-off match between the winners of each league. Wednesday’s All-Star showcase in Los Angeles represented yet another increase in the rapid expansion of opportunities for players, and their two leagues, to compete against one another.Kai Wagner, left, of the Philadelphia Union and the M.L.S. all-stars, who beat a Liga MX team in a penalty shootout.Orlando Ramirez/USA Today Sports, via ReutersThat kind of close collaboration will almost inevitably bring the leagues into conflict with the region’s top soccer authorities, mirroring the fights playing out around the world over breakaway ideas like Europe’s short-lived Super League and this week’s potentially explosive club-vs.-country battle over the release of top European pros for World Cup qualifiers.For now, CONCACAF, which governs soccer in North and Central America and the Caribbean, has blessed both the Leagues Cup and the Campeones Cup. But it does not control either event in the same way it does the Champions League, and Arriola and Don Garber, the M.L.S. commissioner, were not shy about declaring how important their leagues are to the region’s soccer credibility.“Mexico, the U.S. and Canada represent 99 percent of the total value of CONCACAF,” Arriola said. But the confederation operates on a one-country, one-vote system, and power in the region has traditionally been held by Caribbean countries, the largest group of members, and one that often votes as a bloc.A Concacaf spokesman did not respond to a request for an interview with Victor Montagliani, the Canadian president of the organization.Asked what he believed Concacaf thought about the increased collaboration, Garber chose his words carefully. “The sport here has these long-established institutions going about governing the game the same way for generations, and I don’t necessarily think that that has to be the way the sport moves forward,” he said.For Liga MX, an increased presence in the United States means spurring revenue growth by tapping into a larger fan base. Mexico’s national team, through its own partnership with the M.L.S.-affiliated Soccer United Marketing, already plays more games in the United States than it does in Mexico, and Liga MX matches regularly draw higher television ratings than M.L.S. games. Arriola acknowledged that, like Mexico’s soccer federation, the Mexican clubs he represents see valuable revenue streams waiting on the northern side of the border.“We are a net exporter of football as a country because we have 60 million consumers in the U.S., and those 60 million people have a G.D.P. per capita 700 percent above ours, and they consume televised games two times compared to the Mexican consumer,” Arriola said.Garber’s bet is that aligning with Liga MX will help M.L.S. make inroads with those fans too, as well as with soccer fans in Mexico. But the most immediate benefit may be a competitive one.In continental competitions, Mexican clubs have traditionally overpowered teams from the U.S., and while that disparity has narrowed in recent years, an M.L.S. team has not lifted the Champions League trophy since 2000. Playing more games, and more consistently, against Mexican opposition may further close the gap between the leagues. And if and when M.L.S. clubs can consistently win those matchups, its credibility and global profile can only grow.Raúl Ruidiaz, a Peruvian striker signed from a Mexican club, helped Seattle become the only M.L.S. team to advance to the Leagues Cup semifinals.Stephen Brashear/Getty ImagesReorienting how the world looks at M.L.S. is Garber’s ultimate goal. The league’s last 15 all-star games have seen a team of M.L.S. stars take on top club teams from Europe, generally squads in the middle of preseason tours. But that format no longer suits the league’s purposes, or its focus, which years ago shifted to the acquisition of rising talents from Central and South America instead of aging players from Europe.In its current iteration, M.L.S. would like to be seen as the leader of a region that is quickly catching up to South America and Europe. But to do that, it first must prove it is a worthy rival to Mexican soccer. Garber said this week that he was willing to try any innovation that might make that happen.“I have always been tasked with having to answer questions about why do the Americans want to do things differently in the sport of soccer,” Garber said. But that might also mean he can get a look at where the sport should be — or is — going faster than his tradition-bound peers in South America and Europe.The obvious question is if M.L.S. and Liga MX will eventually merge. After all, they are hosting the World Cup together with Canada — which already has teams in M.L.S. — in 2026.Wouldn’t a single league made up of the best clubs across North America improve the level of play? Gianni Infantino, the president of FIFA, stoked such speculation earlier this year when he said such a league could be “the best league in the world.”Hanauer, the Sounders owner, was happy to entertain the question, but he also urged caution. The first time anybody can remember multiple owners from M.L.S. and Liga MX convening together, he said, was in February 2020. That meeting took place at Hanauer’s house in Cabo San Lucas, just before the pandemic shut things down.“It is a ‘walk before we run’ answer,” he said, adding, “We are at the very early stages of beginning to understand each other and get to know each other.” More

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    Matthew Stafford Wants His Hollywood Ending. So Do the Rams.

    After 12 seasons in Detroit, the quarterback wanted out. The Los Angeles Rams, looking to move on from Jared Goff, saw in Stafford another shot at a championship run.THOUSAND OAKS, Calif. — After Matthew Stafford, the Los Angeles Rams’ new quarterback, threw three interceptions this month in a joint practice with the Las Vegas Raiders, he and his teammates remained calm. Instead of pouting or slamming his helmet, he convened with his coaches to discuss what went wrong.Les Snead, the team’s general manager, also looked relaxed as he watched from afar on a cloudy, rainy afternoon. He had orchestrated the January trade to acquire Stafford, sending the team’s starting quarterback, Jared Goff, and three draft picks, including two first-round selections, to the Detroit Lions.By adding one of the most productive quarterbacks in the N.F.L. (Stafford’s 45,109 career yards rank him fifth among active passers) but parting with the chance to draft in the first round until 2024, the team drastically raised its fans’ hopes for the immediate future. Stafford’s practice turnovers, however, had many of them expressing angst on social media. According to Snead, they included one of his children, a teenager, who texted him asking if “Stafford had a bad day.”The interest in the team makes sense. Until the trade, the Rams had risked languishing in one of the N.F.L.’s toughest divisions. Now they have a 33-year-old quarterback who asked out of the only franchise for which he had ever played for a better shot at football glory. The Rams’ window opens now.“I think Matt’s at that point in his career where he’s played a lot of football, he’s made a lot of money and we’re now at that chapter of ‘OK, let’s do something special,’” Snead said in an interview. “I think he’s looking at it like, ‘This is a good place to write my farewell chapters in this league.’”The off-season had the potential to be defined by high-profile quarterback changes. In an era in which Stafford’s peers have been emboldened to use their star power to gain leverage, either to seek trades or to influence rosters, his requested breakup with the Lions stands out for being resolved peacefully, and privately. He believes his relationship with the team’s ownership allowed the process to move smoothly.“This could’ve gone a bunch of different directions, and I’m glad it went the way it did,” Stafford said.Despite losing in the first round in all three of his playoff appearances over 12 seasons in Detroit, Stafford threw for over 4,000 yards eight times and completed 38 game-winning drives. He knew he could still produce at an elite level and wanted to compete with a contender. Detroit finished 5-11 last season. Had he stayed for 2021, Stafford would have played for his fourth head coach and third general manager. He quietly requested a trade and the Lions agreed, something he knew was not a guarantee.In training camp scrimmages, Stafford delivered impressive passes to receivers on throws with velocity and touch. Johm Mccoy/Associated Press“I have to give them a ton of credit for how they approached it,” Stafford said. “I think they knew, from 12 years of dealing with me, if I told them something, that was my word, and I knew I felt the same way about them.”Other quarterbacks who had looked for a change had different outcomes this off-season. Rumors swirled that Aaron Rodgers wanted out at Green Bay. Deshaun Watson reportedly requested a trade from Houston. Russell Wilson asked for more say in the Seattle Seahawks’ personnel decisions. His agent, though, publicly disclosed a list of teams Wilson would consider joining in a trade.When training camps opened, those quarterbacks rejoined their teams. In his circumstance, Stafford said that he wanted an open discussion with the Lions and that he was grateful they agreed with his point of view.“I wasn’t in a mode of trying to be empowered, I just wanted to be honest,” he said. “I just wanted to let them know how I was feeling, and it was really great for them to respect that and work with me on it.”Initially, it seemed unlikely that Stafford would join the Rams. They had signed Goff to a four-year contract extension worth $134 million in 2019 after he led them to a Super Bowl. But over the past two seasons, Goff regressed, throwing 29 interceptions, causing Snead and Coach Sean McVay to seek an upgrade. Stafford’s availability piqued both men’s interest.“We felt maybe it was the right time, and this might be the right place to add all of those sets of variables together at that very, very important position,” Snead said.Stafford should solve a lot of what ailed the Rams in 2020, when the team was 10-6 and lost to the Packers in the divisional round of the playoffs. They had one of the N.F.L.’s best defenses, anchored by lineman Aaron Donald and cornerback Jalen Ramsey, but the offense did not regularly threaten downfield strikes and finished with only 50 passing plays of at least 20 yards, ranking 14th.In training camp and in practices, Stafford delivered impressive passes to receivers on throws with velocity and touch. Two of the interceptions in that scrimmage against the Raiders came on tipped passes, mistakes that McVay said could be corrected as Stafford learned the new offensive system and the receivers adjusted to his timing.“He’s one of those guys that elevates everyone around him,” Rams Coach Sean McVay said of Stafford. Kelvin Kuo/Associated Press“He’s one of those guys that elevates everyone around him,” McVay said. “When things don’t go our way, I just like how even-keeled he is. He’s consistent.”Unlike other stars on less complete teams, Stafford has not issued a list of his wants or asked to weigh in on roster decisions, though McVay and Snead said they would welcome his input if he offered it.“I’m the new guy here,” Stafford said. “I’m just trying to show up and get my job right as best I can. I trust those guys and they’ve done a great job of building a program here that has a great atmosphere.”With a roster stacked for a postseason run, Stafford can focus on what lies ahead. Despite his numbers in Detroit, Stafford was selected to just one Pro Bowl. This month, he watched as his former Lions teammate Calvin Johnson was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Being in Canton, Ohio, and seeing the history around him made Stafford think about his own legacy and what kind of career ending he could write in Los Angeles.“I just want to play meaningful football and get to know these guys as well as I can and play for as long as I can here,” Stafford said. More

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    Paying the Price for Premier League Riches

    The surplus players at English clubs would make fine assets for teams across Europe. The problem is that the clubs that could use them cannot afford them.The headed clearance did not quite get the requisite power, or direction. It floated, rather than fizzed, out of Brentford’s penalty area, the danger not quite clear. Two Manchester United players converged on it, sensing opportunity. The ball bounced off the turf, not too high, not too quick, and hung in the air for just a second. And that is where Andreas Pereira met it.There is a reason some Manchester United fans have come to know Pereira — with equal parts affection and admonishment — as the Preseason Pirlo. It is in the exploratory exchanges, the warm-up fixtures and the touring exhibitions, where he does his best work. Once meaning is introduced to the games, once the season gets down to business, Pereira tends to fade from sight.Perhaps that is the sort of player he is: undeniably talented, often capable of the spectacular, but too much of a luxury to fit into a tightly defined system. Perhaps it is lack of opportunity or managerial trust. Perhaps he falls — and this is no criticism — just a shade below the level required to thrive at a club as grand, and as demanding, as Manchester United.Whatever the reason, the chance against Brentford was his sort of moment. Pereira was first to the bouncing ball. He pulled his right leg back, catching the ball at its apex, and cracked a volley toward goal, where it hit the underside of the bar and dropped like a stone. Not quite half full, Old Trafford’s crowd stood, open-mouthed, to applaud.After the game, Pereira used his sudden spotlight to issue a cri de coeur. He stood ready to serve, he said. He just needed United’s manager, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, to give him a run, he said. He was ready to compete for a place, to play regularly, to show that — at age 25, almost a decade after he first moved to Manchester — he was a man, not a boy.His plea will, in all likelihood, fall on deaf ears. Even with uncertainty hovering over the future of Paul Pogba, Solskjaer has an abundance of options in his central midfield: Bruno Fernandes, Scott McTominay, Fred, Nemanja Matic, Donny van de Beek. Having committed more than $140 million to sign Jadon Sancho and Raphaël Varane, the club needs to balance the books. No matter how much he looks like Andrea Pirlo in the preseason, Pereira will be sold, if a suitable offer arrives.Like Pereira, left, Jesse Lingard has value but also a pricetag that makes offloading him difficult.Peter Cziborra/Action Images, via ReutersPereira is not the only player in that bind. Diogo Dalot, a Portuguese fullback, also featured in that game at Old Trafford late last month. So did Jesse Lingard. Like Pereira, Lingard spent last season out on loan. Like Pereira’s, his departure this summer from United would most likely be accepted as an economic — and to some extent sporting — necessity. Like Pereira, Lingard had a chance to play in preseason because many of Solskjaer’s first-choice players have been given extended breaks after featuring in the European Championship and the Copa América.There are more — many more — players like them across the upper echelons of the Premier League. A couple of days after United played Brentford, Arsenal hosted Chelsea in another tuneup game. Arsenal’s team included Mohamed Elneny and Sead Kolasinac; Chelsea, the European champion, introduced the likes of Davide Zappacosta, Danny Drinkwater and Ross Barkley from the bench. All of them, too, are available to the highest bidder. Or, in fact, any bidder.It is the same situation at Liverpool — where Xherdan Shaqiri, Nat Phillips and Divock Origi have been part of Jürgen Klopp’s preseason camp — and at Manchester City, where even Patrick Roberts, a wing who has spent the last five years out on loan, has managed an appearance in recent weeks. But City cannot attract bids for Riyad Mahrez or Bernardo Silva, let alone Roberts. Tottenham would like to clear the decks, too, but it has been unable to find a buyer for Serge Aurier, Moussa Sissoko or Harry Winks.Mohamed Elneny, right, was one of the Arsenal players in the shop window during a preseason friendly against Chelsea.Adrian Dennis/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesNone of these players, with the possible exceptions of Silva and Mahrez, are likely to feature regularly for their clubs once the season starts next weekend. They are all, to some extent, now more useful to their teams as potential sources of income — not so much as defenders or midfielders or forwards but as assets to be sold, to free up space and to raise funds.And yet, with only a few weeks left in the transfer window, they all remain firmly in place. It is not because they lack talent. It is not, necessarily, because of a shortage of suitors: There are plenty of teams for whom all of those players would be fine recruits. The problem, instead, is money: They all earn too much of it, and the teams that might desire them do not have enough of it.It is an issue that does not just apply to England. No team in Europe requires funds quite so much as Barcelona, with its stratospheric salary bill and its apparent inability to find a way to sign Lionel Messi to a new contract, while somehow staying within La Liga’s financial rules.It has attempted to shed some of its high earners, too, but with no luck so far. Samuel Umtiti, Miralem Pjanic and Philippe Coutinho and all of the others are still there, at Camp Nou, pinned down by the sheer weight of their contracts. There are plenty of clubs out there that would be delighted to have any of them. And there are some that could afford a transfer fee and their salaries. Those two groups, though, do not intersect.This is precisely the problem — albeit a scaled-up, more urgent iteration of it — facing clubs across the Premier League. Their surplus players would make fine assets for teams across Europe, but no club that wants them can afford them.The most immediate explanation for that, of course, is the coronavirus pandemic: a year of hosting games in empty stadiums, along with the rebates due to the broadcasters that have kept the game afloat, has led to purse strings being tightened and reduced budgets.But there is a deeper issue at play, too. Over the last few years, the teams of the Premier League — alongside a cadre of continental superclubs — have gloried in recruiting as many of the best players on the planet as possible. They have done so by offering them far higher salaries than they could feasibly obtain elsewhere.The on-field consequences of that trend have been clear. The Premier League stands alone as the most competitive domestic competition in the world; the rest of Europe’s major leagues have come to be seen as the private fiefs of a handful of elite clubs. It is only now, though, accelerated by the pandemic, that we can see the off-field impact.The player trading market that underpins the activities of every club in Europe — even in the Premier League, insulated from the worst of the downturn by its vast television revenues — is fundamentally fractured. The salaries on offer at English teams, and at the likes of Barcelona, are way out of step with what everyone else can afford to play.For years, that has brought an impressive reward: The Premier League has gloried in its financial potency. Now, though, the cost is becoming clear. England’s elite are able to buy, but — sufficiently detached from the rest of their peers — they are increasingly unable to sell.Riyad Mahrez could help dozens of clubs. But how many can afford him?Lee Smith/Action Images, via ReutersPereira, as one example, most likely could not earn what he does at Old Trafford if he moved to the sort of team, in Italy or in Spain, that might be interested in his services: Lazio, say, or Valencia. Even if he was prepared to accept a lower salary, and willing to join a lower-profile club, United would have to pay out the rest of his contract, as it did with Alexis Sanchez.And even then, signing Pereira — still relatively youthful at 25 — might appeal less to one of those clubs than picking up a younger, cheaper model, with greater resale value, from France, Belgium or Portugal, where prices have dropped precipitously as a result of the pandemic: the very same rationale that means selling players to other Premier League teams is not proving as easy as, perhaps, everybody thought. The unwanted reserves of the great English teams and the overpaid castoffs of the super-clubs are too old, too expensive, too much risk and too little reward.For some of those players, there will be a way out. Moves will materialize once liquidity pours into the market. Pereira may get a chance to prove his Andrea Pirlo tribute act can endure after the start of the season. More creative, lower risk deals — loans with options for future purchase, in particular, offsetting the cost — may rescue others.Still more, though, will remain where they are, stuck in limbo, not valued enough by their current employer but valued far too highly by everyone else. In doing so, they will absorb not only money but space and time in squads increasingly laden with unwanted passengers.The pattern is one that England’s teams would do well to heed, as they consider how best to exercise their financial superiority in what has become, and is likely to stay, a buyer’s market. How much of that money they can spend, of course, may define how much success they enjoy today. It is how well they spend it, though, that will define what tomorrow looks like.The Case for Buyout ClausesHas Harry Kane chased his last ball for Tottenham?Pool photo by Mike EgertonThere are two sides to the great Harry Kane debate, and each one is equally valid. One holds that, as the captain of England and one of the best strikers of his generation, he has the right to decide where he wishes to — borrowing a phrase from LeBron James — take his talents. The other points out, no less convincingly, that he has three years left on his six-year contract, and so he really does not have the right.It is easy to see why Kane might feel that Tottenham is standing in his way. It is easy to see why Tottenham feels Kane might like to come to work, given that Manchester City — his intended future employer — has yet to make an offer for his services worthy of consideration and debate. Predicting how it resolves from here would take a particularly gifted clairvoyant.The problem, as is so often the case, is that both are reasonable positions. Players should, of course, have the right to work wherever they like: Transfer fees are, when you think about it, really quite strange things. But then clubs, too, should be rewarded for the role they play in developing those players, and protected from their sudden loss.The answer, perhaps, already exists: If players’ contracts came as standard with a buyout clause, then there would at least be a little clarity. This is already the case in Spain, and it is increasingly common throughout Europe. The clubs get their protection. The players get their freedom, even if, on occasion, it tends toward the theoretical. And everyone knows where they stand.As One Rises, So Another FallsA dejected Carli Lloyd at the United States’s semifinal loss to Canada. Lloyd scored twice in the team’s bronze medal match, a victory over Australia.Chang W. Lee/The New York TimesA mixed week for the national teams of the United States. For the men, the prospect of a bright future ahead, after Gregg Berhalter’s side beat Mexico to win the Gold Cup. For the women, a rather darker horizon, after defeat at the Olympics at the semifinal stage at the hands of Canada relegated them to the bronze medal game, where they beat Australia.It is hard to overestimate the men’s achievement. This was, after all, a severely weakened U.S. squad, deprived of most of its most promising talents. When it takes to the field for World Cup qualifying later this year, its lineup is likely to be starkly different. Much better, in fact: If anything, this Gold Cup win is proof of the scale of the strength in depth at Berhalter’s disposal.The United States’ Gold Cup triumph was its second win over Mexico in a final this summer.David Becker/Associated PressFor the women, though, the outlook is a little more troubling. The performances of Sweden — Canada’s opponent in the gold medal match, and easy victors over Vlatko Andonovski’s team in the group phase — and the Netherlands highlight the sense that Europe’s best teams are catching the United States at a considerable rate of knots. At the same time, the timidity of defeat to Canada indicates that perhaps the U.S. is caught between cycles.That is not to say that the U.S. women’s program will no longer be a force, or will see its star wane; when the World Cup begins in two years’ time, it will still, most likely, be the favorite. Tokyo should serve as a warning, though: Its primacy cannot be taken for granted, and that as the game grows, so does the scale of the competition.CorrespondenceDavid Alaba is a great player, but he can’t fix everything.Pool photo by Christof StacheA good point from Paul Tigan on the connections between the two elements of last week’s newsletter: players being suffocated by the pressure placed on them from outside to perform, and the case of David Alaba, who seems to have been given the job of solving all of Real Madrid’s problems.The latter part, Paul wrote, “read like a classic, thoughtful analysis of a club setting unreasonable expectations on an individual. Not just on defensive performance, but also filling the gaps in the culture of a faltering organization (by being asked to fill in the shoes of Ramos and the like).”He is right, of course: There is a link between the two cases, and one that I did not see as I was writing them. Clubs burden players with intolerable expectations, too — the final piece of the jigsaw phenomenon — and that is only heightened, as in Madrid’s case, by poor planning and lack of forethought. If Real Madrid’s struggles, by its standards, this year, Alaba may well be deemed a flop. The consequence will be personal. The cause may well be institutional.Luka Martinac raises a valid question, too. “I wonder how long before sport start rejecting social media in order to protect their stars? Apart from the commercial benefit, it’s hard to see what reason there is to be on it.”I’ve had the same thought. I suppose, first of all, we should not underestimate the commercial value. Second, I know a lot of soccer players — and I imagine this goes for other athletes — genuinely enjoy the chance to connect with fans. But most important is this: They have as much right as we do to use social media safely. If they have to withdraw because of the toxicity toward them, then what does that say about, well, us?And a question from Vincent LoVoi, who wants to know why last week’s newsletter did not make mention of the Olympic soccer tournament, but focused instead on a Dutch player who currently straddles the English and French leagues.This is entirely on me: I’m lucky enough to get to pick what I write about in this newsletter. I’m not sure I can explain my thought process any more clearly than “I thought it was interesting,” but I’ll give it a go.The Olympics move pretty quickly, so the danger of writing a column on the tournament is that, within a few hours of its publication, it might look out of date. The timings of the games have not been great for a Friday newsletter, either: The women’s final, for example, will have finished by the time many of you read this. And besides, I’m not sure anyone, currently, can say they do not have enough Olympics coverage.I hope that makes sense. It may not be satisfying, but that is the thinking behind the choice of subject. More

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    FIFA Will Share in $200 Million Payout From Justice Department

    Soccer’s governing body and two affiliates in the Americas have been awarded millions after having been classified as victims in a corruption scandal.FIFA, world soccer’s governing body, and two other organizations in the Americas are set to receive about $200 million in compensation from the United States government after the Justice Department classified them as victims in the corruption scandal that toppled most of their senior leadership in 2015.The repayment will begin with an initial payment of $32.3 million in forfeited funds, the Justice Department said Tuesday, but prosecutors have approved a plan that could see the soccer organizations receive as much as $201 million.The return of the money comes six years after a sprawling criminal prosecution laid bare decades of corruption on a stunning scale, with millions of dollars diverted from the sport and into the pockets of global soccer officials and businessmen. It comes five years after FIFA, framing itself as corrupted but not corrupt, first began asking for a share of the money that American officials were collecting in the case. The repayments will be directed to FIFA, the sport’s governing body; CONCACAF, the organization overseeing soccer in North and Central America and the Caribbean; and CONMEBOL, which governs the sport in South America. The previous leaders of those organizations, as well as those of national soccer federations across the Americas, had been implicated in the scandal in colorful detail. More than 50 people and companies have been charged in the case since 2015, and dozens have pleaded guilty.The Justice Department’s decision suggested a measure of restored faith in FIFA’s management, even as the money came with strings attached: The funds must be walled off in a foundation and directed toward developing soccer around the world, according to Tuesday’s announcement.In a statement Tuesday, FIFA’s president, Gianni Infantino, thanked the American authorities for their “fast and effective approach in bringing these matters to a conclusion, and also for their trust in general.” Such parameters for spending have figured into other major corruption cases, like the United Nations oil-for-food case, in which the Justice Department specifically designated restitution money for a development fund in Iraq. As American authorities announced their criminal case in 2015 and dozens of powerful officials and marketing executives pleaded guilty to charges including racketeering, wire fraud and money laundering conspiracy, prosecutors made clear they saw the soccer organizations as victims that had been co-opted by dishonest operators.Lawyers for FIFA and the regional confederations fought further to manage the perceptions of prosecutors and the public, seeking to distance the organizations from the accused criminals; cooperate with the authorities; and solidify the sports organizations’ place as victims powerless to their top leaders’ fraud.In a court filing in 2016, lawyers for FIFA argued that the organization had lost at least $28 million paid to 20 soccer officials over 12 years, along with having suffered other incalculable costs.CONMEBOL has already recovered millions of dollars through other channels. In July, it said it had been awarded more than $1.7 million by the Swiss authorities, money that had been in a personal account of one of its former leaders. That money was in addition to the $55 million the organization said it had already clawed back from the accounts of other former officials.FIFA, under its new president Gianni Infantino, had argued it was a victim in the corruption scandal that brought down his predecessors.Michael Buholzer/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesIn the years since it burst into public view with raids on a luxury hotel in 2015, the FIFA case, one of the largest criminal prosecutions in America when it was announced, has moved forward even as public attention to its proceedings and to corruption in global soccer has waned.Just this week, Reynaldo Vasquez, El Salvador’s former top soccer official who was charged in 2015, pleaded guilty in federal court in Brooklyn. Earlier this year, prosecutors announced the Swiss bank Julius Baer had agreed to pay more than $79 million in penalties for its role in laundering money in the scandal.Even so, years on, key figures have still not been convicted or sentenced, and some former officials remain at large. One, Marco Polo del Nero, the former head of Brazil’s soccer federation, was recently recorded appearing to direct the federation’s affairs despite FIFA having banned him for life from working in organized soccer.In announcing the new conviction this week, American law enforcement officials telegraphed that they were still keeping tabs on the sport, and Tuesday’s announcement underscored that.“From the start,” the acting United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, Jacquelyn M. Kasulis, said in a statement, “this investigation and prosecution have been focused on bringing wrongdoers to justice and restoring ill-gotten gains to those who work for the benefit of the beautiful game.” More

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    Premier League Will Not Release Players for World Cup Qualifiers

    The decision sets up a confrontation with FIFA, which can order the players’ release, and could affect the strength of dozens of national teams.The Premier League said Tuesday that its clubs would not release any players for travel to so-called red list countries during soccer’s September international break, a brazen rejection of protocol that sets up a significant confrontation with the sport’s governing body, FIFA.The decision, a reflection of continuing public health concerns amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, will affect roughly 60 players from the 26 countries currently on the British government’s red list. Residents are warned that they “should not travel” to any of the countries on the list, and those who do face either strict quarantine conditions or outright exclusion if they attempt to return to Britain.The decision to withhold players will affect World Cup qualifying matches for the national teams of more than two dozen countries, including Argentina, Brazil and the rest of South America, and also those from coronavirus hot spots like Egypt, Mexico and Turkey. It also touches 19 of the Premier League’s 20 clubs, potentially affecting players like Liverpool’s Alisson and Roberto Firmino (Brazil) and Mohamed Salah (Egypt); Manchester City’s Brazilian stars Fernandinho, Ederson and Gabriel Jesus; Manchester United’s Uruguayan striker Edinson Cavani; and Colombians like Yerry Mina (Everton) and Davinson Sánchez (Tottenham).Premier League clubs have today reluctantly but unanimously decided not to release players for international matches played in red-list countries next month Full statement: https://t.co/JBl6FuzUNC pic.twitter.com/EJiZaODub1— Premier League (@premierleague) August 24, 2021
    The Premier League said its decision was a result of FIFA not extending a rule that had allowed clubs to hold back players if they were required to quarantine upon their return to their clubs. Forcing teams to release players and then quarantine, sometimes for as long as 10 days when they returned, created a situation that affected league play and fair competition, the clubs and the Premier League have argued.“If required to quarantine on return from red list countries, not only would players’ welfare and fitness be significantly impacted, but they would also be unavailable to prepare for and play in two Premier League match rounds, a UEFA club competition matchday and the third round of the EFL Cup,” the Premier League said in a statement.Even after those quarantine periods, the clubs said, the players would then need more time to regain match fitness.FIFA’s international windows normally allow players to return to their home countries for two games, but the pandemic has left FIFA a compressed window to complete qualifying matches for the 2022 World Cup, which will open in Qatar next November.Most of the world’s top leagues and clubs had urged FIFA in a meeting this summer to work with them to find an accommodation to the scheduling crunch, which now will require national teams to play three matches instead of two in each international window.FIFA ignored those entreaties, though, and added two extra days for qualifying matches in September and October. The clubs, and their leagues, were furious, but they face sanctions if they refuse to release their players.That appears to be a risk the Premier League teams are willing to take.“Premier League clubs have always supported their players’ desires to represent their countries — this is a matter of pride for all concerned,” the Premier League’s chief executive, Richard Masters, said in a statement supporting the clubs’ decision. “However, clubs have reluctantly but rightly come to the conclusion that it would be entirely unreasonable to release players under these new circumstances.”The Premier League’s objections are also financial, and competitive. FIFA’s ruling extending the international break will most likely leave clubs in Europe and elsewhere without hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of talent for key early-season games because the new dates — and player travel — would overlap with domestic schedules.“As a governing body, FIFA should be trying to find the best solution for the entire football community,” the World Leagues Forum, an umbrella organization for about 40 top leagues, said in a statement protesting the decision to add days to the international break. “Instead, FIFA has decided to impose the worst possible option with practically no notice. This poses an obvious governance issue which will have to be addressed.”FIFA has rejected the appeals of the clubs and the leagues to find a different solution, saying in a statement related directly to the release of South American players that its schedule allows for adequate rest. “The addition of two days will ensure sufficient rest and preparation time between matches, reflecting the longer travel distances required both to and within South America, thus safeguarding player welfare by mitigating the negative consequences of this more intense schedule, while ensuring fair competition as well as a prompter return to their clubs of the players involved,” FIFA said.FIFA made no immediate comment on the Premier League’s announcement that it would not release players. More

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    Fight Over World Cup Schedule Pits FIFA Against Leagues

    A dispute about World Cup qualifying games has highlighted the power soccer’s governing body holds over clubs, and how little recourse they have.A meeting was called, discussions were held, and groups representing some of the world’s biggest soccer clubs and leagues were given a chance to have their say.Their concerns were immediate: Extra dates being proposed for qualifying matches for the 2022 World Cup would badly affect their operations, they said, with dozens of their players from South America, including Lionel Messi and Neymar, set to miss crucial league games because of their national team commitments.FIFA, world soccer’s governing body, reassured the officials from the clubs and the leagues. Do not worry, the clubs were told, FIFA would consider the needs of all the affected groups before deciding how to squeeze in the extra dates, which were needed to accommodate matches postponed by the pandemic.But in the end, FIFA chose what worked best for FIFA. Ignoring entreaties from clubs and leagues around the world, FIFA and its regional confederation for South America, CONMEBOL, went ahead and added two extra days for qualifying matches in September and October. The clubs, not World Cup organizers, would just have to adjust.The outcome was perhaps the clearest example of the immense power FIFA wields when it comes to directing a sport for which it is the chief governing body and also the organizer of the World Cup, one of the biggest sporting events on the planet. While everyone involved agreed something needed to be done to find a spot for the games, which had been postponed earlier this year because of the coronavirus pandemic, only FIFA had the final say on when they would take place.The rosters of top European clubs like Real Madrid are dotted with South American players.Pablo Morano/ReutersWhile the leagues, clubs and players’ unions are often given a hearing, they had little say in the matter beyond expressing impotent frustration at the outcome. That was what a lobbying group, the World Leagues Forum, did this month when it noted FIFA’s ruling would most likely leave clubs in Europe and elsewhere without hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of talent for key early-season games because the new dates — and player travel — would overlap with domestic schedules.“As a governing body, FIFA should be trying to find the best solution for the entire football community,” read the statement by the World Leagues Forum, an umbrella organization for about 40 top leagues. “Instead, FIFA has decided to impose the worst possible option with practically no notice. This poses an obvious governance issue which will have to be addressed.”The growing tension comes amid a wider discussion about the future of soccer, with FIFA pushing for new competitions and new revenue streams and even evaluating the possibility of staging the World Cup every two years. That discussion, which officially is related to soccer’s calendar for the next decade starting in 2024, is expected to conclude by the end of this year.The talks follow perhaps the most fractious period in modern soccer history, encapsulated by a failed attempt by a group of leading European clubs to form a closed superleague and break away from the century-old structures that bind the game together.While their efforts did not ignite the revolution they had designed — their so-called Super League collapsed in a matter of days — their revolt did highlight the unequal distribution of power in global soccer: While teams and leagues invest billions of dollars in the game, they have little say over how it is run.At present, FIFA has signed so-called memorandums of understanding that provide a framework that allows players, who in the main are trained and compensated by their clubs, to play for their countries. Under the terms of that relationship, clubs are required to release players for national team duty for up to 10 days for each international window.For years, that agreement largely held firm, until the coronavirus changed everything and cut the time available to fit in matches before the World Cup at the end of 2022. Instead of two games and their accompanying travel in each window, national teams now would be scheduled for three.At a meeting on July 27, FIFA, represented by Victor Montagliani, its vice president and the head of the regional body for North and Central America, met with officials representing the leagues and clubs. All agreed that a solution needed to be found in order for South America’s qualifiers — backed up by pandemic-related cancellations — to be completed in time for the World Cup.An official from CONMEBOL, according to notes taken at the meeting reviewed by The New York Times, explained that traveling to and within South America was extremely challenging, and that the confederation required three extra days in September and October to ensure the games could be played safely.Like Brazil and Argentina, Uruguay and Colombia also count on European-based pros to fill out their rosters in qualifying.Andressa Anholete/Getty ImagesA representative for the leagues said that would not be acceptable, since it would mean scores of players would be unavailable for at least one weekend of league play, and perhaps more, because of quarantine requirements upon their return to their clubs. He said the leagues could accommodate one extra day, and suggested that the games be played in a secure bubble to minimize travel. At the same meeting, a representative of the players’ union, FIFPro, reminded FIFA of the health effects on athletes of traveling long distances and playing so many games in quick succession.A few weeks later, on Aug. 7, FIFA announced its decision. In a meeting of its most senior body, the Bureau of the FIFA Council — a group made up of the FIFA president, Gianni Infantino, and the leaders of the six regional confederations — it was decided that the South American qualifiers in September and October would be triple match days — three matches in one international break — and clubs would be required to release players for two additional days. Only UEFA, Europe’s governing body, voted against the plan. Previously, it and CONMEBOL had worked together to oppose some of Infantino’s suggestions.“The addition of two days will ensure sufficient rest and preparation time between matches, reflecting the longer travel distances required both to and within South America, thus safeguarding player welfare by mitigating the negative consequences of this more intense schedule, while ensuring fair competition as well as a prompter return to their clubs of the players involved,” FIFA said in a statement.That hardly mollified the clubs. To make matters worse, FIFA said it had scrapped a regulation that allowed teams whose players faced quarantines upon return to withhold releasing them for national team games.“From a regulatory standpoint, this means that FIFA compels players to play for their national team even if they are restricted afterward from playing for their club for several games,” the leagues said in a letter addressed to the FIFA president. The effect, the leagues said, would be quarantine measures that would result “in the disruption or discontinuation of domestic leagues.”With the first games of the September window just over a week away, leagues and clubs are weighing their options. Under FIFA’s current regulations, they may not have many: They will be sanctioned if they refuse to release their players for the looming international window. The complaint would be brought by national soccer associations that comprise FIFA. The body that would rule on the complaints? FIFA. More