Raphael Stevens

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    At Euro 2020, No Semifinalist Is an Island

    Denmark and Italy borrowed ideas from Spain. Spain has learned from Germany. And England has taken everything it can from anywhere it can get it.LEEDS, England — Kalvin Phillips came home, for the first time, as a fully fledged England international with four jerseys as souvenirs. He had asked his new teammates to autograph one, destined to be framed and mounted on a wall at home. Two others were reserved for his mother and grandmother, as tokens of gratitude for years of support. More

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    Terry Donahue, Who Led U.C.L.A. to Bowl Victories, Dies at 77

    Over 20 years, he had more wins than any football coach in the school’s history, including seven consecutive bowl championships.Terry Donahue, who became the face of football at U.C.L.A. as a player and coach, staying in the latter position for 20 years and leading the school to seven consecutive bowl-winning seasons in the 1980s, died on Sunday at his home in Newport Beach, Calif. He was 77.The cause was cancer, U.C.L.A. said.Donahue won more games than any other coach in the school’s and the Pac-12 Conference’s history, and he ended his career with a winning record against each of the conference’s teams, including the Bruins’ crosstown rival, the University of Southern California Trojans.Overall, he won 151 of the 233 games he coached, and 98 of those victories were in the Pac-10 (as the conference was known before adding two teams in 2011). His eighth and final win in a bowl came in the 1991 John Hancock Bowl.Donahue’s streak of bowl victories included Rose Bowl wins in ’83, ’84 and ’86. He was the first person to appear in the Rose Bowl as a player, an assistant coach and a coach.On the field, Donahue played in 1966 in U.C.L.A.’s first Rose Bowl victory. The team earned the nickname “Gutty Little Bruins” because nobody on the defensive line weighed more than 225 pounds. Donahue, a walk-on, weighed just 195 pounds.He brought the same overachieving spirit to his tenure as a coach. Some of U.C.L.A.’s best players in the Donahue era, like the future Hall of Famer Jonathan Ogden, came from regions far from California. The famed quarterback Troy Aikman transferred to U.C.L.A. from another college football program.Donahue talking to his quarterback John Barnes in 1992.Otto Greule Jr/Allsport, via Getty ImagesIn an article last year about how Donahue’s successors have not measured up to the standard he set, The Los Angeles Times attributed Donahue’s success to his being “a pioneer in national recruiting,” in part by having a scout “scour the country for talent.” N.F.L. teams chose 14 players from the Donahue era in the first round of professional drafts.In a 2011 interview with The Los Angeles Times, he discussed the level of commitment required to discover and woo young quarterbacks. “You need money, access to an aircraft if possible,” he said. “I went and got players from Ohio, New Jersey, New York, Hawaii, Texas, Oregon.”A news conference where Donahue announced his retirement in 1995 became a spectacle. The Los Angeles Times said that a U.C.L.A. spokesman prepared two news releases in case Donahue changed his mind. As he began to explain his decision, hundreds of reporters and friends “leaned forward at the same instant,” The Times reported.“I can’t believe I’m holding this press conference,” Donahue said. “What are you all doing here?”But he did retire. Twenty-five years later, The Times would write that the U.C.L.A. football program had been “tormented” since Donahue’s departure.Terrence Michael Donahue was born on June 24, 1944, in Los Angeles to Betty (Gantner) Donahue and Bill Donahue, a physician.He was a starting linebacker at his high school in the Sherman Oaks section of Los Angeles, but he struggled to establish himself in college, failing to gain a steady position at San Jose State and Los Angeles Valley College before getting a tryout at U.C.L.A. in 1964. He was taken on as a reserve lineman and worked his way up to starter.“Terry didn’t have a lot of ability, but he had a lot of character, high intelligence and seldom made a mistake,” Jerry Long, a former U.C.L.A. line coach, said.Donahue graduated from U.C.L.A. in 1967 with a bachelor’s degree in history. He also earned a master’s from the university in kinesiology in 1977.Donahue in 2013. He struggled to accept his own decision to retire as U.C.L.A.’s coach. “I can’t believe I’m holding this press conference,” he said during the announcement. “What are you all doing here?”Stephen Dunn/Getty ImagesHe got his start as a coach by asking a former mentor, Pepper Rodgers, to take him on as an unpaid assistant for the University of Kansas Jayhawks. When Rodgers became head coach at U.C.L.A., Donahue followed him. Rodgers’s successor, Dick Vermeil, left to coach the Philadelphia Eagles in 1976, and Donahue took over, even though he was in his early 30s.After leaving U.C.L.A., he worked in the front office of the San Francisco 49ers from 1999 to 2005.Donahue’s survivors include his wife of 52 years, Andrea (Sogas) Donahue; three daughters, Nicole, Michele and Jennifer; and 10 grandchildren.In 1976, Donahue’s first season coaching U.C.L.A., the Bruins went 9-2-1. An article in Sports Illustrated said he “may be the best young coach in the country.” Known to be relaxed and well tanned, Donahue was asked if he ever felt nervous.“We’re prepared and we’ve worked hard, so there’s nothing to worry about,” he told Sports Illustrated. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go throw up.” More

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    Danger Awaited in Myanmar. So He Made a Daring Bid to Stay in Japan.

    After defying Myanmar’s military rulers at a soccer match, Ko Pyae Lyan Aung decided to seek asylum. But he was being watched.OSAKA, Japan — The soccer player’s plane was at the gate. Ahead of him stood his last chance at safety.The athlete, Ko Pyae Lyan Aung, had come to Japan with Myanmar’s national team. On the field, before the first match, he had flashed a gesture of defiance — the three-finger salute made famous by “The Hunger Games” — against the military junta that had ousted his country’s elected government. He was now afraid of what might happen if he returned home.Several times, he had tried to break away from the team and claim asylum, and each time he had been caught. The immigration line at the Osaka airport offered one more opportunity. When an agent waved him forward and asked for his passport, he presented his phone instead. On it was a message in English and Japanese: “I don’t want to go back to Myanmar.”The gambit worked. He can stay, at least for now. But while Mr. Pyae Lyan Aung’s case has riveted Japan and put pressure on the government, his fate may ultimately hinge on two of the most politically sensitive issues in the country today: its hostile immigration system and its response to the Myanmar coup.Few countries are less hospitable to refugees than Japan, which settled just 47 asylum seekers last year, less than 1 percent of applicants. In recent months, the immigration system has become a political battlefield after the death of an emaciated Sri Lankan migrant in a detention cell.At the same time, the government has been under intense pressure at home and abroad to do more to dissuade Myanmar’s military as it has ruthlessly crushed protests against its Feb. 1 coup. But Japan, which has been a top investor in Myanmar and generally avoids rights issues overseas, has been reluctant to make any moves that might alienate the junta, parting ways with allies like the United States that have imposed sanctions.A clash between protesters and security forces in Yangon, Myanmar, in March.The New York TimesMr. Pyae Lyan Aung’s case is likely to raise more questions about Japan’s stance. A growing number of athletes from Myanmar have refused to represent the country at international sporting events, arguing that to do so would risk legitimizing the military leaders. Myanmar’s participation this month in the Tokyo Olympics could become another flash point.So far, Mr. Pyae Lyan Aung has kept mostly quiet about politics, and his journey through the immigration system — in contrast to the experience of so many refugees in Japan — has been smooth. In May, the country announced emergency measures allowing citizens of Myanmar who wish to stay in Japan to apply for provisional visas. On June 22, Mr. Pyae Lyan Aung did so.That day, reporters amassed outside the Osaka immigration bureau, a gray filing cabinet of a building in a weedy corner of the city’s port, where he had gone to submit his official asylum request.He had recently learned that soccer players he knew in Myanmar had been killed while protesting, his lawyer said, adding that the new information would make Mr. Pyae Lyan Aung’s plea more compelling.As reporters shouted questions, a tattoo of a giant eye peered out from the crook of Mr. Pyae Lyan Aung’s elbow, unblinkingly surveying the scene.After an interpreter began to relay his responses, another foreign man suddenly appeared in the doors of the immigration center, screaming “Save me!” in Japanese. He sprinted down the street, and officials, lanyards swinging from their necks, puffed out of the building in close pursuit.Myanmar’s national team training at a stadium in Chiba, Japan, in May, before a World Cup qualifier against Japan.Charly Triballeau/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesDays before, just blocks from where Mr. Pyae Lyan Aung now stood, he had been the immigrant trying to flee.He would rather have made headlines for blocking kicks during his team’s World Cup qualifier against Japan, he said during an interview in the narrow Osaka rowhouse where he now lives. But Myanmar lost, 10-0, and his defiant gesture made news instead.In the lead-up to the Japan trip, soccer players from Myanmar had begun openly expressing resistance to the regime. One grabbed international attention during a match in Malaysia when he celebrated a goal with his own three-finger salute.Ten players later declared that they would not play for the national team. That followed a decision by a Myanmar swimmer based in Australia to boycott the Olympics and call on the organizers to bar the Myanmar Olympic Committee. (The organizers said they had to stay out of politics.)The soccer players’ walkout delayed the trip to Japan, and Myanmar’s embarrassed national soccer association pressured the rest of the athletes to travel.Before he left, Mr. Pyae Lyan Aung decided to make a statement. He was frustrated and heartsick about the situation at home, he said, and felt betrayed when the Myanmar soccer association did not distance itself from the junta.Protesting against Myanmar’s coup outside the Chiba stadium.Charly Triballeau/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesHis moment came when his team lined up for the national anthem before its game against Japan’s national team, known as Samurai Blue.As news coverage of his defiant gesture snowballed, supporters became concerned about his safety. They reached out to U Aung Myat Win, an activist and restaurateur who fled from Myanmar to Japan in the 1990s. After years of being detained in the Japanese immigration system, Mr. Aung Myat Win had become one of the few refugees to receive asylum in the country.Over the years, he had gone to extraordinary lengths to help other immigrants from Myanmar navigate life in Japan. He messaged Mr. Pyae Lyan Aung, arguing that going back home could be deadly, and asked him whether he wanted to stay in Japan.At first the athlete wasn’t sure. But before long he had decided to try.His team was under close watch. Its management was keeping tabs on the players, and Japan’s soccer federation had hired a private security firm to ensure that the men didn’t break quarantine.Mr. Aung Myat Win scouted possible routes for Mr. Pyae Lyan Aung to slip out of his Osaka hotel. He would have to sneak past his teammates and down a central bank of elevators or emergency stairs.It proved too difficult. After several failed attempts, Mr. Aung Myat Win contacted an immigration lawyer specializing in asylum cases, Yoshihiro Sorano, who filed a complaint with the police saying that Mr. Pyae Lyan Aung was being held captive.Mr. Pyae Lyan Aung studying Japanese at the rowhouse where he now lives.Shiho Fukada for The New York TimesOfficers contacted the Japan Football Association, which assured them that the athlete was free to move around. The officers never spoke to him or visited the hotel, Mr. Sorano said.Asked about the situation, the group said that because of the government’s Covid-19 restrictions, it had hired private security to monitor all foreign teams in Japan, as well as Japanese players who had come into contact with them. It said it had not been able to confirm whether there were additional restrictions on Mr. Pyae Lyan Aung’s movement.Mr. Aung Myat Win and Mr. Sorano kept trying to make escape plans, but journalists had begun gathering outside the hotel, and the attention soon made it impossible.Before long, Mr. Pyae Lyan Aung and the other players were on a bus to the airport. Mr. Aung Myat Win followed.“When you get to immigration, tell them, ‘I don’t want to go home,’” he told Mr. Pyae Lyan Aung, who speaks little English and no Japanese. A supporter texted him the message in both languages to show the agent.Now that his asylum application has been filed, Mr. Pyae Lyan Aung is unsure what’s next. He has no job, has no Japanese language skills and is unlikely to get support from the government. He hopes to keep playing soccer professionally, he said, but if that doesn’t work out, he will do what he must to stay in Japan.All he knows for sure is that — for now at least — he can’t go home. More

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    Belgium Beats Portugal at Euro 2020, Sending Cristiano Ronaldo Home Early

    A failed strategy sent defending champion Portugal out early at Euro 2020 and kept alive the title hopes of Belgium’s golden generation.The list of people who had let Cristiano Ronaldo down was, by the end, a long and illustrious one.Their transgressions had varied, in both nature and severity, and so had their punishments: Diogo Jota, failure to pass, hard stare; Renato Sanches, not getting out of the way of a free kick, baleful finger-point; Bruno Fernandes, speculative and wildly inaccurate shooting not entirely unfamiliar to Ronaldo himself, primal scream into Seville’s stifling night sky. More

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    Belgium Falls to Italy and Searches for a Silver Lining

    A loss to Italy at Euro 2020 sent another star-studded Belgian team home empty-handed. But not before it offered a peek at its future.Belgium’s players were still, their faces blank, as they heard the clock strike midnight. At the other end of the Allianz Arena in Munich, Italy’s players were being slowly consumed by their fans, released only once they had surrendered their white jerseys and their green training bibs and, in some cases, their muddied shorts for use as future sacraments. More

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    Denmark’s Secret at Euro 2020? There Is No Secret.

    Sometimes, timing and talent and teaching converge. Sometimes there is a story to tell and a path others can follow. And sometimes there is not.Jan Laursen was inside the Parken Stadium in Copenhagen on the afternoon Denmark lost to Belgium. The result, at the time, felt secondary. For most in the crowd, the game was a chance to show their affection not only for the absent Christian Eriksen, but for a team that had acted with such grace and courage even in the thick of primal horror. More

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    Jack Grealish: England’s Golden Boy

    Fans chant his name at Wembley and pressure his coach to play him. But what does England really know about Grealish? And what does it want from him?The Wembley Stadium crowd was calling for him, yearning for him, long before it had seen him. The second half of England’s game with Germany had reached a deadlock. The English had not troubled Manuel Neuer’s goal for some time; the Germans had mustered a single shot, and then retreated into their shell. Stalemate had set in. More

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    N.F.L. Fines Washington Football Team $10 Million

    The penalty of a $10 million fine follows an investigation into sexual harassment and abuse in the team’s front office.The N.F.L. on Thursday announced that the Washington Football Team would pay a $10 million fine to the league after a yearlong investigation into reports of the club’s rampant culture of sexual harassment perpetuated by managers and executives under the ownership of Daniel Snyder. The team also must reimburse the league for the cost of the investigation.Snyder will remove himself from day-to-day business operations of the club through at least mid-October, ceding that control to his wife and new co-chief executive, Tanya Snyder. Daniel Snyder, though, will attend games and continue to work on searching for a new team name and a new stadium. Vestry Laight, a firm that works with companies to address misconduct, which was already retained by the team, will provide the league with updates on the team’s human resources practices for the next two years.Roger Goodell, the league’s commissioner, “concluded that for many years the workplace environment at the Washington Football Team, both generally and particularly for women, was highly unprofessional,” the N.F.L. said in a statement. “Bullying and intimidation frequently took place and many described the culture as one of fear, and numerous female employees reported having experienced sexual harassment and a general lack of respect in the workplace.”The penalties are some of the harshest levied against an N.F.L. team and conclude an investigation into allegations of sexual harassment and abuse by men in the team’s front office dating to 2004. Beth Wilkinson, a lawyer based in Washington who led the investigation, shared her findings in an oral presentation that formed the basis of the league’s decision to penalize the team.“We are incredibly remorseful and incredibly sorry, and we want everyone to be treated with dignity and respect and professionalism,” Daniel Snyder said in an interview on Wednesday.“I’m mortified to think that’s happening in our building and our business,” Tanya Snyder added.Nearly 150 current and former employees of the football club were interviewed as part of Wilkinson’s investigation into reports of misdeeds that were detailed in several Washington Post articles last year, as well as reports in The New York Times in 2018 about abuse of cheerleaders. In addition to several incidents of inappropriate treatment of female office workers and cheerleaders by men employed by the franchise, The Post reported that two women had accused Snyder, 56, in separate episodes of harassment dating to 2004. He has denied those allegations.Snyder also reached a financial settlement in 2009 with a female former executive who had accused him of sexual misconduct during a trip on a private jet. He has denied any wrongdoing.The N.F.L. released only a brief summary of the team’s toxic internal culture, not a full accounting of allegations, so it is unclear how deep the dysfunction went.Lisa Friel, the N.F.L. Special Counsel for Investigations, said that Wilkinson was not asked to verify the accuracy of any allegations, or produce a written report of her findings to preserve the anonymity of the witnesses.“We felt it was best due to the sensitivity of the allegations and the requests for confidentiality,” Friel said, adding that a written report might have given away the identity of some of the employees.Snyder has conceded that he was too lax in his management of the team over the years, leaving much of the day-to-day running of the club to Bruce Allen, the former team president who was dismissed at the end of 2019 after a decade on the job.“I appreciate the people who came forward and intend fully to implement all of the recommendations coming out of the investigation,” Daniel Snyder said in a statement released Thursday.Lisa Banks and Debra Katz, lawyers who are representing 40 former team employees, said Wilkinson’s investigation “substantiated our clients’ allegations of pervasive harassment, misogyny and abuse.” They said the N.F.L. was protecting Snyder by ignoring their requests to make Wilkinson’s findings public. The $10 million fine, they added, “amounts to pocket change” for the club.“The N.F.L. has effectively told survivors in this country and around the world that it does not care about them or credit their experiences,” they said in a statement. “Female fans, and fans of good will everywhere, take note.”The allegations of widespread harassment within the Washington franchise have been acutely embarrassing for the league, which during the past two decades gained a reputation that it had failed to adequately reprimand players, coaches, staff and team owners who were accused of harassing or assaulting women.The team also decided to drop its nickname and logo last July after years of criticism from people who considered it a racist slur against Native Americans and of threats from major corporations to end sponsorships. The team is reviewing new names and logos.In the past year, Snyder also battled publicly with three longtime shareholders. Their boardroom brawl included dueling lawsuits, accusations of the smear campaigns and bullying.Months before the investigation into the leadership of the team and the conduct of its employees was completed, the league’s owners endorsed Snyder by unanimously voting to allow him to add $450 million of new debt so he could purchase the 40 percent of the team that he and his relatives did not already own.The fine against the Washington franchise for failing to properly manage its staff is the first financial penalty against a team in a sexual harassment case since Jerry Richardson was fined $2.75 million for making racist comments and sexually harassing female members of his staff while he was owner of the Carolina Panthers. The league fined Richardson after he had reached an agreement to sell the team in 2018 for $2.2 billion.The N.F.L.’s penalizing of Snyder fell short of suspending him. Only a handful of owners have been suspended, and typically because they were personally charged with crimes. Edward J. DeBartolo Jr. of the San Francisco 49ers was suspended for a year and fined $1 million after he pleaded guilty to one felony charge of failing to report an alleged extortion attempt by the then-governor of Louisiana, Edwin Edwards.Jim Irsay, the owner of the Indianapolis Colts, was suspended for six games and fined $500,000 after he pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of driving while intoxicated following his arrest after a traffic stop in 2014.After the allegations of sexual harassment became public last summer, Snyder fired nearly every front office executive. He has tried to revive the club’s tattered image by hiring new executives, including Jason Wright, the N.F.L.’s first Black team president, and several women. A coed dance team will perform on game days, replacing the cheerleading program, which had been overseen by one of the since-fired executives who had been accused of sexual harassment.Snyder said he would adopt the recommendations put forth by Wilkinson, which include the detailed development of protocols for “victims to report anonymously and without fear of retaliation” any misconduct and the implementation of regular anti-bullying, discrimination and harassment training seminars.Fatima Goss Graves, chief executive of the National Women’s Law Center, said that none of the recommendations can prompt change without the release the investigation’s findings.“There is no reason to issue a significant fine without giving a full explanation of why,” she said. “It is hard to have meaningful accountability without transparency when the allegations go to the very top of the organization.”Kim Gandy, the former chief executive of the National Network to End Domestic Violence and a one-time adviser to the league, questioned whether $10 million is significant enough.“The fine represents only 2 percent of last year’s revenue, and less than three-tenths of 1 percent of the team’s value,” she said.In the interview this week, Snyder said he and his wife are down to a few dozen options for new names for the team and that a location for a new stadium will be chosen in about six months.Despite its rebuke of the Washington team, the league as a whole continues to be plagued by claims of harassment, not just in ownership circles, but among players and coaches. “We will review our own policies and practices,” the league said Thursday. 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