Sports

English newspapers The Times, the Guardian and news agency Reuters reported on Wednesday that UEFA, football's European governing body, was set to drop its threat to boycott all FIFA tournaments. The decision to allow European teams to participate in next month's Under-20 Women's World Cup in Poland came after UEFA had reportedly received guarantees that football's world governing body would not revive a plan to sell a stake in FIFA tournaments to private investors. FIFA President Gianni Infantino had dropped his plan to create a commercial subsidiary called FIFA Forward Enterprises (FFE) in the face of widespread protest last month. UEFA spearheaded opposition to the plan but it had also demanded that "assurances have to be made that such attempts to disfigure the game in this way will ...

"A year ago, I told my team that we need to step things up by two gears, and we did that," Schalke's second-year coach, Miron Muslic, told the club's website ahead of this season's return to the Bundesliga. "Now we need to step things up by two gears all over again. At first glance it may sound like a threat, too dramatic, but this is what we will need to meet this challenge. The lads know this and we are confident that we have a higher gear in us." The challenge for Muslic is not simply to avoid relegation in year one after three seasons in the second division, but to "establish ourselves in the Bundesliga." It will also be Muslic's first season in the Bundesliga after he succeeded where several of his predecessors failed – guiding the Royal Blues back to the topflight. 'Where did thi...

The 64th season of the Bundesliga is here. The tiny team from Elversberg will become the 59th club to play in the league, Ismael Saibari is Harry Kane's new back-up at Bayern Munich, Schalke return after three years away, and Kathleen Krüger is Head of Sport at Hamburg.  Coming off an XXL World Cup and a new broadcasting deal in the US, the Bundesliga is looking to step forward into a new era. But beyond the loyal support of club fans both domestic and abroad, has the international appeal of the league, particulary in the key US market, worn off? "It would be hard to argue that the Bundesliga has not suffered some back-sliding in their standing. When Bayern and Dortmund met in the Champions League final [in 2013], I believed it was just the league announcing its superiority with intent t...

Organizers of the 2026 Sydney Marathon are making the best of the situation after minting tens of thousands of medals engraved with depictions of landmarks from the eastern Australian city along with one that doesn't belong — the Allianz Arena in Munich, Germany. The medal should have shown Allianz Stadium in Sydney, one of the sights participants in the upcoming race will pass as they run the 42.2-kilometer (26.2-mile) course. More than 40,000 participants are expected to earn the medal as a "badge of honor" for completing the race on August 30. Other landmarks shown include the famous Opera House and the Sydney Harbour Bridge. What have organizers said about the medal mix-up? "A little too much international flavor has found its way onto the back of the finishers' medal, with an i...

Bayern Munich striker Harry Kane has been named men's Player of the Year in Germany after a record-breaking season for the Bundesliga champions. Bayern coach Vincent Kompany was voted trainer of the year, while Germany defender Giulia Gwinn completed a clean sweep for the Munich club by winning the women's Player of the Year award. "A Bayern double — never before have the men and women's Player of the Year awards gone to the same club. Congratulations to Harry and Giulia, as well as our coach Vincent," Bayern president Herbert Hainer said in a club statement. "When men's and women's football makes history together, then that's Bayern, making a mark. We're proud of this result." Why was Harry Kane named Germany's footballer of the year? Kane received 272 votes from members of the Associ...

Organizers of the 2026 Sydney Marathon are making the best of the situation after minting tens of thousands of medals engraved with depictions of landmarks from the eastern Australian city along with one that doesn't belong — the Allianz Arena in Munich, Germany. The medal should have instead shown the Allianz Stadium in Sydney, which is one of the sights that participants in the upcoming race will pass while running the the 42.2-kilometer (26.2-mile) course. More than 40,000 participants are expected to earn the medal as a "badge of honor" for completing the race on August 30. Other landmarks shown include the famous Opera House and the Sydney Harbour Bridge.Sydney's Allianz Stadium also has its own unique appearanceImage: Rafael Ben Ari/Newscom/picture alliance What have organizers s...

As announced last Friday, the 14 Women's Bundesliga clubs have officially established their own league organization during a meeting in the German city of Frankfurt. Katharina Kiel of Eintracht Frankfurt was elected as the first president of the Frauen-Bundesliga FBL e.V. (Women's Bundesliga Association). Veronica Sass of Bayern Munich and Florian Zeutschler will serve as vice presidents. The FBL's stated purpose is to take the league's marketing and professionalization to a new level, and it will reportedly be rolled out in 18 months time. "Today marks a historic moment for German women's football. For the first time, all top-division clubs are joining forces and pooling their interests within a league association," Kiel said in a statement posted on Eintracht Frankfurt's website. "For...

While Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo are still playing at 39 and 41 respectively, most football fans thought Ronaldinho belonged to another footballing era. That all changed in June, when Italian Serie C club, Ravenna, announced that the former Barcelona, Paris Saint-Germain and AC Milan forward would play for them in the upcoming season. On a rainy Thursday in northeastern Italy, the former Ballon d'Or winner was unveiled with a quick press conference and a sense of excitement gripping the city. "I'm very happy to be here with friends, we have a team that can do something good," said Ronaldinho. "I just arrived, but I have a great desire to live this experience with the whole city." Pure PR? The 46-year-old last played for Fluminense in his homeland in 2015 and will become a sha...

There is probably no other sport in the world that has experienced a boom like Hyrox in recent years. What started as an idea in 2017 has, within just a few years, evolved into one of the fastest-growing fitness movements in the world. The format was developed by event organizer Christian Toetzke, communications expert Michael Trautmann, and Moritz Fürste, a former member of the German national field hockey team that won gold at the 2008 and 2012 Summer Olympics. Their basic idea was very simple: to create a competition that combines the atmosphere of a running event with the intensity of functional strength training that many people know from time in the gym. Hyrox consists of eight functional stations interspersed by eight 1-kilometer (0.62 miles) runs. Moritz Fürste went from nationa...

Several months after moving to Germany, Bernadette Amani is clearly where she wants to be, having won both the Bundesliga and the German Cup in her first half-season since joining Bayern Munich. "It's a dream come true for me to be here, and I'm living my dream to the full," the 28-year-old midfielder told DW in a recent exclusive interview. "Munich is a very, very big club. Beyond just making me happy, it's a real achievement, a dream come true to be here, to play for such a prestigious club." Amani, who recently captained Ivory Coast at the Women's Africa Cup of Nations (WAFCON), added that playing for Bayern's women has been a major step up from what she had come to know playing for CD Tenerife Femenino of Liga F, Spain's topflight. "I was already professional when I was in Spain, b...