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Europe’s giants kick off UCL with Man City at home to Red Star, PSG facing Dortmund

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Champions League

Manchester City begin their title defence of the Champions League at home to Red Star Belgrade to kick off the European club season in earnest tonight.

Following a busy summer of football with the Women’s World Cup taking centre stage and domestic seasons returning back to action, memories of City’s first-ever Champions League win – a 1-0 victory over Inter Milan in a tedious final in Istanbul – may seem distant, but Pep Guardiola’s mind on Tuesday will no doubt flashback to that June night when his club at long last lifted the European Cup.

With an insatiable desire for victory, the Spaniard is confident that City have what it takes to retain their title, a feat last achieved by Real Madrid in 2018.

“It’ll be easier,” said Guardiola, who will be without the injured John Stones, Jack Grealish, Mateo Kovacic and Kevin de Bruyne for their home opener against Red Star. “The most difficult to win is the first one. It is incredible for us but it is just one. It’s important the players don’t feel relaxed.”

“For our club to win the Champions League is incredible but in perspective how many (clubs have) won one Champions League? A lot. We haven’t done anything special with just one, but we are incredibly proud.”

Top of the Premier League table, City will be favourites to reach the final at Wembley with other traditional powerhouses like Real Madrid and Bayern Munich currently lagging well behind, both in terms of match performance and resources. It will be the first Champions League season without Lionel Messi, who is stateside, and Cristiano Ronaldo, who is in Saudi Arabia, though making waves in the Asian Champions League tonight in Iran.

Owned by the Saudi Public Investment Fund, Newcastle United return to Europe’s premier competition for the first time since the 2002/03 season. They kick off their campaign against AC Milan at the San Siro.

Paris Saint-Germain vs Dortmund is another standout fixture on Tuesday. Since Qatar Sports Investment took over the Parisian club in 2011, PSG have won nine Ligue 1 titles, but the Champions League trophy remains elusive. They reached the 2021 final but succumbed to Bayern Munich 1-0. Instead, City, last season, became the first state-backed club to win the competition.

“When a club is obsessed with something, it’s never a good sign,” said PSG manager Luis Enrique.

“You have to have ambition but obsession doesn’t work in any area of life. You have to wait and see how the competition goes, football is a wonderful sport, any result is possible. You can play an incredible game and lose, play badly and win. As a club, we play all competitions to win them, that’s the objective. It’s very ambitious but it’s necessary.”

This will be the last season of the existing 32-team format in the group phase before the competition moves to a Swiss model featuring 36 clubs in the group stages in a league model.

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Events

Jos, Plateau Comes Alive As NNL AGA Holds This Friday

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All is set for the Annual General Meeting of the Nigeria National League which is scheduled to hold in the capital city of Plateau state.

Already, stakeholders have started arriving the Tin City for the one-day deliberation.

The AGA which is the first activity of the season will see the NNL board meet with the 40 club representatives to fashion our all formalities for a successful season.

Kickoff date, format, funding and other matters of critical importance will be decided at the assembly.

NNL Chairman George Aluo who is already on the ground, gave further insight on the agenda.

“At the NNL AGA we will be rubbing minds with the club owners, share our thoughts and plans with them and be on the same page and decide when the league will start basically, as that is the most important thing so that after the AGA in Jos, we should be able to tell Nigerians when the league will kickoff.”

He continued, “The President of the NFF Alhaji Ibrahim Gusau has given us a mandate to start the league on time and ensure it aligns with the international calendar and that is the direction we want to go. So we have come up with our own plans and by the time we finish with our AGA in Jos, we’ll tell Nigerians what the plans are and how the league will be played.

He revealed that the board ” has put some plans in place as the NNL has been able to partner with the National Institute for Sports (NIS) for a pre-season capacity building seminar for our coaches. We want to upscale our coaches to make them better. Already, we have invited some resource persons from the NIS and the Technical Director of the NFF Augustine Eguavoen who will be involved in that and a Portuguese coach Thiago Conde so, at the end of the day, we would have upscale our coaches technically and before the start of the season by the time you’ve taken them to the classroom, I’m sure it will rub-off on the NNLas the 2023-2023 season gets underway.”

He appreciated the Plateau state Government for hosting the board as they begin deliberation this Friday.

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Colombia 2024: Falconets progress to third round as Mauritius withdraw

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The Mauritius Football Association has notified the Confederation of African Football of the withdrawal of the country’s U20 Women National Team from the ongoing African qualifying series for next year’s FIFA U20 Women’s World Cup finals.

“Kindly note that CAF was informed of the withdrawal of Mauritius FA from the African qualifiers of FIFA U20 WWC 2024. Consequently, Nigeria is qualified to the next round of the competition and the missions of all officials of matches 37 & 38 are cancelled,” read a communication from CAF to the Nigeria Football Federation.

The Falconets were to fly to Mauritius next week for the first leg in Saint Pierre against the Mauritius U20 girls, with the return leg scheduled for the MKO Abiola National Stadium, Abuja on Saturday, 14th October.

With this situation, 2022 World Cup quarter-finalists Nigeria now progress to the next round of the qualification series.

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Confed Cup: Insurance players vow to beat RS Berkane for their chief motivator, Obaseki

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As Federation Cup champion, Bendel Insurance of Benin plays RS Berkane on Friday in a Caf Confederation Cup match, the players and officials said they are ready to shed blood to win for the good people and government of Edo State especially their number one supporter and motivator Governor Godwin Obaseki.

Though Insurance has a mountain to climb in the decisive leg in Morocco after they were forced to a 2-2 draw by RS Berkane at the Samuel Ogbemudia Stadium, Benin, in the first leg on Saturday, September 16, they are confident that will beat their host and qualify for the next round of the competition.

Monday Odigie’s side will miss the services of striker Osarenkhoe Imade, who scored their opener in the first leg as well as their other goal in the last round.

The 22-year-old just penned a deal with United Arab Emirates side, United FC.

Despite missing their highest goal scorer from last season, stand-in captain and goalkeeper, Amas Obasigie, echoed the confidence of the team.

“Knowing the honour that awaits us if we beat our opponents to qualify for the group stage, we are going to fight for everything in the field of play to go home happy. We made two mistakes in Benin and will not want a repeat. We are facing very strong opponents who have been champions twice in a space of three years, but we will not allow their intimidation to affect our play. They should expect a good fight from us the way they also fought in Benin.

“Above all, we want to fight to win for our state Governor, who has been wonderful in giving his all, in sponsorship and motivation that has taken us thus far both in the domestic league and continental level,” Obasogie said.

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