It’s BMWs all around for Leicester players
Lavish reward for Premier title
First it was pizzas. Now it’s top-ofthe-range sports cars.
A fleet of 19 BMW i8s — each worth around $135,000 — lined up outside Leicester’s stadium on Friday morning as a reward to the players for their Premier Leaguewinning exploits last season.
Another bonus for producing the most improbable title success ever in English football.
Asked whether he would be getting a car bought for him, Leicester coach Claudio Ranieri smiled and said: “Some gifts are only for them? Not for me? I want to speak with my owner.”
The Italian rewarded his players for clean sheets by taking them out for pizza during last season. The bar has been raised considerably with the gift of a brand-new car for each member of the title-winning squad. It will set Leicester’s Thai owners back US$2.6 million.
Leicester gets its season rolling with a match against Manchester United for the Community Shield at Wembley Stadium on Sunday. It is the annual season curtainraiser, between the winners of the Premier League and FA Cup.
“This is not a friendly,” the Italian coach added. “We will give the maximum and also Manchester United will too. Both teams want to win it.”
Leicester’s first game of its Premier League title defence is against Hull on Aug. 13.
Man City plays Steaua in Champs League
Manchester City and new coach Pep Guardiola will face Steaua Bucharest in the Champions League playoffs for a place in the elite group stage.
Guardiola will lead last season’s semifinalist at home first against the Romanian champion.
Among the other 10 playoff pairings announced by UEFA on Friday, two-time champion Porto will play Roma and four-time winner Ajax faces Russian debutant Rostov.
Dundalk, the surprise team in qualifying, will play Legia Warsaw, and Hapoel Beer- Sheva is away first against Celtic. Also, it was: Villarreal vs. Monaco, Young Boys vs. Borussia Moenchengladbach.
First-leg matches are played Aug. 16-17, and second legs on Aug. 23- 24. Playoff winners will join 22 direct qualifiers in the group-stage draw on Aug. 25 in Monaco.
Ronaldo in, Messi out for best player list
Cristiano Ronaldo is in and Lionel Messi is out of a three-player shortlist for UEFA’s Best Player in Europe award for last season.
Ronaldo, Antoine Griezmann and Gareth Bale were picked for the shortlist by media voters from UEFA’s 55 member countries.
All three performed well at the European Championship, with Ronaldo leading Portugal over France in the final, Griezmann adding a golden boot to his runnerup medal by scoring six goals, and Bale inspiring Wales to the semifinals.
Ronaldo and Bale also helped Champions League winner Real Madrid beat city rival Atletico and Griezmann in the final. UEFA says Messi was fifth in second-round voting behind Barcelona teammate Luis Suarez. The winner will be chosen in a vote on Aug. 25 during the Champions League groupstage draw in Monaco.
Berlusconi sells full AC Milan stake
AC Milan is the latest European club to be taken over by Chinese owners after Silvio Berlusconi reached a preliminary deal to sell his entire majority stake in the seven-time European champion that he has owned for 30 years.
The deal with a Chinese investor group, which includes the participation of a Chinese state investment fund, values the club at around $820 million.
Berlusconi owns 99.93 per cent of the club. The three-time former premier and billionaire businessman has been negotiating for over a year to sell a stake in the club, failing to reach a deal for a 48-per cent stake with Thai investors last year before opening talks in May with the then-unnamed Chinese investors, initially for a 70 per cent stake.
The deal comes a month after Chinese retail giant Suning bought a majority 70-per cent stake in Inter Milan, which shares the San Siro Stadium with AC Milan.