Williams brothers enjoy stirring send-off at Athletic after international calls
On Sunday evening Iñaki Williams boarded a plane north to Paris. About the time he set off from there to Le Havre on Monday, Nico Williams was heading in the other direction, south to Barajas and on to Las Rozas, 25km outside Madrid. On Saturday, a night none of them would ever forget – a delirious, joyous celebration of everything they are – they had embraced; then, for the first time, Bilbao’s brothers went separate ways. “It was always our dream to play together and see our mum happy,” Iñaki says. This week they won’t, a new chapter beginning in their lives. But they’ll be back and, boy, had they had a send off.
As for their mum, Maria, she couldn’t be happier. The scheduling means hopefully she’ll be able to see both her sons take their next, giant steps, for a start. This Friday, Iñaki Williams will probably make his debut for Ghana against Brazil in France, aged 28. The following night, Nico Williams, eight years younger, will probably make his for Spain against Switzerland in Zaragoza. They arrive having celebrated those call-ups with a 3-2 win over Rayo Vallecano to take Athletic into a Champions League place. It was Inaki’s 239th consecutive game – yes, two hundred and thirty-ninthand, yes, consecutive – for Athletic. It was Nico’s 48th in total. It was also the first match in which they had both scored, San Mamés roaring all around them.
The first time Iñaki played for Athletic, back in 2014, he still didn’t know exactly how he had got there. He was 20 when his mum sat him down and told him how she was pregnant with him when she and her husband Felix left Ghana and crossed the Sahara by truck and barefoot – Felix still has problems walking – and climbed the fence into Melilla, Spanish north Africa. A few months later, Iñaki was born in Bilbao. Destiny, he calls it. “My friends and I talk about it: bloody hell, incredible. Everything happens for a reason. If I hadn’t been born in Bilbao, I could never have played for Athletic.”
Iñaki joined the club at 14, driven by an objective. In 2005 or 2006, with the family living in social housing in Pamplona and the financial crisis brewing,
The Tottenham captain, Hugo Lloris, has emerged as an injury concern in the lead-up to the north London derby at Arsenal next month.
Lloris impressed during the 6-2 win against Leicester on Saturday, making a crucial save to deny Patson Daka in the second half that prevented the visitors from drawing level at 3-3.
The 35-year-old goalkeeper joined the French national team on Monday before the Nations League fixtures with Austria and Denmark this week but he has since left the camp in Clairefontaine. He has been diagnosed with an injury to his right thigh, which will concern the Spurs manager, Antonio Conte, with a trip to Arsenal on the horizon for 1 October.
“Arriving on Monday morning at the National Football Centre in Clairefontaine, Hugo Lloris consulted Dr Franck Le Gall,” a statement from the French Football Federation read. “A small injury to the right thigh has been diagnosed for the Tottenham goalkeeper.
“He is therefore unavailable for the two matches against Austria on Thursday at the Stade de France and in Den-* mark on Sunday.”
Lloris is the second Tottenham player to pull out of international duty after Ben Davies was forced to withdraw from the Wales squad following an injury to his knee. He also faces a race against time to be fit to face Arsenal.