CGTN Sports Talk

The 2-1 loss against Saudi Arabia nearly exposed all of the problems Argentina have: their defensive line is unstable; they lack control in the midfield; their attackers are clueless about how to beat the blanket defense. By contrast, Saudi Arabia have every reason to celebrate: it's the first time for the team to win their first group game at the World Cup; they beat the two-time World Cup champi...

England, which usually began slow at the FIFA World Cup, began the 2022 tournament in Qatar with a 6-2 win over Iran on Monday. The bus Iran parked in front of their goal didn't stop the "Three Lions" which exploited well their free kicks and had more players than expected involved in the scoring feast. The Netherlands, in a fast and physical contest against Senegal, claimed a valuable 2-0 win tha...

In their World Cup debut, at the first edition of the tournament in either the Middle East or winter, Qatar became the first host team to lose the opening game. If the defeat was not disappointing enough, Qatar failed to enter Ecuador's box in the first half and had no shots on goal for the whole game. It took the team about an hour to finally snap out of it and begin to move like professional pla...

The 2022 FIFA World Cup will kick off between the host Qatar and Ecuador at Al Bayt Stadium on November 20. In the previous five editions of the tournament, only one reigning champions team was not eliminated in the group stage. France won the title in 1998 and then failed to reach the Round of 16 in 2002. Now that they won it again in 2018, will they repeat history? Qatar 2022 will be the last Wo...

Cristiano Ronaldo's interview with Piers Morgan became one of the ugliest and most shocking pieces of football news this week. Ronaldo is not the first star player to criticize the club he plays for, his manager or his former teammate, but it's very rare for an active player to do all those together in one interview. It has been no secret that the relations between Ronaldo and Manchester United br...

The Los Angeles Lakers won two of the past four games and then lost the other two after starting the 2022-23 NBA regular season with a 0-5 record. Having Russell Westbrook begin off the bench enabled him to play more comfortably and more efficiently. That was one of the major reasons behind the team's two straight wins. However, that solution didn't fix all of the purple and gold's problems, which...

It's rare to see the following names – Juventus, Barcelona and Manchester United – all in the UEFA Europa Champions League together, but times have changed. The arrivals of the traditional powerhouses from the top five leagues will definitely make things interesting, but they won't necessarily win the title like going to a picnic. For starters, anything can happen in a two-legged contest. Second,...

The Philadelphia 76ers now have a .500 record after beating the Washington Wizards on Monday. It is inspiring considering that they began the 2022-23 NBA regular season with three straight losses. Joel Embiid has faced criticism for his underperformance in the first two losses. He scored 40 points in the third game against the San Antonio Spurs but they still lost. Embiid's numbers looked more "no...

Donovan Mitchell, Dejounte Murray and Rudy Gobert were traded this offseason to new teams by the franchises they had been playing for since they were drafted into the NBA. Mitchell leads the Cleveland Cavaliers in scoring with 31 points per game in five games, which is exactly what the team needs from him to make a deep playoff run. Murray became the Atlanta Hawks' best backcourt defender and seco...

Twelve clubs have qualified for the Round of 16 in the 2022-23 UEFA Champions League after Group Stage games. Only three groups still have any suspense over which teams will advance to the next stage. Group D has the most complicated situation because the leader Tottenham Hotspur are only two points above the bottom Olympique de Marseille while the two in between, Sporting CP and Eintracht Frankfu...

Two games on Tuesday night raised the curtain for the 2022-23 NBA regular season. The Golden State Warriors had nothing but joy as they received the championship rings for the last season, gave their young players enough time to refine themselves and smashed the opponents at Chase Center. While the Los Angeles Lakers review their loss against the Warriors, they may also want to ask their front off...

When Kylian Mbappe inked a three-year contract extension with Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) in May, he became reportedly one of the most powerful players in any football powerhouse in Europe because the new deal gave him a say in how the club is run, according to The Guardian. However, that hasn't seemed liked it has made the 23-year-old French genius happy enough to stay at the Parc des Princes, beca...

When Bayern Munich, Barcelona and Inter Milan were put in Group C at the 2022-23 UEFA Champions League, this group was considered by many as the "Group of Death." Back then, more expected to see Bayern and Barca to qualify for the next stage than those who believed in Inter. After four games, Bayern are the group leader with four straight wins; Inter are second after a win and a draw against Barca...

When Ben Simmons of the Brooklyn Nets appeared in the NBA pre-season game against the Philadelphia 76ers on October 3, he played his first formal game since June 20, 2021. Judging by his performance against the 76ers, his defense, agility, athleticism and orchestrating were all still there. So were his problems of lacking shooting ability outside the paint. As a 2.11-meter-tall point guard and a t...

Draymond Green of the Golden State Warriors punched his teammate Jordan Poole during team practice on Wednesday - and himself out of the team for at least days. The 32-year-old veteran said the clash was not about contract extensions, which both he and Poole have been negotiating over with the team. But after his behavior and the release of the related video, Green is unlikely to get the salary he...

Inter Milan shoved Barcelona into third place in Group C after defeating them 1-0 in the UEFA Champions League game at the Stadio Giuseppe Meazza on Tuesday. The Nerazzurris" (Inter's nickname, which means The Black and Blue) exploited the Italian signature "Catenaccio" (an Italian word that means "door-bolt" and implies a major focus on defense) well to ruin Barca's efforts to control the game in...

The Detroit Pistons were the NBA's third-worst performing team during the 2021-22 regular season with a 23-59 record. The good news was that their young men, Cade Cunningham and Saddiq Bey, both grew well. So did Marvin Bagley III, who seemed to have found a way to save his career after he was traded to the Pistons in the second half of last season. The poor record from the 2021-22 campaign enable...

Arsenal remained the leading club of Premier League after defeating Tottenham Hotspur 3-1 at home on Saturday. Though it was only the first win of "The Gunners" over one of the Big Six teams, Arsenal still showed a lot of surprising improvement. In the years when Arsene Wenger was their manager, Arsenal often had a great start of the season but habitually crumbled in February or March. Wenger left...

The Miami Heat, which made the NBA Finals once and the Eastern Conference Finals once in the past three season, have never been a serious title contender in many discussions. They had first-class defense and the ability to drag any opponent to six or even seven games in a series, but when the game reached the point of win or go home, the Heat lacked the ability to wrap it up. Jimmy Butler was able...

Gareth Southgate, manager of England, said he was ready for criticism after his team lost to Italy 1-0 in the UEFA Nations League game on Friday and, as a result were relegated from the top tier. The Nations League, since it was created in 2018, has not been the most favorable event of both national teams and star players. That's why there were often a lot of unexpected results in its games, like...

The New Orleans Pelicans have good reasons to eye for something bigger than an NBA playoffs berth as Zion Williamson is coming back in likely good health for the 2022-23 regular season. Last season, they beat the San Antonio Spurs and Los Angeles Clippers in the play-in tournament and then almost forced the Phoenix Suns into a corner in the first round of the playoffs. The Pelicans have astonishin...

When Robert Lewandowski returned to the Allianz Arena on behalf of Barcelona to play against Bayern Munich in the UEFA Champions League game on Tuesday, Bayern fans greeted him in a surprisingly warm way. So did his former teammates, except that they beat him and his new team 2-0. Manchester City hosted Borussia Dortmund at Etihad Stadium on Wednesday. Erling Haaland met his old teammates as well,...

All 16 games of Week 1 of the 2022 NFL regular season have come to an end. On Monday, Russell Wilson led the Denver Broncos to Lumen Field, where he played 10 seasons, and lost to the Seattle Seahawks 17-16. Not only did Wilson have to endure the ear-splitting boos from home fans, he was outperformed by Geno Smith, who was his backup the previous two seasons. On Sunday, the Miami Dolphins, who acq...

NBA teams will be able to spend much more money signing players soon as the salary cap is expected to reach $134 million for summer 2023-24. Furthermore, when the new nine-year, $75 billion TV deal begins to take effect in summer 2025, the salary cap is likely to reach an even more lucrative number. If history is any reference, dramatic salary cap growth means a lot of big contracts will be signed...

It has been three seasons since Kawhi Leonard and Paul George joined the Los Angeles Clippers in the summer of 2019. Instead of dominating the NBA like many had expected, the two haven't taken the team to the Finals even once. There were, of course, various reasons behind that, including injuries, lack of a solid orchestrator or chemistry, among other things. The Clippers have been trying to fix t...