CGTN Sports Talk

Bayern Munich, Manchester City, Liverpool and Real Madrid became the first four teams to reach the quarterfinals in the 2021-22 UEFA Champions League on Tuesday and Wednesday. City basically spent 90 easy minutes on the field waiting to advance after a 0-0 draw with Sporting CP.Bayern made an aggressive statement, returning to their best form with a 7-1 win over Red Bull Salzburg. Liverpool still...

The Phoenix Suns have won three of their recent four games in the absence of Chris Paul. Though the opponents they beat, like the Oklahoma City and Portland trail Blazers, are hardly playoff teams, the Suns lost to the Utah Jazz, which are fourth in the Western Conference, by only four points. Paul, who has averaged 14.9 points and 10.7 assists this season, has been nothing but integral to the Sun...

Roman Abramovich will soon sell Chelsea. During the 19 years under his ownership, the club has won 21 titles, the most in Premier League in that period. Almost every year, the names of Chelsea and Abramovich were connected with the most expensive player on the market, partly because they usually brought that player to Stamford Bridge. Every two to three years, the name Abramovich was connected to...

Chelsea secured the only victory in the four UEFA Champions League Round of 16 first-leg games on Tuesday and Wednesday after Kai Havertz and Christian Pulisic scored two goals at Stamford Bridge to beat LOSC Lille 2-0.Juventus left Estadio de la Cerámica with a 1-1 tie with Villarreal despite Dusan Vlahovic scoring record fast goal for the visiting team in 32 seconds. Sebastien Haller had two...

The three-day NBA All-Star Weekend ended at Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse in Cleveland on Sunday. The floor on Sunday night belonged to two superstars, LeBron James and Stephen Curry. Both were born in Akron, which is less than an hour of drive from Cleveland. Curry drained a record of 16 3-pointers for Team LeBron to score 50 points, which were only two points away from matching the All-Star score r...

The 2021-22 UEFA Champions League came back this week with four Round of 16 first-leg games. Though they were playing on the road, Manchester City smashed Sporting CP 5-0 at Estadio Jose Alvalade. For the first time in years, Paris Saint-Germain beat strong opponents in both the result and the process after the 1-0 win over Real Madrid at Parc des Princes. Bayern Munich would have been upset by Re...

The Los Angeles Rams defeated the Cincinnati Bengals 23-20 in Super Bowl LVI at SoFi Stadium on Sunday, becoming the second NFL team to win the top honor at home. Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow, who was sacked 51 times in the regular season, almost kept a clean shirt in the first half with one sack, which allowed him time to find receivers Ja'Marr Chase and Joe Mixon. However, he didn't escape the...

The NBA was shocked when the Brooklyn Nets and the Philadelphia 76ers reached a deal to exchange James Harden and Ben Simmons less than two hours before the trade deadline. Simmons has not played one game for the 76ers this season, while Harden has been struggling with the Nets. Departure could bring relief and new opportunities for both of them. The Nets could enhance their defense with Simmons a...

A lot of the deals reached during the 2021-22 winter transfer window of European football were very surprising. For example, few expected financially-struggling Juventus to land Dusan Vlahovic from Fiorentina with 81.6 million euros (about $125.7 million).Meanwhile, some of the teams were making transfers to fix their previous mistakes instead of trying to make the franchise better. For example, T...

Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow and Los Angeles Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford are meeting each other in their Super Bowl debuts at SoFi Stadium on February 13.Burrow led the underdog Bengals to upset Patrick Mahomes and the Kansas City Chiefs to win their first American Football Conference title since 1989.Stafford and the Rams beat the impregnable defense of the San Francisco 49ers...

The starting-lineups of this season's NBA All-Star Game have been confirmed, but not completely because the captains of both sides, LeBron James and Kevin Durant, may miss the entertaining mid-season event due to injury. Before their replacements can be found, the rest of the squads have been questioned as well. For example, many don't think Andrew Wiggins can be a legit All-Star starter; and the...

The NFL playoffs continued to bear more surprises after two days of competitions in the Conference Divisional round games. The San Francisco 49ers knocked out the National Football Conference (NFC) top-seed Green Bay Packers to challenge the Los Angeles Rams, which eliminated the reigning Super Bowl champions Tampa Bay Buccaneers. The young Cincinnati Bengals managed to beat the American Football...

The six NFL wild-card games played last weekend produced few surprises. Super Bowl favorites like the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Kansas City Chiefs both secured easy wins; the rising Cincinnati Bengals and Buffalo Bills defeated their opponents too; the Los Angeles Rams, who were relatively disappointing in their last few games, refused to be upset by the Arizona Cardinals. By contrast, the Dallas C...

Klay Thompson had a great performance for the Golden State Warriors in his first NBA game in 941 days. The dunk he made, the three triples he drained and the block he delivered in Sunday's game at home all sent one message: the other half of the "Splash Brothers" is back. One game is too small of a sample size to draw any real conclusions, but Thompson will undoubtedly play an integral role for th...

All 14 teams have been confirmed for the NFL playoffs after the final week of regular season games concluded on Sunday. The Pittsburgh Steelers secured a berth after their tough win over the Baltimore Ravens, but they also should thank the Las Vegas Raiders for not pulling punches against the Los Angeles Chargers. The San Francisco 49ers also pushed their way into the postseason by upsetting the L...

When the No. 41 jersey of Dirk Nowitzki flew above the floor at American Airlines Center on Wednesday, the Dallas Mavericks were giving one of the top honors for an NBA player to the biggest legend in their franchise history. Nowitzki deserves every part of it after playing 21 seasons, the longest in league history, scoring 31,560 points, the sixth-most in NBA history, and winning the only Larry O...

The Los Angeles Lakers won their second consecutive game on Sunday after 37-year-old LeBron James played center for 68 minutes in two games. With DeAndre Jordan and Dwight Howard on the roster, few would have expected to see James playing the center position. Sadly, even fewer would expect James score 30+ points in seven consecutive games, resulting in five losses. Trying to figure out one or seve...

European football clubs can start calling the players that will become free agents in summer after the winter transfer window opened on Saturday. That means Real Madrid can reach out to Kylian Mbappe, negotiate about his contract and share details of the grand plan they have for him. Teams that are kind enough to do Manchester United a favor by signing Paul Pogba can talk to the world champion mid...

Bayern Munich defeated Borussia Dortmund 3-2 in the first leg of the Bundesliga's Der Klassiker fixture this season at Westfalenstadion on Saturday night. Robert Lewandowski scored two goals for Bayern, leading the German top league's history of scoring goals in away games (118).Mats Hummels, who played for both sides in his career, was involved in all three goals of Bayern, but unfortunately, he...

This season, the Phoenix Suns have become one of the most unstoppable teams in the NBA after beating the Western Conference leader Golden State Warriors to achieve a 17-game winning streak, matching franchise record. Considering they are hosting Eastern Conference bottom ranking Detroit Pistons on Thursday, setting a new record seems to be only a matter of time. The Suns have made the NBA Finals t...

Manchester United surprisingly finished the Premier League game against Chelsea with a lucky 1-1 draw on Sunday, but that did not change the fact that the Red Devils still have a lot to operate in the winter transfer window which is one month away from launching. Bayern Munich edged Bielefeld 1-0 at home. Not only the win was not impressive enough for a powerhouse like Bayern, it also exposed some...

In less than 100 days, athletes from all over the world will be competing in the five events of curling and ice hockey at the 2022 Winter Olympic Games in China. Unlike most winter sports, curling is not about speed nor physical strength. It seems easy to do, but not that easy to understand. In fact, curling involves coordination, calculation and strategy. Compared with curling, ice hockey is extr...

More teams have made the 2021-22 UEFA Champions League Round of 16 after another two days of competition. Manchester City had their revenge on Paris Saint-Germain but both teams made it through. Sporting CP joined them, walking over the bodies of Borussia Dortmund. Manchester United were fortunate to beat Villarreal and reach the next stage after Cristiano Ronaldo saved them again. Compared with t...

Multiple players have shown potential for the 2021-22 NBA Most Valuable Player (MVP) Award after one month of the regular season. They include Stephen Curry of the league's No. 1 team Golden State Warriors, Kevin Durant of the Eastern Conference leader Brooklyn Nets, Giannis Antetokounmpo of the reigning champions Milwaukee Bucks, Dallas Mavericks franchise player Luka Doncic and the defending MVP...

The 2021-22 UEFA Champions League group games are two match days away from Round of 16. So far, Liverpool of Group B, Ajax of Group C, Bayern Munich of Group E and Juventus plus Chelsea of Group H have all secured their places in the next stage. By contrast, other heavyweights like Paris Saint-Germain, Manchester United, Barcelona and Inter Milan are not lucky. One careless loss could easily cost...