Asian Cup 2023 Finals: Vietnam falls into a difficult group; Juventus escapes defeat at the last minute, AS Roma wins with difficulty

Juventus escape defeat at the last minute, AS Roma win with difficulty

Early morning of May 12 (Vietnam time), the first leg of the 2022/2023 European Cup C2 semi-finals took place. The two Italian representatives, Juventus and AS Roma, both played at home, welcoming Sevilla and Leverkusen, respectively.

At Juventus Stadium, Sevilla made the home team go through a difficult 90 minutes. In a lightning counter-attack in the 26th minute, Ocampos created a favorable pass for En-Nesyri to easily tap the ball into the net of the Old Lady of Turin. After a series of missed opportunities, it was not until the 90+7 minute that Coach Allegri's team found the equalizer.

From a corner kick on the left wing, the ball hit the heads of two home team players before Federico Gatti finished close to the goal, bringing a valuable draw for Juventus.

Federico Gatti becomes Juventus' savior. Photo: Getty

Meanwhile, in the match at the same time, the remaining representative of Italy, AS Roma, also had a difficult match against Leverkusen.

In the first 15 minutes of the match, the home team unexpectedly let the German representative take the initiative and create many dangerous opportunities.

It was not until the 62nd minute that the deadlock was broken. After Tammy Abraham's powerful shot was pushed away by the Leverkusen goalkeeper, Edoardo Bove quickly fired home the opener for AS Roma.

The 90 minutes at the Olimpico stadium ended with a 1-0 victory for the Italian representative.

Both second leg semi-finals of the European Cup C2 will take place at 02:00 on May 19 (Vietnam time).

Asian Cup 2023 Finals: Vietnam falls into a difficult group

At 6:00 p.m. on May 11 (Vietnam time), the draw for the 2023 Asian Cup Finals took place.

The draw of luck has put Vietnam in the same group with Japan (group 1), Iraq (group 2) and Indonesia (group 3). Of which, Indonesia is the team that has faced Vietnam many times at the AFF Cup.

Asian Cup 2023 draw results.

As for Iraq, the last time Vietnam faced this team was in the group stage of the 2019 Asian Cup. However, the strongest opponent in this group that Vietnam had to face was Japan.

The 2023 Asian Cup finals will be held in Qatar – the new host country replacing China, which withdrew from hosting. The tournament has been postponed from this summer to early 2024, with the tournament scheduled to start from January 12 to February 10, 2024.

The Glazers are about to sell MU to Ratcliffe.

Britain's richest businessman, Sir Jim Ratcliffe, is dominating the race to take over MU, as his offer best suits the Glazer family.

Although not the highest bidder, Ratcliffe's terms, through Ineos, are making the American owners excited. Accordingly, after a 5-month negotiation process, through 3 bidding rounds, the main purpose of Joel and Avram Glazer has gradually been revealed. That is, they want to continue to exist at MU.

Glazer is about to close the sale of MU to Ratcliffe.

So while Sheikh Jassim’s £5bn bid was the highest among the bidders, the Qatari businessman’s ambition to buy all of the shares was not in line with the Glazers’. Meanwhile, Ineos’ offer to buy 50% of MU shares, on average, was closer to the £6bn the Glazers offered to sell the club for.

More importantly, Ineos will allow two Glazers to remain on MU's board of directors, while the remaining four members of the family will still have the right to receive dividends from the club.

Therefore, according to British media, in the next few days, when Raine Group - the intermediary that arranged the acquisition of MU, announces the winning bidder, the advantage will be on Ratcliffe's side, not Sheikh Jassim's.

Coach Troussier announced bad news after U22 Vietnam drew with Thailand

After the 1-1 draw with Thailand U22, Coach Philippe Troussier announced the injury status of striker Quoc Viet. Accordingly, this striker sprained his ankle in a dispute with a Thai player near the end of the match.

Quoc Viet was treated by a doctor on the field but could not continue playing. After examination, the Hoang Anh Gia Lai Club striker was concluded to have to sit out the entire SEA Games.

Quoc Viet sprained his ankle.

This is a great loss toU22 Vietnamas the team enters a tense semi-final match with Indonesia. Talking about the upcoming match, Coach Philippe Troussier admitted that this is a very difficult match.

"We have to calculate because we only have one day off. The team only has 18 players left, plus there is a new case of Quoc Viet, so it is very possible that I only have 17 people left," said the French strategist. Sharing more about the semi-final match, the captain of U22 Vietnam said: "We and U22 Indonesia are staying in the same hotel. I played with the Indonesian coaching staff, and saw that their players are very focused in all actions and activities. I rate U22 Indonesia, U22 Thailand and U22 Vietnam as the teams with the highest possibility of winning the 32nd SEA Games Gold Medal."

Chelsea ready to sell Kovacic in Summer 2023

The contract between Chelsea and Kovacic expires in June 2024. In the past, the two sides have negotiated a contract extension but have not yet achieved results.

According to The Guardian, Chelsea have considered the worst case scenario of not being able to renew with Kovacic. Specifically, The Blues are ready to let the Croatian player leave in the summer transfer window of 2023 to collect a fee instead of losing him when the contract between the two parties expires.

Kovacic could leave Chelsea next summer.

At present, there is no shortage of teams interested in Kovacic such as Bayern Munich, MU or Man City...

Kovacic's priority is still to stay at Chelsea. Not long ago, he affirmed that he felt happy after 5 years playing at Chelsea and wanted to continue contributing here.