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The Chilean has joined Manchester United, which makes him the latest in a long line of players to leave north London in search of trophies

Getty ImagesNicolas Anelka to Real Madrid | 1999

Nicolas Anelka followed Arsene Wenger into Arsenal in 1997, signing from Paris Saint-Germain at just 17 years of age. Wenger would use him sparingly during his first season in the Premier League, but an impressive second season and a prolific third saw him gain interest from Real Madrid in 1999.

Anelka made no effort to hide his intentions to leave Arsenal, and indeed England, admitting he had struggled to settle in London, before joining Real in a deal worth around £22 million.

AdvertisementGetty ImagesAshley Cole to Chelsea | 2006

A lot of Arsenal fans have still not forgiven Ashley Cole for the way in which he left the club. A graduate from the Arsenal academy, Cole was tipped to become the club captain having helped the Gunners to three FA Cups and two Premier League titles.

However, after nearly crashing his car in shock at being offered a new contract worth £55,000 per week, he left for London rivals Chelsea and enjoyed even more success. The left-back would win four FA Cups, a Premier League title, a League Cup, the Europa League, and in 2011-12 was part of the Blues side to lift the Champions League trophy. 

Getty ImagesEmmanuel Adebayor to Manchester City | 2009

Emmanuel Adebayor spent four seasons at Arsenal but failed to win a trophy, though he did pick up a place in the 2007-08 PFA Premier League Team of the Season, having struck 24 league goals in 36 games. Then, upon leaving for Manchester City, Gunners fans turned on the Togo international in a feud which would play out in front of those at the Etihad in 2009.

As well as being accused of stamping on Robin van Persie's face, Adebayor scored against his former club and ran the length of the pitch to celebrate in front of the travelling support, much to their anger. Adebayor would also go on to play for Tottenham, Arsenal's north London rivals.

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Kolo Toure to Manchester City | 2009

Another player to build his reputation at Arsenal, Kolo Toure signed from local club ASEC Mimosas in 2002. The defender would go on to play well over 300 games for the Gunners and was a major part of the club's 2003-04 Premier League title campaign in which the Gunners remained unbeaten.

The trophies would soon disappear at Arsenal, however, and so would Toure, as he moved to Manchester City in 2009. Toure would have to settle for a bit-part role at the Etihad, though did pick up another Premier League winners' medal in 2011-12.

The league's newest team seemed destined to fail, but a ragtag group of journeymen and rejects has come together to produce something truly special

Roman Burki is willing to let us in on a little secret, one that he doesn't necessarily want his team-mates to hear. But, to understand the meaning behind it, you have to get what St. Louis City SC are all about.

Burki is, of course, the star goalkeeper of MLS' newest team. He's almost certainly the team's most recognizable face – a former starter at Borussia Dortmund who played at the top level for many years.

That was in the past, though. In the here and now, Burki is the No.1 for MLS' most absurd collection of misfits, a group of unheralded and previously-unrecognizable stars who have taken the league by storm. This is St. Louis City's first season of existence, and virtually everyone with an opinion about MLS saw disaster in their future. Rightfully so, perhaps. In a league that has seen so many expansion teams fall flat on their face, St. Louis looked destined to be the next to stumble.

They had no recognizable stars, having instead spent big money on a goalkeeper, Burki, in a move that has always been MLS' cardinal sin. Their other big moves? A pair of signings from Germany that no one in the U.S. had ever heard of. Their roster was filled with MLS journeyman, other team's rejects and young stars that never got a chance wherever they were before.

"We have players that were not used anymore by the previous clubs, players that were not really wanted," Burki tells GOAL. "We collected them, basically."

And yet here they are, top of the Western Conference. St. Louis was the best team in the conference from wire to wire, starting off with a series of incredible wins and never looking back.

Somehow, this group of misfits and cast-offs turned into something much more: a team. And, as that team prepares for their biggest challenge yet, we can go back to Burki's secret.

"I would not say this in front of the team," he begins, "but, to me, it doesn't matter how it's going to end now in the playoffs. Of course, you want to go as far as possible, but when you look back after this season, I think everyone can be really proud of what we have achieved.

"Like everyone has played a part in that, and that is very important. We always stick together and nobody was ever blaming the other one. This team just has a great mentality and so many really good guys. I really am so proud to be a part of this team."

So how did they get here? How did a group of outcasts turn into arguably the biggest surprise in MLS history? Let's start at the beginning…

St. Louis City SCA fresh start in a soccer city

That beginning predates MLS. It also predates just about anyone who watches the league. To understand St. Louis City SC, you must first understand St. Louis.

There are few cities in American soccer that have the history of St. Louis. It could be argued that no city has had a bigger impact on the U.S. men's national team, but, despite that, St. Louis had no real modern history on the club level.

A total of 76 players from the area have played for the USMNT, including five in the starting XI that upset England at the 1950 World Cup. St. Louis has had a player on 11 World Cup teams.

It's a city that has always had love for the game. There had been pro teams, none really catching hold in modern times. The St. Louis Stars played in the old NASL, while other clubs rose and fell in the lower leagues in the years since.

So, when St. Louis City City SC arrived ahead of the 2023 MLS season, a soccer city was finally given it's due.

"St. Louis has such a soccer history," defender Tim Parker tells GOAL. "There are so many soccer people here, but there's also just a lot of soccer fans. I think the city is still just so happy that there's a club here."

AdvertisementGettyThe building process

As an MLS veteran, Parker had seen plenty of expansion teams. Some, like LAFC and Atlanta United, immediately vaulted to the top of MLS. Others, most others, were somewhere between somewhat okay and absolutely awful.

So where would St. Louis fall? At the start of it all, you can never be too sure.

"I've definitely seen a couple of successful ones, but not too many, and then I've definitely seen some bad ones," Parker said. "I think it's just about an overall buy-in. I think it's developing a clear identity early on in terms of how you want to play because I feel like a lot of teams that come into this league don't necessarily have that right away. They don't have the buy-in from the players."

That was step one: finding players willing and able to buy in. That job fell to Lutz Pfannenstiel, a German former goalkeeper that played for a whopping 25 clubs during his career. In the years since, he rose to prominence in Germany, spending years in Hoffenheim's sporting department before serving as Fortuna Dusseldorf's managing director.

In 2020, Pfannenstielwas hired as St. Louis' sporting director and given a three-year runway to figure out what this club could and should look like. In January 2022, the club hired Bradley Carnell as its first-ever head coach, handing the reigns over to a man that was formerly a key figure with the New York Red Bulls.

Parker credits those two for laying the foundation: Pfannenstiel for finding the players and Carnell for giving them all something to believe in.

"It obviously comes down to the sporting director and head coach to get the right guys in and then obviously implementing the gameplan and the tactical side," he said. "On the player side, it all required a lot of buy-in and trust."

Getty ImagesSimilar mindsets

Preseason, as expected, was a bit awkward. Several players, like Burki, had joined the club early to get some sort of head start leading up to the expansion season. Most, though, were meeting each other for the first time and had no idea what to expect.

"I think there were a lot of [awkward moments]," Parker admitted. "It's an expansion team, in general, and then a lot of it is that we had guys that are so new to the league. Those guys have to get used to how this league operates, which can kind of be chaotic at times."

It didn't take long, though, for players to realize that they all had something in common. There were MLS veterans like Parker and Jacob Nerwinski next to European imports Burki, Joao Klauss and Eduard Lowen. Former USMNT prospects Nicholas Gioacchini and Indiana Vassilev were just meeting their new team-mates, too, fresh off of stints in Europe.

All of them quickly realized that they all had something in common: before St. Louis, they felt unwanted. Parker had felt it, having bounced around several MLS teams despite being a solid starter. Burki felt it, too, as Dortmund were all too content to move on from him after years of service. Vassilev was never quite given a chance at Aston Villa, while Lowen and Klauss were loaned out multiple times by Bundesliga clubs before St. Louis committed to them.

"A lot of us came here with that vision and some of us could say, 'I've been in the league a while and maybe not have had as much success'," Parker said. "I think this felt like it was our opportunity, a fresh start, to try something new."

He added: "There's a little bit of that underdog mentality and we've thrived on being that underdog and having that second-chance mentality. This was the kind of chance for you to revive your career, or launch your career in some instances for some of the younger guys. I think a lot of guys took that and have done really well playing with that freedom."

So here they were, a group of misfits that felt unwanted and uncared for. Many of them had struck out as individuals at some point but, as a group, they began to wonder: what can we do together?

"I think the good thing when you have guys who are realistic and don't live in a world full of dreams is that there are basically no egos," Burki said. "We all said: 'Okay, I have one more chance now here in St. Louis and I'm gonna try my best and give it everything'. Everyone had the same ambitions, like they wanted to make this chance and to be to show all the other people who didn't trust in them that they are better than what they thought."

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GettyHot start…

From the outside, it was impossible to see that mindset. What the outside world saw was a group largely made up of cast-offs, playing in front of the league's highest-paid goalkeeper. There was no Carlos Vela or Miguel Almiron in this team, no real stars, present or future, that you could look at and go 'Ah, there's their match-winner'.

Because of that, St. Louis was largely expected to be a big ol' mess in year one. It's a familiar story: team builds roster, team struggles, team slowly fixes roster over two or three years. At that point, they can compete. At that point, they're a team.

So, when St. Louis won their opener against Austin FC, it seemed like a feel-good moment. When then took down Charlotte FC – a second-year team very much in the aforementioned scenario – in their home opener, it felt like a storybook opening for the club.

That storybook, though, didn't have an ending, at least not for a while. Portland Timbers, San Jose Earthquakes, Real Salt Lake – all of them fell victim to the newcomers, who grabbed all 15 of their first 15 available points before the streak ended in April with a 1-0 loss to Minnesota United.

It was over those first five games that the outside world started to take notice. St. Louis' style of play had flustered teams, as the club focused on aggressive pressing to overwhelm their opponents.

"There's a lot of teams that really like the ball," Parker says, "and we have kind of had an against-the-ball mentality. I think we thrived in that as well."

The rest of the league would surely figure it out at some point, right?

As for those in the locker room, those first five weeks justified what many of them were already feeling: this team had something to it.

"I had a feeling in preseason already," Burki said. "We didn't win one game in preseason, or maybe one, I don't know, but still, you know how just sometimes you can tell how the players are reacting when you have a good games? Or how you react when you lose, how that next training is? After a loss, you can see a lot with the reaction, and it was always positive. We never stopped working. We never really complained about anything. That was, for me, a sign that this team, we can go far."

Formula 1 Max Verstappen may have competition in the racing stakes, with Lionel Messi spotted driving a bright pink theme park car.

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Argentine superstar returned to Europe from USAPicked up another Ballon d'Or while in ParisTook the opportunity to relax & have some fun

WHAT HAPPENED?

The Inter Miami superstar was recently back in Europe to collect the eighth Ballon d’Or of his remarkable career. He spent time in Italy during that trip, while also returning to Paris – where he spent two years with PSG before heading to the United States – and picked up his latest Golden Ball in the French capital.

AdvertisementGettyTHE BIGGER PICTURE

Messi found time during a family vacation, which came at the end of his debut campaign in MLS, to pay a visit to Disneyland Paris. He took his young family along for a fun-filled day out, with the Argentine superstar happy to play the doting dad despite forever operating under the brightest of spotlights.

WATCH THE CLIP

Messi was never going to sail under the radar while taking in some theme park rides, with one eagle-eyed fan spotting the 2022 World Cup winner taking the wheel of a colourful sports car – one sporting Inter Miami colours – that he had to pretend was being driven around a track.

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WHAT NEXT FOR MESSI?

Messi has now taken in his final competitive game of 2023 – with Argentina playing out an eventful 2026 World Cup qualifier against Brazil at the Maracana – and will not be seen on the field again until Inter Miami return for pre-season. Various friendly dates are being mooted for the Florida-based outfit, although talk of facing Al-Nassr and Cristiano Ronaldo has been played down.

The boycott by Nepal’s national cricketers has been called off after the constitution of an advisory committee that would work in tandem with the Cricket Association of Nepal

Rachna Shetty17-Apr-2014The boycott by Nepal’s national cricketers has been called off after the constitution of an advisory committee that would work in tandem with the Cricket Association of Nepal. The decision to form the planning and monitoring committee was taken on Wednesday night at a meeting between the board and the players facilitated by Nepal’s sports ministry and sports council. The committee will have five members – a representative each from CAN, the sports ministry and the sports council, along with the captain and the coach, Pubudu Dassanayake.”The committee will plan the development of cricket, make suggestions to CAN and then monitor the progress of these plans,” Ashok Nath Pyakuryal, the secretary of CAN, told ESPNcricinfo. “They will look at suggesting ways to develop cricket, restructure domestic cricket in the country and once their recommendations have been submitted to the board, the sports ministry and the sports council will supervise the implementation of these suggestions.”Pyakuryal also said that the other major demands made by the players at the time of the boycott – related to payment of dues and medical aid to allrounder Prithu Baskota – had already been resolved.The advisory committee was seen as a middle ground in the negotiations as the board, considered to be the highest cricket administrative authority in Nepal, could not be dissolved under the existing laws of the country.Nepal captain Paras Khadka, who had earlier stated the boycott was prompted by a need for better accountability in the administration, said he was excited that players had been given a say within the system.”It’s the first time for players to be involved in the decision-making process and it’s a great initiative,” Khadka said. “It will help us create a base for the future and help the next generation of cricketers. The committee will meet regularly and will also be looking at the overall aspects of the game, including administration and finance.”Khadka also expressed hope that the cricketers would soon have a contract system, which would also benefit the regional players, and that the board would appoint full-time professionals, like a CEO, over the next year.Nepal’s national cricketers had decided to boycott the national one-day tournament, which began on April 9 and was meant to be a selection trial for the Asian Cricket Council’s Premier League tournament, scheduled to begin on May 1. The deadline for submitting the squad was April 10 but Pyakuryal said CAN had sought an extension and would select a squad for the tournament soon.

Lancashire halted a run of three Royal London One-Day Cup defeats with a thumping 101-run win over Derbyshire with nearly 10 overs to spare.

Press Association07-Aug-2014
ScorecardKarl Brown was one of five half-centurions for Lancashire•Getty ImagesLancashire halted a run of three Royal London One-Day Cup defeats with a thumping 101-run win over Derbyshire with nearly 10 overs to spare.Derbyshire were unbeaten in three matches but a target of 301 proved beyond them and their former paceman Wayne White took 4 for 33 as they were bowled out for 199 with skipper Wayne Madsen top-scoring with 49.Lancashire’s total of 300 for 8, which was their highest against Derbyshire in one-day cricket, was built around half-centuries from Ashwell Prince, Karl Brown, Alex Davies and Steven Croft with Tony Palladino returning his best limited-overs figures of 5 for 49.Derbyshire lost early wickets and when Madsen was fifth out to White with 200 still needed, the game was almost up. To complete a miserable day for Derbyshire, 19-year-old seamer Tom Taylor suffered what appeared to be a serious ankle injury.Lancashire’s innings started slowly with only 49 coming from the first 10 over Powerplay for the loss of Australian Test batsman Usman Khawaja, who made 31 from 28 balls against his former county before Mark Footitt found some late movement and bounce to have him caught behind.Derbyshire suffered a blow when Taylor injured his left ankle two balls into his sixth over and had to be helped off the field and Lancashire gradually increased the tempo with Prince and Brown adding 61 in 15 overs.Prince was bowled for 57 trying to sweep David Wainwright and Brown also failed to go on when he was caught behind for 59 off a bottom-edged pull against Palladino in the 32nd over. Lancashire lost skipper Paul Horton for 19 in Palladino’s next over when he was caught at point off a ball that stopped on him but Alex Davies lifted Footitt over the wicketkeeper’s head for the first six as he and Croft accelerated in the last 10 overs.Croft drove and pulled Wes Durston for successive sixes before Palladino halted the charge by having him caught at deep square leg for 51 from 42 balls and then yorking Davies for 53 with the next delivery.Derbyshire’s chase started badly when the dangerous Durston was lbw playing back to Tom Bailey who struck again by tempting Scott Elstone into a wild drive at a wide ball with only 28 on the board. When Billy Godleman also fell to a reckless cut at Jordan Clark and Marcus North top-edged to backward point trying to pull White, Derbyshire’s hopes rested with Madsen who moved smoothly to 49 from 37 balls.But when he tried to launch White over the deep square leg boundary and only picked out Brown who made no mistake, his exit signalled the end of the home side’s chances and although Alex Hughes straight-drove Simon Kerrigan for six, White completed an efficient display by the visitors with 57 balls still remaining.The victory keeps Lancashire’s chances of making the knockout stages alive and Prince admitted: “We needed a win and it’s nice to get one over on a team that’s in form. We haven’t been batting or bowling particularly well in this competition so to get 300 was good and now we need to keep winning – just like we lost three in a row we maybe now need to win three in a row.”Derbyshire’s first defeat in the tournament was hard to swallow for Palladino who said: “It’s a tough loss to take when we have been playing so well but we weren’t quite at the races today. In my opinion they got 15 to 20 runs too many and if we had been at our best fielding-wise and with the ball we would have restricted them to a lower total.”

Ross Taylor had not scored a fifty during Sri Lanka’s visit until his 96 in Dunedin on Sunday, but despite a string of mediocre scores, the batsman said he had never been out of form

Andrew Fidel Fernando25-Jan-20151:52

‘I was just not scoring’ – Taylor

Ross Taylor had not scored a fifty during Sri Lanka’s visit until his 96 in Dunedin on Sunday, but despite a string of mediocre scores, the batsman said he had never been out of form. His previous four innings had yielded an aggregate of 65, but he rebounded to play a knock that was instrumental to New Zealand’s progress to 315 for 8 in the sixth one-dayer.”It was nice for me to score some runs, because it’s been a long time between drinks,” Taylor said. “I wasn’t out of form, I just wasn’t scoring any runs. We were still winning games, so the team could probably carry me for a little bit. At the same time, you have your own standards and you want to contribute to a team performance. I wasn’t doing that. Today was a start. It’s a long campaign and hopefully I’m scoring runs heading into the World Cup.”Taylor had tinkered with his technique in the early stages of Sri Lanka’s tour, but suggested he returned to a more familiar approach on Sunday. He had also worked with long-time mentor and coach Martin Crowe during the series.”I probably worked on a few things that didn’t work,” Taylor said. “It was just nice to go back and keep it simple. With [Crowe], we worked on using my feet a bit more as well as some other things to evolve my game a little bit and hopefully be a better player. It would have been nice to get a hundred with Kane Williamson, but it wasn’t meant to be.”Taylor scored almost a third of his runs square on the offside, hitting five of his seven fours in the arc between third man and deep cover. He had been guilty of trying to cut too close to his body earlier in the series, particularly to the spin of Rangana Herath, but was largely untroubled on Sunday.”I get myself into trouble when I look too square too early,” he said. “If they bowl me something there, then your instinct takes over and you start looking for that shot. When it’s not there, sometimes, you’re waiting for a little bit of a release. But today my feet started moving even better than it did the other day. (Tillakaratne) Dilshan saved a couple, but I probably got one or two past him.”The match was also Daniel Vettori’s 280th ODI for New Zealand, making him the most-capped one-day player for his country. Vettori had a guard of honour from his teammates as he walked onto the field, and delivered eight overs at an economy-rate of 2.75. He was particularly effective against Mahela Jayawardene, who narrowly avoided being dismissed by Vettori twice.”Dan didn’t want a big hoo-ha about the event, but it’s a special moment for a player who has had a great career,” Taylor said. “He will go down in New Zealand history as one of our best. He’s been bowling pretty well in most games, but today he got the ball to hold a little bit, and that’s always been great. Mahela and Kumar Sangakkara are pretty good players of spin, but he was able to bowl dot balls to them on a pretty good wicket.”

ESPNcricinfo previews the final one-day international between Australia and England at the Adelaide Oval

The Preview by Daniel Brettig25-Jan-2014Match factsJanuary 26, 2014, Adelaide
Start time 1350 (0320GMT)The Big pictureWitnesses to the celebrations that followed the 1987 World Cup Final tell of their delight at watching years of worry and wrinkles disappear from the glowing face of Australia’s captain Allan Border as he was hoisted on the shoulders of Craig McDermott and Dean Jones in the aftermath of victory. While a lone ODI win is nothing by comparison, the effect the Perth result had on England seemed similarly transformative. Certainly Alastair Cook was suddenly speaking a lot more positively about the team, cricket and life itself having finally led his men to a win, albeit over a weakened Australian side.Now, having spent most of the summer toying with England, the hosts have a far chirpier and enthusiastic opponent for the final match of the series at Adelaide Oval, played on Australia Day. They will be fortified by the returns of the captain Michael Clarke and the allrounder Shane Watson, a pair of inclusions that will also add some incentive to England’s quest for a promising end to a wretched tour. Having beaten Australia at the WACA Ground, they would dearly like to repeat the trick against a stronger home line-up in Adelaide, on a pitch that will offer little in the way of pace or lateral movement.For the first time this summer, the Australia must find a way to regain the momentum they had previously ridden across all eight previous encounters, a tidal wave of confidence and accomplishment that was hinted at during the ODIs in England and India but which truly began during the first Test in Brisbane. There was a profligacy about Australia’s bowling in Perth that suggested a slight loss of focus, and it is the most pressing concern for the coach Darren Lehmann ahead of this fixture.Form guide(Completed matches, most recent first)
Australia LWWWL
England WLLLLWatch out forThe only member of Australia’s bowling attack to excel at the WACA Ground, Glenn Maxwell is developing his offspin in a handy and timely manner. But it is his livewire batting that has brought Maxwell most of his career advancement to date, and he continues to wrestle with the competing instincts to attack or build. His overeager dismissal in Perth drew sharp criticism from Lehmann, who made the rare step of deliberately criticising his player in public. Given the array of strokes he possesses, and the power with which he can play them, it will take only the merest hint of better “course management” to have Maxwell frightening the life out of England’s bowlers in Adelaide, and those in the series beyond.Ben Stokes has often been at the centre of what little good cricket England have produced this summer•AFPNot unlike Darren Gough on the 1994-95 Ashes tour, Ben Stokes has been the ebullient centre of what little good cricket England have played this summer. So it was altogether fitting that he dominated the match that finally brought victory for Cook’s team, his improvement in the No. 3 position after a halting first attempt in Sydney proving just as vital as his four wickets. As England’s “find of the tour”, Stokes will keenly want to finish off on a note of foreboding for any Australians thinking of crossing him again in 2015.Team newsMichael Clarke and Shane Watson are back in Australia’s squad for Adelaide, meaning Steve Smith and Daniel Christian are the two men expected to make way. Clint McKay is a likely inclusion in place of Mitchell Johnson, who has stayed home in Perth, while Xavier Doherty can also expect a recall.Australia 1 Aaron Finch, 2 Shaun Marsh, 3 Shane Watson, 4 Michael Clarke (capt), 5 George Bailey, 6 Glenn Maxwell, 7 Matthew Wade (wk), 8 James Faulkner, 9 Clint McKay, 10 Nathan Coulter-Nile, 11 Xavier Doherty.Having finally won an international match on tour, England can be expected to try to maintain their new-found confidence with an unchanged team.England (possible) 1 Alastair Cook (capt), 2 Ian Bell, 3 Ben Stokes, 4 Gary Ballance, 5 Eoin Morgan, 6 Ravi Bopara, 7 Jos Buttler (wk), 8 Tim Bresnan, 9 Stuart Broad, 10 Chris Jordan, 11 James Tredwell.Pitch and conditionsAdelaide’s drop-in pitch should be brimful of runs though it will lack the pace of Perth. The forecast temperature for Australia Day is a dry, dusty 35 degrees.Stats and trivia A victory for England would move the tourists up to third in the ODI rankings behind the other members of the “big three”, India and Australia, surpassing South Africa Australia have hosted England four times in ODIs on Australia Day in Adelaide, winning three times. England were the victors on the most recent occasion however, in 2011.Quotes”He (Maxwell) is a great young kid, and he realises his mistake last night. He owned up to that and he realises he’s got to get better. He’s an all-rounder but he’s batting in the top six, so you’d say he’s a batting all-rounder. But he’s got to show the responsibility of that (role) at six. We know he’s got that excitement and that flair and we love that about him, but we want him to understand the game better.”
“We always took the positive option, which in these conditions I think you have to do. There’s always a bit of risk with that but you have to be good enough as a top-order batsman to make those shots.”

Norwich City made it well and truly clear to Leeds United on Saturday evening that they will push them to the very end of the season to claim the Championship title and secure automatic promotion to the Premier League.

Marcelo Bielsa’s men were put to the sword by the Canaries at Elland Road, suffering a 3-1 defeat that saw Norwich move top of the league table with a better goal-difference than Leeds.

But, while the big defeat was probably a big wake-up call to the Whites that they still have a long way to go if they were to play top-flight football next season, the loss presents a good opportunity for the manager to push his players even further.

Leeds travel to Teesside this coming Saturday to tackle Middlesbrough in what could be another tough encounter.

Middlesbrough are currently fifth in the league and are more than capable of delivering a good performance against Bielsa’s team.

But, the manager should use the pressure to his team’s advantage and get Leeds to raise their game for the match and the rest of the campaign.

Leeds have shown the tremendous talent and desire they have in their squad and Bielsa has done a brilliant job at getting his players to deliver at just the right times this season.

The loss on Saturday was only their third one at home this campaign and would’ve been somewhat of a shock to the club, given how easily and poorly the conceded the three goals.

This should also motivate this current set of Leeds players to make sure such a result doesn’t occur again this season, while the defeat should also not see the club revert into a state of panic, because they now sit second on the table.

Leeds have proven on more than a few occasions this season that they know how to bounce back from a setback and this trip to Middlesbrough presents them with the perfect opportunity to show once again how committed and determined they are to play in the Premier League next season.

Gary Kirsten has said he knew Virat Kohli was destined for success when he worked with the batsman during his tenure as India coach

ESPNcricinfo staff03-Sep-2013Gary Kirsten has said he knew Virat Kohli was destined for success when he worked with the batsman during his tenure as India coach and added that he was fortunate to be a part of Kohli’s development process.”I always had a different kind of feeling when I started working with Virat Kohli,” Kirsten told . “From the beginning, I was very sure that he was a rare talent and would become a great player. He grew massively in these past few years and has matured a lot. I was fortunate to be part of that process of seeing him grow and that give me immense pleasure.”Kohli made his debut in India’s limited-overs squad in 2008 and was part of 54 ODIs during the Kirsten years, scoring five centuries. Since Kirsten’s departure as India coach, following the World Cup win in 2011, Kohli has matured to become the best batsman in the Indian side and has also graduated to the Tests. However, Kirsten was careful not to make any comparisons between Kohli and Sachin Tendulkar.”I have always been very careful about appointing someone in that place (Tendulkar’s replacement). It’s a very dangerous position and very risky to name anyone.”All I can say is that Kohli is a fantastic batsman whom the opposition bowlers are finding difficult to get out. The teams nowadays do a lot of planning to get him out.”Kirsten also had words of praise for Shikhar Dhawan with whom he had limited interaction when Dhawan made his ODI debut in 2010.”Unlike Kohli, I haven’t seen much of Dhawan but what I have gathered over time after some interactions with him is that he has a massive amount of self-belief in his abilities which is very refreshing,” Kirsten said.Kirsten will have another chance to work with Indian talent after he signed up as coach of Delhi Daredevils for the next three years.

Surrey’s chairman, Richard Gould, has confirmed the club want to hang on to Kevin Petersen once the severance of his ECB central contract is complete

ESPNcricinfo staff07-Feb-20140:00

Andy Zaltzman: ‘About as much sense as attempting to climb Mt Everest in a submarine’

Surrey are preparing to offer Kevin Pietersen “a good market rate” to retain his services once the severance of his ECB central contract is complete. Pietersen’s England deal was due to run until October but his representatives have been negotiating a pay-off, in conjunction with the Professional Cricketers’ Association.Pietersen’s England career was effectively ended by the ECB on Tuesday when it announced he would not be considered for selection. As a centrally contracted player, Surrey were not required to pay him a salary but Richard Gould, the club’s chief executive, said that discussions to prolong the 33-year-old’s stay were planned at the earliest opportunity.Agreeing the termination of his England deal would free Pietersen up to play a full season in the IPL and, while he may be reluctant to return to the UK for Division Two Championship cricket, he is settled living with his family in Chelsea and thought to be open to a limited-overs arrangement.”We know that he really wants to continue playing for Surrey and he knows we are really keen for him to continue doing so,” Gould said. “Over the next week or so we will work together to try and make sure that happens.Surrey hope to retain the services of Kevin Pietersen once his England contract ends•Getty Images”We need to make sure we can offer a ‘KP’ a good financial package as well as the knowledge that he belongs to a club that really values him and wants to see him play.”Pietersen has developed good relationships at Surrey, who he joined in 2010, and was at The Oval giving a coaching session to team-mates on the day of his controversial sacking by England. He will likely command a hefty fee in next week’s IPL auction, in light of his extended availability, and could also be a target for the Caribbean Premier League, which clashes with the latter half of the English season.”We are doing well commercially and we could afford to pay above that salary cap but the rules of the game mean that we’re not allowed to.” Gould said. “There is competition from the Caribbean Premier League, who have a three to four week tournament, but I just need to make sure we can offer Kevin a good market rate for his services that keeps us within the boundaries we need to remain within.”