“I have my opinions on politics, but when our country plays, I take pride in supporting the players who are wearing the badge.”

There is no reason why the iconic World Cup venue has had its name changed for this tournament – but it is the least of Fifa’s worries

The world’s game is being repackaged for an elite audience

Join SC Libero, the most important of the least important membership clubs, now: liberopodcast.com.—Manchester City’s 2-1 win over Arsenal on Sunday was a rare thing: a Premier League game that...

So it all comes down to this. Maybe. After Arsenal lost at home to Bournemouth and Manchester City swatted aside Chelsea, the Premier League has a genuine title decider: Mikel Arteta’s stumbling ...

Javier Zanetti, Edgar Davids in wraparound shades, imperial-phase Francesco Totti. Operazione Nostalgia is a window back to Serie A’s legends era

Javier Zanetti, Edgar Davids in wraparound shades, imperial-phase Francesco Totti. Operazione Nostalgia is a window back to Serie A’s legends era

The modern game has stripped away the idea of the omnipresent and omnipotent football manager

Rory Smith Judge Bellingham's contentious England career and the end of PSR.

Is the club’s TV channel harmless propaganda, or something more sinister?

The Faroe Islands prove that while qualifying may be imperfect, it remains the beating heart of international football

Rangers manager’s methods need time but that is one thing that Glasgow’s derby pressure never allows

The Champions League is back. Or more specifically, the league phase, which starts with matchday one spread over the course of this week.On today’s episode, Jack Pitt-Brooke, James Horncastle and...

Rory Smith on the 24/7 game happening off the pitch.

For 13 years an anonymous social media account has posted transfer gossip to the delight – and despair – of fans

A look at the places, history, humanity, and flavors that make football that most interesting of obsessions.

This episode was recorded before the tragic news about the death of Diogo Jota and his brother.Jack Pitt-Brooke, Rory Smith and, eventually (18:41), James Horncastle try to get their heads around t...

Inter Milan swept away as French champions run up record-breaking score in Munich

Rory Smith on the disrespect of Lautaro Martínez, Inter Milan and PSG's first-ever meeting, and the best brezels in Munich.

Today on Libero Jack Pitt-Brooke, Rory Smith and James Horncastle look forward to Saturday’s Champions League final between Paris Saint Germain and Inter Milan.First up is the question of what ac...

Dispatches from the Libero's Bilbao Bureau bring word of an all-English European final that was not the greatest advert for the 'Best League in the World™', so instead James Horncastle, John Brew...

Two deaths a fortnight ago have failed to dispel the turbocharged allure of the motorsport for riders

On today’s episode of Libero, Rory Smith, John Brewin and James Horncastle wonder whether anyone not named Carlo Ancelotti can make sense of the modern Real Madrid, and assess the prospects for X...

Today’s episode starts with a look to the Arctic circle, where Bodo/Glimt have become one of the best stories in European football this decade. The small club from northern Norway have won four o...

This is another podcast about football. But it is also not really, when you think about it, about football. It is about the football industry, about that gauzy web of characters who determine how the ...

Podcast Episode · Libero · 02/04/2025 · 52m

This is a podcast about football. But also not about football. Mainly it's about the people and the surfaces that collide in the orbit of this strange, obsessional world of bluffers, sharks and genuin...

Sports Podcast · Updated Biweekly · This is a podcast about football. But also not about football. Mainly it's about the people and the surfaces that collide in the orbit of this strange, obsessional ...

Reporting from Kolkata and speaking to dozens of key figures in India, we examine the state of the game in the world’s most populous nation

This is a podcast about football. But also not about football. Mainly it's about the people and the surfaces that collide in the orbit of this strange, obses...

Jimbo’s got Julien Laurens, Rory Smith, Seb Stafford-Bloor and Pol Ballús in tow to put all the action from across the continent under the microscope.It’s advantage Inter in Serie A as the Ner...

Conspiracy theories are raging across European football and those involved are doing more damage than they might realise

The Athletic goes behind the scenes on CBS's flagship soccer show to find out why it works and what it reveals about sports broadcasting

Twenty-seven of the competition's 36 teams are still alive - it's exactly what UEFA wanted when designing this new Champions League format

The right-back is someone to hang strong opinions on, a player perfectly suited to the bitesize, quickfire content mill

The 'posh' North Yorkshire market town is finally making its mark on the sport thanks to an FA Cup date with Leeds

Unify is the latest brainchild of A22, the company that appears to exist solely to pursue the abolition of European football as we know it

The new Champions League may feel hollow at times but scratch beneath the surface and you might find stories to counter that notion

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Salah and De Bruyne are Premier League stars but they are human, too, and a decline is inevitable, which means any new deal is hard to price