22 NEWS
THE WEEK 28 May 2021Sport
Football Leeds avoided
relegation from the Premier
League with a 2-1 victory over
Brentford. Burnley, who lost
2-1 to Newcastle, have been
relegated, along with Watford
and Norwich.
F1 Max Verstappen won the
Spanish Grand Prix to
establish a six-point lead in
the drivers’ standings over
Charles Leclerc. The Monacan
had been leading until a
power unit failure forced his
retirement from the race.
Tennis Naomi Osaka, the
former world No. 1, lost 7-5,
6-4 in the first round of the
French Open to Amanda
Anisimova of the USA.The final afternoon of the 2021-22
Premier League season began with
top-placed Manchester City leading
Liverpool by a single point, said Phil
McNulty on BBC Sport. Pep
Guardiola’s side knew that a win at
the Etihad Stadium – against Aston
Villa, a side managed by Liverpool
legend Steven Gerrard – would
guarantee them their fourth title in
five years. A draw or a loss, on the
other hand, would almost certainly
hand the Reds – who were taking on
Wolves at Anfield – their second title
in three seasons.In the event, City got the victory they
needed, beating Villa 3-2, said Henry
Winter in The Times. Yet such a
summary doesn’t begin to do justice to the “nerve-draining” route
they took to that destination. With just 14 minutes remaining,
Villa were 2-0 ahead – thanks to a first-half goal from Matty
Cash and a wonderful 69th-minute effort by another former
Liverpool player, Philippe Coutinho. Although at this stage
Liverpool were 1-1 against Wolves – meaning that City were still
theoretically heading for the title, on account of their superior
goal difference – no one expected things to stay that way. And
indeed, two late goals at Anfield gave the Reds three points. City’s
predicament was therefore stark: their hopes of winning the title
depended on scoring three quick goals.What happened next was
scarcely believable, said Martin
Samuel in the Daily Mail. “It was
as if a switch had been flicked.”
City, who up to that point had
been a pale shadow of their
usual selves, “suddenly woke up to the looming catastrophe”.
In the space of five surreal minutes, they took the league out of
Liverpool’s hands by finding the back of the net three times. First
came a header by Ilkay Gündogan, set up by a “good, early cross”
from Raheem Sterling. Next came an impeccably controlled side-
footed effort by Spanish midfielder Rodri. And then Gündogan
completed the job with the “simplest conversion”, after the
indefatigable Kevin De Bruyne had spotted him “lurking again at
the far post”. Much of the credit must go to Guardiola for a trio
of inspired second-half substitutions, said Jason Burt in The Daily
Telegraph. Gündogan and Sterling had both been introduced afterthe break, as had Ukrainian left-
back Oleksandr Zinchenko – who
provided the pass for Rodri’s goal.As the “wildest of celebrations”
got under way at the Etihad –
including an ugly pitch invasion,
during which Robin Olsen, Villa’s
keeper, was struck in the head by
a City fan, and one of the goals
was dismantled – it was
“impossible to ignore” the
historical parallels, said David
Hytner in The Guardian. In 2012,
needing a victory on the final day
to secure the title (this time with
Manchester United lying second),
City had trailed Queens Park
Rangers 2-1 before scoring twice
in stoppage time. “I swear you’ll never see anything like this ever
again,” commentator Martin Tyler had famously declared on that
occasion, following Sergio Agüero’s 94th-minute winner. City,
admittedly, didn’t leave it quite so late this time, said Owen Slot in
The Times. But for sheer improbability and drama, this was surely
the equal of the “Agüerooooo moment”. It was “another day
when football held your attention and so shook you, you could
not quite believe it”. What a fitting end to a magnificent season.Liverpool, for their part, will go into Saturday’s Champions
League final against Real Madrid carrying an “unmistakable
sense of regret”, said Andy Hunter in The Guardian. But for City’s
remarkable comeback, that
match would have represented
a chance for the Reds to
fulfil their dream of an
unprecedented quadruple. They
may yet win the treble, but it
must be galling to end the season with 92 points – the third-
highest points total in their history – and yet again finish in the
runner-up spot. To make matters worse, they may well have to
play Real Madrid without their “great maestro of the midfield”,
Thiago Alcântara, said Sam Wallace in The Daily Telegraph. The
Spaniard “headed straight off the pitch” on Sunday after injuring
his Achilles tendon late in the first half, and was “hobbling quite
a bit in the post-match lap of appreciation”. With Fabinho,
Liverpool’s other key midfielder, also doubtful for Saturday,
Liverpool have their work cut out if they are to atone for their
Premier League heartbreak by becoming champions of Europe.Football: a stunning end to the Premier League season
A remarkable comeback sealed City’s fourth title in five yearsThe world’s 100th-best golfer thwarted by final hole Sporting headlines
For most of its “excruciating” final
day, the US PGA Championship
being played at Tulsa, Oklahoma,
looked as if it would end in the
first-ever major victory for a
Chilean golfer, said James
Corrigan in The Daily Telegraph.
Mito Pereira, the world No. 100,
began his final round nine under
par – three shots ahead of the
competition – and clung onto the
lead for virtually the whole day.
Still one shot ahead at the 18th,
he needed only a par for victory.
Instead, he “found the water off the tee and
could only manage a double-bogey”. That
relegated him to joint third, and as a result the
tournament went to a three-hole play-off
between the Americans Justin Thomas and Will
Zalatoris. Thomas, the former world No. 1, whohad started the day seven strokes
off the lead, emerged victorious
from that encounter to claim his
second title in Oklahoma.
It is Pereira’s “painful
implosion” – rather than Thomas’s
remarkable comeback – that will
linger as the most memorable
aspect of the tournament, said
Ewan Murray in The Guardian. It
is impossible not to feel for the
Chilean, who admitted that nerves
had got the better of him. To his
huge credit, though, he didn’t turn
down a single interview request afterwards. “I
thought I was going to win on 18, but it is what
it is,” he said. “We’ll have another one.” There
was disappointment, too, for Northern Ireland
Ireland’s Rory McIlroy – who led after the
opening round, but ended in eighth place.“A day when football held your attention and
so shook you, you could not quite believe it”Pereira: a painful implosion