South Africa international midfielder Steven Pienaar has completed a permanent transfer back to former club Everton from Tottenham Hotspur on a four-year deal for £4.5 million (US$7.04 million), the Merseyside club announced on Tuesday.
Pienaar, 30, left Goodison Park for Spurs in January last year, but failed to impress in North London and started just five league games before returning to Everton on loan in January.
On his return to Everton, Pienaar scored four goals in 14 league games to help them finish seventh and boss David Moyes stated his desire to re-sign the South African earlier this month.
“We are keen on Pienaar and I hope in time we would be able to conclude that deal,” he said.
“I don’t know if the situation has changed [with Andre Villas-Boas coming in as new Spurs manager], but Steven has made it very clear he wants to come back here and my understanding is that hasn’t changed,” Moyes added. “My next job in the coming weeks is to get Steven Pienaar here as well.”
Pienaar told evertontv: “I am happy to be here. It took a few weeks to sort out, but I am delighted to be back and excited to play for Everton.”
Bayer 04 Leverkusen go into today’s match at TSG 1899 Hoffenheim stung from their first league defeat in 16 months. Leverkusen were beaten 3-2 at home by RB Leipzig before the international break, the first loss since May last year for the reigning league and cup champions. While any defeat, particularly against a likely title rival, would have disappointed coach Xabi Alonso, the way in which it happened would be most concerning. Just as they did in the Supercup against VfB Stuttgart and in the league opener to Borussia Moenchengladbach, Leverkusen scored first, but were pegged back. However, while Leverkusen rallied late to
If all goes well when the biggest marathon field ever gathered in Australia races 42km through the streets of Sydney on Sunday, World Marathon Majors (WMM) will soon add a seventh race to the elite series. The Sydney Marathon is to become the first race since Tokyo in 2013 to join long-established majors in New York, London, Boston, Berlin and Chicago if it passes the WMM assessment criteria for the second straight year. “We’re really excited for Sunday to arrive,” race director Wayne Larden told a news conference in Sydney yesterday. “We’re prepared, we’re ready. All of our plans look good on
The lights dimmed and the crowd hushed as Karoline Kristensen entered for her performance. However, this was no ordinary Dutch theater: The temperature was 80°C and the audience naked apart from a towel. Dressed in a swimsuit and to the tune of emotional music, the 21-year-old Kristensen started her routine, performed inside a large sauna, with a bed of hot rocks in the middle. For a week this month, a group of wellness practitioners, called “sauna masters,” are gathering at a picturesque health resort in the Netherlands to compete in this year’s Aufguss world sauna championships. The practice takes its name from a
When details from a scientific experiment that could have helped clear Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva landed at the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), the leader of the organization’s reaction was unequivocal: “We have to stop that urgently,” he wrote. No mention of the test ever became public and Valieva’s defense at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) went on without it. What effect the information could have had on Valieva’s case is unclear, but without it, the skater, then 15 years old, was eventually disqualified from the 2022 Winter Olympics after testing positive for a banned heart medication that would later