Manchester United are likely to have to take the longer route to reach the group stage of the UEFA Champions League next season.
A 1-1 draw with Arsenal on Sunday left United facing a likely fourth-place finish in the English Premier League, which would send them into the final qualifying round of the Champions League, which could mean potential matchups with strong opposition, such as Valencia and AS Monaco, to reach the group stage.
“It is always stressful,” United manager Louis van Gaal said. “You can meet an opponent who is halfway through a season already. It is not so easy, but I am satisfied we have set our goal [of finishing in the top four] and reached that.”
Photo: Reuters
Tyler Blackett’s late own-goal earned Arsenal a point that kept them in third place, two points ahead of United. Arsenal can secure a top-three finish by winning one of their last two matches — first against Sunderland tomorrow and then against West Bromwich Albion on Sunday in the final round of league games.
Arsenal have gone through the Champions League’s qualifying round for the last two seasons and manager Arsene Wenger is likely to be glad to see the back of it.
“It takes the pressure off the holidays,” he said. “We have always that in mind when you prepare [for a new season] and it will be great when we do it, but it is still to do.”
Ander Herrera opened the scoring for United in the 30th minute, calmly volleying home from Ashley Young’s cross.
Manchester City are favorites to finish second behind Chelsea after beating Swansea City 4-2 to move five points ahead of Arsenal, having played a game more.
City have won their last five games and their attacking swagger has returned, with 10 goals coming in the team’s last two games. City have ensured qualification for the Champions League’s group stage and a home win over Southampton would secure second place.
Wilfried Bony scored in stoppage-time on his first return to Swansea since moving to City in January, while Yaya Toure scored two goals and James Milner added the other.
Swansea came from 2-0 down to pull level thanks to goals by Gylfi Sigurdsson and Bafetimbi Gomis, but conceded twice in the final 16 minutes. The Welsh team are definitely going to finish eighth and cannot now qualify for the UEFA Europa League.
At Old Trafford, United might have bid farewell to their top-three hopes — and also might have said goodbye to their goalkeeper David de Gea.
The Spain international hobbled off with a hamstring injury in the second half and is set to miss United’s last match of the season, against Hull City.
With Van Gaal saying it would be hard to keep De Gea amid interest from Real Madrid, United’s best player this season might have played his last game for the club.
“He is Spanish, he is a Spanish international, now a Spanish club is coming, his girlfriend is Spanish, his father and mother come every week or every two weeks here. So it is difficult,” Van Gaal said.
Radamel Falcao could also have played his last game at Old Trafford. The Colombia striker, who is on loan from Monaco, offered a little wave to the crowd after being substituted after 60 minutes and Van Gaal gave no assurance Falcao would be back next season.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier