Rabu, 29 Agustus 2012

Marvels, milestones and rivalry reprised FIFA.com's latest stats review features memorable moments for David Beckham, Javier Zanetti and Aaron Johannsson, a long-awaited Ligue 1 win for Reims, and broken records in Spain's biggest fixture. 1000 CONCACAF Champions League goals was the landmark reached in spectacular style on Thursday, when David Beckham scored direct from a corner. This is the third such goal for the LA Galaxy in his long and illustrious career, and comes 17 years on from his first, while he was on loan with Preston North End in 1995. It helped give the MLS champions a 5-2 win over El Salvador’s Isidro Metapan, and it took CONCACAF's club showpiece onto the 1000-goal mark in its 249th match. 800 Inter Milan appearances is the latest milestone to have been reached in the extraordinary career of Javier Zanetti. The 39-year-old celebrated the landmark in Inter’s 2-0 victory over Romanian side Vaslui in the first leg of their UEFA Europa League play-off last Thursday, and took his tally to 801 against Pescara three days later – playing 90 minutes in both matches. Monday marked the 17th anniversary of Zanetti’s first Inter appearance, and the veteran utility man - who already holds the record for most appearances for both his club and Argentina’s national team (145) - is still going strong. His Inter coach, Andrea Stramaccioni, three years Zanetti’s junior, said of this latest achievement: "I don't think I've even seen 800 games in my whole life! Zanetti should be cloned, because in my view he is not human. He's bionic." 87 Clásico wins is the identical tally with which Barcelona and Real Madrid go into this evening’s Supercopa second leg, and should the Catalans triumph, they will lead the head-to-head standings for the first time in eight decades. The historical score was left deadlocked after Barça’s 3-2 win at the Camp Nou last Thursday, the first Clásico to witness five or more goals in the second half since Real won by an identical scoreline in 1961. The match also included landmark goals for the teams’ stars, with Lionel Messi equalling Cesar Rodriguez’s club record of 14 goals against Real, and Cristiano Ronaldo becoming only the fifth player to score in four successive Clásicos. Real go into tonight's match aiming to make amends after their 24-match unbeaten La Liga record came to an abrupt end at Getafe on Sunday. It was the first time in over five years that Real had been beaten after leading at half-time, and the first time since August 2006 that any Jose Mourinho team has surrendered a winning position in such circumstances. Real now trail Barça by five points in La Liga, the biggest gap there has ever been between these fierce rivals after just two matchdays. 33 years after their last Ligue 1 win, Reims finally ended their long wait for another top-flight triumph. It came in dramatic and unfortunate circumstances, secured by a 94th-minute own goal by Sochaux’s Sloan Privat, but the manner of the victory mattered little to a club that had gone 12194 days without one. Marseille, meanwhile, sit atop Ligue 1 after starting the season with with three straight wins for the first time since 1998/99. Incidentally, that campaign ended with the south coast giants in second place, pipped to the title by a Bordeaux side led by the current L’OM coach, Elie Baup. Marseille’s latest success was a 1-0 win at Montpellier on Sunday, the reigning champions’ first home defeat since 24 September 2011. Crucial to Baup’s side’s fine form has been the renaissance of Andre-Pierre Gignac, who has four goals and one assist in six competitive appearances this season, having failed to find the net in the last Ligue 1 campaign until the 37th round of matches. 3 minutes and 50 seconds was the time in which Aaron Johannsson scored the quickest hat-trick in the history of the Danish Superliga on Saturday. The 21-year-old AGF Aarhus striker carried out a one-man demolition job of AC Horsens, scoring all of his team’s goals in a 4-1 away win. But it was by notching up the first three of those strikes in the 32nd, 33rd and 36th minutes that the Iceland U-21 international set a new record in his adopted country, eclipsing the previous benchmark, set when Ebbe Sand hit a four-minute-and-two-second hat-trick for Brondby against Vejle BK on 7 November 1997. Add your comment

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