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10 Footballers Who Need To Step Down In Their Career  

One thing that’s very important for top athletes to have is self-awareness and the ability to know when to exit the big stage. You need to know when to retire and also when to take a step down in your career. There are some footballers who need that now more than ever and we’re about to look at a few of them now.

Here are 10 footballers who need to take a step down in their careers for their own good.

Why Are Footballers Escorted By Kids In A Football Match?

Football is without doubt the most popular sport in the world. Hundreds of thousands play it and hundreds of millions watch it all over the world. Be it barefooted, futsal or association football, there seems to always be a crowd available to watch and enjoy the beautiful game. With the passage of time, football organisations have begun to acknowledge fans and viewers as a massive part of the sport.

As a matter of fact, about 80 percent of football's biggest changes in the past 50 years  have been made solely to accommodate and entice fans - new stadium designs, new grass patterns, sale of paraphernalia, mandatory press conferences, you name it.

The game has evolved so much; and on the highest level, it is almost as if match days are not just about 22 players chasing one ball. One particular change that has caught our eyes is the introduction of children who accompany players to the pitch before kickoff.

Anytime players come out of the tunnel holding the hands of young children, the match seems a little grander and the fans cheer a little louder. But did you know this has been happening as far back as the 90s?

10 Incidents When Footballers Were Given Standing Ovation By Opposing Fans

There is a famous saying –  . The importance of the 12th man is widely famous, talked about in the dressing rooms and even in tactical discussion. Coaches mention it in their press conferences too.

We as fans give our everything to support our club, and many a times, it is that very support that pushes teams to go the extra mile, and get a result.

What is strange is that there have been times when opposition players have been applauded, or have even got a standing ovation by the opposition home fans.

So here are 10 incidents, where footballers of the opposition teams have been given a standing ovation by the home crowd.

1. Ronaldo Nozario at Old Trafford (Manchester United)

2. Cristiano Ronaldo at the Allianz Stadium (Juventus)

3. Kylian Mbappe at the Bernabeu

4. Ronaldinho at the Santiago Bernabeu

5. Lionel Messi vs Real Betis (2019

6. Thiery Henry at the Stadium of Light (2003)

7.  Frank Ribery at the San Siro (2019)

8. Steven Gerrard at Stamford Bridge (2015)

9. Andres Iniesta at the Bernabeu (2015)

10. Alessandro Del Piero (2008)

8 Footballers Who Struggle Around Women  

Nervous, shy, speechless. These are not the words you normally attribute to superstars who grace our television screens every week playing in front of capacity filled stadiums.   

But something happens to a man when he stands in front of a beautiful woman. Breath becomes bated, lips get dry and words are fumbled.  

For a few sportsmen, this is all too real so today, we have compiled a list of footballers who have a hard time socializing with women or get very nervous around them.

The 2022 World Cup really brought out a completely different side of Lionel Messi; a side which we don’t get to see a lot of time. Messi is usually this calm guy who doesn’t talk too much and always keeps to himself, but on a few occasions, the Argentina captain has gotten aggressive and even vulgar.  

While Messi is known to almost always accord respect to his colleagues, there have been times when he let his opponents feel the wrath of his tongue. Here are 5 times Messi has insulted an opponent.

After Argentina made it to the World Cup final for the second time in 3 editions, there have been shouts that the 2022 World Cup might be rigged to favor the South American nation. Some say it was rigged to give Messi the perfect end to his international career.

Of course, this was not the popular opinion after Argentina lost the opening game of the tournament to underdogs, Saudi Arabia. But as the team got stronger and started carefully scaling their hurdles, the talks of the entire tournament being rigged started to become rampant.

Now, it’s easy to dismiss these people as mere conspiracy theorists and Messi haters, but do they actually have a point? Come along and check out the points they have made and decide for yourself.

There have been talks about the 2022 World Cup having been rigged to favor a particular team. But if you call what we saw out in Qatar a rigging, then maybe you don’t remember or just don’t know what happened 20 years ago.

So, in 2002, we were in Asia for the FIFA World Cup for the first time ever. South Korea and Japan had the joint-responsibility of hosting the tournament, and it was history being made for many reasons. First, it was the first time the competition would be held outside America and Europe. And then, it was also the first time that 2 different nations would host a single tournament of the World Cup.

And that in itself was a surprising eventuality as South Korea and Japan had actually put in rival bids for the hosting rights of that tournament. Japan had never qualified for the World Cup before then, but it was they who put in the first bid. Then South Korea only came along with their bid as a response to their political and sporting rival.

Anyway, FIFA decided the best option would be to grant hosting rights to both nations. But that decision didn’t exactly go well with most football fans in America and Europe who accused the football governing body of being corrupt in their host selection process. Does that remind you of another Asian World Cup host?

4 World Cup Curses That Have Been Broken In Qatar

The nature of football has made it possible to have many deja Vu moments and that is quite understandable. But when a certain result keeps happening over many years, people start getting curious and begin attributing it to omens and curses.

In club football, many of such curses exist. Think of the curse of Bella Gutman on Benfica and you may find yourself believing in such omens. The world cup is no different. Many trends have been seen and attributed to curses but we are here to highlight a few of them that have been broken at Qatar 2022. You wouldn't believe how long some of them have actually stood for.

 10 Footballers Who Could Earn Big Transfers After The World Cup

The World Cup is really interesting because it’s an avenue for young players to announce themselves to the world on the biggest stage of all. If you’re able to take advantage of that opportunity, you could very easily earn yourself a very lucrative transfer to a big club.

The 2022 World Cup was another big platform, and of course, some players used it to their advantage. Here are 10 footballers who could earn big transfers after the World Cup.