Report – Inter Milan Keen To Bring Youngster Back For FIFA Club World Cup But Sampdoria Keen To Keep Him For Serie B Relegation Playoff
Inter Milan want Ebenezer Akinsanmiro back for the Club World Cup, but Sampdoria want to keep the Nigerian for the Serie B relegation playoff.
This according to Genoa-based newspaper Il Secolo XIX, via FCInterNews.
Advertisement
Midfielder Ebenezer Akinsanmiro joined Sampdoria on loan last summer.
The 20-year-old has been received regular playing time at the Marassi throughout the season.
However, it has been a very tough season for Sampdoria as a team.
The Blucerchiati looked to have suffered a shock relegation to Serie B after a season which saw multiple changes of coach.
However, Sampdoria have a chance of staying up. The enforced relegation of Brescia for off-pitch reasons has offered them a lifeline.
Inter Want Ebenezer Akinsanmiro Back For FIFA Club World Cup – Sampdoria Keen To Keep Him For Serie B Playoff
Inter Milan's Nigerian midfielder #41 Ebenezer Akinsanmiro controls the ball during the Italian Serie A football match between Lecce and Inter Milan at the Ettore Giardiniero stadium in Lecce, on February 25, 2024. (Photo by Carlo Hermann / AFP) (Photo by CARLO HERMANN/AFP via Getty Images)
Akinsanmiro's loan to Sampdoria runs out at the end of next month.
Advertisement
However, Il Secolo XIX report, Inter want the Nigerian back in their squad earlier than that.
That is because of the fact that Inter play in the Club World Cup this summer. Therefore, they will have an opportunity to try out a number of younger players.
And Akinsanmiro is among the young talents that Inter would like a look at.
However, there is a problem. Sampdoria have a huge two-legged relegation playoff against Salernitana next month.
Hashtags

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


New York Times
27 minutes ago
- New York Times
‘There are no words' – Lionel Messi and his record-breaking scoring for Inter Miami
Two years into his time with Inter Miami, Lionel Messi remains the game-changing superstar he has been throughout his career. Messi, who won the MLS Most Valuable Player award in 2024 with 20 goals and 16 assists in just 19 games played in the regular season, seems intent on increasing his output this year. Miami set the record for most points in a season last year en route to the Supporters' Shield, and the club is again on pace to finish first atop the regular season standings thanks to Messi's recent form. Advertisement Entering Wednesday night's match vs. FC Cincinnati, Messi has scored multiple goals in five consecutive regular-season games, the first player in MLS history to do so. No other player had ever done it in four. You'd be forgiven for having it slip out of your focus, as the streak straddles the Club World Cup. Messi scored two goals in a pair of wins over CF Montréal and the Columbus Crew on May 28 and May 31, respectively. Miami then played four games in the FIFA Club World Cup, with Messi's free kick goal against Porto earning MLS their only win in the tournament and ensuring that Miami would be the only MLS team to advance to the knockout stage. 53' ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED? 🐐 Messi scores a GORGEOUS free kick goal and @InterMiami are now leading 2-1 versus @FCPorto! Watch the @FIFACWC | June 14 – July 13 | Every Game | Free | | #FIFACWC #TakeItToTheWorld #MIAFCP — DAZN Football (@DAZNFootball) June 19, 2025 Since returning to MLS play, Messi has seemed intent on making a statement as rumors swirl about his future — even as sources close to Miami and the player have insisted that he is nearing an extension to remain in South Florida. Messi has scored two goals in each of his last three games — all wins — over Montréal, the New England Revolution and Nashville SC. That lifts Messi's season tally to 16 goals — tied with Nashville's Sam Surridge for the league lead — and seven assists in 16 games played. While Miami is five points back of the Philadelphia Union, who sit in first place in the Supporters' Shield table, it has three games in hand. Miami is setting the pace with two points per game — ahead of the Union's 1.95 pace – and is 6-2-2 in its last 10 games, having not lost in MLS play since May 17. It's riding a five-game winning streak, which coincides with Messi's latest goal binge. Advertisement 'There are no words. What he continues to do is incredible — breaking records every three days,' Inter Miami coach Javier Mascherano said after the Nashville win. 'It's what I have said a thousand times in this room: He's the flagbearer of this team, he sets the standard for how we compete, he is the leader, the one who obviously encourages his teammates, shows them how we have to keep going, and, above all, maintain at this moment the tone we are setting. 'It's a blessing to be part of this stage of his career.' While the goal tally is remarkable in itself, how it has been achieved is even more so. The shot map below showcases the wide range of strikes by Messi, including five from outside the box — more than 22 of the 30 MLS teams have managed in their entire campaigns. And it was a long-range effort that kickstarted the multi-goal streak in Miami's 4-2 victory over Montréal in May. Scored in typical Messi fashion, he quickly shifted the ball to create an opening, aided by teammate Sergio Busquets, who cleverly blocked the onrushing Montréal midfielder Victor Loturi, before Messi curled a precise shot into the bottom corner. The second also came from his repertoire of trademark finishes. No player has perfected the dinked finish quite like Messi and his uncanny ability to generate the perfect loft, regardless of the goalkeeper's proximity or height, was on show again as he dinked the ball over Jonathan Sirois from close range. For all his ability, a streak like this can't persist without a healthy dollop of good fortune. In the following match against Columbus Crew, Messi was gifted his first goal thanks to some disastrous goalkeeping from Nicholas Hagen. The Guatemalan 'keeper made a costly error, miscuing a goal kick straight into Messi's path on the edge of the area. Messi gave Hagen the chance to atone for his blunder with an uncharacteristically underhit lob, but the goalkeeper only managed to palm it goalward. He was less charitable with his second 10 minutes later, this time his lob from just inside the area was perfectly calibrated. He kept the streak alive with a brace in his next match, again against Montréal. No player has completed more take-ons than Messi's 3.9 per 90 minutes in MLS this season, and both goals against Montréal demonstrated the jinking movements that continue to make him so feared throughout the league. The first saw the Argentine dart into the area and swiftly shift his body weight to carve out space for another arrowed finish into the far bottom corner, but it was the second that was truly breathtaking. Picking up the ball from Luis Suárez near halfway, Messi embarked on a long, mazy dribble, leaving a trail of confusion as bamboozled Montréal defenders collided while trying to stop him. He evaded them at every turn before rifling a shot into the top corner from close range. Ankara Messi, Ankara Messi, Ankara Messi Ankara Messi, Ankara Messi . 🐐 — Major League Soccer (@MLS) July 6, 2025 After two relatively routine efforts, in his next match, a 2-1 victory against New England, there was one glaring omission in his scoring streak: a free kick. Against Nashville, he duly obliged, opting for measured placement over whipped power, as he guided an effort from the edge of the area into the bottom-left corner. After this and his staggering effort against Porto in the Club World Cup, he's now up to a staggering 69 career free kicks. Leo en su idioma. 🔊 ¡El golazo de tiro libre de Messi vs. Nashville en español! 🎙️ @brunovain — MLS Español (@MLSes) July 16, 2025 This phenomenal streak has been a self-contained showreel of the myriad ways Messi can put a ball into the back of the net. And based on this evidence, he's far from done.


New York Times
an hour ago
- New York Times
Was the Club World Cup really worth $1bn to DAZN – and what happens now?
The morning after the night before, DAZN rolled out the big numbers in the search for Club World Cup vindication on Monday. Alongside the 'heartfelt thanks' to U.S. President Donald Trump included in a company LinkedIn post to add the full stop to a month of coverage, there was the bold claim from DAZN chief executive Shay Segev that the competition had seen 'over three billion viewers' tune in to their free content. Advertisement That was three viewers for every dollar spent on becoming the tournament's global broadcast partner back last December and repeated the triumphant forecasts of FIFA president Gianni Infantino at the weekend. His slightly more reserved expectation was that between 'two and three billion' had been swept along ahead of the final. DAZN and FIFA have not been willing to show the working behind their optimistic sums but, by their reckoning, a 63-game run that ended with Chelsea's 3-0 win over Paris Saint-Germain on Sunday achieved viewing figures that equate to roughly a third of the world's population. Little wonder, then, that Infantino declared his gift to football's ecosystem a 'huge, huge, huge success'. The unverified and questionable figures pushed by FIFA and its broadcast partner are in keeping with a competition driven by self-promotion. They serve a purpose, projecting the Club World Cup as an event that only the foolhardy missed, but drifted some way from reality. Viewing numbers were good, above some pre-tournament estimates, but far from spectacular. DAZN, now backed in part by Saudi Arabia's wealth, have so far offered no audience insight beyond the three billion claim but sub-licence holders in Europe and North America have delivered mixed verdicts to this point. The World Cup or even the Champions League it was not: this tournament caused ripples but not a splash. Advocates of the Club World Cup would find no shame in that, accepting this is just the start of a journey that has seen FIFA park tanks on UEFA's lawn. But for those, like Infantino, who suggest this marks the start of a 'golden era of club football', TV audiences were not fully convinced. Big sporting events do not make a habit of talking themselves down. FIFA said two years ago that the Qatar World Cup brought an engagement of five billion people, a number that included an 'array of platforms and devices across the media universe'. The International Olympic Committee (IOC), by chance, came to the same figure when counting up a global audience for the Paris Olympics last year. Advertisement They are figures typically taken with a tablespoon of salt and FIFA's latest count, this time for the Club World Cup, will inevitably be viewed through the same sceptical lens. 'These figures sound like a very rough estimate of reach, the number of people who watched at least a game for a couple of minutes,' says Francois Godard, senior media analyst at the London-based Enders Analysis. 'But the billion width of (Infantino's) estimate makes it difficult to take seriously. Anyway, the commercial value of the Club World Cup resides in the professionally and independently measured viewership in the richest markets, starting with the U.S., where advertising airtime is sold at the highest global prices. 'Everybody is equal, but to advertisers, one average U.S. viewer is worth a multiple of an average Latin American viewer.' The U.S., which played host to the Club World Cup, feels a pertinent place to start. On the back of underwhelming crowds at some stadiums and 12 months out from FIFA's World Cup coming to the U.S., Canada and Mexico, there were strong figures reported by the two sub-licence holders, Warner Bros Discovery (WBD) and TelevisaUnivision, who aired 18 games across their Spanish-speaking networks. The first data from Nielsen, which specialises in audience insight, suggested the two platforms brought in a combined 2.45m for the final alone. Also of note was the fact that almost half of the Club World Cup audiences on WBD channels came from the 18-49 demographic, a group targeted for long-term growth. 'Speaking specifically to the U.S. broadcasts on WBD and the TelevisaUnivision networks, the FIFA Club World Cup numbers were strong,' says William Mao, senior vice president of Octagon's global media rights consulting. 'The final drew 2.45million viewers across TBS and Univision broadcasts, putting the total audience in range of the average viewership for the NHL Stanley Cup Finals on TNT / TruTV this past season. Advertisement 'To put the performance of the FIFA Club World Cup as a U.S. TV product into further context, the 494,000 average viewers across matches on WBD networks (TNT, TBS, TruTV) is higher than that of much-talked-about Roland-Garros broadcasts on TNT last month (399,000), greater than the 2024-25 NHL regular season average audience on TNT / TruTV (317,000), and also more than Major League Baseball's average on TBS in 2024 (353,000). 'Obviously, the FIFA Club World Cup had fewer overall matches and TV broadcasts than these other sports properties, but the average is still solid. For TNT and TelevisaUnivision, their sub-licenses were a worthwhile play given the resulting audiences.' Viewers on the WBD platforms were typically drawn to the big European sides and, until the final, it was Real Madrid's quarter-final win over Borussia Dortmund that drew the biggest audience, peaking at 1.3million. Two of their top six broadcasts also included Lionel Messi's Inter Miami before the final drew in 1.3m, with a peak of 1.8m on TBS. Matches airing on weekends and nights across the tournament, 15 in total, averaged 535,000. TelevisaUnivision, meanwhile, was encouraged by its own figures. It had 856,000 watch the opening game between Al Ahly and Inter Miami before 1.43m watched Sunday's final. Its press release last night called that the highest-rated Spanish-language daytime telecast of the year to date. It added that the tournament coverage reached 9.2m total viewers across all TelevisaUnivision networks in the U.S. None of this, of course, includes the numbers of DAZN, which is not obligated to publish its viewing figures or sign-up numbers as a streaming platform and does not have its audiences measured in the same way as traditional broadcasters. A post-tournament report in the coming days is likely to shed greater light on the performance of FIFA's global broadcast partner for the maiden 32-team event, with numbers expected to have been most encouraging in South America after Palmeiras, Botafogo, Flamengo and Fluminense (eventual semi-finalists) advanced to the knockout stages. DAZN has always focused on this being a global event and the hope of Pete Oliver, chief executive of growth markets, to hit over 100million direct viewers on its platform is likely to have been realised. A figure closer to 150million is thought to have been hit. Advertisement FIFA, however, would be hard-pressed to conclude the Club World Cup had left a deep mark on the UK. Although DAZN will inevitably have driven audiences to its app, Channel 5, the UK's terrestrial broadcast partner, reported modest figures in a country that produced the eventual winners. Paris Saint-Germain's drubbing of Real Madrid in last Wednesday's semi-final drew an average audience of 657,000, which was broadly half (1.2million) of the Women's Euro 2025 clash between Wales and France on fellow terrestrial station ITV1, according to data from Overnights for Broadcast website. They also reported that coverage by the BBC, a public service broadcaster, of England against the Netherlands in the Euros averaged 2.3million in the less attractive late afternoon slot. Channel 5 said its biggest audience ahead of the final had been Chelsea's opening game against Los Angeles FC, when a peak of 1.4million viewers in the UK watched a fixture that kicked off at 8pm on a Sunday night. In a press release, it added that adults aged 16-34 had accounted for 34 per cent of the audience that had averaged 922,000. In contrast, the Nations League final between Portugal and Spain eight days earlier was watched by 2.6million in the UK. Sunday's final would eventually deliver a new high audience for Channel 5, an average of 1.1million across the five-hour broadcast. That represented a nine per cent market share, less than half the number that watched England play Wales in the Euros. That audience averaged at 2.9million, though the Club World Cup final numbers did not include DAZN's UK viewership. That underwhelming landscape, though, has not been replicated in other parts of Europe, where figures in other key territories are said to have exceeded some expectations. France, in particular, received the competition well — buoyed, no doubt, by the progress of an exciting PSG side which dominates the national marketplace in terms of support. With a selection of games broadcast on TF1, as well as DAZN, 3.8m watched PSG's victory over Atletico Madrid and then, according to Mediametrie, another 4.79million tuned in for the final against Chelsea. The direct comparison on the night was France's 5-2 win over the Netherlands at the women's Euros, which had 2.28million, but the Club World Cup final took a 30 per cent market share. Advertisement Its popularity was notable in Spain, too. Coverage of Sunday's final on Telecinco, a free-to-air established channel, averaged just under three million, according to figures from Barlovento Comunicacion. The same data group found that 4.1million had watched PSG trample all over Madrid four days earlier. Germany and Italy, who each had two competing clubs in the U.S., also reported far better ratings than in the UK. 'The early indications are relatively positive,' says Godard. 'We're looking at good ratings of Club World Cup games on broadcasters like Mediaset in Spain and Italy and Sat.1 in Germany. 'This is summer, there is no alternative football programming, and entertainment content is typically reheated. So the Club World Cup was a fresh piece of content in a slightly dry environment.' So, was the Club World Cup worth $1bn to DAZN? The streamer's unequivocal (and perhaps inevitable) answer is affirmative. It can point to record sign-ups to its app, with a hugely inflated customer base now at its disposal in a wide range of global territories. Social media exposure also exploded. According to data from Social Blade, a website used to track activity on multiple platforms, DAZN added one million subscribers to its YouTube channel, a rise of over 50 per cent. That helped deliver 253million views of its YouTube videos across 30 days. Extended highlights of Sunday's final alone had clocked up 17million views. There was little that was revolutionary about DAZN's coverage, although the advent of the camera stationed on the referee's chest undeniably offered the armchair viewers another intriguing perspective on play. There is already an expectation that similar angles will be made available to Premier League viewers, subject to approval from IFAB, the sport's lawmakers. Ref cam's of Neto's goal is AMAZING 🤯 Watch the @FIFACWC | June 14 – July 13 | Every game. Free. | | #FIFACWC #TakeItToTheWorld #CHELAF — DAZN Football (@DAZNFootball) June 16, 2025 Besides, according to DAZN, this was as much about playing the long game. Although it is unlikely to see a short-term lift in its subscriber numbers, it has left a footprint on a landscape it wishes to eventually conquer. 'It has worked for DAZN,' says Pierre Maes, an expert in the sale of sports rights in Europe. 'It's seen a lot of people downloading the app and creating an account, that's for sure. Worldwide for DAZN, it has been good. Advertisement 'DAZN is a good partner for FIFA because it has this global footprint. Also, it can act like an agency, as it did here, to find sub-licences and bring exposure to all countries in the world. That's a beautiful asset.' The last month, though, is likely to have emboldened Infantino as plans begin for the next Club World Cup. To say those plans are at an embryonic stage would be something of an understatement: the date, location, entry criteria and number of participants are all yet to be determined. Either way, FIFA's ambitions would suggest it will be intent on sourcing more than $1billion from a broadcast partner next time around, especially if the format is expanded to include more of Europe's elite. DAZN might yet stick around for another dance, given the strong bonds that have been forged with FIFA in the last six months but will this new Club World Cup have convinced other broadcasters to chance their arm? 'I don't think so,' says Maes. 'It would be a huge surprise to me to see broadcasters pay a big amount for the next edition. 'Their resources are limited and they have to choose. And this is one more soccer competition. If they struggled to find a broadcaster for this edition, it's going to be as difficult, at least, for the next edition. 'For me, the Club World Cup is the illustration of football killing itself. We see more and more competitions invented to try to drive more revenues. By doing this, with an overabundance of events, football is killing itself. 'Look at the NFL in the States. Their main strategic priority and asset is scarcity. Every game is an event because there are not a lot of games. Football is doing exactly the opposite.' Another football property has been added to the menu for broadcasters to select from, but it remains to be seen if FIFA's new offering, showcased and promoted across the US, has done enough to convince future audiences to bite.
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
Report – Bayern Munich Misfit Becomes Leading Candidate To Replace Turkey Superstar At Inter Milan
Report – Bayern Munich Misfit Becomes Leading Candidate To Replace Turkey Superstar At Inter Milan Bayern Munich misfit Joao Palhinha has emerged as the likeliest candidate to replace Hakan Calhanoglu at Inter Milan. According to Corriere della Sera via FCInter1908, the San Siro giants have chosen the 30-year-old as the Turk's heir. Advertisement Joao Palhinha has landed on Beppe Marotta's shortlist out of the blue. Indeed, after being priced out of a move for Atalanta's Ederson, Inter had to expand their search. Therefore, they've shifted their attention toward the ex-Fulham star. Inter Milan Identify Joao Palhinha as Hakan Calhanoglu Heir MUNICH, GERMANY – APRIL 08: Joao Palhinha of Bayern Muenchen looks on prior to the UEFA Champions League 2024/25 Quarter Final First Leg match between FC Bayern München and FC Internazionale Milano at Fussball Arena Muenchen on April 08, 2025 in Munich, Germany. (Photo by) Palhinha joined Vincent Kompany's side last summer for a reported fee of €51 million. Despite his superb Premier League form, the Portuguese ace has failed to settle in the Bundesliga. After a disappointing first season at the Allianz Stadium, he could pack his bags again. Whether he would move to Inter depends on Hakan Calhanoglu. Advertisement Indeed, courted by Galatasaray, the 31-year-old is yet to remove doubts around his future. Although Inter would preferably keep hold of the ex-AC Milan playmaker, everything is still hanging in the balance.