Lara Gut-Behrami to retire from Alpine skiing after 2026 Olympics
Lara Gut-Behrami already said she has competed at her last World Championships. Now she's saying she plans to end her Alpine skiing career after a fourth Olympics in 2026.
Gut-Behrami, the 2022 Olympic super-G gold medalist, shared the news at an event in her native Switzerland on Tuesday night, according to Swiss media reports.
Gut-Behrami, 34, also won world championships in the super-G and giant slalom in 2021 and World Cup overall titles in 2015-16 and 2023-24.
Her 48 career World Cup race victories are third among active women behind Mikaela Shiffrin (101) and Lindsey Vonn (82).
Gut-Behrami said before this past February's World Championships that it would be her last time competing at the biennial worlds.
Gut-Behrami has raced on the highest level since age 16, including winning two world championships silver medals at age 17 in 2009.
After the 2026 Olympics, Gut-Behrami plans to move to England as her husband, Valon, will be the technical director at his former soccer club, Watford, according to Swiss media.
Nick Zaccardi,
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43 minutes ago
China's humanoid robots generate more soccer excitement than their human counterparts
BEIJING -- While China's men's soccer team hasn't generated much excitement in recent years, humanoid robot teams have won over fans in Beijing based more on the AI technology involved than any athletic prowess shown. Four teams of humanoid robots faced off in fully autonomous 3-on-3 soccer matches powered entirely by artificial intelligence on Saturday night in China's capital in what was touted as a first in China and a preview for the upcoming World Humanoid Robot Games, set to take place in Beijing. According to the organizers, a key aspect of the match was that all the participating robots operated fully autonomously using AI-driven strategies without any human intervention or supervision. Equipped with advanced visual sensors, the robots were able to identify the ball and navigate the field with agility They were also designed to stand up on their own after falling. However, during the match several still had to be carried off the field on stretchers by staff, adding to the realism of the experience. China is stepping up efforts to develop AI-powered humanoid robots, using sports competitions like marathons, boxing, and football as a real-world proving ground. Cheng Hao, founder and CEO of Booster Robotics, the company that supplied the robot players, said sports competitions offer the ideal testing ground for humanoid robots, helping to accelerate the development of both algorithms and integrated hardware-software systems. He also emphasized safety as a core concern in the application of humanoid robots. 'In the future, we may arrange for robots to play football with humans. That means we must ensure the robots are completely safe,' Cheng said. 'For example, a robot and a human could play a match where winning doesn't matter, but real offensive and defensive interactions take place. That would help audiences build trust and understand that robots are safe.' Booster Robotics provided the hardware for all four university teams, while each school's research team developed and embedded their own algorithms for perception, decision-making, player formations, and passing strategies—including variables such as speed, force, and direction, according to Cheng. In the final match, Tsinghua University's THU Robotics defeated the China Agricultural University's Mountain Sea team with a score of 5–3 to win the championship. Mr. Wu, a supporter of Tsinghua, celebrated their victory while also praising the competition. 'They (THU) did really well,' he said. 'But the Mountain Sea team (of Agricultural University) was also impressive. They brought a lot of surprises.' China's men have made only one World Cup appearance and have already been knocked out of next years' competition in Canada, Mexico and the United States.
New York Times
3 hours ago
- New York Times
Lionel Messi has made Miami America's new soccer capital. Will it last?
In Scarface, Tony Montana is driving through Miami on a balmy summer night, top down, his car upholstered in understated tiger print. 'Me, I want what's coming to me,' he says to his compadre, Manny. 'And what's coming to you?' Montana gets asked. 'The world, Chico, and everything in it.' The Club World Cup has come to Miami this summer. The World Cup is next. The One Year Out celebration held at the city's Perez Art Museum on June 11 made that feel real. Advertisement 'First of all, we're more than qualified to host it, as we know,' the Latin Grammy winner and Miami native Marc Anthony said. 'We've hosted from Super Bowls to Formula 1.' Maybe the less said about last year's Copa America final, the better. At a conference in Coral Gables, Nicolo Zini, a business executive for the host committee, talked about 'real momentum' and the importance of the Club World Cup acting as a signpost that the World Cup is on its way. 'It is not a minor selling point,' Zini added. Miami did not have a game at the 1994 World Cup. 'The stadium wasn't ready. It went to Orlando.' Anticipation is building and has been ever since Inter Miami persuaded Lionel Messi to play in MLS. Away from the Art Deco curves and sandy pavements of Miami Beach, the boxiness of Wynwood has provided a canvas for more than the pastel colours that made this city famous through the outfits of Don Johnson in Miami Vice. It is home to the world's first graffiti museum. Pedestrians on the sidewalk find themselves in the shadow of cherry-pickers, not palm trees. The pop and shake of spray paint cans alternates with the rat-a-tat-tat of spluttering exhausts from Ferraris and Lamborghinis. Messi looms large in this neighbourhood. He smiles down from murals, as he does outside the Fiorito in Little Haiti, a steakhouse named after the Buenos Aires barrio where Diego Maradona grew up. It's a place where some of the area's 58,000 Argentinians come for blood sausage, empanadas and a vacio-cut so good you order it for main and dessert. Framed on the wall are a pair of red and yellow cards signed by Hector Elizondo, the Argentine referee who sent off Zinedine Zidane in the 2006 World Cup final. A Boca Juniors basketball game is on the TV. It is niche. Messi isn't everywhere in Miami. He plays and trains on the outskirts of Fort Lauderdale, where autograph hunters all the way from Tucuman wait on the corner for his Maybach to turn into the Florida Blue Training Center. Advertisement This is a sprawling place and as such, you can ride around for hours without seeing Messi — apart from, every now and again, on towering freeway billboards where he competes for advertising space with injury lawyers, pharmaceuticals and air conditioning units. You don't need a car collection like the Miami Heat's legendary coach Pat Riley to get around the city, but you do need to drive. It is one big Scalextric track with rising, bending interchanges that look like albino anacondas surging out of the Everglades. F1's recent success here makes sense. The number of cars is perhaps why the city's most famous pieces of architecture are the stacked garages, like the Herzog & de Meuron one on 111 Lincoln Road. It is why the Hard Rock Stadium has 26,718 parking spaces. You reach it via Dan Marino Boulevard and Don Shula Drive, a pair of greats in Miami Dolphins lore. It is a reminder that the other football remains America's Game. Shula's passing was a big moment in Miami sports. On the way to the mixed zone at the Hard Rock, you pass the 72 Club, a hospitality experience named after the team Shula coached in 1972; the one and only team in NFL history to go an entire season undefeated. And yet, even as the Florida Panthers vied for and won the Stanley Cup during the group stage of FIFA president Gianni Infantino's new, expanded Club World Cup, fans turned out for the the competition in Miami. As much as half-empty stadiums were a focus of the coverage, the teal-coloured 65,000-seater Hard Rock averaged crowds of 60,000 over the first fortnight of the tournament. Some of that was down to the magnetic Messi effect. It was no coincidence that FIFA chose Inter Miami to raise the curtain on the Club World Cup against Al Ahly. The Hard Rock record, however, was for the Bayern Munich-Boca Juniors game. That, in no small part, spoke to the aforementioned Argentine diaspora — the irrationality of the Boca fans and their willingness to follow their team not only to Miami but, as their striker Miguel Merentiel said, 'to the moon, even'. Advertisement On the other, it highlighted, as Real Madrid–Al Hilal did too, that there is a market for football in Miami that isn't totally dependent on Messi. Madrid es Madrid, after all. The biggest club of all. And Americans love a winner. They love stars. And although predictable, it was striking nonetheless to see the pull Real Madrid has on Hispanic and Latino fans outside of Spain. 'Miami is a city with Latin American passion that loves soccer and has recently had the privilege of enjoying the magic of Messi and company,' Infantino said on the eve of the opening game. 'Not only that, it is also home to FIFA and Concacaf.' Joan Didion, the great writer and journalist, once observed that Miami isn't an American city but a 'tropical capital,' a 'Latin capital, a year or two away from a new government.' No matter where the World Cup is hosted, the government is — if not overthrown — then superseded, in a purely sporting sense, by FIFA. That won't happen in the U.S. but FIFA moved their legal and compliance division to Coral Gables because it makes logistical and geographic sense. After the Copa America, the Club World Cup and the men's World Cup, the next editions of the women's tournament will be held in Brazil and then the U.S.. It feels like FIFA and Messi have made Miami the football capital of America — something that Seattle, LA, Atlanta and St. Louis will no doubt dispute, but the growth potential here is remarkable. Over half of the population in Miami-Dade is foreign-born, and Spanish is the main language spoken at home and on the street. Historically, that population was drawn from nearby Cuba, which is only 90 miles off the coast. Jorge Mas Canosa, the father of David Beckham's co-owners at Inter Miami, Jorge and Jose, was one of many who exiled from Cuba after the rise of Fidel Castro. Advertisement The received wisdom assumed Cubans were interested in baseball, track and field, and boxing: not soccer. When shown reconnaissance photos of football pitches in Cienfuegos in 1970, the U.S.'s then-national security adviser, Henry Kissinger, demanded to see President Richard Nixon immediately. 'Those soccer fields could mean war, Bob,' he told an incredulous White House chief of staff, H.R. Haldeman, who in turn asked: 'How come?'. 'Cubans play baseball,' Kissinger said. 'Russians play soccer.' And yet, Cuba sent a team to the 1938 World Cup, where they beat Romania in extra time and reached the quarter-finals. More recently, Miami has become a haven for Latin America's affluent and aspirational. It is a city that teems with people for whom soccer is the primary sport. Miami United tried to tap into it by signing Adriano. Miami FC, a joint venture between media rights empresario Riccardo Silva and Milan legend Paolo Maldini, had a go and still continue in the USL Championship. Only Inter Miami, however, were granted a license as an MLS expansion team. The hispanic and Latino demography of South Florida means support is fragmented. Think about it. Not everyone is Argentine. Not everyone is a Messi fan. Some 240k in the Miami-Dade and Broward counties are Colombian, and they made their presence felt at the Hard Rock for last summer's Copa America final, which Messi's Argentina won in extra time. The two nations met again in a World Cup qualifier that preceded the start of the Club World Cup. But the roster Inter Miami have built is representative of the city and South America. Benjamin Cremaschi is born and raised in Miami, the son of Argentine parents. Telasco Segovia is Venezuelan, Luis Suarez and Maximiliano Falcon are Uruguayan, Leo Afonso is Brazilian, David Martinez is Paraguayan and Allen Obando is Ecuadorean. Advertisement 'The best thing about Miami as you have seen or will see,' Inter Miami's president of business operations Xavi Asensi said at a conference held by the Argentine newspaper Ole, 'is that it is very near America.' Its proximity to more established football cultures and the conceptualisation of Inter Miami as a team not only of America but the Americas too is a benefit. Jorge Mas recently told ESPN he would like Inter Miami to one day compete in the Copa Libertadores. The brand, choice of name, colours and crest, and its association with Beckham has allowed Inter Miami to resonate far and wide. But if the pink Messi No 10 jersey is MLS's best seller and is seen in Hong Kong, Cape Town, Buenos Aires and London, it is, by Asensi's admission, because of Messi. His star power is not to be underestimated. Palermo pink would sell if Messi were in it. 'At Inter Miami,' Asensi said. 'Leo is bigger than the club.' Revenues have tripled since he joined. In April, Colombus Crew moved their regular-season home game against Inter Miami to the Cleveland Browns' stadium to meet demand for tickets. 'Wherever we go, it's like The Rolling Stones,' Asensi explained. Playing at the much bigger Hard Rock rather than Chase Stadium, their backyard in MLS, has not posed a challenge. Both group-stage games Inter Miami played there fetched crowds of 60k. It raises the question: why will Freedom Park, the new ground Inter Miami are building near Miami International Airport, have only a 25k capacity? It is, in fairness, a size in line with other MLS, soccer-first grounds in the U.S.. It perhaps also reflects a realism. Messi turned 38 earlier this week and while Jorge Mas wants him to retire at Inter Miami, that retirement is ever nearer. How long, if at all, will Messi carry on playing beyond next summer's World Cup? He has said, even during this Club World Cup, that these are his 'final games.' The end is coming. Who then will buy Inter Miami jerseys when they can't put Messi 10 on the back? Who will watch them when he is in the executive box rather than on the pitch? Advertisement The hope is that the Messi effect has a legacy. That the kids who have come to see him at Chase Stadium these past two and a half years become fans of the game, of Inter Miami in general and not just him. That the city, as Infantino desires, 'writes its name in gold letters' as major soccer destination. The world and everything in it has come to Miami. But, after Messi, after the World Cup, will it stay there? (Photos: Getty Images; design: Kelsea Petersen)
New York Times
3 hours ago
- New York Times
Slaven Bilic: ‘People think coaching in Saudi Arabia is easy. It's not'
Slaven Bilic is at home in Croatia. It's the height of summer and in the background, down the phone line, birds are chirping under an afternoon sun as he describes what makes Croatian football special. How it is that a country of fewer than four million people so consistently punches above its weight? Advertisement 'Obviously we have a lot talent,' Bilic says, 'but we have always really good at team sports. At basketball, water polo, handball. I think that's because we like to mix. We like to be out on the streets. 'In the parts of the country where many sportsmen come from the climate is good so our kids were always out. Maybe less and less nowadays, with social media, but we used to spend hours and hours outside. 'I'm a good judge of Croatian football because I played for the national team and coached it, and I think our players have a camaraderie that is underestimated. No matter who the manager is, the players are friends, not just colleagues. Even after international breaks end, most of them are still talking to each other. 'You can't analyse the effect of that. You can't measure it. But it's crucial.' Bilic knows what he is talking about. He has had a rich career, full of experiences in different countries. In its first act, he was the rugged centre-back who fortified West Ham and Everton in the 1990s and was part of a gifted Croatian national team that finished third at the 1998 World Cup. In its second, aged just 37, he would coach the national team between 2006 and 2012, leading an era of renewal which saw a clutch of young players, including Luka Modric, Ivan Rakitic and Vedran Corluka, all of whom Bilic had coached at under-21 level, establish themselves as senior internationals. In the years after, he embarked on a club career that zig-zagged across the world. Bilic has coached in Russia and Turkey, China and England. Most recently, he spent a year in charge of Al Fateh, in Saudi Arabia, a role he left in 2024 by mutual agreement. So, much has happened over the last 20 years, but Bilic is still only 56 — still finding ways to grow and evolve, to develop as a coach. Asked what the most instructive part of his career has been, he pauses, draws a long breath, and reflects. Advertisement 'I don't think I can pinpoint a moment. My whole life has been connected to football and to the job that I'm doing now. Every coach who I've been coached by has had an influence, even if we're talking about Hajduk Split's academy back in the 1980s. I remember those coaches too and I still use some of their methods on a daily and weekly basis. 'How you talk to players. How you build a pre-season. It's all connected. 'And it's really helped me to see different cultures and different people. How hard you can train different players. How you change your sessions for players of different abilities and climates. When you go from China to Saudi Arabia, you can't just copy and paste. How can you make sure they have time for prayer? There are all sorts of differences. 'But I think, at this stage of my career, that knowledge and experience has me better prepared than ever.' After leaving the Croatia national team in 2012, Bilic coached — in order — Lokomotiv Moscow, Besiktas, West Ham, Al Ittihad, West Bromwich Albion, Beijing Guoan, Watford and Al Fateh. Each job brought a new environment with different obstacles and new problems to solve. 'The Premier League brings out the best of you. Tactically. Everything. The whole world is watching and you're facing unbelievable coaches and players. 'But some people think that coaching in Saudi Arabia is easy — and it's not. The level is not the Premier League — that's right — but as a coach there is still a big challenge. 'First of all, you're under pressure because football is very big there. Second, 80 per cent of the players on some of the teams are from foreign countries, and they're good players, most of them could play in Europe, but then you have to field three domestic players, too. Some of them are very good, but others are not on quite the same level. Advertisement 'What many clubs do is put those domestic players in full-back positions, or sometimes in midfield. The league — the clubs, the fans — they want to see stars and the stars are wingers and forwards. 'So, it means that — let's say — your left back has to face the right winger. He has to face Sadio Mane or Riyad Mahrez. He has to face unbelievably good players. Your weakest link is playing against one of their strongest. To make it worse, your left winger might be a really good player, but perhaps he doesn't want to help your full-back defensively. 'Your job is to find a solution. Actually, you have to be more creative in many situations in Saudi than you do in England.' Bilic likes the detail in football. The humanity of it. He's engaging and interesting to talk to, in a way that perhaps was never able to rise above the Premier League din. Even now, he sounds like he is still tussling with the game's finer points. Not with his preferred style, though. That he is clear on. 'I always want my teams to play good football. Or to be able to play good football. I'm not talking about system. I want to put as many players who are good on the ball on the pitch at the same time. If my teams can be dangerous, then they have a chance. 'The rest is my job. To make that team defend. To make them solid, to make them organised and to make them run. 'That's what me and my assistants have tried to do all my career. When I was with Croatia, my midfield was Niko Kranjcar, Ivan Rakitic and Luka Modric, but with Niko Kovac (a more defensive midfielder) behind. 'At West Ham, the midfield was Dimitri Payet and Manuel Lanzini. Not one of them — both. It would be suicidal if you let them play without organisation and without responsibility. But that's my job. I'm going to convince them to do the dirty work and to enjoy it. Advertisement 'You have to be dangerous. It helps defensively, too, if you have more possession. And every player likes to be in a good environment like that. When you have players like Rakitic and Modric, or Payet, they make the less talented players around them better. They put them in better positions. They can help their confidence in important games and makes them better players. It's stops them shrinking. 'The way I think about football is that all of that is connected.' For Premier League fans, Bilic is entwined with Payet and a glorious run of form. The mercurial French midfielder was a riddle when he arrived at West Ham in 2015, but in Bilic's system, during the final season at Upton Park, he produced arguably the best football of his career and a highlight reel that never grows old. 'When a situation like that with Dimi happens,' Bilic says, 'you can easily think, 'Oh, this is me and nobody has ever thought of doing this or that before'. And I'm not underestimating myself, I was a part of it, but he was like a surfer catching a wave at the right time. 'A few weeks before he joined us, his wife gave birth to their third son, so it was probably a very good atmosphere at home. And then he came to a club like West Ham, where they were chanting his name, he jumped on that wave and stayed there. 'Our first away game was against Arsenal. We won 2-0. Our second away game was Liverpool. We beat them 3-0. Third away game: Manchester City — we beat them 2-1. All with him starring and, suddenly, there was talk about him getting a call-up to the French national team. It all helped and he never looked back. 'Maybe that all started with his good situation at home? But I've had the opposite, too. Where me and my staff have spent hours and hours talking, thinking and analysing, trying to work out why a player has had a dip, and not being able to find a reason. And then I would find out later about big issues off the pitch. 'Sir Alex Ferguson used to know everything. He knew a player's parents, he knew their girlfriends, he knew everything about them. It's not like that as much anymore. Sometimes you find out things months later, that you had no idea of at the time.' Bilic is a positive coach. An optimistic one. Perhaps that is reflected best in his attitude towards young players and how to use them. 'I've never afraid to put young players in the team. That hasn't changed,' he says. 'I did it with Modric, I did it with Rakitic. I did with (Vedran) Corluka, Eduardo and Declan Rice. Or Grady Diangana, when he was on loan from West Ham (at West Brom). Advertisement 'I like young players because they are like sponges with information. Second, they are not afraid of making mistakes. They think positively. Always they think that the glass is half full. And they bring an energy that is unbelievable to a team and to training. 'But the game is like life. It lasts 90 minutes and during that time you have your crucial moments and your turbulence. But young players don't need older players' experience when everything is going well. But when they have conceded a goal or during a period when the opponent is better than them — when they get punched — that's when they need their safe houses. 'That's why ideally, if we talk about my time with national team, then yes you want Modric, Kranjcar and Rakitic, but also with Niko Kovac. The metronome. The stable player who can help them when they need help on the pitch. The safe house.' This is the game through Slaven Bilic's eyes: football as life. It's not clear what's next yet. Nothing has grabbed him since Al Fateh and he wants to believe wholeheartedly in a project. Wherever that may be, attacking football will be at its heart and young players with their restless energy will be its soul. After 20 years, the sense of adventure in one of the game's great travellers is still what it has always been.
