Raúl González Blanco (born 27 June 1977 in Madrid, Spain), known simply as Raúl, is a Spanish footballer who plays as a striker. He currently plays for German club Schalke 04, in the Bundesliga. Raul has spent most of his career playing for Spanish club Real Madrid until 2010 and is the club’s all-time top goalscorer. Raúl is a three-time winner of the UEFA Champions League and has long been the competition’s all-time leading goal scorer. He left Real Madrid on the 25th July 2010, having scored 323 goals in 740 appearances. He is also the all-time top goalscorer for the Spanish national side.

Full name: Raúl González Blanco
Date of birth: 27 June 1977
Place of birth: Madrid, Spain
Height: 1.82 m
Playing position: Striker
Club Career: San Cristóbal de los Ángeles / Atlético Madrid / Real Madrid (Youth career) / 1994–2010 – Real Madrid – 550 – (228) / Schalke 04

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Adriano Correia Claro (born 26 October 1984), simply Adriano, is a Brazilian footballer currently playing for FC Barcelona in La Liga.

One of few players in the world who is genuinely two-footed, he is capable of playing as a defender,midfielder, or winger, on both sides of the pitch.

Full name: Adriano Correia Claro
Date of birth: 26 October 1984
Place of birth: Curitiba, Brazil
Height: 1.72 m
Playing position: Defender / Midfielder / Winger
Club career: Coritiba / Sevilla / Barcelona
National team: Brazil: 8 = (0)

Sevilla: Born in Curitiba, Paraná, Adriano started professionally for his hometown club, Coritiba Foot Ball Club, making his first team debuts at not yet 18. In January 2005, he joined Sevilla FC in a four 1/2-year deal, his La Liga debut arriving on the 29th, a 0–4 home loss against eventual champions FC Barcelona – the Andalusians did finish sixth and qualified for the UEFA Cup.

In the following seasons, Adriano continued to feature in several positions for Sevilla with equal success, as it won back-to-back UEFA Cups, with the player contributing with 25 matches and four goals in both editions combined. In the final of the latter edition, he opened the score against RCD Espanyol, in an eventual penalty shootout win; previously, in late September 2006, he had added a further five years to his link.

Adriano struggled with some injuries during the 2009–10 season, but still contributed with 27 games (no goals) as Sevilla finished fourth and returned to the UEFA Champions League.

Barcelona: On 16 July 2010, Adriano signed a 4+1 deal with Barcelona, for €9.5 million plus a conditional fee of €4; it also included a buyout clause of €90 million. He was awarded the #21 shirt, vacated by Ukrainian Dmytro Chygrynskiy, departed after just one season

Adriano Correia Video

Adriano Correia: Adriano scored the signature….

Barcelona, Sevilla player, Brazilian Adriano Correia was transferred. Barcelona Club, which can serve in the defense and midfield with 25-year-old Adriano has been told four-year contract.

Thierry Daniel Henry (born 17 August 1977) is a French professional footballer who plays for the New York Red Bulls in Major League Soccer.

Henry was born in Les Ulis, Essonne (a suburb of Paris) where he played for an array of local sides as a youngster and showed great promise as a goal-scorer. He was spotted by AS Monaco in 1990 and signed instantly, making his professional debut in 1994. Good form led to an international call-up in 1998, after which he signed for the Serie A defending champions Juventus. He had a disappointing season playing on the wing, before joining Arsenal for £10.5 million in 1999.

Full name: Thierry Daniel Henry
Date of birth: 17 August 1977
Place of birth: Les Ulis, Essonne, France
Height: 1.88 m
Playing position: Striker/Winger
Club career: CO Les Ulis / US Palaiseau / Viry-Châtillon / Clairefontaine / Monaco / Juventus / Arsenal / Barcelona / New York Red Bulls
National team: France U20 – 5 – (5) / France – 123 – (51) (1997 – 2010)

It was at Arsenal that Henry made his name as a world-class footballer. Despite initially struggling in the Premier League, he emerged as Arsenal’s top goal-scorer for almost every season of his tenure there. Under long-time mentor and coach Arsène Wenger, Henry became a prolific striker and Arsenal’s all-time leading scorer with 226 goals in all competitions. The Frenchman won two league titles and three FA Cups with the Gunners; he was nominated for the FIFA World Player of the Year twice, was named the PFA Players’ Player of the Year twice, and the Football Writers’ Association Footballer of the Year three times. Henry spent his final two seasons with Arsenal as club captain, leading them to the UEFA Champions League final in 2006. In June 2007, after eight years with Arsenal, he transferred to Barcelona for a fee of €24 million. His first honours with the Catalan club came in 2009 when they won the league, cup and Champions League treble. He went on to achieve an unprecedented sextuple by also winning the Spanish Supercup, the UEFA Supercup and the Club World Cup. In total, Henry has been named in the UEFA Team of the Year five times. He joined MLS side New York Red Bulls in 2010.

Henry has enjoyed similar success with the French national squad, having won the 1998 World Cup, Euro 2000 and 2003 FIFA Confederations Cup. In October 2007, he surpassed Michel Platini’s record to become France’s top goal-scorer of all time. Off the pitch, as a result of his own experience, Henry is an active spokesperson against racism in football. He married English model Nicole Merry in 2003 and had a daughter with her, but they divorced in 2007. Henry is also one of the top commercially marketed footballers; he was ranked ninth in the world in 2006.

International career: Henry has had a successful career with the France national team. His international career began in June 1997, when his good form for Monaco was rewarded with a call-up to the Under-20 French national team, where he played in the 1997 FIFA World Youth Championship alongside future teammates William Gallas and David Trézéguet. Within four months, France head coach Aimé Jacquet called Henry up to the senior team. The 20-year-old made his senior international debut on 11 October 1997 in a 2–1 win against South Africa. Jacquet was so impressed with Henry that he took him to the 1998 World Cup. Although Henry was a largely unknown quantity at international level, he ended the tournament as France’s top scorer with three goals. He was scheduled to appear as a substitute in the final, where France beat Brazil 3–0, but Marcel Desailly’s sending off forced a defensive change instead. In 1998, he was made Chevalier (Knight) of the Légion d’honneur, France’s highest decoration.

Henry was a member of France’s Euro 2000 championship squad, again scoring three goals in the tournament, including the equalizer against Portugal in the semi-final, and finishing as the country’s top scorer.France later won the game in extra time following a converted penalty kick by Zinédine Zidane. France went on to defeat Italy in extra time in the final, earning Henry his second major international medal. During the tournament, Henry was voted man-of-the-match in three games, including the final against Italy.

The 2002 FIFA World Cup featured a stunning early exit for both Henry and France as the defending champions were eliminated in the group stage after failing to score a goal in all three games.France lost their first match in group play and Henry was red carded for a dangerous sliding challenge in their next match against Uruguay. In that game, France played to a 0–0 draw, but Henry was forced to miss the final match due to suspension; France lost 2–0 to Denmark.

Henry returned to form for his country at the 2003 Confederations Cup. Despite playing without team stalwarts Zidane and Patrick Vieira, France won, in large part owing to Henry’s outstanding play, for which he was named Man of the Match by FIFA’s Technical Study Group in three of France’s five matches. In the final, he scored the golden goal in extra time to lift the title for the host country after a 1–0 victory over Cameroon. Henry was awarded both the adidas Golden Ball as the outstanding player of the competition and the adidas Golden Shoe as the tournament’s top goal-scorer with four goals.

In Euro 2004, Henry played in all of France’s matches and scored two goals.France beat England in the group stages but lost to the eventual winners Greece 1–0 in the quarter-finals.During the 2006 FIFA World Cup Henry remained as one of the automatic starters in the squad. He played as a lone striker, but despite an indifferent start to the tournament, became one of the top players of the World Cup. He scored three goals, including the winning goal from Zidane’s free kick against defending champions Brazil. However, France subsequently lost to Italy on penalties (5–3) in the final. Henry did not take part in the penalty shootout, having been substituted in extra time after his legs had cramped. Henry was one of 10 nominees for the Golden Ball award for Player of the Tournament, an award which was ultimately presented to his teammate, Zidane and was named a starting striker on the 2006 FIFPro World XI team.

On 13 October 2007, Henry scored his 41st goal against the Faroe Islands, joining Michel Platini as the country’s top goal-scorer of all time. Four days later at the Stade de la Beaujoire, he scored a late double against Lithuania, thereby setting a new record as France’s top goal-scorer. On 3 June 2008, Henry made his 100th appearance for national team in match against Colombia, becoming the sixth French player ever to reach that milestone.

Henry missed the opening game of France’s short-lived Euro 2008 campaign, where they were eliminated in the group stages after being grouped together with Italy, the Netherlands and Romania. He scored France’s only goal in the competition in a 4–1 loss to the Netherlands.

The French team struggled during the 2010 World Cup qualifiers and finished second in their group behind Serbia. During the playoffs against Ireland, Henry was involved in a controversy in the second leg of the game at the Stade de France on 18 November 2009. With the aggregate score tied at 1–1 and the game in extra time, he used his hand twice to control the ball before delivering a cross to William Gallas who scored the winner. This sparked a barrage of criticism against the Frenchman, while national team coach Raymond Domenech and Arsenal manager Arsène Wenger defended him.The Football Association of Ireland lodged a formal complaint with FIFA, seeking a replay of the game, which FIFA declined.Henry said that he contemplated retiring from international football after the reactions to the incident,but maintained that he was not a “cheat”; hours after FIFA had ruled out a replay, he stated that “the fairest solution would be to replay the game”.FIFA President Sepp Blatter described the incident as “blatant unfair play” and announced an inquiry into how such incidents could be avoided in future, and added that the incident would be investigated by the Disciplinary Committee.Blatter also said Henry told him that his family had been threatened in the aftermath of the incident.In January 2010, FIFA announced that there was no legal basis to sanction Henry.

Henry did not feature in the starting line-up for France at the 2010 World Cup. France drew in their first game against Uruguay, and lost 2–0 in their second against Mexico. The team was thrown into disarray when Nicolas Anelka was expelled from the team, and captain Patrice Evra led a team protest by refusing to train.In the final group game against host-nation South Africa in which Henry came on as a second-half substitute, France lost 2–1 and were eliminated from the tournament. He then announced his retirement from international football, having won 123 caps and scored 51 goals for Les Bleus.

Thierry Henry: Henry had quit the National Team

French striker Thierry Henry has left the national team...

Contract with Barcelona after the end of the New York Red Bulls of the U.S. team was transferred to Henry, attended the press conference before the new form, leaving the national team said. France’s 1998 World Cup, European Championship winning team in 2000 in Henry, outside Barcelona, Monaco, Juventus and Arsenal played.

Henry, who played 124 times at the French national team, scored 51 goals the most in the national team players have won the title.

Thierry Henry joins the New York Red Bulls Video

Thierry Henry – France vs Ireland Handball Goal Video

Thierry Henry Legend All Arsenal Goals

Wimbledon 2010: Anna Kournikova and Martina Hingis lend some spice to Court Two

Court Two has long been Wimbledon’s best kept secret, a modest but beautiful arena slightly away from the madding crowd that bakes slowly in the sun from dawn to dusk and all its slumbering inhabitants likewise.

Anna Kournikova – Martina Hingis Wimbledon 2010 Video

That was until Tuesday evening, anyway, when the self-styled Spice Girls – the still youthful but long retired Anna Kournikova and the perennially “re-emerging” Martina Hingis – decided it was time for one last revival “gig” before going their separate ways. Veterans of 29, they have both admittedly squeezed in a couple of lives apiece in they contemplate the horror of 30th birthdays.

The Invitation Doubles conveniently caters for such romps down memory lane and Britain’s Ann Hobbs and Sam Smith were the perfect sidekicks, in no way attempting to share the limelight but providing enough oppspositon to see one “great” and one very fine woman’s tennis player to best effect as they moved to a 6-2, 6-4 win.

The Wimbledon blazers, who weren’t born yesterday and have forgotten more about putting on a show than we will ever know, teasingly scheduled the match as fourth on Court Two and you could see one or two dejected males adopting a position of prayer mid-morning as the rain lingered and a full day’s play seemed unlikely. So near and yet so far.

Mercifully the sun came out and the punters politely, but with a tangible impatience, willed the three ’undercard’ games to finish in straight sets so the main act could take centre stage. The massed ranks of photographers cursed audibly about “losing the light”, but then again they start piping up with that one soon after breakfast.

“Come on the grannies” shouted a deeply ironic voice early in the first set. “Come on England,” responded a deluded man in a Wayne Rooney shirt. Play was light-hearted but high quality and the Spice Girls seemed to have a ball, applauding their opponents’ occasional winners even louder than the home crowd.

Hingis was the Singles champion here in 1997 and a seven time Grand Slam champion although on the evidence or her performance recently in Strictly Come Dancing not on account of her dodgy footwork.

She was the first to be eliminated and even the kindly ’Head Judge Len’ struggled to find anything encouraging to say. Could the eyesight be going as well? One of her challenges last night was out by a yard, or perhaps she was gently showboating, something she never did as a stellar player.

A teenage prodigy who kept going, yesterday was her first appearance at Wimbledon since she tested positive for cocaine here three years ago, a transgression which earned a two-year ban. All seemed forgiven – she remains the naughty but nice daughter most families have.

Kournikova was/ is a very fine doubles player – the dynamic duo twice won the Australian Open title – and once ranked eight in the singles but above all else she was the original attitudinal blonde bombshell from Russia. In her pomp she was the most googled sportstar on earth, Basketball superhero Michael Jordan trailing home a very distant second.

At one stage her earnings from endorsement and appearance money was nearly 20 times that which she accumulated in a season’s prize money.

Nice work if you can get it, although not a situation that always encouraged harmony among the WTA ranks. Hardly her fault though.

With Kournikova it was as if ‘tennis girl’ – normally reckoned to be the biggest selling poster in the world – had suddenly morphed into life and that the iconic blonde so cheekily scratching her derierre had stepped off the bedroom walls of schoolboy millions and straight onto centre court. A fantasy player of massive style and just enough substance.

For such a natural athlete Kournikova has suffered horribly from lower back and spinal injuries and she even picked up a nasty burst blister on her right hand last night.

She has been “retired” seven years now with a litany of back injuries.

Money is no object, with pop god Enrique Iglesias as her steady squeeze in sunny Miami. Life is still sweet and she does more than her fair share of charity matches but, amid the laughter and the fun, you could also sense a little yearning for what might have been.

What this Spice Girl wants, what she really really wants, is to be fit and injury free like the golden teenager she once was.

Katy Perry and Anna Kournikova – Legs Cleavage: Here’s Anna Kournikova on the Graham Norton Show the other day giggling and laughing and teasing us with her tennis hottie cleavage. I’ve always loved her and the fact that Katy Perry is also on the show and I hardly even notice her hipster boobs because Anna is there stealing the spotlight, makes me love her even more. I don’t know who Graham Norton is, but he’s a lucky bastard for getting to snuggle on the couch with these two hotties.

Luis Alberto Suárez Díaz (born 24 January 1987 in Salto) is a Uruguayan footballer who currently plays as a striker for AFC Ajax, where he is captain, and for the Uruguayan national team.

Suárez grew up alongside seven brothers, with a single mother. He was a troublesome teenager, involved in drinking and partying, instead of focusing on football. At the age of 14, however, he was given an ultimatum by his youth team coach, and started to work hard in practice.

Full name: Luis Alberto Suárez Díaz
Date of birth: 24 January 1987
Place of birth: Salto, Uruguay
Height: 1.81 m
Playing position: Striker
Club career: Nacional / Groningen / Ajax

Suárez began his career at Nacional. He moved to Groningen in 2006, before transfering to Ajax in 2007. At Ajax he mainly played as a supporting striker with the main striker initially being Klaas-Jan Huntelaar and later Marko Pantelić. Following the arrival of manager Martin Jol at Ajax in 2009, Suárez was made the club captain following the departure of Thomas Vermaelen. In 2010, Suárez was named Dutch Footballer of the Year, having ended the season as top scorer in the league with 35 goals (49 goals in all competitions).

Luis Suarez Videos

Luis Suarez TV ADS Videos

2010 FIFA World Cup: On 2 July 2010, during the quarter final match against Ghana, Suárez intentionally handled the ball on the line in the last minute of extra-time and denied Ghana a goal that would have won them the game.He was subsequently given a direct red card and sent off the field. The resulting penalty was however missed by Asamoah Gyan and Uruguay went on to win 4–2 in the shootout and progress to the semi-final. His subsequent boasting about manipulating the rules of the game to keep Ghana out of a semi-final appearance has made him seem to be an international villain to some partisans. He was quoted saying “I think I made the best save of the tournament” and was seen cheering when Gyan’s penalty hit the crossbar.Due to this, he was audibly booed by members of the crowd each time he touched the ball in his next appearance, the 3rd place game of the World Cup 2010 against Germany. However, some football commentators point out that because Suarez intentionally committed an illegal act to deny the opposing team an obvious goal, he compromised the sporting integrity of the match itself, thereby cheating the game of football.Others have explained the booing as mainly a reaction to the elevation to hero status of Suarez by Uruguay’s fans.

Diego Alfredo Lugano Moreno (born November 2, 1980 in Canelones) is a Uruguayan international football central defender who currently plays for Fenerbahçe in the Turkish Super League. He has previously played for Plaza Colonia, Nacional and São Paulo. He is also captain of the Uruguayan national football team. He was selected the best captain in Fifa World Cup 2010…

Diego Lugano Profile

Full name: Diego Alfredo Lugano Moreno
Date of birth: November 2, 1980
Place of birth: Canelones, Uruguay
Height: 1.88 m
Playing position: Centre back
Club career: Nacional / Plaza Colonia / São Paulo / Fenerbahçe

Diego Lugano (The Mad) Video

Fenerbahçe SK: He joined Fenerbahçe on 21 August 2006 for 7,5 M € and signed 4 years contract. He and former teammate Edu Dracena’s powerful defensive abilities helped Fenerbahçe’s 100th anniversary year championship. He is notorious for his presence in the attack, as shown in many games with his current club Fenerbahçe, having scored goals with headers from dead ball situations and even supported the forward line unexpectedly. He became a fan favorite with his brave and warrior soul in defence and spectacular dead ball goals for Fenerbahçe fans. Fans calls him TOTA with the words as Talento, Orgullo, Tecnico, Ambicion (Talent, Pride, Skillfulness, Ambition in Spanish). Following a red card, he was suspended for 5 weeks after the Galatasaray derby during the 2008–09 season when he beat Emre Aşık on 12 April 2009 in Ali Sami Yen Stadium. Since then he started a strong connection with supporters, especially the Genç Fenerbahçeliler (Young Fenerbahce).

He signed another 4 years contract in 2009 with Fenerbahce…

Diego Lugano Fight (Galatasaray v Fenerbahce 12/04/2009) Video