“Growing up as a boy football supporter in the 1960s, I cannot remember coming across the term striker. Can anyone identify when or where this description of a goalscorer was first used?” asks Simon Warner.

It’s a good time for the question, with Erling Haaland and Darwin Núñez joining the Premier League this summer. Let’s start with the relevant part of the definition in the Collins online dictionary

An attacking player, esp one who generally positions himself or herself near the opponent’s goal in the hope of scoring

The position has been around since football began, but it seems – both anecdotally and through trawling the newspaper archives – that it didn’t really become commonplace unt…

The National Women’s Soccer League enters its 12th regular season this weekend, starting with an afternoon game in the midwest between Kansas City Current and the Portland Thorns. That marks the first match at CPKC Stadium, the NWSL’s first women’s soccer-specific venue, and the first purpose-built women’s sports stadium in the world. And that’s just one of a few exciting evolutions in the stateside game.

What’s new? This season starts with two new teams. The introduction of Bay FC and return of Utah Royals (back for the first time since 2020) brings the league total to 14.

With more teams comes more matches. Teams face the longest season in league history as they traverse the country playing 26 games. …

Before the kids get back to school, we’re grading the best in class at the trade deadline. Here are the top deals from the swap meet to end July, with an eye on impact potential for the final two months of the season.RHP Jack Flaherty, DodgersHe flopped as a deadline-deal acquisition last year with the Orioles, but the 28-year-old revitalized his career after signing a one-year deal with the Tigers, and the Dodgers will reap the benefits down the stretch and in the postseason. With several question marks regarding their rotation, the NL West leaders landed the best starting pitcher dealt at the deadline.It doesn’t mean the Dodgers will cruise to a World Series title, but this trade potentially sets them up with a formidable playoff rotation of Tyler Glasnow, Clayton Kershaw (or possi…

Gennady Golovkin easily dispatched his foe Daniel Geale Saturday night, bumping his record to 30-0 (27 by knockout) and retaining his WBA and IBO middleweight belts. No moment in the match better explains why the Kazakh fighter is boxing's scariest man alive
than the knockout punch itself: delivered off-balance and immediately following a solid right cross from Geale that found its target in the middle of Golovkin's face. We GIFed this right afterward
, but felt it deserved the full slow-mo treatment. Here you are. [HBO] This is a Deadspin Video, in which strange sports moments are slowed down to ridiculous speeds and matched with indie music. This video features " Death Ray" by Thebrotherkite. See previous episodes here. To contact the author of this…

As of this second, we are 122 days away from the 2015 Academy Awards, hosted by Neil Patrick Harris as Billy Crystal growls angrily in the corner and everyone tries real hard not to make a Renee Zellweger joke. That's a ludicrously long time from now, but there won't be a single moment between now and then in the world of movies that's not specifically focused on that date. In fact, you can make a strong argument it's been going on for a couple of months now. Almost every release, every interview, every TV appearance—it's all about that silly date 122 days from now.
The Academy Awards are dumb, of course, but they're the right kind of dumb: Stabs at quality work in the name of personal prestige and ego sometimes, as it turns out, end up actually creati…

With a score of -11 after the final day of play on Sunday, Tiger Woods earned himself a two-stroke win in the Tour Championship, the final individual tournament of this season’s PGA calendar. It was his first tournament win since the 2013 WGC-Bridgestone Invitational, with a lifetime’s worth of health problems and grim news in between. Tiger’s victory wasn’t especially dramatic, even though his lead shrunk as the day went on. More memorable than any particular shot he made was the sight when he approached the 18th green, as a massive number of fans trailed behind him to catch a glimpse of the winning putt. It’s been just 17 months since Woods had spinal fusion surgery, which was his fourth back surgery, and even more recently he was arrested for DUI and checked himself in…

This would seem to be University of Michigan president Mary Sue Coleman delivering a speech during halftime of yesterday's Wolverines game against Nebraska. She sounds HAMMERED. We hope that's the case, because usually in these instances it turns out the slurred speech is the result of a stroke or other medical emergency. But Coleman's not just slurring her words; she's doing the other typical drunk asshole things like shouting out the ends of sentences and repeating what she just said. We can't blame her, really; to put up with four quarters of watching that putrid UM offense we'd get wasted too. Were you in attendance? Have anything to add? Email us. Update (Nov. 11, 9:02 a.m.): Coleman claims she was thrown off by the reverberation. As noted in rep…

Nikola Jokic won a game at the buzzer for the Denver Nuggets last night, erasing what should have been an iconic, game-winning dunk from Luka Dončić with an objectively ugly fall-away jumper that somehow went in: This is sort of Jokic’s thing. That shot was his fourth game-winner of the season, and it looked a lot like those that preceded it. Some guys win games with daring, cinematic pull-up jumpers from behind the arc, or courageous drives into the teeth of the defense. Jokic wins them by just kind of oafishly moving towards the basket and then flicking his wrist in such a way that the ball finds an unlikely yet unstoppable path to the basket. He did it against the Heat: And the Grizzlies: And the Kings: And now the Mavericks. Athletes are impressive because they are able to…

data-mm-id=”_7w896knhu”>Anthony Davis has been phenomenal to open the 2019-20 season and his arrival has vaulted the Los Angeles Lakers to the top of the Western Conference. But it's not all sunshine and roses. Davis is dealing with a shoulder injury and if it gets worse, it could derail the Lakers' season.Davis' right shoulder has been bothering him for weeks and he tweaked it again on Sunday night against the Toronto Raptors. He has claimed there isn't a single play where he doesn't notice the shoulder pain and that's he's just playing through it. That's not good. It's clearly something that's not getting better. Through nine games this season, Davis has been flat out phenomenal. He's sixth in the NBA in scoring (26.6 points per …

data-mm-id=”_3zx4phofc”>Taysom Hill had a breakout season for the Saints, acting as their gimmicky Swiss army knife with blades that work at wide receiver, running back, quarterback and special teams. Apparently after that success, Hill now thinks he's morphed into a deadly machete capable of singlehandedly slicing and dicing up defenses from a singular position under center. Unfortunately for him and his bank account, he's wrong. After a season in which he completed all of three passes for the Saints, Hill, a restricted free agent, came out and said he views himself as a franchise quarterback and is willing to leave the Saints for the right opportunity. For a guy who will turn 30 before the season starts, and has thrown a total of zero touchdowns and one interception in his …