Germany and Real Madrid Great Toni Kroos to Retire After Euro 2024 

Football - Champions League - Real Madrid Press Conference - Ciudad Real Madrid, Valdebebas, Madrid, Spain - May 8, 2023 Real Madrid's Toni Kroos during the press conference. (Reuters)
Football - Champions League - Real Madrid Press Conference - Ciudad Real Madrid, Valdebebas, Madrid, Spain - May 8, 2023 Real Madrid's Toni Kroos during the press conference. (Reuters)
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Germany and Real Madrid Great Toni Kroos to Retire After Euro 2024 

Football - Champions League - Real Madrid Press Conference - Ciudad Real Madrid, Valdebebas, Madrid, Spain - May 8, 2023 Real Madrid's Toni Kroos during the press conference. (Reuters)
Football - Champions League - Real Madrid Press Conference - Ciudad Real Madrid, Valdebebas, Madrid, Spain - May 8, 2023 Real Madrid's Toni Kroos during the press conference. (Reuters)

Toni Kroos will retire from football after trying to give Real Madrid yet another Champions League trophy and lead Germany to the European Championship title at home.

The 34-year-old German midfielder said Tuesday it was a tough decision, but that the timing felt “somehow perfect."

“I always wanted to leave at the peak of my abilities and I know, and from a lot of examples you see, that it isn’t easy, that you can miss that point in time very quickly,” Kroos said on a podcast he hosts with his brother.

“I never wanted to have the feeling at the end that the club, the fans, the people around me would have to tell me, ‘That’s enough,’ or that I’d spend another two or three years sitting on the bench.”

Madrid thanked Kroos and hailed his achievements with the team.

“Real Madrid would like to express its gratitude and affection to Toni Kroos, a player who will go down in Real Madrid history as one of our club and international football’s greatest legends,” the club said.

Kroos was a World Cup champion with Germany in 2014 in Brazil, and had a successful career with Bayern Munich as well, helping it win one Champions League and three German league titles.

Madrid will face Borussia Dortmund in the Champions League final on June 1 in London. His European trophies with Madrid came in 2016, 2017, 2018 and 2022. He won the Champions League with Bayern in 2013.

Kroos has been with Madrid since 2014, helping it win 22 titles, including four European Cups and four Spanish leagues. He made 463 appearances with the club, which called the midfielder “a key player in one of the most successful periods of Real Madrid’s 122-year history.”

“Toni Kroos is one of the great players in Real Madrid history and this club will always be his home,” club president Florentino Pérez said.

Madrid said Kroos will remain forever in the hearts of every fan “thanks to his mastery of the game and the fact he has given his all for our jersey, a steadfast example of the values of Real Madrid.”

Kroos' contract with Madrid was expiring at the end of this season and the club and the player had reportedly been negotiating an extension.

Kroos said in February he agreed to play for Germany at Euro 2024 after a request from coach Julian Nagelsmann. He has not played for the national team in almost three years, since Germany’s loss to England in the second round of the last European Championship.

Kroos was named last week in Germany's preliminary squad for the tournament.

He had said a few months ago that he didn't know what would happen next season.

“I thought it over for a really long time and in the last few days I’ve reached the conclusion that this season, this wonderful season, the 10th season with Real, is also my last season with Real,” Kroos said Tuesday.

“And anyone who has paid attention when listening to me over the last few months or years will have heard the sentence at one time or other that the only option for me was to end my career at Real Madrid. And if you can put one and one together, you know that my last season with Real means it's over this summer. No more Real, no more football.”



Flawless Oscar, Max Flounders: Bahrain Grand Prix Talking Points 

McLaren driver Oscar Piastri of Australia in action during the the Formula One Bahrain Grand Prix, in Sakhir, Sunday, April 13, 2025. (AP)
McLaren driver Oscar Piastri of Australia in action during the the Formula One Bahrain Grand Prix, in Sakhir, Sunday, April 13, 2025. (AP)
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Flawless Oscar, Max Flounders: Bahrain Grand Prix Talking Points 

McLaren driver Oscar Piastri of Australia in action during the the Formula One Bahrain Grand Prix, in Sakhir, Sunday, April 13, 2025. (AP)
McLaren driver Oscar Piastri of Australia in action during the the Formula One Bahrain Grand Prix, in Sakhir, Sunday, April 13, 2025. (AP)

Oscar Piastri produced a command performance on Sunday to deliver McLaren's first win at the Bahrain Grand Prix since the nocturnal desert dust-up joined the Formula One calendar in 2004.

The Australian crossed the line in Sakhir over 15 seconds clear of Mercedes' George Russell to move second behind teammate Lando Norris in the drivers' standings.

Norris completed the podium to take a three-point lead into next Sunday's race in Jeddah.

AFP Sport looks at three talking points from the fourth round of the season:

Oscar Piastri shone brightest under the floodlights in Bahrain to enhance his standing as a potential world champion.

Cool, calm and collected, nothing seems to faze the 24-year-old Australian.

As McLaren team principal Andrea Stella succinctly remarked: "There's no noise in Oscar's head".

Brushing off the misfortune of a late run off in the season-opener in Melbourne that dropped him back from second to ninth he regrouped to win in China, take third in Japan, and win from pole in Bahrain.

"I'm very proud of the team, proud of myself, and excited for next week," he said after his fourth career win.

Piastri's persona is poles apart from that of the man on the other side of the McLaren garage, Lando Norris.

The Briton wears his heart on his sleeve, is intensely self-critical, and left Bahrain searching for answers to regain his and his car's mojo.

"I'm not confident, I'm not comfortable, I know what I can achieve, it's not gone, I've not lost it, but things aren't clicking. I've got to look at why but that's proving not to be easy."

Red Bull picked up their first double points of the season in Sakhir, with Max Verstappen sixth and his new teammate Yuki Tsunoda ninth.

But that was small consolation for a team in trouble and desperately searching for answers to solve issues with their problematic 2025 car.

Team principal Christian Horner was frank about the situation when he met the media in the team's hospitality tent after the race.

"Look, it was a bad weekend.

"It's a 24-race championship, we're eight points behind in the drivers' championship, and we know we need to make progress very quickly."

With Verstappen slipping to third in the drivers' standings his quest for a fifth successive title, a feat only achieved by Michael Schumacher, looks in danger.

"Everything went wrong, poor start, wheel spin, same problems in qualification, hard tires didn't work, I was last after the second pit stop," remarked Verstappen.

"Considering everything to finish sixth was alright.

"It's not what we want, but it's where we are at.

"It's tough, got to hang on to improve the situation -- hopefully we can improve soon," added the downbeat Dutchman.

Arguably the driver of the day was George Russell.

His Mercedes was doing everything it could in the closing stages to sabotage his race.

He found himself having to multi-task at high speed trying to sort out a litany of electronic issues -- at one stage he pressed the team radio button only to engage DRS (drag reduction system).

All that as he was fending off Norris.

After surviving a steward's inquiry over the DRS incident which carried with it the threat of a five-second penalty Russell's runner-up spot maintained his best ever start to a season with his third podium finish.

"I'm mega happy, the last 10 laps were exceptionally difficult," said the man who has seamlessly taken over the role of team leader at the Silver Arrows after Lewis Hamilton's move to Ferrari.

Hamilton's replacement Kimi Antonelli was going well until undone by the late safety car to finish just outside the points in a race which will serve as a valuable learning exercise for the brilliant young Italian rookie.