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Solskjaer Returns to Coaching With Turkish Side Besiktas

Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's last club coaching job was over three years ago at Manchester United - AFP
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's last club coaching job was over three years ago at Manchester United - AFP
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Solskjaer Returns to Coaching With Turkish Side Besiktas

Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's last club coaching job was over three years ago at Manchester United - AFP
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's last club coaching job was over three years ago at Manchester United - AFP

Former Manchester United boss Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, who has been out of a club coaching job for more than three years, has been appointed coach of Besiktas, the Turkish side announced on Saturday.

The 51-year-old Norwegian, who was axed by United in November 2021, takes over from Dutch coach Giovanni van Bronckhorst who was sacked by Besiktas at the end of November, AFP reported.

"A contract has been signed with Ole Gunnar Solskjaer... until the end of the 2025-2026 season, with the 2026-2027 season as an option," said the Istanbul-based side in a press release.

Solskjaer made over 200 appearances as a striker for United and was a member of their treble-winning side in 1998-99, scoring the winner against Bayern Munich in the Champions League final.

After his playing career he went into coaching, spending a long period with Norwegian side Molde before rejoining United in 2018.

He became a technical observer for UEFA after losing his job at Old Trafford.

Besiktas are currently sixth in the Turkish Super Lig, 21 points behind leaders Galatasaray and 12 behind second-placed Fenerbahce, coached by Jose Mourinho, whom Solskjaer succeeded in Manchester.

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Swiatek is in Total Control during a 6-1, 6-0 Rout of Raducanu

18 January 2025, Australia, Melbourne: Polish tennis player Iga Swiatek celebrates her victory over Britain's Emma Raducanu during their women's singles third round match of the Australian Open tennis tournament at Melbourne Park. Photo: Joel Carrett/AAP/dpa
18 January 2025, Australia, Melbourne: Polish tennis player Iga Swiatek celebrates her victory over Britain's Emma Raducanu during their women's singles third round match of the Australian Open tennis tournament at Melbourne Park. Photo: Joel Carrett/AAP/dpa
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Swiatek is in Total Control during a 6-1, 6-0 Rout of Raducanu

18 January 2025, Australia, Melbourne: Polish tennis player Iga Swiatek celebrates her victory over Britain's Emma Raducanu during their women's singles third round match of the Australian Open tennis tournament at Melbourne Park. Photo: Joel Carrett/AAP/dpa
18 January 2025, Australia, Melbourne: Polish tennis player Iga Swiatek celebrates her victory over Britain's Emma Raducanu during their women's singles third round match of the Australian Open tennis tournament at Melbourne Park. Photo: Joel Carrett/AAP/dpa

Everything came so easily for Iga Swiatek during a 6-1, 6-0 victory over Emma Raducanu on Saturday in the only Australian Open women's third-round match between two past Grand Slam champions — if you thought that meant it would be close, you'd have been rather wrong — that this was how she described it:
“I felt like the ball,” The Associated Press quoted Swiatek as saying, “is listening to me.”
Loud and clear. Asked to explain that sensation, Swiatek put her two index fingers a few inches apart and said, “It’s just being able to aim for this kind of space.” Then she spread her palms more than a foot apart to show that's the margin for error on other days.
The difference, she said, comes down to “being more precise and actually knowing where the ball is going to go, seeing the effects that you want it to.”
When the five-time major champion and former long-time No. 1-ranked woman — now No. 2, behind Aryna Sabalenka — is at the height of her powers, as she sure has seemed to be in Week 1 at Melbourne Park, it is hard for anyone to slow Swiatek down.
The heavy-spinning, high-bouncing forehands. The squeaky-sneaker scrambling to get to every shot. The terrific returning. And so on.
Against Raducanu, who won the 2021 US Open as a teenage qualifier, Swiatek played at a level she called “perfect.”
Indeed, Swiatek mounted a 24-9 edge in winners, made only 12 unforced errors — roughly half of Raducanu's 22 — and claimed 59 points to 29. That caused one spectator to yell out, “No mercy!” in the second set as Swiatek was reeling off the last 11 games after the match was tied at 1-all early with not a cloud in the sky and the temperature approaching 80 degrees Fahrenheit (above 25 Celsius).
“I think it was a little bit of her playing well, and me not playing so well,” Raducanu said. “That combination is probably not good.”
Swiatek, who agreed to accept a one-month suspension in a doping case late last year, owns four trophies from the French Open and one from the US Open. But she’s never been beyond the semifinals in Australia; she lost in that round to Danielle Collins in 2022.
A year ago, Swiatek was upset in the third round by teenager Linda Noskova.