Real Madrid captain Luka Modric reveals he will leave the Spanish giants after the end of their Club World Cup campaign this summer.

Insults were directed towards Brazilian in December 2022 La Liga hails judgment as ‘unprecedented milestone’ Luka Modric to leave Real Madrid after Club World Cup Five Valladolid fans who abused the Real Madrid forward Vinícius Júnior have been given suspended prison sentences, in what La Liga described as a landmark ruling that condemned racist insults hurled in a football stadium as a hate crime. The case goes back to Madrid’s 2-0 win in December 2022 at Real Valladolid’s José Zorrilla stadium, during which several fans hurled racist abuse at the Brazilian. The individuals were later identified using images and videos published on social media. Continue reading...

The Ballon d’Or winner has set his sights on helping the club grow, offering his expertise and pulling power It was the transfer nobody saw coming: Luka Modric to Swansea City, not joining as a player but a minority stakeholder. The most decorated player in Real Madrid’s history, a six-time Champions League winner and one of the greatest midfielders of his generation pitching up as a co-owner at a mid-table Championship club was certainly an unforeseen end-of-season development. A Ballon d’Or winner and Bernabéu star walking into the Swansea boardroom or exploring the Mumbles? The sight of Modric cradling a Swansea-branded football in the accompanying press release prompted a few double-takes and sent a jolt across the game. “Hi Swansea fans, I’m Luka Modric and I’m excited to be part of the journey,” came his message. The 39-year-old Croatia captain may be in the twilight of his career but Swansea hope those words mark just the start of his involvement. “My goal is to support the club’s growth in a positive way and to help to build an exciting future.” Continue reading...

Real Madrid could not live with his relentlessness but how will Rice fare against João Neves, Fabián Ruiz and Vitinha? Declan Rice went into Arsenal’s Champions League quarter‑final against Real Madrid knowing it was a chance to go to another level. Rise to the occasion against the kings of Europe and people would see the midfielder in a different light. Remember the boy who was kicked out of Chelsea at 14? The tearful one who travelled across London for a trial at West Ham, went on to captain them to their first trophy in 43 years, and left for £105m? Well, the thing you need to know about him is that he has never been afraid to meet a challenge head on and make people think twice about questioning his talent. So Rice backed himself when he faced Madrid and left Jude Bellingham, Eduardo Camavinga, Luka Modric and Aurélien Tchouaméni in the shade by producing man-of-the-match displays in both legs. He drove Arsenal on, powering them forward, bending the tie to his will. Madrid, the reigning European champions, could not live with his relentlessness. There was hype around Rice’s duel with Bellingham, but it did not live up to much. There was no debate about who dominated the battle between the two leaders of England’s midfield. Continue reading...

Following Luka Modric's investment in Swansea City, the BBC Sport's Ask Me Anything team looks into why more and more footballers are snubbing management.

With Luka Modric investing in Swansea City, BBC Sport asks why? How did it happen? What will his role be? And what does it mean for the Welsh club?

Midfielder’s contract with Real ends in the summerMajor changes behind scenes at Championship club The Real Madrid midfielder Luka Modric is poised to acquire a minority stake in Swansea. The 39-year-old Croatia captain, who is out of contract at the end of the season, is close to making his first foray into football ownership. His motivations for joining the Swansea structure are unclear. Swansea are fronted by the American owners Andy Coleman, Brett Cravatt and Jason Cohen. Swansea are 12th in the Championship after a renaissance under their caretaker head coach, Alan Sheehan, who succeeded Luke Williams in February. Swansea host Hull on Friday and have taken 17 points from nine matches under Sheehan. He is expected to be a leading candidate to take the job on a permanent basis. Continue reading...

Real Madrid and Croatia legend Luka Modric is set to take a minority ownership stake in Swansea City.

Jude Bellingham was not shocked by Madrid’s display after a campaign littered with defeats and tactical muddle On the way out of the Emirates, someone asked Kylian Mbappé whether Real Madrid could still do this. “Course we can,” he replied, three words and then he was gone. In front of him, Vinícius Júnior left in silence. Rodrygo passed by unnoticed again. Luka Modric didn’t talk, nor did Fede Valverde. Lucas Vázquez and Raúl Asencio did, then Thibaut Courtois and Jude Bellingham. “We weren’t good,” Vázquez admitted. “We forgot to play well,” Courtois said. “It’s not what what we expected,” Asencio said, but it wasn’t unexpected either, which is why it was the description Bellingham didn’t use which said it best. Asked whether he was shocked, Bellingham said: “I don’t know if ‘shocked’ is the right word.” No one who has watched them all year could have truly been shocked by this, except that they’re Real Madrid, stupid, and somehow Real Madrid always seem to find a way. “There is nothing we can draw from external excuses or anything like that; we have to look at ourselves,” Bellingham said. “These are similar sets of themes to when we have dropped points all season. It’s happened again tonight on a larger scale.” Continue reading...

El clásico kicks off at 8pm (BST) at the Santiago BernabéuReal Madrid and Barça meet in clásico like those of oldShare your thoughts with Scott via email “These two might, just might, actually be the best teams in Europe again; this could be a battle the way it used to be, closer and more competitive than anyone anticipated … a clash of styles and identities … a clash of titans.” Allow the good doctor to set the scene. The reigning champions Real Madrid are without Rodrygo and Thibaut Courtois, both of whom are injured. They’re two of three changes to their starting XI after the 5-2 comeback win over Borussia Dortmund, with club captain Luka Modrić dropping to the bench; Aurélien Tchouaméni and Eduardo Camavinga step into the midfield, while Andriy Lunin is in goal. Continue reading...

It’s not the moments or the music, the joy in how he plays. It’s something simpler with ‘the eternal solution’ Ferenc Puskas played pregnant, teammate Amancio Amaro liked to say. The day he arrived at Real Madrid in 1958, he was 31 years old, 18kg overweight and, banned by Fifa for defecting after the Hungarian uprising, hadn’t played football for two years. He couldn’t possibly go on a pitch like this: signing me is all well and good, he told the club’s president Santiago Bernabéu, but have you seen me? “I was the size of a large balloon,” he recalled and the coach, Luis Carniglia, didn’t know what to do with him either. That, Bernabéu replied, was their problem not his. As it turned out, blessed with a left foot like no other, 242 goals followed, the only problem that he hadn’t come sooner. Most called him Cañoncito pum! (Little Cannon Bang!), although Alfredo Di Stéfano called him little cannon big belly. That summer Puskas trained wrapped in plastic and woolly jumpers. By the season’s end, he had scored the goal that took Real Madrid to the European Cup final; a year on, he scored four in the final but gave Erwin Stein the match ball. Old when he came, supposedly finished, he helped Madrid reach three more. He scored a hat-trick in 1962 and played in 1964 but when the 1966 final arrived, eight years after he had, it was over. Left behind while they travelled to Brussels, he was in a makeshift cup team facing Betis three days before and 1,000 miles south. Continue reading...

Composed midfielder demonstrated the ability to do the right thing again and again that is vital to his position The English Toni Kroos does not exist. Nor does the English Andrea Pirlo, the English Luka Modric, the English Rodri. Instinctively, everybody knows this. England doesn’t have earthquakes, England doesn’t grow citrus fruit and England doesn’t produce technical central midfielders who can control a game and dictate the tempo of play. That’s just the way it is. And so on a clear and bracing Helsinki night, into this paradox steps Angel Gomes. Paradoxical because in many ways the player Gomes is trying to be, the role he is being fitted for, is something that doesn’t actually exist. Naturally, because football fans are impatient and adore the dopamine rush of making instant sweeping judgments, the impulse is to measure him against this stratospheric, borderline-impossible standard. He’s either the English Pirlo. Or he isn’t. Good luck. Continue reading...

Croatia’s and Portugal’s greatest face each other in Lisbon with neither yet ready to tear himself away from international football People have been trying to retire Luka Modric for more than six years. It was in the aftermath of the 2018 World Cup that friends first gently began to broach the subject: his contemporaries Mario Mandzukic and Vedran Corluka had called it a day after Croatia’s defeat in the final, and Modric himself knew there would be a certain elegiac poetry in taking his curtain call at the moment of his country’s greatest achievement. Plaudits ringing in his ears, the Golden Ball in his grasp. Leave them wanting more, and all that. But still, something in him rebelled. “My heart told me to stay,” he later wrote in his autobiography. “Playing for your national team is one of the most fulfilling experiences; I still want to feel it. I feel fit and motivated. It’s true that retiring after the silver medal in Russia would have left the biggest impression. But I don’t care much about impressions.” Continue reading...

Our picture editor, Jonny Weeks, chooses his favourite images from Germany including a distraught Luka Modric and delighted Jordan Pickford Continue reading...