Former Wales striker Bellamy, who was appointed national boss in July 2024, faced criticism from some fans after holding talks over a potential move to Burnley in June.
In a lengthy news conference after the Norway triumph, he said he feels people “could be kinder to each other” after revealing the negativity aimed at him had also affected his family.
“It’s not me but I have kids and a wife; it’s for them – they see it,” he said.
“I’ve lived in this environment and I had it as a player, but I think there’s ways we can speak to people, and just because it’s the game we love, it doesn’t give us the right to think we can say whatever we want to.
“We’re such a small country, I’m like… why can’t we have each other’s backs? Why don’t we look after each other more? Maybe that’s me.
“I’m not saying everyone’s above criticism, far from it. But I think it’s too easy, and we’re too quick.”
NEW YORK: Family was at the heart of Alexander Zverev’s US Open triumph on Sunday as the German saluted the members of his inner circle and paid a heartfelt tribute to his mother for refusing to let diabetes define his future.
The top seed beat American Ben Shelton 6-3 7-6(2) 5-7 6-2 at Flushing Meadows to finish a spectacular year at the Grand Slams in which he proved his doubters wrong by going from perennial nearly man to two-time major champion.
Shortly after his victory, Zverev reserved special praise for his mother Irina, a former professional tennis player, and credited her with ensuring type 1 diabetes never limited his ambitions in life.
“When your 4-year-old son is diagnosed with diabetes and doctors in the office tell you that life and sports will be very limited for that child, it takes a very strong mother to say ‘my son will be whatever he wants to be’,” Zverev said.
“’If he wants to be a tennis player, he’ll be a tennis player. If he wants to do something else, he’ll do something else, but this illness will not define us’.
“I’m happy that we worked through it and we’re doing the things that we’re doing now. My mother is the most important and strongest person I know because it takes an unbelievably strong woman to do what she did.”
The 29-year-old thanked his team, which includes his father Alexander Zverev Sr and his brother Mischa, for their hard work that had delivered him another Grand Slam trophy to add to his Olympic gold medal from the Tokyo Games five years ago.
“We went almost 30 years without winning a Grand Slam title and now we’ve won two in a span of three months,” Zverev said.
“I think God has seen how hard we’ve worked, how much we’ve suffered, how much pain we went through and I think that 2026 is the outcome of all the years that happened before.”
SCARS OF 2020
Zverev had come agonizingly close to capturing his maiden Grand Slam title in New York in 2020, leading Dominic Thiem by two sets to none and later serving for the match in the fifth set before losing.
He finally won his first major crown at this year’s French Open after defeating Flavio Cobolli in five sets, and the German doubled his tally in New York despite making a shaky start to the fortnight.
He also reached the Wimbledon final this year, falling to Jannik Sinner in four sets.
“The scars of the 2020 (US Open) final, they disappeared after I won in Paris. I said at Wimbledon, though I lost in the final, I enjoyed the match … enjoyed playing on Center Court in front of an amazing crowd,” Zverev said.
“Before winning in Paris, I felt a lot of stress all the time, because there was always a question mark. ‘Will I ever win one?’ Now it’s more of a joy to play those kinds of finals.”
With Sinner sidelined by a knee injury and Carlos Alcaraz having just returned from a wrist problem, Zverev reluctantly accepted that he was the man to beat in men’s tennis after a strong finish to the Grand Slam season.
“Four or five months ago, when both of them were healthy, I wasn’t. I was losing to Jannik all the time,” he added.
“So if everyone is healthy, Jannik is still ahead. It’s as simple as that.”
Tehran, Iran – Iranian authorities and state media have praised the Houthis’ capture of Yemen’s Red Sea coast, which some see as giving Tehran more leverage against the United States.
The Houthis, a political and armed group dominated by Zaidi Shia Muslims, have been fighting against the Western-backed Yemeni government since capturing the capital, Sanaa, in 2014.
The Houthis captured a series of Red Sea coastal cities and islands this week, essentially giving them control over the vital Bab al-Mandeb strait.
The Iran-allied group’s recent victories have been praised in Iran, and are viewed by some as part of Tehran’s wider war against the US, ongoing since February 28.
“The victories of Yemen’s Ansar Allah in the western coast is a narrative of a divine triumph and the fruit of years of steadfastness in the most difficult of battlefields,” Hossein Mohebbi, spokesman of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), wrote on X on Saturday.
Amid the Houthis’ recent battlefield wins against the fragmented Saudi-backed forces, senior Iranian officials have cheered their Yemeni allies on.
The Houthis’ capture of the port city of Mocha on Friday delivered a huge blow for the Yemeni government, which now has no direct access to the Red Sea.
Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Iranian parliament speaker and chief negotiator with Washington, reposted a comment made by slain Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in 2024, saying the “resistance” of the Houthis will inevitably lead to victory.
“The brave Yemeni people will certainly triumph, by permission of God Almighty,” Ghalibaf added on Thursday, in Arabic.
Iran’s First Vice President Mohammad Reza Aref said the government is happy with the Houthi advances, and urged leaders in the region to pursue “the rationality of liberation from dependency [from the US and the West], and unity under the banner of Islam”.
The “grand victory” of the Houthis once again proved that “security is not a commodity that can be bought,” added Mohammad Mokhber, an adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei.
A man reads a local newspaper featuring news of the escalating fighting in the country, in Sanaa, Yemen, September 11, 2026. Yemen’s Houthi group said navigation in the Red Sea and Bab al-Mandeb strait remained safe except for Saudi vessels, which it says remain subject to a blockade, after seizing the port city of Mocha on September 10 and making further gains around the strategic strait the following day [Yahya Arhab/EPA]
How could this benefit Iran?
The Houthis began to attack several vessels in the Red Sea they claimed were linked to Israel in 2023, as part of their stated aim to pressure Israel to end the genocidal war on Gaza.
This prompted bombing campaigns by the US, United Kingdom and Israel against Houthi positions in Sanaa, Hodeidah and other areas.
Saudi Arabia, which joined the war against the Houthis in 2015, has largely stayed out of the current eruption in fighting in Yemen.
After their recent victories, the Yemeni group can now exercise more control over the Red Sea and the Bab al-Mandeb strait.
The Houthis’ control of Yemen’s Red Sea coastline and multiple islands – including the island of Mayun, also known as Perim, sitting about 3km (1.9 miles) off Yemen’s mainland – provides the group with close-range access to the Bab al-Mandeb strait.
A video published on Friday showed a Houthi commander telling soldiers they will no longer need missiles and drones to threaten shipping in the crucial waterway. They could simply position artillery along the coast and fire in all directions at ships, he said.
The Houthis have not declared the strait closed, but the group’s military spokesperson, Yahya Saree, said on Friday that “maritime navigation is safe for all companies except for Saudi vessels.”
Likewise, Iran’s partial control of the Strait of Hormuz on the other side of the Arabian Peninsula has been a key tool of leverage for Tehran in the war against the US.
The prospect of closing down the strait could potentially be used by Tehran in future negotiations over ending the war with the US.
Iranian officials are expected to meet regional Arab representatives on Monday for talks over how to facilitate shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, which Tehran maintains remains closed.
They have said they favour a collective regional approach on passage through the strategic waterway.
A person watches Houthi military spokesman Yahya Saree delivering a televised statement, in Sanaa, Yemen, September 11, 2026 [Yahya Arhab/EPA]
The US, which has continued its naval blockade of Iran’s ports and intensified sanctions on Tehran, reportedly opposes the agreement.
Authorities in Tehran have signalled there will be no talks with Washington under the current circumstances.
“As long as the American side does not accept all of Iran’s conditions, dialogue and negotiation are of no use,” Ebrahim Azizi, head of the hardline Iranian parliament’s national security commission, wrote on X on Saturday.
‘Lord of the straits’
At the start of the working week in Iran on Saturday, hardline and IRGC-linked newspapers and media outlets celebrated the recent Houthi advances.
Keyhan, whose editor-in-chief was appointed by Ali Khamenei, called the advances “the miracle of resistance” and said they had “put the US and Israel in a bind”.
The Quds newspaper, published by the influential Astan-e Quds Razavi in Mashhad, called Iran and the Houthis “the lord of the straits”.
But even though Tehran has repeatedly threatened that Bab al-Mandeb could be further disrupted if the war continues, Iran’s diplomatic apparatus did not immediately link the Houthi advances with the current fight against the US.
As has often been the case, Iran’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs insisted that the Houthis make their decisions independent of Tehran, with their own interests at heart, including ending Saudi Arabia’s blockade on Yemen.
The Iranian Foreign Ministry also called for an end to the Saudi siege on Houthi-controlled areas, an immediate return to negotiations between the group and Riyadh, and respect for Yemen’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.
The ministry also pushed back on the idea that the Houthis act merely as a proxy for Tehran.
“What is happening now in Yemen is the result of the Yemenis losing patience,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei told state television on Friday night.
“It is not fair to ignore the fact that they were under a cruel blockade for years, and concluded that the United Nations and regional mechanisms could not resolve the issues.”
