Rahm steals highlights show of past week
The Week That Was April 5-11
Manchester United’s Scott McTominay and Anthony Martial secured a 2-0 victory over Everton as the hosts climbed above Newcastle United into provisional third spot in the Premier League on Saturday, before dropping to fourth after the weekend’s action.
Erik ten Hag’s United are in the thick of the race to finish in the top four, with 56 points from 29 games, level with Newcastle, and three more than Tottenham Hotspur. – Reuters
Liverpool have been charged by the Football Association with failing to control their players during Saturday’s 4-1 defeat at Manchester City. Several Liverpool players crowded around referee Simon Hooper as they pleaded for him to show City midfielder Rodri a second yellow card for a challenge on Cody Gakpo.
Mercedes aims to give Lewis Hamilton and George Russell a more balanced car, with improved suspension, technical head James Allison said on Thursday. The sport has a big gap in the calendar, due to the cancellation of the Chinese Grand Prix, until racing resumes in Azerbaijan on April 30.
Forward Kylian Mbappe has criticised Paris St-Germain after they used him in a video to promote season ticket sales, without informing him how the interview would be used. The video, released by PSG on Wednesday, features snippets from an interview with Mbappe, in which he talks about the club and its supporters. It links to the ticketing section on the club’s website.
A Paulo Dybala penalty and a superb defensive performance gave AS Roma a 1-0 win away to Torino on Saturday that lifted them to third place in the table and boosted their hopes of a spot in next season’s Champions League.
In the wake of the match, Mourinho dismissed complaints about the lack of offensive quality.
“You win games when you score one more goal than your opponent,” he said to DAZN, emphasising that winning is the goal of sport. “The objective remains the same always, to win as much as possible with the quality at your disposal and try to hide the weaknesses.”
The match was only eight minutes old when Dybala converted a penalty following a handball from Torino’s Perr Schuurs. Following the goal, Roma went on the defensive, causing problems for Torino’s midfield, who searched for opportunities without success.
The US booked their place in the final qualifying tournament for this year’s 50-overs World Cup in India following their 25-run victory over Jersey on Tuesday. At a play-off event in Namibia, the US side, led by Indian-born Monank Patel, posted 231 all out and then bowled out Jersey for 206 to confirm top spot and a place in the final qualifier in Zimbabwe in June-July.
Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) in England, the custodian of laws of cricket, announced Indian legends MS Dhoni, Yuvraj Singh, Suresh Raina, Mithali Raj and Jhulan Goswami among the former players awarded with the honorary life membership of the club, recognising their great careers in the sport.
Former South African batter Nic Pothas has been appointed as the assistant coach of Bangladesh men’s senior team, the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) announced on Thursday.
The 49-year-old has signed a two-year deal with BCB and will be starting his stint in the UK next month with a three-match ODI series against Ireland.
“Former South African batsman Nic Pothas has been appointed assistant coach of the Bangladesh team. The 49-year-old has reached a two-year agreement with the BCB and will join the squad in the UK next month for the three-match ODI series against Ireland to begin his new assignment,” said a statement from the governing body of the sport in the country. In a coaching career that spans over a decade, Pothas worked as the head coach of West Indies (2018-2019) and Sri Lanka (2017-2018).
He had also performed the roles of assistant coach and fielding coach of the West Indies side and had been the lead fielding coach of Sri Lanka. Prior to joining Bangladesh, Pothas was the wicketkeeping coach of Hampshire County Cricket Club. A right-handed batsman in his playing days,
Pothas had appeared in three ODIs for South Africa, in which he scored 24 runs in one inning and has made over 16 000 first-class and List-A runs, out of which over 11 000 runs have come in the former.
After missing the action in the US last month, Novak Djokovic is targeting a strong start to the clay season when he leads the field as the top seed at the Monte Carlo Masters.
The World No. 1 has not competed since he reached the semi-finals in Dubai in early March as he was forced to miss the Indian Wells and Miami, both ATP 1000 masters events, after he was denied entry to the US over his vaccination status.
“I have done more training on clay, which is positive if you think about the clay season. I have not had much success in Monte Carlo in the past two seasons. I haven’t played great tennis here, so I am hoping this year I can start the clay season better than in previous years and build my form,” Djokovic said in his pre-tournament press conference.
The Serbian great has not had much success in Monte Carlo in the past two years and had suffered an opening-round exit last year. However, he has tasted success at the clay-court ATP Masters 1000 event in 2013 and 2015.
International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Thomas Bach has emphasised the importance of sport and the Olympic Games in world peace ahead of the International Day of Sport for Development and Peace. In a video released on Wednesday, Bach stated that sport has the power to foster peace and understanding with fellow human beings. “Sport can open the door to peace in ways that exclusion and division do not,” he remarked.
Bach noted that since ancient times, the purpose of the Olympics has been to promote peace through sport, and that each Olympic Games has brought together athletes from different backgrounds and cultures to put aside their differences and live together peacefully in the Olympic Village.
Daniil Medvedev will head into the Monte Carlo Masters hoping to strike the right balance as the world number four looks to tweak his game for the clay court swing without compromising on the style that has delivered four titles in 2023. Medvedev has won 18 of his 19 titles, including the 2021 US Open, on hard courts, the only exception coming at the Mallorca Open when he triumphed on grass the same year.
He has been in red-hot form this season having triumphed in Rotterdam, Doha, Dubai and Miami, but the 27-year-old knows clay presents a different challenge for his game.
“I definitely have to change my game because my strokes are too flat and clay doesn’t let the ball go through the court as much,” Medvedev, who plays Lorenzo Sonego or Ugo Humbert first in the ATP 1000 tournament, said.
“My opponents can use those (shots against me).
Spaniard Jon Rahm captured the biggest win of his career at the Masters on Sunday and said he felt the presence of his idol, the late Seve Ballesteros, helping pull him through.
Rahm’s triumph, which marked his second major title, was made extra special given it came on the 40th anniversary of his compatriot’s second win at Augusta National and on what would have been Ballesteros’ 66th birthday.
“Still really hasn’t sinked in yet. I’m looking at the scores, and I still think I have a couple more holes left to win,” said Rahm, who looked to the sky with his hands in prayer after his winning putt. “Can’t really say anything else. This one was for Seve. He was up there helping, and he did.” Ballesteros, who died of brain cancer in 2011, inspired a generation of golfers in his country and counts two Masters titles among his five major championships. Rahm trailed Brooks Koepka by two shots entering the final round and needed four holes to close the gap, pulled ahead at the par-three sixth and never relinquished the lead.
The Spaniard, whose last Major triumph came at the 2021 US Open, was a pretournament favourite at Augusta National but was unaware of the significance of what day the final round fell on until he arrived on site.
“I was told a lot of things about why this could be the year, and I just didn’t want to buy into it too much,” said Rahm, who will reclaim top spot in the world rankings. The tournament did not begin as planned for Rahm, who made a disastrous start with a four-putt double-bogey on his first hole on Thursday but he refused to let that moment define his week. |