Liam Rosenior predicts ‘physical’ Carabao Cup second leg
Mikel Arteta has laughed off a suggestion from Paul Scholes that Arsenal would be the most boring team to win the Premier League, insisting his side are considered “the most exciting in Europe” in other countries.
Scholes, the former Manchester United midfielder, pointed to the lack of goals from Arsenal’s front four this season and reliance on set pieces as evidence for his claim. Viktor Gyökeres is the club’s top scorer in the league with six, and Arsenal have scored 17 goals from set pieces – three more than any other club.
Habib Diarra and Chemsdine Talbi sat behind opposing dugouts during last month’s acrimonious Africa Cup of Nations final as Senegal beat Morocco in Rabat.
While suspension deprived Diarra of his starting place for the victors, Morocco’s Talbi was an unused substitute but, on a freezing Wearside night, they were reunited as Sunderland teammates and duly revelled in taking their frustrations out on Burnley.
Hosts’ big clash with All Blacks on second weekend
England will begin against Tonga in Brisbane
The 2027 World Cup will get off to a low-key start with Australia kicking off against Hong Kong after the organisers opted against beginning the tournament with the Wallabies’ blockbuster pool fixture against New Zealand. When Australia were drawn in the same pool as their arch-rivals in December it was widely expected that such a mouth-watering fixture would raise the curtain on the tournament.
But with the first match taking place on Australia’s west coast in Perth on 1 October, organisers have opted to pit Hong Kong – competing at their first World Cup – against the Wallabies in what is sure to be a one-sided affair. The opening weekend of the tournament features just one fixture involving two tier one nations – South Africa against Italy.
Author says accusations ‘spread and amplified’ by people more interested in ‘outrage and getting clicks’
Neil Gaiman has said that multiple sexual assault allegations against him are “simply untrue” and claimed to be the victim of a “smear campaign”, in the first post addressing the accusations for almost a year.
Gaiman, 65, author of novels including American Gods and the Ocean at the End of the Lane, has faced allegations of sexual abuse and coercive behaviour, which were outlined in a podcast by the Tortoise Media team in July 2024.
Move from Claudia Sheinbaum comes after Trump signed an order threatening tariffs on countries that sell oil to Cuba
Mexico’s president Claudia Sheinbaum has pledged to send humanitarian aid this week to Cuba and said Mexico was “exploring all diplomatic avenues to be able to send fuel to the Cuban people,” despite efforts from Washington to cut off oil to the Caribbean nation.
Donald Trump last week signed an executive order allowing the US to slap tariffs on countries sending crude oil to Cuba and on Saturday said that Sheinbaum had agreed to halt shipments of oil at his request – a claim the Mexican leader rejected.
Coalition of groups filed lawsuit to overturn ban on nationals from specified countries over ‘false claims’
A coalition of immigration groups, lawyers and US citizens is suing Marco Rubio and the state department to overturn an order that suspended immigrant visa approvals to citizens of 75 countries, alleging the move “eviscerates” decades of settled policy and is blatantly discriminatory.
The suit, filed in a US district court in New York, accuses the department and Rubio, the secretary of state, of denying immigration rights to the nationals of certain countries on “the demonstrably false claim” that they are likely to seek welfare payments.
Almost immediately after the deputy attorney general, Todd Blanche, announced the justice department was releasing 3m additional pages of files related to Jeffrey Epstein on Friday, Fox News published an exclusive interview with him seeking to shape what Americans could expect to find in the files.
After reviewing years of Epstein’s correspondence, Blanche said, the justice department determined that there was nothing in them in which Epstein said anything criminally implicating Trump.
Sunderland are still unbeaten at home in the Premier League this season. They might be missing Granit Xhaka but you must think they will fancy their chances tonight.
Ruling clears Denmark’s Ørsted to resume construction on its Sunrise Wind project off the coast of New York
All five offshore wind projects halted by the Trump administration in December can resume construction after a federal judge’s ruling on Monday that cleared Denmark’s Ørsted to proceed with its Sunrise Wind project off the coast of New York.
Ørsted’s request for an injunction blocking the interior department order was the fifth brought by an offshore wind developer since the 22 December pause on five leases. The agency stopped work on the multibillion-dollar facilities due to national security concerns around radar interference.
The Republican congressman James Comer has rejected an offer from former president Bill Clinton to conduct a transcribed interview for a House committee’s investigation into the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, pushing the threat to hold both Clintons in contempt of Congress closer towards a vote.
The full House is headed towards potential votes this week on criminal contempt of Congress charges against the Clintons. If passed, the charges threaten both Bill Clinton and former secretary of state Hillary Clinton with substantial fines and even incarceration if they are convicted.
Action could begin next week in some of state’s largest districts including San Diego, San Francisco and LA
California is facing the prospect of massive teacher strikes across the state as conflicts over working conditions, pay and special education staffing reach a boiling point.
The strikes, which could begin as soon as next week, have been approved by thousands of educators – affecting schools in some of the state’s largest districts including San Francisco, San Diego and Los Angeles.
PM Sébastien Lecornu pushes budget through using constitutional powers that avoided vote in parliament
France has finally passed a budget for this year after the minority government survived a series of no-confidence votes in a long-running political saga that has unsettled debt markets and alarmed the country’s European partners.
The prime minister, Sébastien Lecornu, told parliament on Monday, after months of wrangling, that French people “refuse this disorder and want our institutions to function”.
Leaking crisis policy to financiers demands investigation, not evasion. Gordon Brown understands this. Credibility can’t be pursued at the expense of trust
Finally, a Labour prime minister has taken a necessary step. Ordering the cabinet secretary to investigate Peter Mandelson’s contacts with Jeffrey Epstein recognises an elementary truth: if a cabinet minister discusses private government business with financial interests during a crisis, the state must act. Gordon Brown understood this instinctively. Sir Keir Starmer has moved later, and under pressure, but movement alone is not enough. Sir Keir said that Lord Mandelson should be stripped of his peerage while stopping short of legislating to make that happen. That is a choice. And it’s the wrong one to make.
The Epstein files make it hard to dismiss the question of misconduct in public office as frivolous. In 2003/04 it appears that as a Labour MP he received $75,000 from Jeffrey Epstein. Lord Mandelson says he has no recollection of these payments. Six years later, Lord Mandelson leaked sensitive government information during the banking crunch in 2009 to Epstein, a convicted sex offender, while serving in the cabinet. Emails suggest he advised US bank JP Morgan to “threaten” the UK chancellor, which by all accounts it did, over a proposed tax on bankers’ bonuses. The peer’s lobbying firm Global Counsel later had JP Morgan as a client.
Savannah Guthrie’s mother, Nancy, 84, was last seen on Saturday evening and signs indicate she did not leave alone
Authorities in Arizona searching for the 84-year-old mother of the Today show presenter Savannah Guthrie said on Monday they were treating the missing woman’s home as a crime scene, and expressed “grave concern” for her safety.
Nancy Guthrie was last seen by her family at her house near Tucson on Saturday night, and was reported missing on Sunday at lunchtime, sparking a search using a helicopter, drones and dogs, officials said.
A second-half cameo from 41-year-old talisman helped end strugglers’ long wait for win against Girona
First there was applause and then they started singing, the sound coming from the narrow street outside. In the bars and terraces where Real Oviedo’s fans were still picking over the game – in La Patatina, La Pepica, La Competencia and the rest – some put down their drinks and came to see what was going on. Somewhere among all the people filling Calle Juan Ramón Jiménez, a short walk from the Carlos Tartiere stadium, was a 5ft 5in footballer trying to make his way home, which was going to take a while. Santi Cazorla signed autographs, took pictures and shook a hundred hands, going from the crowds of kids to the little old lady as his son Enzo, who can play a bit too, kicked a Coke bottle across the square it opens on to.
On Plaza Pedro Miñor they have seen him many a day but this wasn’t any day and they couldn’t love him more. The son of an ambulance driver from Fonciello, 15 minutes away, Cazorla is something like their son too: an Oviedo fan who joined at eight and finally made his debut 32 years later. Forced to leave at 18, door closing just as it might have opened and his club collapsing into crisis, twice on the verge of disappearing entirely, he returned a man two decades on. He came on the minimum wage – “I would play for free but you’re not allowed,” he said – and helped take Oviedo back to the first division a quarter of a century later, a lifetime since the last time. Then this Saturday, at 41, he led them to the World Cup.
Grammys host Trevor Noah has been threatened with legal action by Donald Trump for a joke during Sunday’s awards ceremony about the president’s connection to the disgraced late financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Trump fired off an angry post on his Truth Social platform shortly after the comedian said the song of the year award was “a Grammy that every artist wants – almost as much as Trump wants Greenland, which makes sense because Epstein’s island is gone, he needs a new one to hang out with Bill Clinton”.
There are just over 20 of us lined up against the walls of a large, square room and I am offended by how many people’s hands are raised. Our ballet teacher has just asked the class who has prior dance experience. This is an absolute beginners course on the foundations of classical ballet and, a single catastrophic line dance lesson aside, it is also the first dance class I have ever attended. I am in the minority.
As we take the barre, it quickly becomes apparent that not being able to tell my left from my right will be a significant deficit over the next 16 weeks. This, however, is a tertiary concern. For now my two biggest worries are my feet. After a series of flexes and points I will later come to learn are tendu, they are cramping so badly it feels as if they have been stomped on.
Scores of live music fans in New York’s hip borough report having their phones stolen during live music shows
During a December visit to see family in his home state of New York, Zander Cammarata, who now lives in Berlin, purchased a new iPhone because they cost less in the United States. He then went to see one of his favorite bands, Silverstein, a post-hardcore emo group, in Brooklyn.
By the time he flew back to Germany, he was again using his old phone.
Abbas Araghchi suggests nuclear programme negotiations could begin imminently, as American forces amass in region
Iran’s top diplomat has said the government is ready for negotiations with the US as the two countries reportedly prepared to send top envoys to Istanbul for high-stakes talks on the Iranian nuclear programme later this week.
As US warships and aircraft have amassed in the region for a potential strike on Iran, the country’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, suggested that talks could take place imminently. Donald Trump on Saturday said Iranians were “seriously talking to us” as he hinted at a deal to avert military strikes against Tehran.
A 2007 FBI memo said further investigation was needed to determine if they ‘engaged in referring possible victims to each other’. Copperfield has never been charged with illegal conduct and has denied any wrongdoing
FBI agents investigating David Copperfield in 2007 said that “a clear connection” existed between the famous illusionist and Jeffrey Epstein, according to documents released by the Department of Justice last week in the latest tranche of the Epstein files.
A 2007 FBI memo by agents in Seattle said further investigation of this “connection” was needed to “to determine if they [Copperfield and Epstein] both shared a predilection for minors” and “if they engaged in referring possible victims to each other”.
Latest row to hit T20 World Cup raises difficult questions for the sport’s governing body, with lucrative TV deal to protect
The announcement on Sunday, fittingly, was made by Pakistan’s government, a reminder that this episode goes well beyond a game of cricket.In a post on X, the government approved the national side’s participation at this month’s T20 World Cup, but with a significant caveat.
“The Pakistan cricket team shall not take the field in the match scheduled on 15 February 2026 against India,” read the statement. The disintegration of this global tournament continues, that one line prompting serious concern for the sport’s economy. No further explanation was provided.
Couple say they love their daughter immeasurably but have a moral obligation to try to find child’s biological parents
A couple is suing a Florida fertility clinic after learning that they were implanted with the wrong embryo, and are going public with their attempts to find their child’s biological parents.
Tiffany Score and Steven Mills have filed a lawsuit against IVF Life Inc, which operates as the Fertility Center of Orlando, and its lead physician, Dr Milton McNichol. The suit, which was initially filed under pseudonyms to protect their family’s privacy, states that three viable embryos were created with Score’s eggs and Mills’s sperm, and an embryo was successfully implanted in April 2025.
Donald Trump claims that the release of millions more files related to Jeffrey Epstein 'absolve' him of wrongdoing, even though his name appears hundreds of times. The latest documents also indicate high-profile figures , including the former prince Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor and Labour peer Peter Mandelson, continued friendships with the disgraced financier after his child sex abuse convictions. So what have we learned from the newly released files and what happens next? Lucy Hough speaks to columnist and host of Politics Weekly America Jonathan Freedland
The tennis pay row has escalated further with the world’s top 10 male and female players rejecting an offer from the grand slams to set up a player council that would give them a greater say in the running of the major championships.
In correspondence sent to Wimbledon, the French Open and US Open last week, the players turned down the offer of a meeting with representatives of the three grand slams at the Indian Wells Masters in March and accused the tournament organisers of ignoring their concerns about pay and player welfare.
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