5 h. ago Euros continue to serve up goal fest as playing styles collide to dazzling effect | Jonathan Liew

With three matches to go, the tournament in Switzerland is clear of the 2022 edition in goals per game, but what’s behind all the extra scoring?And frankly, have you not been entertained? If, of course, we are willing to stretch our definition of “entertainment” to include some of the other popular sensations. Suspense. Terror. Existential despair. Cold sweating. Temporary breakdown of the nervous system. Loud screaming at inanimate items of electrical equipment.But as we approach the final week of this operatic Women’s European Championship, this tournament has a fair claim to be one of the most thrilling in recent memory. And not just on the more intangible metrics: noise, penalty drama, side-eye, flying saves, players singing unprompted into pitch-side microphones, quality of fan walks. With three matches remaining, Euro 2025 has surpassed Euro 2022 in terms of goals, averaging a staggering half a goal more (3.57 against 3.06). Continue reading...

Politics

49 h. ago Are Spain pacing themselves or sleepwalking to a deafening alarm call? | Jonathan Liew

Euro favourites give Switzerland hope before sealing their place in the semi-finals but France or Germany could challenge their supremacyAfterwards, there was an awful lot of messing about. Probably more than you would expect after a briefly absorbing quarter-final whose outcome was never seriously in doubt. The Swiss players performed the world’s slowest lap of honour. The Spanish players posed for a group photo, but it kept having to be retaken as more players arrived. OK, now one more with Aitana. Now one more with Irene. Now one with the staff. Now in portrait for the ’gram. Then the teams gave each other an honour guard off the pitch. At one point you would swear someone laid out some picnic blankets and Scotch eggs.Finally they left. And if there was a strangely ceremonial feel to the post-match perhaps it was because there was a strangely ceremonial feel to the match itself: more event than genuine contest, even as Switzerland held out for more than an hour, counted their ble...

Events

52 h. ago England’s defensive problems go deeper than Carter – and must be fixed fast | Jonathan Liew

Centre-back’s ordeal against Sweden was damaging but sketchy press and midfield failings need to be addressed before Italy semi-finalJess Carter glumly accepted her warm-down top, the pallid commiserations of Arjan Veurink and a seat on the England bench. In truth she had been fortunate to see 70 minutes of this quarter-final, and for all the nightmarish apparitions of the first half perhaps the last few minutes were the loneliest of all. Marooned at the back, 30 yards behind the rest of the team while England forced set pieces and pushed for a route back into the game: a last line of defence that had proved to be very little defence at all.Esme Morgan would replace her to add some extra heft and the entire system would need to be rejigged to a back three. Carter would watch the excruciating last hour from a seated position, reflecting bleakly on the sort of performance that scars international careers, perhaps even defines them. “You’re feeling nothing and everything at the same ti...

Events

7 d. ago Sinner cried like a little boy who had reached for the sweets but came away with the whole jar | Jonathan Liew

The Italian was overcome with joy after learning harsh lesson from his French Open defeat at the hands of Carlos AlcarazAs a boy, Jannik Sinner was a champion skier. As he stood on Centre Court match point up against Carlos Alcaraz, perhaps some of the old skills kicked in. Skiing teaches balance, it teaches flexibility and endurance, but most of all it teaches faith. There is a moment in every slide, before friction kicks in, when the body is basically at the mercy of powder and physics. And the greatest skiers learn that this is the moment to hold your nerve. When it feels like you’re falling, keep falling. When it feels like the edge of disaster, keep going.Three match points against Alcaraz; take two. You’ve lost your last five matches against this guy. He’s the double defending champion. The last time you played, a few short weeks ago, he came back from two sets and three match points down to win. It was one of the most dramatic comebacks ever seen in a grand slam final, and he...

Politics

7 d. ago Sinner reaches for the sweets and comes away with the whole jar at Wimbledon | Jonathan Liew

The Italian was overcome with joy after learning harsh lesson from his French Open defeat at the hands of Carlos AlcarazAs a boy, Jannik Sinner was a champion skier. As he stood on Centre Court match point up against Carlos Alcaraz, perhaps some of the old skills kicked in. Skiing teaches balance, it teaches flexibility and endurance, but most of all it teaches faith. There is a moment in every slide, before friction kicks in, when the body is basically at the mercy of powder and physics. And the greatest skiers learn that this is the moment to hold your nerve. When it feels like you’re falling, keep falling. When it feels like the edge of disaster, keep going.Three match points against Alcaraz; take two. You’ve lost your last five matches against this guy. He’s the double defending champion. The last time you played, a few short weeks ago, he came back from two sets and three match points down to win. It was one of the most dramatic comebacks ever seen in a grand slam final, and he...

Politics

8 d. ago Anisimova endures a hot Wimbledon nightmare after entering the Swiatek bakery | Jonathan Liew

American’s double bagel defeat was a meltdown that nobody saw coming but she can come back from heartbreakThis is what a scream with no vowels sounds like. This is the weight of the soul leaving the body. The arms are no longer connected to the legs, the legs have been severed from the lungs, the lungs have lost contact with the heart and the heart is getting ghosted by the brain. Amanda Anisimova sits on her chair, baking in the heat, stewing in sadness. She dabs her face with a towel and hopes people won’t notice she’s wiping away tears.A faint voice from the outer edge of the universe calls time. She still has to go out there. She takes a deep breath. Lifts herself from her seat and takes the 18 long steps to her mark just behind the baseline. Ever found it a struggle getting up to go to work? Try summoning the strength to face Iga Swiatek when you’re losing 6-0, 5-0 in a Wimbledon final. Continue reading...

Politics

9 d. ago No one ever got rich writing off Novak Djokovic, but even he can’t stretch time for ever | Jonathan Liew

We can’t tell how much is left for tennis’s ultimate champion, but semi-final defeat by Sinner could be the moment Project 25 was buried for goodThe Moment comes at the start of the third set. Nobody in tennis can spot a Moment like Novak Djokovic. The Moment is where he lives, breathes, puts gluten-free food on his family’s table. What happened before was irrelevant. You can rattle and bully him. You can pummel him off Centre Court for an hour, as Jannik Sinner has done. Djokovic will still prowl the chain-link fence all evening, probing it, waiting for the one gap wide enough to let him squeeze through. The point of greatest weakness is where he finds his greatest strength.Sinner’s at 30-30 on his own serve. A defensive backhand from Djokovic sits up invitingly in mid-court, pleading to be dispatched. The world No 1, utterly impeccable to this point, swings a giant fist at the ball and somehow sends it flying in the vague direction of Tooting Broadway. The crowd yelps in shock. Ne...

Politics

1 week ago Playing loose with virtue wins no hearts, and Arsenal should know better | Jonathan LIew

There were plenty of legally unproblematic options available to the club before their former midfielder was charged with rape “We are courageous in the pursuit of progress.” “We champion our community and each other.” Continue reading...

Politics

1 week ago Playing loose with virtue leaves questions for Arsenal to answer over Thomas Partey | Jonathan Liew

There were plenty of legally unproblematic options available to the club before their former midfielder was charged with rape “We are courageous in the pursuit of progress.” “We champion our community and each other.” Continue reading...

Politics

1 week ago Tension and tedium: welcome to the Wimbledon press conference room | Jonathan Liew

Anyone can ask any question of the players, leading to absurd inquiries, but it can sometimes serve a useful purposeTo spend even a little time at Wimbledon is to drown in the sheer scale of things. This is a place of mind-boggling numbers: the 40 miles of racket string, the 55,000 balls, the 300,000 glasses of Pimm’s, the 2.5m strawberries. But Wimbledon’s true staple good is none of these. The most abundant product every Wimbledon fortnight is the word. And even on a rain-affected, slow news day, the words must keep coming.As with everything else, Wimbledon procures its words with a suitable reverence. Post-match interviews, in contrast to the more informal on-court setup at Melbourne and New York, are conducted at a respectful distance in front of a microphone stand, as if Jannik Sinner were actually a high-school student about to spell a very difficult word. But of course the majority of Wimbledon’s bluff and bluster takes place in a small windowless upstairs chamber that most t...

Events

2 w. ago Raducanu justifies primetime billing even as Sabalenka’s superpower wins out | Jonathan Liew

Britain’s No 1 was outpointed when her opponent raised her game but showed why she merits the hype and spotlight that surrounds herIt’s a little after 8pm by the time the first ball is tossed. Karen Khachanov has just beaten Nuno Borges on No 3 Court and so even before it has started Emma Raducanu v Aryna Sabalenka is the last game on anywhere at Wimbledon: a standalone attraction, the roof not so much closed as hermetically sealed. We are locked in, under these hot lights, until nightfall.And of course this is not simply a third-round game. At the behest of the broadcasters this is also a primetime television product, an item of light entertainment. Raducanu isn’t just battling the world No 1 here, she’s up against Gardeners’ World on BBC Two. The hill is packed. Brian Cox and Mary Berry in the Royal Box are transfixed. And to think Roland Garros would probably have put this match on in mid-morning. Continue reading...

Politics

2 w. ago Carlos Alcaraz shakes off Tarvet from his back without inhibitions or regrets | Jonathan Liew

Defending champion is essentially a magic-eye puzzle you can read any way you want but has the inconsistency all but one of his rivals would dream ofThere were negatives, of course. Shall we focus on the negatives? Shall we dwell on the frailties a little? The uncharacteristic errors, the double faults, an occasional scruffiness at the net, the frequent slumps in intensity? Shall we marvel at the fact that the lowest-ranked player in the tournament earned more break points (11) than one of the greatest players of his generation (10)? Shall we warn, in a tone of affected sternness, that the defending champion will have to raise his game on this evidence?Of course we shall, because this is Carlos Alcaraz, and because there is an entire cottage industry built around maintaining the idea that Alcaraz is in a state of crisis at all times, a state of crisis so acute that it is necessary to feign round-the-clock concern for him. We just want to see all that rich talent fulfilled. That’s al...

Politics

3 w. ago Tesla’s EU sales slump continues; Eurostar services disrupted after ‘cable theft’ – business live

Six trains between London and Paris cancelled after theft of cables at Lille leave passengers strandedThe price of the world’s first malaria vaccine for children in endemic countries will be reduced by more than half, to less than $5, according to the drugmakers GSK and Bharat Biotech.The vaccine, called Mosquirix or RTS,S, was developed by GSK and the non-profit health organisation PATH, and was the first malaria vaccine to be recommended by the World Health Organization in October 2021. It is one of two malaria shots recommended by the WHO.“As an epidemiologist working in malaria vaccine development and delivery, I have seen the impact malaria vaccines are already having on children in high-burden regions of Africa. As a result of the collaboration between the research community in implementing endemic countries, industry, NGOs and multilateral organisations, the world’s first malaria vaccine is helping to reduce all-cause mortality and hospitalisations of severe malaria among chi...

Economics

3 w. ago Delap is Chelsea’s shiny new toy but uncut gem Jackson offers rare point of difference | Jonathan Liew

While battle lines are drawn between the two strikers with very different journeys to the top, there is a way both can thrive“They are quite similar,” Enzo Maresca said last week of Liam Delap and Nicolas Jackson, but of course nobody wanted to take any notice of that bit. Already battle lines are being drawn, positions entrenched. Delap or Jackson. Jackson or Delap. One must survive. One must go reluctantly on loan to Serie A. Those are just the rules.On these terms alone, it’s been a very good week for Delap. Against Flamengo in the Club World Cup on Friday, he was preferred up front, and played with bristling, controlled aggression for more than an hour before making way for Jackson. He then watched as his replacement lost possession with his first touch, went studs‑up with his second, was sent off and scapegoated for Chelsea’s 3-1 defeat, and later issued a grovelling apology on social media for his actions. Continue reading...

Politics

4 w. ago Dining across the divide: ‘He didn’t believe women still face discrimination in the workplace’

They had different views on gender equality. Could they agree on the European convention on human rights?Julian, 57, IpswichOccupation Financial services Continue reading...

Events