2 h. ago Football Daily | The Champions League returns! Only 144 games until the knockout stage

Sign up now! Sign up now! Sign up now? Sign up now!After enduring the slog of one season of Bigger Cup with its “Swiss Model” 36-strong league table, where each team plays eight matches against different sides, Football Daily still hasn’t decided if Uefa’s experimental new format is better, worse or much the same as the fairly jeopardy-free group stage it replaced. Instead of needing what seemed like an already excessive 96 matches to whittle the 32 competing teams down to 16, as its name suggests, Bigger Cup now requires a whopping 144 matches to eliminate just 12 of the 36 teams lining up on this season’s grid. A $uper €eague in all but name, Uefa is painfully aware its flagship club competition is now an even more unwieldy, bloated mess that places unreasonable and unnecessary demands on the bodies of exhausted footballers but doesn’t appear to care. When it means it gets to pit Manchester City against Real Madrid for the 11th time in six seasons and the cash keeps rolling in, th...

Sport

5 h. ago Real meaning behind numbers on toaster and it's not how long your bread is toasting

Ever wondered what the numbers on your toaster really mean? Many people think they represent how long your bread is toasting, but an expert has shared the truth

Politics

3 d. ago Autocrats and tech bros want to live for ever. Here’s how bleak that future could be | Hanna Thomas Uose

My novel explores the consequences of extreme longevity. Meanwhile, Putin and Xi are pondering immortality in real lifeI was in bed scrolling on my phone when I read the headline: Hot mic catches Xi and Putin discussing organ transplants and immortality. It took me a long time to get to sleep after that. Not yet, I thought. I pride myself on my prescience, but I wasn’t ready for the future I had imagined to arrive so soon.Since 2017, I’ve been thinking about the implications of longevity research, sketching out possible futures – the shifts in society, the complications and subcultures. This year I published the result of my thought experiment, Who Wants to Live Forever, a speculative literary novel. It follows Yuki and Sam, a couple at a crossroads at the same time that a new drug, called Yareta – which extends the human lifespan by 200 years and preserves youth – becomes available. Sam takes it, Yuki doesn’t, and the novel follows the fallout as the world changes around them. The ...

Politics

3 d. ago Real meaning of Bella Ciao, antifascist anthem from Netflix show that Charlie Kirk shooting suspect obsessed over

Charlie Kirk's alleged killer, Tyler Robinson, is said to have scrawled the lyrics to the Italian folk-song Bella Ciao on bullet casings.

Events

8 d. ago Rental Family review – Brendan Fraser is stranded in mawkish misfire

Toronto film festival: The Oscar-winning star of The Whale makes another awards play with a beautifully shot yet emotionally inert comedy dramaBrendan Fraser is an actor performing characters who help people achieve a sense of emotional healing, affirmation or comfort. That could describe who he tends to be in “real” life (whatever that means in this context) but it’s also what he’s playing in Rental Family.The feelgood dramedy – or at least that’s what it tries so hard to be – is about an actual service in Japan that supplies actors who perform as bit players in everyday people’s lives. They’re hired by clients to fake it in roles as a family member, a friend or even the cheering audience at a karaoke bar. The premise packs meta layers and gives Fraser the opportunity to inhabit multiple roles, while turning the lens back on the audience to consider what we’re looking for in the movie(s). Unfortunately, when it comes to Rental Family, it’s just not that deep. Continue reading...

Society

1 week ago A new vintage train will run between Rome and Siena this autumn

The operator says the train is ‘not just a means of transport, but a real journey into the soul of Tuscany’

Politics

3 w. ago Are we heading for a world where no one ever needs to talk to another human being?

Self-service tills, apps for shopping and takeaways, silent hair salons, driverless taxis – why are we going to extreme lengths to avoid engaging with each other?So we’re just playing dumb then, are we? Righto. An extremely confusing study of San Francisco’s transport services has found that not only are people completely on board with driverless taxis, they are also willing to pay 50% more and wait significantly longer for them. Whyever could this be, eh? Most of the mooted explanations have been largely practical – driverless taxis are proven to be safer (until the machines rise up as one and wipe out humanity). They can’t be over the limit, on their phone at the wheel or give in to road rage. And yes, these are technically valid reasons, but come on. The real answer, which no one is admitting, is that driverless taxis mean we don’t have to talk to anybody.It’s not surprising that many of us would happily put our lives in robot hands to dodge the horror of panic-asking a living, b...

Politics

3 w. ago Hozier fans in disbelief as they learn hidden meaning behind hit song Too Sweet

Hozier fans have been left in disbelief after learning the real meaning behind his hit song Too Sweet, with the singer recalling a rather embarrassing moment during a live show

Events

4 w. ago The Real Housewives of London review – one of them dresses up in ruffs like a Poundshop Elizabeth I

After a 20-year wait, the UK capital gets an edition of the US reality franchise – and the results are as hellish as you might expect. It was worth the waitIt’s taken nearly 20 years for the American reality franchise to wind its way across the Atlantic to the capital. In the meantime, there were pretenders and near-misses – Ladies of London, Real Housewives of Cheshire – but now, finally, west London’s ex-model community has a viable retirement plan.The delay seems all the more inexplicable, when you consider how to the manner born – if not to the manor born – these ladies are. Take Amanda, who lives in Belgravia, drives a Bentley convertible, runs an underperforming luxury beauty brand and is in a co-dependent relationship with her poodle-cum-stylist, Monty. Amanda has it all – clearly – and in the first episode’s first five minutes, she cements her status as RHOL’s Queen Bee by saying: “I’m actually a really private person.” Direct to camera. On a reality TV show. With a straight...

Politics