Aston Villa stadium could be renamed to “Lotus Villa Park” suggests prospective owner Chinese Tony Xia May 21, 2016 Incoming Aston Villa owner Tony Jiantong Xia has suggested he will alter the name of the club's stadium to feature his Lotus Health food business once his £60m takeover is completed. The Chinese businessman agreed a deal to buy the club from current owner Randy Lerner earlier this week, but is still waiting for ratification [...]
Barcelona agree “record-breaking” kit sponsorship deal with Nike, trumping Manchester United’s Adidas deal May 21, 2016 Barcelona have agreed a new kit sponsorship deal with Nike worth a record-breaking £120m per season, according to local reports. The La Liga champions' new deal is reported to be the biggest in world football, worth more than even Manchester United's £75m per year deal with Adidas. The two parties announced a "long-term" extension of [...]
Walter Mazzarri: Watford appoint former Napoli boss as head coach on a three-year deal May 21, 2016 Watford have appointed Italian Walter Mazzarri as their new head coach to replace the outgoing Quique Sanchez Flores. The 54-year-old Mazzarri has signed a three-year deal with the Hornets following spells with Inter Milan and Napoli, who he guided into the Champions League for the first time in 21 years. Despite securing a second consecutive [...]
French Open 2016 prize money: Novak Djokovic can become first player to make $100m at this year’s Roland Garros May 20, 2016 World No1 Novak Djokovic is set become the first tennis player to make more than $100m in prize money at this year's French Open. More prize money is on offer than ever before at Roland Garros, with the men and women's singles winners promised €2m (£1.5m). Yet Djokovic only needs to make the final four [...]
This Is Living is a David Nicholls-style weepie starring This Is England’s Michael Socha May 20, 2016 This is Living | Trafalgar Studios | ★★★★☆ This is Living is a weepy in the David Nicholls mould, effectively and sometimes shamelessly pressing the audience’s emotional buttons; at least a third of the people there on opening night were openly sobbing. The two-man play begins with Michael (Michael Socha, This Is England) standing over [...]
Major League Soccer salaries revealed: Chelsea legend Frank Lampard paid $6m, dwarfing former team mate Ashley Cole’s $300,000 salary May 20, 2016 Former England midfield partners Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard will be the fourth and fifth best-paid football players respectively in America next season. Gerrard, at LA Galaxy, will earn $6.1m and New York City's Lampard is in line for $6m but it is AC Milan and Real Madrid's former Brazilian forward Kaka who tops the [...]
Peter Alliss: Women who want to play at Muirfield should get married to a member May 20, 2016 Golf commentator Peter Alliss has suggested women who still want to play at Muirfield golf course after it voted to block female membership should marry an existing member. Muirfield lost the right to host the Open after its members failed to reach a two-thirds majority needed on a vote to allow female membership and according [...]
Hales shines as debutant Shanaka rains on England’s parade May 19, 2016 Opener Alex Hales vowed to continue improving after his timely spike in form helped England recover from a shaky start to their summer on day one of the first Test against Sri Lanka at Headingley. Hales’s patient 71 not out steered the hosts to 171-5 after visiting debutant Dasun Shanaka had plundered three wickets from [...]
X-Men: Apocalypse review: James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender can’t salvage this incoherent X-jumble May 19, 2016 X-Men: Apocalypse takes the franchise’s hard-won chips and bets them all on tumbling pyramids and slo-mo explosions. It sells the X-Mansion for a bag of CGI beans. It’s an incoherent jumble, lacking any kind of authoritative vision; a collection of disparate elements that rub uncomfortably against each other, more closely resembling a fan-made super-cut than [...]
Pardew aiming to land a blow for English managers by guiding Palace to first major trophy May 19, 2016 Crystal Palace manager Alan Pardew is desperate to make it third time lucky in the FA Cup final and land a blow for English managers in the increasingly cosmopolitan upper reaches of the domestic game. Pardew has tasted defeat in the Wembley showpiece twice before: as a player against Manchester United in a 1990 prequel to [...]