Lionel Messi seeks to meet Afghan boy who was wearing a plastic jersey

February 2, 2016

Kabul, Feb 2: Barcelona star Lionel Messi is hoping to arrange a meeting with an Afghan boy who shot to fame after pictures of him dressed in a striped plastic bag jersey went viral, Kabul's football federation said on Monday.

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Five-year-old Murtaza Ahmadi idolises the Argentine soccer star but a jersey of his favourite player is beyond the means of his poor family in the volatile province of Ghazni near Kabul.

His elder brother Homayoun, 15, made him the blue-and-white-striped plastic shirt with Messi's named scrawled in marker pen and posted the photos of Murtaza wearing it on Facebook in mid-January.

Jorge Messi, Lionel's father, told AFP on Saturday that the footballer was aware of the photos that made waves on social media and "wants to do something" for his young fan.

The Afghanistan Football Federation (AFF) on Monday said Messi was keen to meet Murtaza as soon as possible, though no date or venue has so far been finalised.

"Messi has been in communication with the federation to set up a meeting with the young boy," AFF spokesman Sayed Ali Kazemi told AFP. "We are working to see whether Messi will come to Afghanistan or the five-year-old will travel to Spain or they will meet in a third country."

There was no immediate comment from FC Barcelona.

Setting up a meeting in Afghanistan, in the grip of a fierce Taliban insurgency, is fraught with security challenges. The Spanish embassy in Kabul told AFP it would do whatever possible to facilitate a meeting in a European destination.

Murtaza's father, a poor farmer in Ghazni's Jaghori district, admitted he could not afford to buy him a replica jersey, adding that Murtaza only had a punctured ball to play with.

Photos of the boy wearing the improvised Messi jersey -- made from grocery bags discarded by their neighbour -- has touched a chord with football fans around the world.

Sport was rarely played under Taliban rule, and the football stadium in Kabul was a notorious venue for executions, stonings and mutilations.

Football and cricket are the two most popular sports in the war-ravaged country.

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Nadine
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Sunday, 4 Jun 2017

One more book suggestion; just got done checking out \The Snowball\"-- the
authorized bio

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News Network
January 30,2020

Hamilton, Jan 30: Caught unaware about the Super Over scenario, Rohit Sharma took five minutes to “find” his abdomen guard after the third T20 International against New Zealand had ended in a tie on Wednesday.

The India vice-captain said the team had almost given up with New Zealand going great guns at one point.

“Everything was packed. All my stuff was inside my bag. I had to get it out. It literally took me five minutes to find my abdomen guard because I didn’t know where it was,” Rohit said.

“I mean we never thought it would go to the Super Over, the way they were batting at one point. It looked like they could easily win the game,” he added.

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Agencies
February 7,2020

New Delhi, Feb 7: It was on February 7, 1999, that Anil Kumble became just the second bowler in the history of cricket to take all ten wickets in an innings of a Test match.

He achieved the feat against Pakistan at Feroz Shah Kotla Stadium, now known as Arun Jaitley cricket stadium in Delhi during the second Test of the two-match series.

India had set Pakistan a target of 420 runs in the match and the visitors got off to a steady start as openers Shahid Afridi and Saeed Anwar put on 101 runs for the first wicket.

It was then Kumble who came into the attack and wreaked havoc on the Pakistani batting line-up.

The spinner, also known as 'Jumbo' first dismissed Afridi (41) in the 25th over. After the right-handed batter's dismissal, India kept on taking wickets through Kumble and Pakistan was reduced to 128/6 in no time.

Kumble then kept on taking wickets at regular intervals and he got his tenth scalp in the 61st over after dismissing Wasim Akram.

This effort enabled India to register a win by 212 runs, and Kumble became the second bowler after England's Jim Laker to take all ten wickets in a single Test inning.

Kumble finished with the bowling figures of 10-74 from 26.3 overs.

Kumble announced his retirement from international cricket in 2008 and finished with 619 wickets in the longest format of the game.

He has the third-highest number of wickets in Tests, only behind Sri Lanka's Muttiah Muralitharan (800) and Australia's Shane Warne (708).

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News Network
January 28,2020

Gibraltar, Jan 28: Young Indian Grand Master R Praggnanandhaa pulled off a huge upset, beating former world champion Veselin Topalov in the sixth round of the 18th Gibraltar chess festival to record his fifth straight win here.

The 14-year-old Chennai lad needed just 33 moves to put it across the Bulgarian. He had started with a loss against compatriot P V Nandhidhaa but since then he has been on a winning spree.

Praggnanandhaa, who recently won the world under-18 title, said: "It was very tough to prepare against him."

He is in second spot on five points with six other players and will take on Chinese GM Wang Hao in the seventh round.

Seventeen-year-old Russian GM Andrey Esipenko jumped to sole lead with 5.5 points with a win over Georgia's Ivan Cheparinov

The Russian player would be unpaired in the seventh round as he decided to take a bye.

A bunch of players including Indians — B Adhiban, K Sasikiran, Shardul Gagare, Karthikeyan Murali, SL Narayanan — are in joint third place with 4.5 points.

Adhiban beat Gabriel Flom, while D Gukesh, the world's second youngest Grand Master ever, defeated Martin Percivaldi to move to four points.

Also winning were Karthikeyan Murali against Qi B Chen and Gagare over France's Maxime Lagarde.

Top-seed Shakhriyar Mamedyarov's moderate run continued as he was held to a draw by GM Aryan Chopra.

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