Five-star Liverpool thrash Arsenal, Spurs stunned by Wolves

Agencies
December 30, 2018

Liverpool, Dec 30: Liverpool extended their Premier League lead to nine points as Roberto Firmino’s hat-trick hammered Arsenal 5-1 at Anfield, while Tottenham’s title challenge crumbled in a 3-1 home defeat to Wolves.

Manchester City could cut Liverpool’s lead to seven points when they look to stop a recent slump at Southampton on Sunday, but ahead of their trip to the Etihad on January 3, Jurgen Klopp’s men currently look well on course to deliver a first league title since 1989/90.

“For sure Tottenham’s result people out there reacted, but not inside the dressing room where they were completely concentrated on the match and not allowed to have that influence on our game,” said Klopp.

“That is how I want the team to stay which is to be concentrated, nothing else.”

Liverpool even overcame a rare deficit on home soil as for the first time this season after they trailed in the league at Anfield when Ainsley Maitland-Niles swept Arsenal into an 11th minute lead.

However, the hosts were level within three minutes and 4-1 up by half-time as Firmino struck twice in two minutes before Sadio Mane and Mohamed Salah’s penalty made the points safe before the break.

Salah then passed up the chance to move out in front as the league’s top scorer after drawing level with Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang and Harry Kane on 13 as he allowed Firmino to take Liverpool’s second penalty of the evening 25 minutes from time to complete the Brazilian’s hat-trick.

Spurs stumble

Tottenham had surged ahead of City into second place after smashing 11 goals past Everton and Bournemouth in the previous six days, but ran out of steam at Wembley as Wolves scored three times in the final 18 minutes.

A wonderful moment of individual skill from Kane put Spurs on course for a sixth straight league when he cut inside onto his weaker left foot, but still produced a powerful drive from 20 yards that beat Rui Patricio midway through the first half.

However, much has been made of Tottenham coach Mauricio Pochettino’s ability to extract the most from a stretched squad and Spurs finally looked like a side jaded by competing on four fronts in the final stages.

“We have had a very good run in the last few weeks and to keep that level is difficult,” said Pochettino. “I think we started to pay for the effort in the other games. We are not machines.”

The comeback began when Willy Boly rose highest to meet Joao Moutinho’s corner to equalise.

As the hosts pressed for a winner, Wolves broke in numbers and Raul Jimenez put the visitors in front six minutes from time before Helder Costa raced clear to score his first Premier League goal.

“I want to kill him”

Fulham are now just a point away from safety after Aleksandar Mitrovic saved Aboubakar Kamara’s blushes, but not the wrath of manager Claudio Ranieri.

The Frenchman ignored Ranieri’s orders to let Mitrovic take a late penalty with the scores still tied a 0-0 and saw his effort saved by Jonas Lossl.

“I said to Aboubakar Kamara to leave the ball to Mitrovic, he is the man who shoots the penalties,” said Ranieri. “It is unbelievable, he did not respect me, the club, the team and crowd. I spoke with him, it is not right.

“I want to kill him, that is normal when one man takes a ball, only because he scored the last penalty (against Manchester United). It should be Mitrovic, that is it.”

A missed penalty was also the turning point at the King Power where Cardiff goalkeeper Neil Etheridge saved James Maddison’s spot-kick for Leicester.

And Cardiff snatched a first away win of the season in stoppage time when Victor Camarasa unleashed a rocket to move the Welsh side four points clear of the relegation zone with a 1-0 victory.

Brighton also boosted their survival chances by beating Everton 1-0 thanks to Jurgen Locadia’s solitary goal.

Newcastle are also four points above the drop zone after they were denied a vital three points by Abdoulaye Doucoure’s late equaliser for Watford in a 1-1 draw at Vicarage Road after Salomon Rondon had opened the scoring.

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Agencies
April 12,2020

London, Apr 12: Former Formula 1 legendary driver Stirling Moss died at the age of 90 on Sunday.

"All at F1 send our heartfelt condolences to Lady Susie and Sir Stirling's family and friends," Formula 1 said in a statement.

Often referred to as the greatest driver never to win the world championship, Moss contested 66 Grands Prix from 1951 to 1961, driving for the likes of Vanwall, Maserati and Mercedes, where he famously formed a contented and ruthlessly effective partnership with lead driver Juan Manuel Fangio.

In his 10-year-long stint at the tracks, Moss took 16 wins, some of which rank among the truly iconic drives in the sport's history - his 1961 victories in Monaco and Germany in particular often held up as all-time classics.

Moss won the 1955 Mille Miglia on public roads for Mercedes at an average speed of close to 100mph, while he also competed in rallies and land-speed attempts.

Following an enforced retirement from racing (barring a brief comeback in saloon cars in the 1980s) after a major crash at Goodwood in 1962, Moss maintained a presence in Formula 1 as both a sports correspondent and an interested observer, before retiring from public life in January of 2018.

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News Network
February 19,2020

Feb 19: India captain Virat Kohli on Wednesday dropped enough hints to indicate that seniormost pacer Ishant Sharma and young opener Prithvi Shaw will be in the playing XI for the first Test against New Zealand in Wellington. If India's net session on Wednesday is taken into consideration, Wriddhiman Saha is starting as the wicketkeeper ahead of Rishabh Pant for the series opener beginning on Friday. Hanuma Vihari, the team's designated No 6 batsman for away Tests, will be the fifth bowling option with Jasprit Bumrah, Mohammed Shami and Ishant being three specialist pacers.

Ravichandran Ashwin is in the mix for the lone specialist spinner's spot though Ravindra Jadeja's all-round skills can't be ignored either.

Ishant, who was out for three weeks with an ankle injury sustained during a Ranji Trophy game, bowled full tilt at the nets and even earned appreciation for troubling batsmen with his pace and bounce.

"He (Ishant) looked pretty normal and pretty similar to what he was bowling before the ankle injury. He is hitting good areas again and he has played (Test cricket) in New Zealand couple of times, so his experience will be useful to us. It was really good to see him bowling with pace and in good areas," Kohli said during his media interaction.

The skipper also said in as many words that the team wouldn't like to change Shaw's natural stroke-play which was a good enough hint that Shubman Gill will have to warm the benches for now.

"Prithvi is a talented player and he has his own game and we want him to follow his instincts and play the way he does. Look, these guys have no baggage and are not desperate to perform in any manner," the skipper said.

The skipper wants Shaw to take a leaf out of Mayank Agarwal's performance in Australia back in 2018-19 when he hit back to back half-centuries in Melbourne and Sydney.

"They don't have any nerves to do well overseas. Like a clear head with which Mayank played in Australia, Prithvi can do the same in New Zealand.

"A bunch of guys playing with fearlessness, something that can motivate the whole team, gives us start that the team wants and not get intimidated by the opposition in any way."

The skipper downplayed India's below-par show in the three-match ODI series, especially that of Agarwal.

"Prithvi, I think you can call him relatively inexperienced and Mayank, I wouldn't call him that inexperienced because he has scored a lot of runs last year. So he understands what his game is like in Test cricket.

"I think sometimes in white ball cricket we try to do too much but once you come into red ball cricket, you fall into that disciplined mode of batting, which obviously suits him much more at this stage."

While he didn't give an answer on the Saha-Pant debate, the burly Delhi keeper had precious little to do at the main nets and was seen spending more time doing his keeping drills and only got an opportunity to bat when the first team completed its routines.

New Zealand are likely to go with an all-pace attack but the Indian captain wants to stick to his team's strengths which is play with one spinner in the four-pronged bowling attack.

"If it had been a Johannesburg pitch, I could have said it's a possibility (to play four pacers) but our team has that skill that we can bowl out other teams with only three fast bowlers," he sounded confident.

"But you need one world class skillful spinner, who can take wickets on any pitch. We won't copy the home team. We would rather figure out what is the most lethal combination, which gives us balance," he added.

"As a bowling group it's better than the one that came to NZ last time and that is why we have got so many teams all out in last two and half years. We would like to repeat that here also," Kohli added.

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News Network
July 1,2020

New Delhi, Jul 1: After being named as India's 'Most Valuable Player' in Test cricket in the 21st century, all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja on Wednesday said that he will always aim to give his best for the country.

His remark came as Jadeja achieved an MVP rating of 97.3 and as a result, he was also rated as the second most valuable player Test player worldwide, only second to Sri Lanka's Muttiah Muralitharan.

"Thank you Wisden India for naming me the 'Most Valuable Player'. I would like to thank all my teammates, coaches, fans, and well-wishers for your support as I aim to give my best for our country. Jai Hind," Jadeja tweeted.

Based on CricViz's market-leading analytics, each player in world cricket was awarded an 'MVP rating' by Wisden using a statistical model to rank their 'match impact' compared to their peers.

Jadeja has played in 49 Tests from 2012, managing to score 1,869 runs and has also picked up 213 wickets.

"It might come as a surprise to see Ravindra Jadeja, India's spin-bowling all-rounder, feature as India's number one. After all, he's not even always an automatic pick in their Test team. However, when he does play he is picked as a frontline bowler and has batted as high as No.6 - contributing to a very high match involvement," the official website of Wisden quoted CricViz's Freddie Wilde as saying.

"But Jadeja's position is based on more than simply volume: it's what he does when he's involved that really counts. The 31-year-old's bowling average of 24.62 is better than Shane Warne's and his batting average of 35.26 is better than Shane Watson's. His batting and bowling average differential of 10.62 runs is the second-best of any player this century to have scored more than 1,000 runs and taken 150 wickets. He is an all-rounder of the very highest quality," he added.

With the bat in hand, Jadeja has managed to score one century and 14 fifties in the longest format of the game.

He was last seen in action during India's two-Test series against New Zealand earlier this year.

He would have been in action for the Chennai Super Kings (CSK) in the IPL had the tournament commenced from March 29.

However, the IPL has been postponed indefinitely due to the coronavirus pandemic.

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