Category: 6. Sports

Lottie Woad’s impressive professional debut continued as she shot a second-round 65 to take a two-shot lead at the Women’s Scottish Open.

The 21-year-old again outscored playing partner and world number one Nelly Korda, who is tied-second with Denmark’s Nanna Koerstz Madsen.

Starting at the 10th at Dundonald Links, it took Englishwoman Woad five holes to make her first birdie, adding two more before making a run of four in seven holes from the third.

That took her to 12 under par, with just one bogey in 36 holes.

Scotland’s Gemma Dryburgh shot a superb 67 to make the cut after a disappointing 78 on the opening day, while England’s Georgia Hall is four under for the tournament.

Woad, who won the Irish Open earlier this month, announced her decision to turn professional last week after missing out on £400,000 in prize money at the Evian Championship, the fourth women’s major of the year.

The former world number one amateur finished just a shot outside the play-off won by Grace Kim at that event.

New signings Bryan Mbeumo, Matheus Cunha and Diego Leon have arrived at United this summer, but the club still want a striker and a holding midfield player to address clear weaknesses in Amorim’s squad.

While that might not happen, the former Sporting boss insists he would be happy if he has to face Arsenal in the opening game of the season with the current group of players he has at his disposal.

“At the moment, our club needs to be really careful when we sign a player,” he added.

“So if we have to start the season with this squad, I’m happy because all the players that are here want to be here – and that for me is the most important thing.”

United have spent almost £130m on forwards Cunha and Mbeumo, believing the pair can supply the goals to fire them up the Premier League table from the dismal 15th place they ended last season.

For both players, the move represents a risk.

Cunha had interest from Tottenham and Arsenal but, having harboured an ambition to play for United as a boy, snubbed the chance of Champions League football to become part of the sizeable Old Trafford rebuild.

He knows the likely reaction to a below-par start to the season, and given United’s opponents include Manchester City and Chelsea, in addition to Arsenal, in the first five games, the spotlight will be on immediately.

But Cunha doesn’t care about that as the Brazilian, 26, said: “I really think the pressure of this club is not really pressure, it’s a privilege.

“This is one of the biggest clubs in the world, and when Ruben came to me and said he wanted me to help put the club in the perfect times again, it was a challenge I wanted.”

Ben Healy held tough over the Tour de France’s final Alpine stage to finish eighth on the day and consolidate his ninth spot on the race’s overall ranking.

Stage 19 from Albertville to the summit of La Plagne was shortened to 93.1 Kilometers the night before the race, but was no less brutal with the Col du Pré and Cormet de Roseland on course before the tough climb to the finish.

Ben’s objective was to hang on to the yellow jersey group for as long as he could and hope he still had enough strength in his legs to defend his top-ten spot on G.C. deep into the third week of the race.

After winning stage 6, riding into the race leader’s yellow jersey, and defending it for two stages, Ben wants to see what kind of Tour de France G.C. rider he can become. Today was further proof that he can be a great one.

After hometown hero Alex Baudin went on the attack early and was brought back, Neilson Powless and Harry Sweeny guided Ben over the Col du Pré. Harry did a big turn in the yellow jersey group to help Ben get over the Cormet de Roseland and kept him out of the wind down the descent and into the valley. He led him into the base of La Plagne and then it was up to Ben.

As some of the strongest riders in the race faltered and had to drop back, Ben drove into the cold rain, clawing his way back to the yellow jersey group again, and again, as they attacked. He only had to let the wheel go in the final Kilometers. Then, he pushed his own pace, not letting up until he crossed the line — eighth on the stage and still firmly in the top ten.

The high mountains are now behind us, but this Tour still holds in store two tough tests. Tomorrow’s 20th stage from Nantua to Pontarlier is extremely hilly and promises a big fight for the breakaway. Stage 21 won’t be a parade in Paris either. This year’s circuit goes over Montmartre.

Ben will race to defend his G.C. spot all the way to the Champs-Élysées.

Read their thoughts from the summit of La Plagne.

It was a tough old day out there. Harry did a super job to get over the Col du Pré and the Roseland with me. It was raining hard and then I just suffered, hanging on to Tadej and those guys. Eighth on a mountain stage in the Alps in the third week of the Tour is something we can be proud of. We’re still top ten on G.C. There’s still some good racing yet.

I just time trialled all of the way to the finish. I was in the front group and suffered over the first climb, but got taken off the back by some guys on the descent before the Roseland. Five guys in front of me just let the wheel go. Props to them. They chased for the next 50k. It felt like it was just a time trial out there for such a short stage.

It was cool. I just got carried away with all my friends and couldn’t feel my legs and after I completely exploded. I didn’t have the legs today, but I really enjoyed that short moment in the front with all of my friends. It was fun. It was super cool to race on my home roads. I just wish I had better legs to be an actor in the race. I will come back.

AIX Racing’s Brad Benavides earned his and the team’s maiden FIA Formula 3 Aramco Pole Position Award late on in a thrilling Qualifying session.

The American found time on his final attempt to record a 2:04.253 and beat Championship leader and TRIDENT driver Rafael Câmara to the top spot, with Rodin Motorsport’s Callum Voisin in third.

With the first runs in the books, Câmara hit the front with a 2:05.557 to set the pace ahead of Ugo Ugochukwu by 0.234s.

Practice pace-setter Mari Boya had been in the top five but lost his opening effort to exceeding track limits after running over the white line at Pouhon.

Drivers remained on circuit for another attempt on their first set of tyres and there were improvements in the top 10. Tasanapol Inthraphuvasak closed the gap to Câmara in second, with Alessandro Giusti third on his next attempt for MP Motorsport.

Everyone returned to the pit lane with half the session remaining for a fresh set of the Pirelli Medium tyres.

One of the drivers to go early on the second run was Théophile Nael, who went fastest on a 2:05.508. Van Amersfoort Racing teammate Santiago Ramos improved to third, 0.172s down on the Frenchman’s laptime.

With the rest of the grid back out for their next set of laps, Boya led the train and put in a personal best, but track evolution was huge, leading to a massive improvement in times.

Benavides delivered a 2:04.253 for the provisional top spot with three minutes to go. Câmara also made an improvement but could not better the time of the American driver, settling 0.106s behind in second.

A squabble for track position ended when Ugochukwu moved to the head of the queue for the final attempts with less than 30 seconds to go and with almost the entire grid looking to start their final lap as late as possible.

However, nobody could find an improvement, leaving Benavides with pole for the Feature Race on Sunday, his and AIX’s first in the Championship.

Câmara had briefly lost his lap for exceeding track limits, but it was reinstated to leave him in second at the chequered flag ahead of Voisin in third.

Rodin teammate Roman Bilinski was fourth ahead of Martinius Stenshorne in fifth. Ugochukwu wound up sixth ahead of Tsolov and Inthraphuvasak in seventh and eighth for Campos Racing.

Charlie Wurz and Bruno del Pino completed the top 10, followed by Noah Stromsted in 11th and Freddie Slater in 12th, with the Hitech TGR driver set to start the Sprint Race from reverse grid pole.

The FIA Formula 3 Sprint Race is set to get underway at 09:15 local time on Saturday morning.

Emma Raducanu is eyeing her first tennis title since the U.S. Open triumph in 2021 after beating Maria Sakkari in straight sets 6-4, 7-5 at the Mubadala Citi DC Open 2025 in Washington D.C. on Friday (25 July) to advance to the semi-finals.

In a seesaw first set, 22-year-old Raducanu was broken in her first service game but, after a prolonged battle, hit back against Sakkari. The Briton broke Sakkari again to lead 4-3, the Greek replied in kind to go 4-4, then Raducanu added a third break of serve before going on to win the set 6-4.

Sakkari overcame the disappointment to overturn Raducanu’s serve in the sixth game of the second set to take a 4-2 lead. Raducanu, however, came steaming back to level at 5-5 before going on to close out both the set and the match 7-5.

Middlesex’s bowlers wore down heroic Northamptonshire resistance to close out an emphatic victory by an innings and 107 runs deep into the final session of day four at Merchant Taylors’ School.

Rob Keogh defied the hosts attack for almost five hours despite being struck for a second time on the finger he damaged while fielding on day one to make a gutsy unbeaten 61, while Saif Zaib also battled through pain to add 44 to his 82 of the first innings.

There was even a last-wicket stand of 47 between Keogh and Yuzvendra Chahal to further frustrate the Seaxes, but in the end for Ryan Higgins’ 3-54 (seven in the match) and a maiden first-class wicket for Ben Geddes bowled out the visitors for 257.

Northamptonshire’s hopes of frustrating the host’s victory push were dealt an early blow when Lewis McManus, having played one delicious extra cover drive tried to leave a ball from Roland-Jones, only for it to cannon off the under edge and send his off-stump cartwheeling.

One wicket became two in the next over, Tom Helm beating George Bartlett twice in successive balls before banging in a short one which the batter skied obligingly to Roland-Jones at mid-on.

Much now rested on the shoulders of all-rounders Zaib and Keogh. Zaib picked up where he’d left off in the first innings, Keogh meanwhile took 18 balls to get off the mark and was then struck on his already damaged digit by a ball from Higgins but carried on after lengthy treatment

Deprived of spinner Zafar Gohar due to the arm injury picked up fielding on day three and with a soft Kookaburra ball offering no help to the Middlesex seamers, the stoic resistance of the Steelbacks continued on the resumption.

However, as frustration looked to be setting in, Tom Helm found some extra bounce and Zaib feathered an edge through to Joe Cracknell.

Still the defiance continued with Ben Sanderson, on a pair from the first innings, battling for over an hour for his 12 and guiding Northamptonshire to the sanctuary of tea.

With the new ball imminent, Ben Geddes was introduced to speed up its arrival and promptly found the edge of Sanderson’s bat with his third ball, Higgins taking a smart catch at slip.

Higgins took the ripe cherry in hand to remove Guthrie, before an entertaining last-wicket stand that saw Keogh reach a thoroughly deserved half-century.

Chahal, on a king pair played a glorious off-drive and a few other less conventional shots to reach 20, but Cornwell rearranged his stumps to clinch victory with 25 overs left.

Carlos Sainz: I’m happy with P6 today. It was a big turnaround from the team and myself after missing half of FP1, so it was good to get some decent laps in during SQ. We also have some updates on the car which I still need to properly understand in order to fine tune the set up but, overall, when everything goes to plan, we can better show our pace. Hopefully tomorrow we can keep building through the weekend!

Alex Albon: We had an issue which we thought we’d fixed after FP1, but we were losing a lot of lap time on the straights in Sprint Qualifying, so we will need to try something different to resolve it. We generally have a good car which seems quick around this circuit, so I’m still optimistic about the weekend.

MATCH REPORT: Hartley brilliance helps Lancashire snatch final day win in Cheltenham

Man of the match Tom Hartley produced another career-best performance to propel Lancashire to a hard-earned nine-wicket victory over Gloucestershire at Cheltenham and keep alive their hopes of winning promotion back to the First Division of the Rothesay County Championship.

Having previously staged his highest score of 130 and taken 6-116 to put his team in control, the England slow left armer claimed 5-99 on the final day of an entertaining match at the famous old College Ground as the red rose county made it two wins out of two in the red-ball format under the new leadership team of interim head coach Steve Croft and captain Jimmy Anderson.

Made to follow on, Gloucestershire were dismissed for 285 in 98 overs in their second innings, slow left armer Hartley finishing with match figures of 11-215 after Ben Charlesworth and Joe Phillips had scored 71 and 56 respectively for the home side. Chris Green weighed in with 2-62 as spin accounted for seven wickets on a surface offering some assistance.

Set 110 to win in 26 overs, Lancashire chased down their target for the loss of Luke Wells with five overs to spare, courtesy of an authoritative unbroken second wicket partnership of 103 between Keaton Jennings and Josh Bohannon. Confronted by four spinners as Gloucestershire dispensed with seam, Jennings top-scored with a brisk 57 not out from 67 balls, while the equally forthright Bohannon faced 50 deliveries in raising an undefeated 45 as the visitors eased to victory in the final hour.

Lancashire took 22 points to move into fourth place in the Second Division, in the process, leapfrogging Gloucestershire, who settled for five points after sustaining their third defeat of the season..

Gloucestershire resumed their second innings on 98 without loss, still 78 in arrears and potentially vulnerable to a repeat of the collapse that undermined their first innings. It was incumbent upon openers Cameron Bancroft and Charlesworth to build upon their good start on a pitch that was offering some assistance to spin, but which was not expected to break up.

If Gloucestershire’s minimum requirement was to bat two sessions, Lancashire were reading from an altogether different script, Anderson claiming the prized scalp of Bancroft in the opening over, the Australian edging to mid-wicket without adding to his overnight score of 35.

Having seen off Anderson, Charlesworth was no doubt disappointed to then succumb to George Balderson in his first over from the Chapel Lawn End. Attempting a back-foot flick, Gloucestershire’s first-innings centurion found Marcus Harris at short mid-wicket and departed for 71 with the score 129-2. Guilty of poor shot selection, Ollie Price then pursued a wide delivery from Hartley that bounced off a length and edged to Luke Wells at slip, at which point Gloucestershire were 134-3, still 42 in arrears, having lost three wickets in the first hour.

They came close to losing another in the next over, Miles Hammond standing his ground and being afforded the benefit of the doubt when Jennings claimed a catch at short square leg off the bowling of Hartley. The reprieve proved temporary, Green pinning Hammond lbw for 22 in the final over before lunch, which was taken with the score 168-4. Representing Gloucestershire’s best chance of saving the game, Phillips remained unbeaten on 35.

He was joined by James Bracey and these two wiped out the remaining arrears early on in the afternoon session, Phillips going to a hard-earned 50 from 91 balls with his eighth four. But Lancashire continued to take wickets, Jack Blatherwick angling a short delivery into the body of Bracey, who was unable to get his bat out of the way and edged behind. His departure was a blow for Gloucestershire, who were in effect 21-5 with 57 overs left in the day.

An even bigger blow befell the home side when Phillips’ vigil came to an end soon afterwards, the Cornishman held by the safe hands of Jennings at short leg off the bowling of the ubiquitous Hartley. Phillips had faced 110 balls, accrued 8 fours and defied the red rose bowlers for three hours. Hartley then extracted additional spin to remove van Buuren, who stretched forward and was caught behind for eight to leave the home side between a rock and a hard place at 210-7.

Todd Murphy led a Gloucestershire counter-attack, going for his shots, pushing the field back and sharing in a useful stand of 41 in eight overs with Zaman Akhter, who scored a breezy 20 before offering a return catch to Green as the home side slipped to 251-8. Ajeet Singh Dale survived a searching examination at the hands of Anderson and the new ball, he and Murphy digging in to reach tea on 268-8. Gloucestershire had a slender lead of 92 with a minimum 35 overs remaining.

Lancashire’s go-to man, Hartley returned to bowl Murphy for a 56-ball 33 and complete the first 10-wicket match haul of his career as an enthralling contest entered its final session. He then accounted for last man Marchant de Lange, held at short square leg as Gloucestershire’s resistance with the bat finally came to an end in the early-evening sunshine.