In Cricket, Indian spinner Deepti Sharma is on the verge of becoming the number one bowler in the ICC women’s T20 International rankings for the first time in her career. She has moved to second place in the latest list after gaining one spot, overtaking Australian pacer Annabel Sutherland and now trails Pakistan’s Sadia Iqbal by only eight rating points.
Deepti’s rise came after she took three wickets in the third game of India’s five-match T20I series against England. Deepti has consistently ranked within the top 10 T20 International bowlers for most of the past six years, but the 27-year-old has never held the top position, despite demonstrating great consistency recently.
It’s a big change following Nintendo removing listings for its products from Amazon starting last year. Bloomberg reported in June that Nintendo pulled the listings because third-party sellers sold games at prices “that undercut Nintendo’s advertised rates.” Nintendo and Amazon pushed back on Bloomberg’s report in statements to the publication but didn’t go into specifics.
If you request an Amazon invite, the product page will show a message saying that “if invited to purchase, you’ll get an email with a link that’s valid for 22 hours. We won’t be able to grant all requests.” I got an email notifying me about my request, too.
The Switch 2 has been a huge hit for Nintendo, becoming the fastest-selling game console of all time since its June 5th launch. If you are still looking for a console and Amazon doesn’t come through, retailers like Walmart and Best Buy have occasional restocks.
With ‘Bazball’, technique is secondary to ego, domination is everything, defence is an afterthought (if thought of at all), and importantly, having once settled on a philosophy of quick scoring and ‘entertainment’, there is no Plan B. Bazball contains seeds of its own destruction. That’s something India will have to exploit for the rest of the series just as they did at Edgbaston.
When it comes off, Bazball looks dramatic, as if it is the only way to play cricket. It brings in crowds, eschews draws, puts pressure on the opposition. It has been consistently successful for England since Brendon McCullum (coach) and Ben Stokes (captain) took charge. But when things are going badly, and the call is for swallowing the ego and defending stoutly, it flounders and is left without ideas. There is an attacking Bazball, but no defending Bazball. That is a chapter yet to be worked out.
England’s problems
Suddenly, England have all the problems. Their bowling looks weak and incomplete with neither medium-pacer nor the lone spinner threatening. This might change if Gus Atkinson and Jofra Archer make it to the eleven for Lord’s, but neither has played in a while. The batting looks shaky, with six zeroes in the first innings (and two scores over 150) giving the scoreboard a strange, lopsided look.
India have been ahead on nine of the ten days of the series so far; it is a domination that is not reflected in the 1-1 scoreline. They lost at Headingley despite five centuries, but won at Edgbaston with one man, skipper Shubman Gill making 42% of the 1000-plus runs the team made for the first time. Cricket is a funny game.
It was foolish to have rested the world’s best bowler, Jasprit Bumrah, after losing the first Test, but India got away with it. Bumrah is back for the Lord’s Test this week. Now with Akash Deep’s ten-wicket performance, the pace bowling looks more settled than before, so you can argue it was worth the risk! Akash Deep’s has been an incredible performance, his ability to get the ball to dart back or keep its course almost at will astounding.
Much was made of his manner of hitting the cracks as if the pitch deserved the credit for his wickets. But that is being miserly with praise for the ability to bowl to a plan, and hit a length consistently.
Interesting reign ahead
That the Indian medium-pacers used the Dukes ball and the pitch better than the home team must worry England whose coach has asked for more pace and bounce at Lord’s, while criticising the ‘subcontinental’ wicket at Edgbaston. Gill, who has grown nicely into the role of a leader was unhappy both with the ball which goes soft too soon and the slow wickets which he said kills the essence of the game. It is good to see India’s captain and leading batter speak his mind and go beyond platitudes at the end of a match. We are in for an interesting reign.
This was a Test that India won rather than one which England lost, although the declaration might have been unnecessarily delayed — either because of Gill’s respect for England’s ability to chase down big scores, or putting the game beyond the opposition was the priority even if it meant risking a draw. Perhaps the inability of attacking batters to settle down and play a defensive game to draw a Test is a lost art, and Gill knew it. Yet, the field placing on the final day was overly defensive and beyond understanding. The ability to know when to attack and when to defend is a lesson captains have to learn early.
India seem to have hit their stride, all their batters in form, bowlers effective and the catching, especially close-in safe. When whom to drop rather than whom to pick is the question, the team is in a good place.
Gill’s sublime batting and appetite for huge scores — he has 585 runs from four innings, and if he continues in the same vein could challenge Bradman’s record of 974 for a series — has already elevated the batting on view to a different plane. The coronation ceremony is over, Indian batting has a new king.
Elon Musk’s new US political party faces steep challenges
Elon Musk’s new US political party faces steep challenges
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Building a new US political party from scratch is a daunting task, even for the world’s richest man.
But that is what Elon Musk, the billionaire behind Tesla and SpaceX, said he plans to do in the wake of his falling out with President Donald Trump. Musk this weekend announced the birth of the “America Party” – dedicated, he said, to defeating Republicans who backed Trump’s massive tax-cut and spending bill.
Musk described his new party on his platform X as tech-centric, budget-conscious, pro-energy and centrist, with the goal of drawing both disaffected Democrats and Republicans. Musk has criticized the tax-cut bill, which is forecast to add about $3.4 trillion to the United States’ debt.
Breaking the two-party system’s grip on US federal elections would take tremendous resources and a long-term commitment, political experts say. Similar attempts have failed, underscoring how difficult it is to gain a foothold in a country where elections are organized on a state-by-state level.
“There are just very, very significant barriers to the creation of a viable third party,” said David A. Hopkins, a Boston College political science professor. He said challenges include building party infrastructure, organizing volunteers and qualifying for the ballot.
David Jolly, a former Republican congressman from Florida who left the party over Trump, said Musk can provide what has long been required for such a push: money.
“What the independent space has been lacking has been resources,” Jolly said. “It’s more than filing with the Federal Election Commission. It’s really starting 50 state parties. You’re talking about $100 million just to enter the space with real serious intent.”
Jolly considered returning to politics as an independent, but he concluded that staying within the two-party system would be a more effective way to reach unhappy voters. He is now running for governor of Florida as a Democrat.
In 2016, former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, another billionaire, made a similar conclusion, rejecting the idea of running for president as an independent, saying that such a candidate would have “no chance of winning.”
Jolly estimated it would take Musk 10 years and perhaps $1 billion to build a viable national party – and said Musk’s recent history with his Department of Government Efficiency suggests the billionaire may not be in it for the long haul.
Musk left DOGE after just a few months in Trump’s administration, having delivered little of the savings he promised.
“What we have seen is an Elon Musk who is not disciplined … enough to change American politics,” Jolly said.
Musk’s office did not respond to a request for comment. Tesla shares closed nearly 7% lower on Monday as Musk reignited investors’ worries about his focus on the company.
PLAYING SPOILER
Musk could have chosen a more traditional path, using his political action committee to back Republican challengers to incumbents in the party primaries ahead of next year’s midterm elections, which will determine control of Congress.
He was the largest donor in the 2024 US campaign cycle, making nearly $300 million in contributions, mostly focused on helping Trump return to the White House.
Not all his political efforts have paid off. He poured millions of dollars into a Wisconsin Supreme Court election in April, only to see his preferred candidate fail.
His efforts to convince Republicans in the US Congress not to pass Trump’s tax bill also fell flat.
It is unclear how effective he would be in backing independents in a handful of competitive US House of Representatives races.
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NASA’s troubled efforts to get prized Martian samples to Earth could get a lifeline, if a new proposal for a more cost-effective mission architecture gets the go-ahead.
The Perseverance rover landed on Mars in 2021 and set about collecting intriguing and diverse samples in preparation for a follow up Mars Sample Return Mission (MSR) campaign, which would pick the samples up and deliver them to Earth for analysis. However, independent reviews indicated costs ballooning to up to $11 billion, and MSR faces cancellation in Trump administration budget proposals for 2026.
In a new effort to revive the program, aerospace giant Lockheed Martin, which has built 11 of NASA’s 22 Mars spacecraft over the years, is proposing a cut-price, streamlined mission that would use a smaller lander, a smaller Mars ascent vehicle and a smaller Earth entry system.
Artist’s illustration of Lockheed Martin’s proposed Mars ascent vehicle (MAV) approaching the company’s orbiter for rendezvous. (Image credit: Lockheed Martin)
The lander would build on heritage from NASA’s InSight lander, which successfully touched down on the Red Planet in November 2018.
“Our most recent commercial industry-led offer to NASA is to execute Mars Sample Return (MSR) as a firm-fixed price solution for under $3 billion,” a June 26 statement from Lockheed Martin read.
“Given current MSR estimates of $7 billion, our goal is to utilize existing designs and streamline operations of the primary spacecraft and systems — while managing risk and reducing oversight — offering a significantly lower total mission cost,” the statement continued.
In addition to its Mars expertise, the company noted that it designed and built the spacecraft and return capsules for all three of NASA’s robotic sample return missions, including the OSIRIS-REx asteroid sample return mission, which delivered samples from the space rock Bennu to Earth in 2023.
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Artist’s illustration of Lockheed Martin’s proposed Mars ascent vehicle (MAV) launching the Perseverance rover’s collected Red Planet samples from the company’s lander. (Image credit: Lockheed Martin)
“With a commercial industry approach that focuses on managing key requirements, reducing complexity by leveraging heritage, flight-proven elements and limiting new designs to only those needed to close the architecture, we can bring back the samples that will unlock the mysteries of Mars, and lay the groundwork for the astronauts who will set foot on the Red Planet,” Lockheed Martin wrote.
But Lockheed’s plan is not the only alternative vision for MSR. Private space company Rocket Lab put forward its own cut-price proposal for the mission last year, in response to a NASA call for ideas to get the precious samples home in a faster and cheaper manner.
China too is working on a robotic campaign to collect and return Mars samples. With the launch of its Tianwen 3 mission set for late 2028, the country will get the first shot at acquiring the historic first Red Planet samples, with the material potentially holding the evidence of life beyond Earth.
For now, the U.S. approach to Mars appears to be shifting from a robotic approach and toward putting astronauts on the Red Planet, according to Trump administration budget proposals, likely using SpaceX’s in-development Starship megarocket. Landing humans on Mars is much more challenging and complex but, if realized, would also see invaluable Martian rock, dust and atmosphere samples delivered to Earth.
Brain metastases from ovarian cancer (BMFOC) are rare but associated with poor prognosis. This study aimed to evaluate the efficacy and safety of Gamma Knife stereotactic radiosurgery (GKSRS) in managing patients with BMFOC.
Methods
A retrospective analysis was conducted on 22 patients with BMFOC who were treated with GKSRS between January 2015 and May 2019. The median age at the start of treatment was 57.7 years (range, 46–72 years). A total of 70 brain metastases were treated, with each patient having between one and nine metastatic tumors. The mean tumor volume was 3.6 cm3 (range, 0.1–22.7 cm3). The mean peripheral dose was 16 Gy (range, 7–20 Gy), and the mean isodose curve was 54.6% (range, 45–80%).
Results
At 12 months post-GKSRS, 68 metastatic tumors were assessed: 32 (47.1%) showed complete response, 20 (29.4%) had partial response, 14 (20.6%) remained stable, and two (2.9%) progressed, leading to a tumor control rate of 97.1%. No acute or chronic toxicity was observed.
Conclusions
The findings of this study indicate that GKSRS may serve as an effective treatment modality for selected BMFOC patients, offering high intracranial tumor control rates. The data indicate that GKSRS is generally well tolerated, with no significant adverse effects observed in this study. While GKSRS may be a valuable option for managing BMFOC, treatment decisions should be individualized, taking into account factors such as tumor burden, extracranial disease status, performance status, and patient preferences.
Source:
Journal reference:
Han, C., et al. (2025). Gamma Knife Stereotactic Radiosurgery for Brain Metastases from Ovarian Cancer: A Case Series of 22 Patients. Neurosurgical Subspecialties. doi.org/10.14218/nsss.2024.00009.
Boeing delivered 150 commercial planes in the second quarter, up from 92 in the same quarter a year ago and well above the 129 that analysts had expected
Boeing on Tuesday reported second-quarter deliveries that topped analysts’ estimates, as the plane maker continues to ramp up its production.
Commercial deliveries were up to 150 planes from 92 in the same period last year, when Boeing was in the midst of safety investigations and production limits.
Shares of Boeing have added about 24% in 2025 so far.
Boeing (BA) on Tuesday reported second-quarter deliveries that topped analysts’ estimates, as the plane maker continues its turnaround under a new CEO.
Boeing’s commercial planes segment delivered 150 planes in the quarter, up from 92 in the same quarter a year ago and well above the 129 analysts had expected, according to Visible Alpha estimates.
The 150 delivered commercial jets included 104 of Boeing’s 737 aircraft, up from 70 a year ago, when production had slowed as Boeing burned through billions of dollars amid safety investigations and production limits after the January 2024 Alaska Airlines (ALK) incident in which a door plug detached midflight.
Boeing also delivered 36 helicopters and jets in its defense segment, four more than analysts had expected and up from 28 last year. The plane maker said it will report its full second-quarter results on July 29.
In its last quarterly report, Boeing also topped deliveries estimates, while concerns remained about how the Trump administration’s tariffs could affect the company and its dealings with airlines based in China and other countries. Boeing in April reported a narrower first-quarter loss than expected, with some analysts saying the plane maker was making progress on getting back to the growth that was forecast before the door-plug incident.
Boeing shares were little changed in recent trading Tuesday. They are up about 24% since the start of the year, recently hitting their highest levels since their slide in January 2024.
Ed Miliband has abandoned plans to charge southern electricity users more than those in Scotland, after senior officials warned it could put off investors and make it more difficult to build renewables.
Sources have told the Guardian that the government has decided not to proceed with the scheme, known as “zonal pricing”, and that the decision will be announced once it has been signed off by the cabinet.
The plan was first proposed by the Conservatives as a way to encourage heavy electricity users to relocate to areas where there is more generation, such as Scotland, and windfarms sometimes have to switch off because of a lack of demand.
The proposals were heavily backed by Greg Jackson, the founder and boss of Octopus Energy, but triggered a backlash among many other energy companies such as SSE, Scottish Power and RWE.
One source said: “The government has been weighing this up carefully and concluded that the benefits of delivering the clean power mission at pace, particularly given the expected impact of imminent grid upgrades; the need to deliver on the coming renewables auctions; and the significant risk premium being attributed to the UK by international investors, would outweigh the purported benefits of zonal pricing – which at any rate would take beyond the next election to implement.”
The energy department declined to comment.
The proposals would have set lower electricity prices in areas where supply far outstrips demand, in an attempt to encourage industry to move into those areas and reduce the need to switch off generation. Windfarms are sometimes paid to power down when renewable energy threatens to overwhelm the grid.
Zonal pricing could have cut the cost of renewing and updating the country’s electricity grid by billions.
A report by FTI Consulting predicted overall savings of £52bn for consumers over 20 years, while another, which was commissioned by Octopus, found the UK would need to spend £27bn less would need to be spent on major grid upgrades in the future.
The plans threatened an outcry from the sector and the wider public, however.
Alistair Phillips-Davies, the outgoing chief executive of SSE, said recently the plan would be a “huge mistake”, saying it would create a “postcode lottery” where some households would pay £200 to £300 more because of where they live.
An independent report co-authored by Rob Gross, the UK Energy Research Centre director, found the benefits of zonal pricing could easily be wiped out if renewable energy developers demanded higher subsidies to offset the risk of the new scheme.
Miliband is already under pressure from Downing Street to show when his sweeping reforms to the energy system will bring down bills for ordinary consumers, with No 10 officials increasingly concerned about the threat of Reform UK.
Downing Street intervened in the zonal pricing debate after aides to the prime minister, Keir Starmer, became concerned about the possible effect of rolling out plans which could lead to prices rise for some consumers.
Some also worried about the impact on international investment, which is seen as key to building the energy infrastructure which the government has promised.
The French company EDF confirmed on Tuesday it would take a 12.5% stake in the Sizewell C nuclear plant, boosting ministers’ promises of a “golden age” of nuclear power.
Advisers held meetings with a number of energy companies recently to discuss potential alternatives, and the government has now decided to abandon zonal pricing altogether.
The decision has gone to senior ministers in a process known as “write-round”, and will be announced before the next renewables auction which is scheduled for early August.
Officials are now focused on finding alternatives to zonal pricing which might encourage businesses and manufacturers to locate to electricity-rich parts of the country. They include paying battery storage companies to build major capacity in Scotland, or paying them to turn up their capacity on particularly windy days.
One government source said the search for other plans was “where all the brain power is now being expended”.
MPs have voted to back the Football Governance Bill and establish an independent regulator to oversee the men’s game in England’s top five divisions.
They voted by 415 to 98 to pass the bill at its third reading in the House of Commons, and it is now poised to become law.
The legislation will grant powers to a body that is independent from government and football authorities.
The government has previously said an independent regulator will “protect football clubs” by “ensuring their financial sustainability”.
“I am proud to be part of the winning team that has put our fans back on the pitch at the heart of the game, where they belong,” Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy said.
The bill was initially introduced in March 2024 by the then-Conservative government but failed to pass through parliament before a general election was called in May. The new Labour government reintroduced the bill in July 2024.
In a message to fans before the vote, Nandy had told the Commons: “We are doing this for you because for too long, you have been treated as an afterthought at best or a nuisance at worst in a game that is only great because of you.
“This is for Macclesfield, for Wigan, for Bury, for Bolton, for Derby, for Reading, for Sheffield Wednesday, for Morecambe and for many, many more who have had to endure the misery of being put last when they should have been put first.”
Shadow Minister for Sport, Louie French MP, criticised the Bill, saying “a future Conservative government will trigger a review of Labour’s regulator as soon as possible”.
Football campaign group Fair Game described the bill clearing the Commons as “a historic step forward for our national game.”
“This is a victory for fairness, sustainability and the future of football… Now, at long last, we are firmly on the path to a fairer future for football,” it said.
