🎧 All about transfers

The Devils' Advocate podcast has landed.This week's episode is all about transfers, as BBC Radio Manchester's Gaz Drinkwater and Joe McGrath question why the Bryan Mbeumo deal isn't done yet and discuss whether Viktor Gyokeres could be the answer to United's goalscoring troubles.Plus, do you know which league Manchester United currently top?Listen to the full episode on BBC Sounds

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The Guardian

37 minutes ago

• The Guardian

Royal Ascot 2025: updates, previews, full results and more from day five's races

Update: Date: 2025-06-21T10:13:14.000Z Title: - Chesham Stakes (7f)', ' Content: Good morning. And after yesterday's sojourn to Ascot in my finery (of which more later) here's the run down of today's action and after ginving you the going and non-runner details I will start publishing Greg Wood's previews of all the races. 2.30pm - Chesham Stakes (7f)3.05pm - Hardwicke Stakes (1m 4f)3.40pm - Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes (6f)4.20pm - Jersey Stakes (7f)5.00pm - Wokingham Stakes (Heritage Handicap) (6f)5.35pm - Golden Gates Stakes (Handicap) (1m 2f)6.10pm - Queen Alexandra Stakes (2m 6f) Update: Date: 2025-06-21T10:07:16.000Z Title: Preamble Content: Welcome back to Ascot on the fifth bright, warm morning in a row at this year's Royal meeting, on a day when the biggest crowd of the week might just witness a moment of racing history in the afternoon's feature event, the Queen Elizabeth II Jubilee Stakes (3.40pm). Japan has become one of global racing's powerhouses over the last quarter of a century, winning major races on all continents and often bringing plenty of travelling fans along for the ride. Their record at Royal Ascot, however, and in fact, at Ascot full stop, is a tale of woe, with the occasional near-miss along the way. Agnes World, the first Japanese-trained runner at the meeting, finished second, beaten just over a length, in what was then the Group Two King's Stand Stakes, when he was giving weight to his 22 rivals (and in his next race, won the Group One July Cup, the summer sprinting championship). One of his stable companions finished 22nd in the same race, and since then, only one of 10 runners from Japan has even reached the first five (Shahryar, in the 2022 Prince Of Wales's Stakes). In Noriyuki Hori's Satono Reve, though, the country has one of its strongest contenders for years, and riding legend Joao Moreira has flown in to take the reins. The six-year-old has form that puts him within a length or two of Ka Ying Rising, the top-rated sprinter in global racing, and has been given plenty of time to get used to his new surroundings having arrived in Newmarket in early May. I think he could be the horse to finally break Japan's duck here, and the market seems to agree as he has been backed from 9-2 to 5-2 favourite this morning. Inisherin, last year's winner of the Commonwealth Cup here, is next in on 9-2, and in a truly international field, two French-trained runners, Lazzat and Topgear, are next in at 5-1 and 6-1 respectively. The Jersey Stakes (4.20pm), for three-year-olds over seven furlongs, and the Hardwicke Stakes, over a mile-and-a-half and a race that has often been a stepping stone to the King George VI & Queen Elizabeth Stakes here in July, are the main supporting races on today's card, along with the ever-popular Wokingham Handicap at 5pm. The going remains good-to-firm all over after further watering last night, and temperatures are expected to climb towards 30C as the afternoon goes on, which should ensure that the track is bursting at the seams by the time the royal procession makes its way down the track just before 2pm. The attendance has been up on every day of the meeting so far – it was an 8% jump on Friday – and there is every chance the course will complete a full house today, for the second year in a row. John & Thady Gosden are tied at five apiece in the race to be top trainer, Oisin Murphy is just two wins behind Ryan Moore after taking the last race here on Friday and you can follow all the action and slings and arrows of outrageous fortune as the 2025 Royal meeting draws to a close right here on the Guardian's live blog.

Daily Mail​

38 minutes ago

• Daily Mail​

Money washes through Royal Ascot - a bottle of Whispering Angel costs £75 - but it still appeals to all... DOMINIC KING reveals the glitz and the glamour of the heaven for racegoers

In that special space reserved for the winners, another dream had just come true. A tough little filly called Cercene had just won The Coronation Stakes, one of Royal Ascot 's Championship races, and her connections were beside themselves. 'It's a lifetime's ambition to have a Group One winner,' said Joseph Murphy, a 70-year-old from Tipperary who has been training horses since 1977. 'This is 50 years of work – that's what it is. It's just a whole group of people together. This is heaven on earth.' Money could not have bought the feeling that washed over Murphy on Friday. Success at this meeting hits differently compared to any other time of year, as this is the place to be – and be seen. But money, though, is a theme that washes through the week. Racing finds itself in a tricky position at present, with a number of issues to address and problems to solve, but step into Ascot and you would wonder there are complaints about the sport. Ascot, you see, appeals to all. At one end of the spectrum, you have an influential owners such as Kia Joorabchian, the successful football agent, going head-to-head with the American financial whizz John Stewart at auction on Monday evening. The Goffs London Sale, staged in Kensington Gardens, kick starts Royal Ascot week, with high rollers from around the world coming in to buy horses that ready to run and hold entries at the meeting. Joorabchian and Stewart went head-to-head in dramatic fashion for Lot 10, a beautiful colt called Ghostwriter, with the former coming out on top. Ghostwriter will run for a first prize of £141,775 in Saturday's Hardwucke Stakes. He cost Joorabchian £2million. You don't need pockets that deep, however, to get the unbridled joy of an Ascot win. Havana Hurricane blew his rivals away in the Windsor Castle Stakes on Wednesday and had been bought for £9,000 by his trainer Eve Johnson Houghton. His bounty for winning was £62,381. This provides the best example of the spectrum that Royal Ascot takes in. It is for everyone and you can enjoy it, however much you want to pay. Of course it is possible to pay through the nose. Entry into the Queen Anne Enclosure is £110 and, on your way to it, you will walk past pop-up stalls from luxury watchmaker Longines and bespoke fashion designer LK Bennett. The outfits racegoers are wearing show that no expense has been spared, with gentlemen applying little luxurious flourishes to their Morning Suits by buying floral buttonholes from a trader on Ascot High Street. The charge is at your discretion but it was easy to see crisp £20 notes being tendered for the service. Yet it's not all bank-breaking stuff. One gentleman on X posted that his tie for the meeting, pink and purple to match his waistcoat, had cost £1.70 from a local charity shop. 'You have 300,000 people over five days; everyone from the King of England to someone who has saved all of their expendable income over the last few months,' said Ascot CEO Fliss Barnard during an interview with the Sunday Telegraph ahead of the meeting. 'There's an ecosystem of getting the product right, the pricing and how you're telling people about it.' There are soaring temperatures but punters have 16 hydrations stations Guinness costs £7.80 a pint, in line with what you would pay at Cheltenham, Aintree or Newmarket (courses that are owned by The Jockey Club); Whispering Angel, the rose wine that is enormously popular, will set you back £75 for a bottle, while a bottle of Moet & Chandon champagne is £100. All bars have been doing a roaring trade. Not that you have needed alcohol to combat the raging temperatures: there are 16 hydration stations around Ascot and free bottles of water have been given away at the end of the day to keep racegoers cool. The customer experience is key. Barnard, a 42-year-old mother-of-two who once worked with West Ham, makes the point about an ecosystem and she is right: you can bring a picnic into the centre of the course, open from Thursday to Saturday, and spend as much or as little as you want. A ticket to the Heath enclosure is £45 and when you compare that to other sporting events, it is impossible not to see the value. The quality of the sport, which is what it is all about, is relentlessly high, with superstars emerging from all angles. It costs Ascot £30million to stage the event but the return is exceptional, as between 70 and 80 per cent of their annual turnover is generated. The most recent financial figures saw Ascot turnover £110.9million, so it illustrates the importance. Another aspect to emphasise is that £200million loan that they took out in 2005 to build the stand that takes your breath away – one American visitor on Wednesday stood and looked at it from the parade ring for five minutes in awe – has been paid back. Study the figures long enough and it is enough to make you dizzy but one thing is true: the buzz it provides, the memories it creates is on another level. Murphy called 'heaven' – he wouldn't be alone in speaking that way.

Times

an hour ago

• Times

Tommy Freeman tried — but Lions tactics will not work with bad kicking

The British & Irish Lions didn't lose to Argentina for lack of effort. They didn't lose because of any overriding tactical aberration. Through the course of the 80 minutes, their discipline was outstanding. Much as supporters like nothing more than to blame a referee, James Doleman, if anything, was instinctively on the side of the Lions. He needed the help of the TMO despite being in the ideal position to see Luke Cowan-Dickie clearly fail to ground the ball for a 'try'. There were other examples. The sea of red supported them all the way. As for the opposition, Argentina have, if anything, had a poorer preparation than the Lions. There are no excuses. Tommy Freeman, the Lions wing, summed up an evening that — far from wishing to forget — Andy Farrell's men will do well to remember. This is what happens when effort is eclipsed by inaccuracy and sub-standard execution. Freeman is a superb player but nothing went his way in Dublin on Friday night. Nothing went his way and yet he did exactly what his coaches would have wanted in terms of what he set out to do: Chase those box-kicks, sprint after every restart, get hands on the ball as often as possible. Hunt the ball infield. That's the essence of Freeman. He gives, and gave, everything. From the first to last minute of his performance, he was taking his typical run-up, behind the box-kicker, to compete in, and usually win, those aerial contests. In Dublin, he must have sprinted a 1,000 metres without one clean catch. Argentina's wings are less physically imposing than Freeman and Scotland's Duhan van der Merwe but they were far more effective chasers. That is not just about the respective abilities of those wide players, though, more a profound reflection of the difference in quality of the tactical kicking. Freeman can time his chases from Northampton Saints and England team-mate Alex Mitchell in his sleep but Mitchell's kicking was too often a metre too long. These were not bad kicks but they weren't good either. At the highest levels these fine margins are critical. Whereas Mitchell was OK, his opposite number, Gonzalo García, was outstanding. In the opening ten minutes, the tone was set as the Lions chased in vain and Argentina made frequent gains and turnovers. Mitchell must be disappointed with his performance. He failed to kick-start the Lions. As for Freeman, he produced a fabulous example of how to work off his wing. Sweeping from right to left, he persistently carried hard into the midfield of Argentina. Unfortunately, the passes he received were usually a fraction off target, as Scotland's Sione Tuipulotu failed to find the English wing's wavelength. Little combined errors resulted in collective failure. Tuipulotu, the Glasgow Warriors centre, hasn't played much rugby this season; his rustiness was part of Freeman's frustrations in midfield, just as his scrum half's slightly long kicks helped to explain the ineffective chase game. Tuipulotu needs game time. His lack of sharpness is understandable. Mitchell at No9 wasn't bad but nor was he good enough to press for a Test place. Nothing quite fitted for Freeman. It wasn't a memorable night for Fin Smith, either . A poor cross-kick could, maybe should, have conceded a first-half try while penalty kicks to the corner lacked the vicious precision expected. His all-round game was tentative. If anyone questioned Finn Russell's status as Test No10, this game should have ended any such delusions. Nor did things fall the way of Van der Merwe. He showed the reason for his selection, rampaging into midfield once to shatter the defensive plans of opposition analysts, as James Lowe does for Ireland. However he looked positionally weak beneath the high kick. Whereas Freeman was invariably in the right position, the beefy wing on the opposite side was worryingly ten metres out of position beneath one cross-kick, which left Smith isolated and knocking on. There's no doubt that Van der Merwe is a brilliant broken-field operator but with Australia head coach Joe Schmidt hoping to unleash the unique athleticism of Joseph Suaalii in the wider parts of the pitch, the Scot appears vulnerable. It was noticeable that when Mack Hansen emerged from the bench, he offered more industry and variety than the prolific finishing of Van der Merwe. There is no such thing as a good defeat but Farrell's men have only lost a sporting battle (to write 'skirmish' would be to insult Felipe Contepomi's Argentina). There is no shortage of effort or intensity and the serious stuff is yet to come. By the time the Lions play Western Force in Perth next Saturday, their execution will need to be better than it was on a Friday when it was Argentina, despite missing a host of their Top 14 stars, who shone. The 1971 Lions lost to Queensland en route to their one and only series win in New Zealand. Far better in the immediate aftermath of defeat to praise the Pumas rather than panic about the Lions. Friday night's fix can be a relatively quick one, even though this vintage lacks Edwards, John, Davies and JPR. Optus Stadium, PerthSaturday, 11amTV Sky Sports Main Event