US PGA Tour officials Jimmy Dunne and Ron Price will speak before a US Senate hearing into the PGA merger deal with Saudi backers of...

Aaron Smith says he is going to enjoy his "last dance" for New Zealand, hoping like fellow legends Dan Carter and Richie McCaw in 2015 that he bows out by...

SAN ANTONIO (AP) — Victor Wembanyama made the tying basket with 20 seconds left in regulation, the opening basket in overtime and finished with 21 points and 12 rebounds in his first NBA victory, helping the San Antonio Spurs beat the Houston Rockets 126-122 on Friday night.

The disconsolate trudge is becoming a disconcertingly familiar sight. Kevin De Bruyne has limped out of grander games than the curtain raiser to a Premier League. He has made an early exit from bigger occasions this summer. His Champions League final, like his evening in Burnley, came to a premature conclusion. A focus on De Bruyne’s body can concentrate on the remarkable right foot he uses to unlock defences, to pass and cross with an ability most can only envy. It may switch to his increasingly fragile hamstrings. For De Bruyne, Inter Milan may be bracketed alongside Burnley in the memory. His last two starts, two months apart, ended with him hamstrung. “He was injured again, unfortunately. A problem in the same position, he said to me as in the final of the Champions League,” rued Pep Guardiola. “It depends on the magnitude of the injury but it will be a few weeks out.” There will be no De Bruyne against Sevilla in the European Super Cup or against Newcastle in the first major test of Manchester City’s defence of their Premier League title. He could sit out the start of their Champions League campaign. A summer sandwiched by injuries suggests De Bruyne was rushed back. He had said after the Community Shield he was way ahead of schedule; he had targeted the Super Cup for his comeback. “It’s a pity because he had recovered well,” Guardiola said. “Maybe it was my mistake [to pick him] but if he is injured after 15-20 minutes it is not something wrong, when it is 65 or 70 it is the fatigue of the muscle. We have to talk with the doctors and him.” His plan, he had said, was to give the Belgian 50 or 55 minutes, rather than the cameo he had at Wembley. Which, as that culminated in the penalty he slammed against the underside of the bar in the shootout, has completed an ill-fated start to the season. “He is disappointed but he is strong and will be back,” added Guardiola. Yet for how long? De Bruyne may be increasingly injury prone. For a player who has never looked like a natural athlete, a red-faced figure who can seem a throwback to earlier eras, he has shown great durability. He has won 99 caps for Belgium – he would have brought up a century in the summer but for injury – and this was the 587th game of his club career. His 32nd birthday only came in June but to play almost 700 matches by that stage means he has plenty of miles on the clock. Or miles on the hamstring. He revealed after the Champions League final he had played for two months with the risk it could snap. By the time he is fit again, he will have spent the vast majority of six months with a hamstring problem of some description. It has prompted fears it will be a constant for the rest of his career. A reunion with City’s other talismanic Belgian could illustrate it. Vincent Kompany, a colleague for club and country, still made huge contributions in the latter years of his time at the Etihad Stadium but did not make 30 appearances in any of the last four campaigns. He played his final game at 33. De Bruyne should show greater longevity but his appearances will have to be rationed. All of which could create a problem, even in a squad as gifted as City’s. De Bruyne is a unique talent – “what a player he is,” gushed Kompany – and, as his total of 29 assists last season shows, reaches extraordinary levels of creativity. He is Erling Haaland’s supplier-in-chief and the shifting dynamics in the City squad has rendered his qualities perhaps still more significant. The departures of Riyad Mahrez and Ilkay Gundogan have stripped them of two of the likeliest providers of goals and assists amid the band of attacking midfielders and wingers. Mateo Kovacic won’t deliver as many as the German; should Lucas Paqueta arrive, another able technician won’t replicate Mahrez’s contribution in the final third. De Bruyne is irreplaceable in various respects: no one is a like-for-like alternative and, as he ventures further into his thirties, City will have to ponder the question of who his long-term successor is. In the short term, they can console themselves with memories of Phil Foden’s impact when he came on for De Bruyne in the Champions League final and that, when he was sidelined for much of the 2018-19 campaign, they did a domestic treble. But now each injury comes with the sense that it will not be the last, but that De Bruyne is nearer the end. A man who has illuminated many a game may miss more and more. Read More Kevin De Bruyne faces ‘a few weeks out’ after suffering another hamstring injury Pep Guardiola reveals extent of Kevin De Bruyne’s hamstring injury Erling Haaland at the double as Manchester City kick off new campaign in style

Los Angeles Chargers edge rusher Joey Bosa and Green Bay Packers running back Aaron Jones were each carted to their respective locker rooms after getting hurt on separate first-half plays Sunday at Lambeau Field

How X, formerly known as Twitter, reacted to Manchester United's Champions League clash with Galatasaray in Istanbul.

NBA Rumors: Hawks still open to trading Clint CapelaThe Atlanta Hawks' busy offseason might not be complete. Atlanta traded John Collins to Utah after the NBA Draft, ending years of trade speculation around the former first-round pick and opening up more minutes for A.J. Griffin and Jalen Joh...

Bill Guerin didn’t want to fire Dean Evason

By Alan Baldwin DOHA (Reuters) -Red Bull's Max Verstappen secured his third Formula One world championship after his team mate

The St. Louis Cardinals were big sellers at the trade deadline, but could they be big buyers this offseason for a particular pitcher?The St. Louis Cardinals, sensing that the postseason was out of the question this year, decided to sell some of their players to build toward the future. They did ...

Referees could be replaced by robots within the next 30 years, an expert in the field believes. Artificial intelligence is already prominent in officiating, with the use of VAR and goalline technology, but it is expected to heavily increase in the future. With more high-quality data available, it could be possible for matches to be officiated by an AI-powered machine, taking away the need for an on-field human referee. “Computer vision will be more and more effective in the next few years and the number of cameras on the pitch will only increase,” Aldo Comi, chief executive of leading global football analytics provider Soccerment, told the PA news agency. “The amount of data that is tagged and the quality of the models that are trained with that data will increase exponentially and thanks to that you will have AI models that can make refereeing decisions on the back of what they see on the pitch. “So we might get to the point where we don’t need a referee at all. “Before that, you will maybe have a referee but not linesmen, maybe they will be the first to disappear from the game. And you will have the referee connected to the virtual assistant, guiding them to make better decisions. “Ultimately in a matter of 20 or 30 years probably the referee will be just an AI. I am not saying this is positive, I’m just saying it is likely to happen.” The increase of AI and machine learning in football will not be restricted to officiating and it is already present in the game. The use of data analytics have helped the likes of Brighton and Brentford disrupt the established Premier League hierarchy as they have unearthed high-quality signings which they have sold on for significant profits. But the improvement in the integration of data could see managers using a virtual coach to help them with team selection and tactics. “AI can become a source of new ways of thinking about the game in the next few years,” Comi added. “If you give AI enough high-quality data, you will have the possibility to have a virtual assistant, which will have a better understanding of what is going on the pitch. Ultimately in a matter of 20 or 30 years probably the referee will be just an AI Aldo Comi, CEO of data analtyics company Soccerment “By having the data analysed by AI you can train models to better understand what will happen in the future, for example understanding the probabilities of what is happening in the next five or 10 minutes. “By having this predictive analytics, the AI can give you a so-called prescriptive analytics. It says, ‘Things are expected to go this way, in order to improve your chances I have 10 ideas’. “That could be swapping two players or changing the structure of the team. “The things that the AI suggests will be filtered by the assistant coach and then pass on the information to the manager and it will be up to him to accept. “There will be AI, but not replacing professionals, but it is more of a high-quality support. The clubs that can get this sport will outperform the ones that refrain from having it.” Comi, whose company serve several Serie A and Serie B clubs, says that people will need to learn to trust AI but the evidence of it working is already out there. He added: “It will take time to trust, but in the same way with data analytics, there are enough positive cases to say that you can out-perform the others, we have seen it with Brentford and Brighton. “The advantage that AI can give you is X times more important than data analytics.” :: Soccerment has launched a new platform, xvalue.ai, which has introduced never seen before metrics such as Gegenpressing Intensity (GPI), Expected Offensive Value Added (xOVA), Gegenpressing Efficiency (GPE) and BuildUp Disruption Percentage (BDP%), providing users with more data insights than ever before. For more details visit www.soccerment.com Read More Charity boss speaks out over ‘traumatic’ encounter with royal aide Ukraine war’s heaviest fight rages in east - follow live Football rumours: Al-Ittihad set to make record £215m bid for Mohamed Salah Joe McCarthy delighted after wrestling his way into Ireland’s World Cup squad On This Day in 2020: Ian Bell announces intention to retire from cricket

MLB Rumors: Several would-be contenders threaten to crash the party on Shohei Ohtani, the Cardinals have a blockbuster trade brewing potentially for an ace, and Blake Snell's free agency has two clear favorites.