List of All Articles with Tag 'sports'

PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan is telling U.S. lawmakers the tour was left on its own to fend off a Saudi invasion into golf

Former UFC title challengers will square off in a Fight Night main event this weekend, as Marvin Vettori faces Jared Cannonier. Vettori, one of the UFC’s few Italian fighters, came up short while challenging Israel Adesanya for the middleweight title in 2021, losing to the Nigerian-New Zealander via decision – just as he had in 2018. Thirteen months later, American Cannonier suffered a similar fate, losing to Adesanya on points after an underwhelming performance. Vettori bounced back from his second defeat by Adesanya with a points win against Paulo Costa, before losing to Robert Whittaker. However, the “Italian Dream” again responded positively this March, edging past Roman Dolidze in London. Meanwhile, Cannonier has competed once since his bout with Adesanya, defeating Sean Strickland on points in December. Here’s all you need to know about this weekend’s card. What time is it? The prelims are set to begin at 12am BST on Sunday 18 June (4pm PT, 6pm CT, 7pm ET on Saturday). The main card is then due to begin at 3am BST on Sunday (7pm PT, 9pm CT, 10pm ET on Saturday). How can I watch it? The card will air live on BT Sport in the UK, with the broadcaster’s app and website also streaming the fights. In the US, ESPN+ will stream the action live, as will the UFC’s Fight Pass. Full card (subject to change) Marvin Vettori vs Jared Cannonier (middleweight) Arman Tsarukyan vs Joaquim Silva (lightweight) Armen Petrosyan vs Christian Leroy Duncan (middleweight) Pat Sabatini vs Lucas Almeida (featherweight) Manuel Torres vs Nikolas Motta (lightweight) Raoni Barcelos vs Miles Johns (bantamweight) Prelims Nicolas Dalby vs Muslim Salikhov (welterweight) Jimmy Flick vs Alessandro Costa (flyweight) Kyung Ho Kang vs Cristian Quinonez (bantamweight) Carlos Hernandez vs Denys Bondar (flyweight) Zhalgas Zhumagulov vs Felipe Bunes (flyweight) Tereza Bleda vs Gabriella Fernandes (women’s flyweight) Dan Argueta vs Ronnie Lawrence (bantamweight) Zac Pauga vs Modestas Bukauskas (light-heavyweight) Click here to subscribe to The Independent’s Sport YouTube channel for all the latest sports videos. Read More Amanda Nunes took ‘coward’s way out’ by retiring at UFC 289, says Julianna Pena Meet Charles Oliveira, the UFC’s miracle man Miami Heat mascot hospitalised after Conor McGregor punch How to watch Vettori vs Cannonier online and on TV this weekend When is the next UFC event? Jake Paul agrees to new stipulation in Nate Diaz fight

Chris Eubank has opened up on his split from his son’s team, claiming that Chris Eubank Jr ‘has never listened’. A rift emerged between Eubank and his son in October, ahead of a planned fight between Eubank Jr and Conor Benn – a bout that collapsed after the revelation that Benn had failed two drug tests. Eubank Jr went on to lose to Liam Smith via fourth-round TKO in January, with the pair’s scheduled rematch then falling through due to an injury sustained by Smith. As such, Eubank Jr, 33, is currently without a fight. Addressing the current state of Eubank Jr’s career, his father – a British boxing icon – told Talksport on Tuesday (13 June): “David Haye called me the other day and said [Eubank Jr] doesn’t spar, he does everything that he wants to do, he’s got ‘yes men’ around him. “And so it seems to me, by what David Haye tells me, that he’s still not listening. If you won’t listen, then life will teach you what it taught many of the other fighters. It is arrogance when you shut your ears, and what arrogance gets you is what it got him in his last fight. “The calibre of Liam Smith does not beat Chris Eubank Jr on my watch. Junior on my watch is not supposed to lose to Liam Smith; on the watch of these PE teachers anything can happen, and anything did. He has never listened. “My son could have been a tremendous fighter, he electrified me when watching him, but he hasn’t because he doesn’t listen, and if you don’t listen then you have to feel. The truth will set you free. I did not go missing, he sent me away, you gave me the ability to go away and live my own life. Of course I will accept anything he asks me, but you have to have the humility to ask. Dad is no longer chasing you.” Addressing a past comment made by Simon Jordan, in which the Talksport host labelled Eubank Jr a ‘charlatan’, Eubank Sr said: “In the world of honesty, how can I disagree with you? I guess my silence says it all. Truth is truth.” Discussing the role he played in helping his son secure significant paydays, Eubank, 56, added: “Without me, you can’t make the money that he’s made. “There were three fights he had [...] with fighters who were like [Avni] Yildirim; $9 million, I got him that. He can’t make that kind of money without someone like me, they’re paying these guys $60,000 a fight.” Click here to subscribe to The Independent’s Sport YouTube channel for all the latest sports videos. Read More Chris Eubank Jr and Liam Smith rematch postponed for second time Josh Taylor plunged into the unknown as Teofimo Lopez earns redemptive win Dmitry Bivol hits out at ‘unfair’ WBC ban on Russian boxers

Victor Wembanyama's first moment in the NBA is now just a few days away

The door is open for Real Madrid to try signing Kylian Mbappé because the France superstar decided not to extend his Paris Saint-Germain contract into 2025

Liverpool have sent Calvin Ramsay on loan to EFL Championship club Preston North End next season. The Scotland right-back made only two appearances in an injury-hit first year at Anfield after his 2022 move from Aberdeen and is yet to make his Premier League debut. Now Jurgen Klopp has decided to let him get first-team football with Preston next season rather than using the 19-year-old as Trent Alexander-Arnold’s deputy. Ramsay, who is still undergoing rehabilitation after surgery, will stay with Liverpool for the start of pre-season before going to Deepdale in mid-July. His only start for Liverpool came against League One Derby in the Carabao Cup last November, but Ramsay remains part of Klopp’s long-term plans. The manager name-checked another young right-back in Conor Bradley just before the end of the 22/23 campaign, noting that he would be involved in pre-season with the Reds after a year impressing on loan at Bolton. Bradley has won 12 senior caps for Northern Ireland, while Ramsay made his senior Scotland international bow in November last year. Read More Who is Gabri Veiga? Starlet with links to Liverpool and Chelsea Ben Foster stays at Wrexham for one more year – Friday’s sporting social Liverpool begin midfield overhaul by completing Alexis Mac Allister signing

There will be a new banner over Miami’s home floor next season

There is another international trophy to win in Europe this weekend and players from Manchester City and Inter Milan will be available at the four-team Nations League Finals in the Netherlands

Welcome to Social Buzz, a daily column looking at what’s trending on social media platforms. I’m Caitlin Fichtel,

Germany’s uninspired showing in a 3-3 draw with Ukraine is just the latest example of the team’s struggles

Manchester United Plc shares surged in premarket trading after a tweet from a Qatari newspaper spurred speculation that

For someone who is such a monolith of a man, there are a surprising number of layers to Joe Joyce. At certain points during our half-hour conversation, Joe Joyce the heavyweight boxer is speaking; at others, it’s Joe Joyce the fine-art student, the swimming instructor, the cheerleader, or the trumpet player. “When I was a swimming and diving teacher, it was a really great feeling to have someone who was really afraid of the water and to get their head under the water – or have them swimming three, four strokes by the end,” the Londoner tells The Independent. “To have people who have spent their life not being able to swim, and to get them to even put their head under the water in their late sixties and seventies, that’s something I found really rewarding. “I also played trumpet for quite a few years, I was in the choir at school. I could do a little bit of percussion; I used to go on music holidays. My little brother is the more musical one; he’s at uni doing something musical and was in the Brit School; he was also in Thriller Live. My dad’s an art teacher, he restores antique mirror frames, and my mum was into pottery; she does a series of African-esque heads. Growing up, music and sport was encouraged, as was art. I did my first oil painting when I was seven years old. “It would be nice to make more art and create more things, be more creative than the destructive boxing side.” These other sides to Joyce are all “authentic” elements of the 37-year-old, as he puts it. “I wake up Joe Joyce, I go to sleep Joe Joyce. I’d like to inspire the next generation coming up and teach them, lead by example. It’s good to give back. I’d like to lead a movement, like how Muhammad Ali transcended boxing and is one of these pivotal names in history – like Bruce Lee, Bob Marley, Michael Jordan. That’s the kind of thing I’d like to leave behind, or at least something close to that.” They are huge aspirations for a man who comes across so humbly, but while there is some way for Joyce to go in achieving such status, his profile swelled significantly in the aftermath of his knockout of Joseph Parker in September 2022. “Overnight I saw the change, where people were kind of putting me in the top five [at heavyweight] and were interested and excited about certain match-ups with these top fighters,” he says. Joyce, who claimed silver for Great Britain at the 2016 Olympics in Rio, hammered Parker to the canvas with a left hook in the 11th round in Manchester to become interim WBO champion. “When I was in there, I couldn’t remember what shot I stopped him with; it wasn’t until I got back to the changing room and they showed me the clip of it. I was like, ‘Woah!’” The final shot capped off an indefatigable performance from Joyce, who marched down the New Zealander relentlessly and was unperturbed by Parker’s best strikes. “He did his best, he put his best effort in, and it wasn’t enough,” Joyce says matter-of-factly, before morphing his voice into a fine impression of a 1970s professional wrestler: “And it’s gonna take a wrecking ball to take me down, I’ll tell you that much!” he bellows, making a whipping motion with his index finger, before his voice cracks into a laugh. Unfortunately for the Briton, Zhilei Zhang became that wrecking ball in April. While the Chinese heavyweight did not quite take down Joyce, he battered the “Juggernaut”’s right eye to the point of closure, forcing the referee to wave off the bout in Round 6. With the result, Joyce lost the WBO Interim belt and saw his professional record fall to 15-1 (with 14 of his wins having come via knockout). The clashes with Parker and Zhang, similar to Joyce’s bout with rising heavyweight Daniel Dubois in 2020, were risky affairs on paper. But in a business in which the best rarely do battle with one another, Joyce has shown no trepidation in confronting tough combatants. At 37, he cannot afford to waste time on tune-up fights or meaningless match-ups. “I’m not out here just to earn money or be heavyweight champion of the world,” he insists. “It’s about taking them challenges on and overcoming them. I think some of that can be lost in the sport. It’d be good to bring back those good times of everybody fighting everybody. People don’t wanna lose their ‘0’. I don’t know where that mentality came from... Maybe from Floyd Mayweather? That’s why a lot of the [big] fights don’t happen.” It is a trend that is at odds with what fans want – one that goes against basic fighting instinct, Joyce argues. “There’s that excitement when you’re at school, and someone in the playground shouts, ‘Fight!’ It kicks off, and the whole school gathers around... It’s that primordial excitement that people get, it’s that kind of raw entertainment. When I was in primary school, I had quite a few fights – two on one, or they’d start the fight and I’d finish it. I was always a head taller than everyone. Early days of rugby, there’d be five or six guys hanging on to me, trying to slow me down.” Ironically, a criticism of Joyce has been his perceived lack of speed, but if that is a valid critique then it has not prevented the Juggernaut from building momentum in fights through his pressure and the volume of his output. Before Joyce’s meeting with Zhang, there was a clamour for the Briton to face the likes of Tyson Fury and fellow Olympian Anthony Joshua. The visual of Joyce being scaled by school students on the rugby pitch, coupled with discussions around Fury and Joshua, leads us naturally onto whether Joyce would rather fight five smaller Furys or one gargantuan Joshua. “Five little Furys would be a pain in the ass, wouldn’t it?” he laughs. “That’d be so annoying, being surrounded by them! They’d be coming from all angles, you can’t hit them, the head movement... But imagine the punch on a massive-sized Joshua... ” Before long, Joyce might not even have to imagine the punch on a life-sized Joshua, who – as the 37-year-old acknowledges – is an intriguing enough proposition as is. Joyce’s eagerness to embrace such challenges is an endearing element of his personality – and of his approach to his profession. That dichotomy, between the gentle Juggernaut’s personality and profession, will only make his journey all the more enthralling. Read More Joe Joyce arrives at boxing’s top table with brutal knockout of Joseph Parker Tyson Fury: Joe Joyce ‘couldn’t lace my boots’ but beats Anthony Joshua and Oleksandr Usyk Tyson Fury to record ‘Sweet Caroline’ cover for mental health charity Jake Paul agrees to new stipulation in Nate Diaz fight Josh Taylor says move up to welterweight is ‘imminent’ after first career defeat Teofimo Lopez and his father share emotional exchange during Josh Taylor fight