What Ait-Nouri would bring to City and where he can improve
Manchester City target Rayan Ait-Nouri has been described as the "perfect fit" for Pep Guardiola's side by one of his former coaches at Wolves.Edu Rubio, who worked with Ait-Nouri during the 2022-23 season, said: "His technical competency, his ability and skill in tight areas - keeping the ball close to his feet - give him the opportunity to fit perfectly into Guardiola's possession-based play."He can also dribble with speed to get the team up the pitch, driving with the ball, which is probably what Manchester City need right now - players who can break lines."Defensively, he has improved his game since his arrival in the Premier League and his one-v-one defending is of a very good standard. He can cope physically and is a very versatile player who can operate in any position down the flank, or by playing as an inverted full-back."He needs to improve his decision-making on the ball. He can take one touch too many at times and slow the ball speed down in a possession game that Pep loves. He also needs to work on his end product in attack."At a club like City, he will need to get his assist ratio higher, but it is something he can definitely do."
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The Guardian
23 minutes ago
- The Guardian
MPs ask ministers whether they will recoup Thames Water executive bonuses
The environment secretary has been asked if he will claw back controversial bonus payments to Thames Water senior executives after it emerged some bonuses had already been paid out. Last month, Steve Reed vowed to block bonuses that Thames Water proposed to pay to managers at the beleaguered company. The firm's chair has been forced to admit that bonuses have already been paid to executives out of a £3bn emergency loan paid by creditors for the purpose of rescuing Thames from financial collapse. In a letter to MPs on the environment, food and rural affairs committee, the chair of Thames Water, Sir Adrian Montague, admitted 21 members of the firm's senior management team received a first payment at 50% of base salary on 30 April 2025. He said 'the board does not intend to recover this money'. The letter says that the 21 individuals who received payments did not include Sir Adrian himself, the CEO Chris Weston, or the CFO Steve Buck. However, he added that Buck would be eligible for a later payment under the plan, which he confirmed is 'paused' pending a review. He added that the bonuses are worth £18.5m in total, spread across three payments over two years – '50% of base salary on 30 April 2025; 50% on completion of [Thames Water's] second restructuring plan or, if earlier, December 2025; and a final payment of 200% of base salary in June 2026'. The parliamentary committee has written to Reed asking 'whether you expect Ofwat to recoup the payments made on 30th April to all 21 of Thames management team?' Alistair Carmichael, the chair of the committee, said: 'We have now learned that 21 members of Thames Water's senior management team, not including their CEO and CFO, received payments additional to their salary, in April 2025, at the not inconsiderable rate of 50% of their base rate of pay. Thames Water have stated in a letter to us that they do not intend to recover this money. They also say that the retention payments scheme has been 'paused'. 'As a committee, we are trying to seek clarity as to whether these payments fall within the remit of the government's ban and will be recouped, given that they were not paid to the company's CEO or CFO and are termed by Thames Water as 'retention payments' rather than bonuses. We are also asking whether Defra and Ofwat were aware of these payments and what undertakings they have received from Thames Water about the pausing or withdrawal of the retention plan. 'Given that the plan includes two further retention payments, including 200% of base salary due to be paid to these 21 individuals in June 2026, it is vital that Thames Water, Defra and Ofwat are clear with us all about what exactly is going on.' In his letter, Montague also apologised for misleading the committee after the Guardian revealed he had wrongly told MPs the large bonuses were 'insisted' upon by creditors. He told the select committee that the lenders said that 'very substantial' bonuses of up to 50% of salary should be paid to company executives from the controversial loan in order to retain key staff. The Guardian revealed that sources with knowledge of the details of the agreement, the term sheet for the loan and court documents suggested that while the bonuses were agreed to by the creditors they were not necessarily proposed by them. He said: 'For complete clarity, I did misspeak. However, I certainly did not intend to mislead. I deeply regret having caused confusion through my appearance.' A Thames Water spokesperson said: 'We wrote to the Efra select committee to apologise for the confusion caused following the recent evidence session and to provide further clarity. 'The company's CEO is not party to the MRP [management retention plan] and has received no payments to date. None of the retention payments have been funded by customers. Full details of the plan have been shared with our economic regulator. We will review the requests from the select committee chair and will respond in due course.' Defra has been contacted for comment.
BBC News
29 minutes ago
- BBC News
'It will make a lot of difference': Reactions to winter fuel payment U-turn
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Telegraph
31 minutes ago
- Telegraph
TNT Sports brands rugby rebel league ‘delusional'
Power brokers at TNT Sports, England's principal rugby broadcaster, have rubbished the emergence of a proposed breakaway league, called R360, branding it 'delusional' and ' commercially unsustainable '. Telegraph Sport revealed last week how Mike Tindall, the Rugby World Cup winner and member of the Royal family, was one of the driving forces behind rugby's new breakaway global league, pitched as 'driving generational change in rugby', which is scheduled to launch later this year with a number of players reportedly having signed pre-contractual agreements which are valid until September. But the concept has been derided by both TNT Sports and Premiership Rugby, the two bodies who agreed a new television deal until the end of the 2030-31 season last month. 'I'm going to take my TNT Sports hat off just for the moment,' said Andrew Georgiou, president and managing director of Warner Bros. Discovery Sports, which owns TNT. 'I've been involved in sport for 25 years. I can't tell you how many of these PowerPoint presentations have come across my desk with people who were absolutely certain that what they had on that page was going to be the new thing. It was going to be absolutely the new thing. 'I don't know the details of what's happening, no one's come to us and made a presentation, no one's told us what the new format is, no one told us what the new schedule is. I mean, I actually don't know much about it. But the one question that I think you guys should be asking is, 'how are they going to grow the revenue by putting this event on?' Where's the money coming from? The media industry is going through a massive generational change. There's been more change in the media industry in the last five years than there has been since the invention of cable television in the late 70s and early 80s. 'So, if these folks believe that they are going to grow the revenue by putting this thing on, I think they're delusional. I really do. What it will do is further complicate what is already a well-functioning rugby ecosystem. And so I would just ask some pretty fundamental questions around whether this is a commercially sustainable model. The fact that it's being likened to LIV Golf, I think is a perfect analogy. It's a perfect comparator to what this is really going to be. Commercially unsustainable.' When it was suggested that TNT Sports, therefore, would not be interested in bidding for broadcast rights on the new league, Georgiou replied: 'You bet.' Both TNT and the Premiership have experienced unprecedented growth this season. The league has seen 30 sold-out match days up from 18 last season and 13 the season before. This weekend's final, between Bath and Leicester, sold out in record time – with last season's show-piece also a full house – while growth among fans aged between 18 and 34 increased by 30 per cent in one year. Furthermore, Bath's play-off victory over Bristol last week was the most-viewed Friday night match ever on TNT. Red Bull's investment in Newcastle is understood to be nearing completion and Simon Massie-Taylor, Premiership Rugby's chief executive, believes that the league's previous financial woes are behind them and a new chapter is beginning. At board level, the Premiership will not allow itself to become distracted by R360 and Massie-Taylor has said that 'there has not been any engagement' with the breakaway league. 'It's not a threat per se,' said Massie-Taylor. 'But we have no idea how it could ever work full stop. But definitely for the club game. In England, in France, URC, southern hemisphere, how would it actually work and help develop the club game? 'But rugby needs roots, it doesn't need pop-ups. Rugby needs roots. The complicated thing about rugby is there's an international game, there's a club game that relies on, there's a community game. The whole thing's linked, the community game's inspired by both. Funding comes down to help the community game and there's this whole sort of connectedness to it. And that sometimes is an inhibitor to growth because you have to find a solution that compromises all these types of things. 'But without those roots, it's very difficult to understand how a system could ever work. The whole phrase [is] 'it takes a village', right? That one person who's going to turn up and go out on the field, there's a whole system, a whole team, a whole grass-roots network that needs to develop that person beyond just rocking up. 'I'd be worried if players are counting on that because they may miss out on genuine opportunities that exist within their club. Things need sanctioning for a start and things need money coming through the door before these people can actually get paid.'
