
Oleksandr Usyk v Daniel Dubois: undisputed heavyweight championship
Date: 2025-07-19T19:45:29.000Z
Title: Bryan will be here shortly.
Content: In the meantime here's Donald McRae's lookahead to tonight's main event.

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Daily Mail
15 minutes ago
- Daily Mail
Luke Littler and darts' new generation called out as 'boring' by two-time world champion who bemoans the lack of banter among today's stars
Two-time darts world champion Gary Anderson has hit out at the 'boring' younger generation of players with 'their bloody earphones in' as he bemoaned the lack of 'banter' in the modern game. Fresh from his first round victory over Luke Woodhouse on day two of the World Matchplay, The Flying Scotsman, 54, longed for his days competing with the likes of Adrian Lewis, Phil Taylor and Kevin Painter. 'Youngsters are boring. Absolutely boring,' said Anderson. 'You talk to them, they're too busy looking at their phone. They're sitting on their phones with their bloody earphones in. Don't talk to you. It's a completely different life.' He added: 'I was sitting thinking the other day, having a talk with (Ian) White, (Adrian) Lewis, (Phil) Taylor, (Kevin) Painter, we used to sit and have a cracking laugh. 'Nowadays, I'd rather sit like this. Nobody talks to anybody. You don't have a good laugh, you don't have a bit of banter. You need to have a laugh. Doesn't matter what you do in life, on a building site, office, you've always got to have a laugh. Nowadays, there's not much of that going about.' The new wave of darts players - led by current world champion Luke Littler - have helped usher the sport into a new age. There is more attention on events than ever and more money than ever for its stars. Anderson acknowledged the today's players are more professional than performers of the past but he insisted that they need to 'calm down' at times. 'The youngsters, they're here to do their job. They've realised they've got a great chance in life to make a lot of bloody money, buy their first house, then their second house. 'But they need to calm down and think: right, this is my job. That's it.'


BBC News
15 minutes ago
- BBC News
'Right up there' - Portrush shines for Open week
Only the Open Championship could make a small, seaside town in Northern Ireland feel like the centre of the sporting an overwhelming majority of the huge crowds were willing home favourite Rory McIlroy to victory, that it was the world number one who denied the story its fairytale ending still felt wholly fitting. Other events of this size are played out in cities of similar stature, but the sight of superstar Scottie Scheffler hoisting the Claret Jug on the 18th green of a brilliant, yet remote, course tucked away on the north coast of the island of Ireland summed up what is unique about this have been plenty of similarly seemingly incongruous scenes over the past seven it be multi-millionaires getting their morning coffee in establishments where an Ulster fry would set you back less than £7, a former Open winner becoming a repeat customer at a small pie shop on the main street or the defending champion sinking a stout round the corner, the Open did not just come to town, it became a part of it for the duration of its Cameron Smith, who won his Claret Jug at St Andrews in 2022, could hardly have paid Portrush a bigger compliment than comparing it to the home of golf."It seems like there's a lot of Opens where the course is great but the town doesn't really get involved, whereas this one kind of seems like everyone in town is happy to have you here and gets around the whole tournament," he said."It's right up there. It's a very similar feeling to St Andrews for sure." In a week that began with the eventual winner questioning the meaning of it all, there was great purpose in the way the first arriving fans flooded through the gates and on to the course after word spread that McIlroy had snuck out for a practice round at the earliest available opportunity. Those first holes on Monday, and his stints watching chunks of Christopher Nolan's Oppenheimer between rounds, must have felt like the briefest slices of quiet for the most recent member of golf's Grand Slam all other points around Royal Portrush, galleries thronged around the Holywood star, the roars that greeted each of his made putts reverberating across the links. While his walk off the 18th green was without the Claret Jug, the love for the returning hero, playing at home for the first time since his Masters victory, was a far more fitting conclusion to his week than the tearful missed cut back in it was not just McIlroy who sparked adoration. Americans Bryson DeChambeau and Jordan Spieth, as well as England's Tommy Fleetwood, were among other huge draws obliging as many requests for selfies and autographs as time allowed, while the thump of children's feet along grandstands as players neared with golf balls sounded like the promised thunder. So keen were others to take home a souvenir of their week by more conventional means, queues for the merchandise tent snaked round multiple sets of barriers with one visitor reportedly spending £13,000 in one were content with more transitory pleasures. On Padraig Harrington's insistence that Royal Portrush had the best ice creams on The Open rota, there seemed general agreement after what was surely a record number of 99s consumed up and down the links. A more uniquely Northern Irish staple - the fifteen traybake - proved more divisive in the media coconut-based treat was not all that failed to gain universal popularity. Jason Day was left confounded by local weather forecasts as the week proved true the old cliche about Northern Ireland featuring all four seasons in one day, while marathon rounds on Thursday left a few players grumbling about bottlenecks on the course. Those that took the time to look around as they waited, though, were rewarded with the spectacular views that make Portrush such a memorable course for the hacker and world's best player alike."It's one of the coolest views that I've seen in the game of golf, to be honest with you," said Scheffler of the course's signature hole Calamity Corner."We were kind of looking out. It was a day in which you had a bunch of rain and there was rainbows on the other side, and you're looking out over the golf course on the right, and you've got the huge bluffs by the ocean and it's just mounds and hills, and the town is in the distance." Even Shane Lowry, who had the best day of his golfing life here six years ago when winning the 148th Open Championship, cut a wholly frustrated figure at points during a weekend when he was handed a two-shot penalty on Friday and struggled with illness in his third after a brilliant closing 66 on Sunday, Royal Portrush had clearly redeemed itself in the Offaly man's eyes when all was said and by BBC Sport NI when would he like to see The Open be back here for its fourth staging, he replied: "How about next year?"While it will surely be longer than a six-year wait for another go this time around, after another hugely successful week, a return sooner rather than later seems a certainty.


Reuters
15 minutes ago
- Reuters
Diamondbacks not acting like sellers, face injury-riddled Astros
July 21 - The Arizona Diamondbacks look to build on a strong run while the Houston Astros hope to get back on track when the teams meet in a three-game series beginning Monday in Phoenix. The Diamondbacks opened play after the All-Star break with a three-game sweep of the St. Louis Cardinals, outscoring them by a combined 16-1 in the first three innings of each outing and 22-7 overall. The American League West-leading Astros lost two out of three at top division contender Seattle. While Houston salvaged the final game with an 11-3 win Sunday to stay sweep-less in Seattle, the Astros lost another top run producer when All-Star third baseman Isaac Paredes (right hamstring strain) was placed on the injured list. Arizona third baseman Eugenio Suarez, meanwhile, stepped up in the St. Louis series. Suarez slugged two homers in each of the last two games of the series, giving him an National League-high 35 homers and a major league-best 85 RBIs. "We all knew how important this series was," said Arizona manager Torey Lovullo, whose team entered the second half more likely to sell than buy at the July 31 trade deadline. "They want to put this team back in the middle of the race, and we did that." The Diamondbacks gained three games on the Cardinals in the NL wild-card race but remain 4 1/2 games behind San Diego for the final spot with the deadline approaching. Arizona right-hander Zac Gallen (7-10, 5.40 ERA) will oppose rookie left-hander Colton Gordon (3-2, 4.67) in the first game of the series on Monday. Paredes leads the Astros with 19 homers, and his loss is another blow to a lineup that has been without middle-of-the-order bat Yordan Alvarez (broken hand) since May 2 and shortstop and leadoff hitter Jeremy Pena (broken rib) since June 27. Pena leads Houston with a .322 batting average, .378 on-base percentage and .489 slugging percentage. Paredes suffered a strained right hamstring in a 7-6, 11-inning loss Saturday, after pulling up on his way to first after a third-inning single. "That guy is definitely an anchor in our lineup," said Astros first baseman Christian Walker, who homered Sunday. "He's tough. That's super unfortunate, but that being said, we've got to find a way to win anyway." Walker will return to Arizona for the first time since signing a three-year, $60 million deal as a free agent last winter. He had 146 homers and was a three-time Gold Glove winner in six seasons with the Diamondbacks. "It's next-man-up mentality," said outfielder Taylor Trammell, who had three hits including a homer and three RBIs on Sunday. "We're locked in. The boys are rolling. We are ready to do our jobs." Gallen made two of his best starts of the season in early July, giving up a combined three runs (one earned) with 19 strikeouts in 13 innings in victories over San Francisco and San Diego. However, he gave up six runs on eight hits and two walks in a 10-5 loss to the host Los Angeles Angels on July 12. "We'll see what happens," Gallen said of the trade rumors. "I'm just trying to execute pitches for the D-backs at this point in time. If it happens, it happens, but, hopefully, we play a little bit better baseball and that's not the case in the next two and a half weeks." Gordon will make his first start since July 7 after pitching one inning in relief on July 13, the day before the All-Star break. He has one quality start among his 10 starts. After going 3-0 with a 2.14 ERA in four June starts, including five shutout innings in a win over Philadelphia, Gordon gave up nine runs in 10 1/3 innings in his two July starts, at Colorado and home against Cleveland. --Field Level Media