Your Guardian Sport weekend: French Open finals, football, cricket and much more

The Guardian

19 hours ago

Join Emillia Hawkins and Barry Glendenning with all the breaking news as we build towards Saturday afternoon's England men's World Cup qualifier against Andorra at 5pm (all times BST). The match is being staged at Espanyol's 40,000-capacity RCDE Stadium in Barcelona. since Andorra's national stadium is unavailable after hosting the Games of the Small States of Europe. The last time the Three Lions visited Andorra in October 2021, they won 5-0.
Over-by-over coverage gets under way before the first ball of the day at Taunton is due at 1pm. Tanya Aldred and James Wallace are at the helm for what should be another run-fest for the hosts. England have outclassed West Indies across the 20-over and 50-over formats so far, hammering them by 143 runs in the second one-day international in Leicester. That came hot on the heels of a bruising 108-run win for England in the first ODI at Derby. Stars of both those shows were the openers Amy Jones and Tammy Beaumont, who both hit their second successive centuries. Raf Nicholson reports from the County Ground.
Tony Paley helms our live blog and Greg Wood reports from Epsom in the build up to the Flat season's highlight. Aidan O'Brien's No 1 runner Delacroix has solid claims in the Derby, but he perhaps lacks the 'wow' factor of many of his other winners. The Lion In Winter must overcome being drawn in stall 19 but it would be no surprise to see him bounce back given O'Brien's recent exploits with City Of Troy and Auguste Rodin. Also making a strong case in the 19-strong field are Guineas winner Ruling Court and Dante victor Pride Of Arras.
World No 1 meets world No 2 at Roland Garros as top-ranked Aryna Sabalenka takes on Coco Gauff, the French Open runner-up in 2022. A three-time grand slam champion on hard courts, Sabalenka makes her first final on the red dirt of Paris and John Brewin helms our live blog while Tumaini Carayol reports from the City of Lights.
Aaron Bower is at Wembley for the game's annual migration south as Sam Burgess seeks his first trophy as a head coach with Warrington. Standing in the Wolves' way are Super League leaders Hull KR. Willie Peters' side are aiming for a first Challenge Cup triumph in almost half a century. As a prelude to the big game, traditional powerhouses St Helens and Wigan face off in the women's final.
Tom Bassam is your minute-by-minute guide and Michael Aylwin our match reporter as Tigers face Sharks in their Premiership semi-final. It's Michael Cheika's chance to edge closer to winning the Premiership title in his one-off season at Welford Road on his home-ground farewell. The game promises to be a cracker if their exchanges in the regular season are a reliable measure – Leicester have shared 142 points across two league games with Sale already.
Thomas Tuchel's Three Lions take on underwhelming opposition as the new head coach builds towards the finals in North America, this qualifier coming three days before meeting Senegal in a friendly in Nottingham. Making all the headlines in the buildup was the recall of Ivan Toney, back for the first time since he left Brentford for the Saudi Premier League club Al-Ahli last summer. The 29-year-old has scored 29 goals in 43 games this season and won the Asian Champions League. Clearly it's the moment for him to impress the German. Rob Smyth follows the action while David Hytner and Jonathan Wilson report from Barcelona.
Who will be the king of clay at Roland Garros? Tumaini Carayol reports from Paris and Daniel Harris your live host.
Following Friday's T20 series opener in Durham, the action moves to Bristol on Sunday afternoon before the third match at Southampton on Tuesday. After brushing West Indies aside 3-0 in the ODI series, England will be eager to maintain their upswing under new white-ball captain Harry Brook. Opener Jamie Smith has certainly been making an impression under England's new leadership, his 64 from 28 balls in the final match of the one-day whitewash over the tourists a positive sign of things to come. Daniel Gallan helms our over-by-over coverage and Taha Hashim reports.
A clash of old Iberian rivals in Sunday night's final in Munich – a showdown that pits a young pretender against the old king. The 17-year-old Lamine Yamal, the undoubted rising star of Spanish football, meets the 40-year-old Cristiano Ronaldo – and both players will want to lay down markers for the World Cup. Lamal scored twice in a nine-goal thriller of a semi-final defeat of France, a match that featured the last two Nations League champions: France in 2021 and Spain two years ago. Spain are targeting a third Uefa tournament success in a row – having won the last Nations League and Euro 2024. Ronaldo scored his 137th international goal for Portugal – who won the first tournament in 2019 –as they battled from a goal down to beat Germany 2-1 in Munich. Join Dominic Booth for our minute-by-minute coverage while Sid Lowe reports.