Category World News

After the government banned real-money online gaming last month, leaving the world’s richest cricket board scrambling to find a new lead sponsor to replace Indian fantasy sports platform Dream11.

After the central government forbade real-money online games as well as their promotion, including fantasy sports, Dream11, which had signed a three-year contract worth about 3.6 billion rupees ($44m) through 2026, can no longer sponsor the national team.

The Bill 2025 Promotion and Regulating Online Gaming Act was passed last month in India’s upper house of parliament.

Due to cricket’s popularity and the country’s diverse population, the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) established a September 16 deadline for new bid submissions.

Although the Asia Cup will begin on September 9 and there will be no front-of-shirt sponsors on the field in the opening week, which includes the marquee game against Pakistan on September 14, the auction is unlikely to remain unsold.

According to a source with knowledge of the situation, the board is seeking 35 million rupees ($397.6k) per match for bilateral matches and 15 million ($170.4k) per match for India’s participation in the International Cricket Council and Asian Cricket Council tournaments in a three-year sponsorship cycle, according to a citing a source with knowledge of the matter.

Over an estimated 140 games in the 2025-28 cycle, the BCCI expects to generate about 4.52 billion rupees ($51.3m), about 940 million ($10.7m) more than under Dream11’s deal, which was 3.58 billion ($40.7m) for the period July 2023 to March 2026 – an uplift of more than 20 percent.

Before Afghanistan’s formidable starting batting duo, Ibrahim Zadran and Sediqullah Atal slammed their own deep batting lineup for an 18-run victory in the first T20 of their tri-series, Ibrahim Zadran and Sediqullah Atal each hit six half-centuries.

In their first match of the tournament, the spin trio of Pakistan’s captain Rashid Khan, Mohammad Nabi, and Noor Ahmad, who took six wickets, limiting Pakistan to 151-9.

After Khan won the toss and was chosen to play for the field, Afghanistan posted 169-5, adding to their 113-run performance against the United Arab Emirates from the previous day.

The tri-series saw the successful defense of totals for the fourth straight game. In a battle between Pakistan and Afghanistan, UAE both lost.

In the tournament’s opening game, Haris Rauf had led Pakistan by 39 runs when the number 10 batter top-scored with 34 not out of 16 balls on Tuesday. After Afghanistan’s spinners had almost sealed the game by squeezing Pakistan to 111-9 in 17 overs, Rauf’s blitz arrived too late.

With two wickets in the powerplay, Afghanistan’s fast bowler Fazalhaq Farooqi won the game. When Saim Ayub feathered a catch off a misplaced pull shot to the wicketkeeper, the left-armer was dismissed without scoring.

Sahibzada Farhan (18) hit two sixes, but Farooqi’s clean bowling from a delivery that slammed back at the right-handed batter and hit the off-stump prevented Farooqi from getting the better of the two.

After the Afghan spinners bowled from both ends, Fakhar Zaman was unable to convert a successful start of 25 runs from 18 balls. At the non-striker’s end, Khan brilliantly ran out of Salman Ali Agha after slicing an easy catch to short third off Nabi.

Before Mohammad Haris’ run of poor form continued and he holed out deep square leg of Nabi as Pakistan stuttered to 82-6 in the 12th over, Hasan Nawaz was unable to clear Ahmad’s first ball, a low leg side full toss.

After a Pakistani batter’s second error saw him take two wickets from Mohammad Nawaz, Khan rattled Shaheen Afridi’s stumps before Rauf denied Khan the hat trick. Noor then clean-bowled Ashraf off his final ball to end a flawless day.

Before Ashraf’s 4-27 prevented Afghanistan from scoring freely in the death overs, Zadran and Atal had already shared a century.

When Ayub bowled three sparse overs in the powerplay and took Rahmanullah Gurbaz’s wicket (8-1) for the first wicket, both batters joined.

With Rauf and the two spinners Nawaz and Sufiyan Muqeem contributing 95 runs from their combined eight wicketless overs, Zadran and Atal led their partnership well after the powerplay.

As Afghanistan couldn’t accelerate in the final five overs, Zadran and Atal were caught in the outfield while deceiving Azmatullah Omarzai and Nabi with their slower deliveries, picking all four of Ashraf’s four wickets in the final three overs.

After three games, Pakistan and Afghanistan each have four points, while the UAE, which faces Pakistan on Thursday, has none.

A judge in Washington has ordered Alphabet’s Google to share information with rivals in order to promote online competition.

The court’s request to force the internet giant to sell its well-known Chrome browser is also rejected by the decision made on Tuesday.

Sundar Pichai, the head of Google, was accused at a trial in April of worrying that the US Department of Justice’s request for data-sharing measures might allow Google’s rivals to reverse-engineer its technology.

It may take years before Google is required to take legal action in response to US District Judge Amit Mehta’s decision because it has previously stated that it intends to appeal.

Additionally, Mehta has forbid Google from entering exclusive agreements that would prevent manufacturers from installing rival products on new devices.

Google claimed that the only appropriate course of action was to loosen its agreements with device manufacturers, browser developers, and mobile network operators. According to the documents presented at trial, Samsung Electronics, Motorola, and wireless providers AT&amp, T and Verizon can now load rival search offerings, according to its most recent agreements with device makers.

One of the world’s most successful businesses and its parent country, the US, were involved in the decision, which came after Mehta declared last year that it had an illegal monopoly on online search and related advertising, for five years.

Prosecutors argued in the trial in April for drastic measures to reinvigorate competition and stop Google from limiting its search dominance to artificial intelligence.

Google claimed that the proposals would give away its technology to rivals because they went far beyond what was legally necessary.

Google is suing over its dominance in other markets in addition to the search controversy.

In a lawsuit brought by “Fortnite” maker Epic Games, the company recently announced it would continue to fight a ruling that would require it to overhaul its app store.

In a separate case brought by the Justice Department, where a judge determined that Google holds illegal monopolies in online advertising technology, the company is scheduled to go on trial in September to determine remedies.

The Justice Department’s two cases against Google are just one more example of the US’s wider, bipartisan crackdown on big tech companies, which included those brought on by Amazon and Apple during President Donald Trump’s first term.

Asisat Oshoala, a Nigerian forward, left Bay FC for Saudi Women’s Premier League side Al-Hilal.

The agreement’s terms were not made public. The 30-year-old international from Nigeria signed a two-year deal with Al-Hilal.

Oshoala left Barcelona for Bay FC in the beginning of its 2024 season, where she won two Women’s Champions League titles. In her first year with the San Francisco Bay Area team, she scored a team-high seven goals.

In the 17th minute of a game between Angel City and Bay FC, the 30-year-old scored the club’s first franchise goal on March 17, 2024.

Asisat has been a significant player in Bay FC history, not just because of her physical exertion but also because of the energy, professionalism, and kindness she consistently brought to the field,” according to Matt Patter, the sporting director of Bay on Tuesday.

We are appreciative of everything she contributed to our club during its first season because she is a top player and an even better person.

Oshoala, who won her sixth Africa Cup of Nations title in July, was a member of the Nigerian team that won its 10th African Cup of Nations title. She was also a six-time African player of the year.

Oshoala, who was born in Ikorodu, was also the first African woman to receive the Ballon d’Or award, a title that is given annually to honor the best player in the world.

She was denied the Spain’s Alexia Putellas with the 2022 award. She received her sixth and final African Women’s Player of the Year award in that year.

According to a judicial source and a human rights organization, a French court has issued arrest warrants for seven former top Syrian officials, including former president Bashar al-Assad, related to the bombing of a press center in Homs.

On February 22, 2012, a rocket struck the “informal press center,” injuring two journalists and an interpreter, as well as renowned US journalist Marie Colvin and French photographer Remi Ochlik.

In addition to al-Assad, who emigrated to Russia in December of that year when opposition fighters took control of Syria, warrants have also been issued against his brother Maher al-Assad, who at the time was de facto commander of the 4th Syrian armoured division, intelligence chief Ali Mamlouk, and then-army chief of staff Ali Ayoub, among others.

In its courts, France allows the filing of crimes against humanity.

According to the Syrian Center for Media and Free Expression, it was determined that the attack had purposefully targeted foreign journalists by the French judiciary.

According to Mazen Darwish, a lawyer and general director of the Syrian Centre for Media and Freedom of Expression, “the judicial investigation clearly established that the attack on the informal press center in Bab Amr was part of the Syrian regime’s explicit intention to target foreign journalists in order to stifle media coverage of its crimes and force them to leave the city and the country.”

The journalists were the victims of a “targeted bombing,” according to the Paris-based International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) who also reported.

The warrants, which were issued on Tuesday, were welcomed by Clemence Bectarte, the family of Ochlik, and he called them “a decisive step that opens the door for a trial in France for war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by Bashar al-Assad’s regime.”

The attack on the informal press center where they were employed also injured British photographer Paul Conroy, French journalist Edith Bouvier, and Syrian translator Wael Omar.

Colvin, who had lost one eye to an explosion during Sri Lanka’s civil war, was renowned for her fearless reporting and signature black eye patch. A Private War, a Golden Globe-nominated movie, celebrated her career.