Coco Gauff, the fourth seed, defeated Paula Badosa in the first China Open final after going set and break.
The 20-year-old American dug deep to come through 4-6 6-4 6-2.
Spaniard Badosa served with a 4-3 lead in the second set, which was a 19th-ranked player but a former world number two.
However, Gauff eventually won the game in two hours and 21 minutes by breaking and rattled off the next four games to set up a decider.
Badosa, who was in the top 140th place in the world rankings in May, had a strong start to the semi-finals in Beijing, winning over Jessica Pegula, the second seed, and Jessica Pegula, the finalist.
And she took advantage of Gauff’s inconsistencies, particularly on her serve which produced 11 double faults, to win the opening set and break in the first game of the second.
After resuming her relationship with Brad Gilbert last month and avoiding contention for the US Open in the fourth round, Gauff is now working with new coach Matt Daly.
The American gained momentum as Badosa recovered with her composure after she dropped her first set of the week after saving four break points to avoid falling to 4-1 in the second set.
In the final match, Gauff broke three times to claim the victory as she competes for Auckland’s only title of the year so far in January.
Morrissey’s recent accusations weren’t something Johnny Marr was willing to let go of.
And the guitarist, 60, has moved to try to set the record straight, from his perspective at least. Morrissey, 65, had claimed Marr had successfully applied or 100 per cent of the trademark on the name of their band, The Smiths. The singer also criticized Marr for refusing to negotiate for the naming rights at a rumored reunion, before claiming that the band had turned down an invitation to go on tour once more.
This also means that Marr can now tour as The Smiths while Morrissey can use the singer of his choice, Morrissey had claimed, and it also prevents Morrissey from using the name while also denying him a significant financial support.
Johnny Marr has hit back at Morrissey’s claims
However, Marr was quick to shut down the claims and said they simply weren’t true. Marr wrote in a statement of his own that “Morrissey’s recent statements regarding the Smiths’ name trademark are incorrect.” Marr claimed Morrissey had refused to share their trademark after discovering the band didn’t own it, and the statement continued to include “facts.”
Marr added: “To prevent third parties from profiting from the band’s name, it was left to me to protect the legacy. This was done for both my former bandmates and myself. As for the offer to tour, I didn’t ignore the offer – I said no”. The guitar guru also blasted rumors that he would be performing with a different singer as “not true,” adding: “There are no such plans.”
More than three decades after the band’s bitter split in 1987, the band’s latest back-and-forth is. At the time, the pair’s strained relationship was given as part of the reason behind the band’s fracture. In 2022, Marr claimed there was “zero chance” he’d ever work with Morrissey again, telling BBC Radio 2’s Steve Wright that he hadn’t spoken to Morrissey in person in “18 or maybe 15 years”.
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England cruised to a comfortable 20-run victory over New Zealand at Lord’s to end their home-grown run of unbeaten.
The White Ferns’ batting woes, which have plagued them throughout the series, continued as they were only able to manage 135-8, set 156 to win.
With a strong all-round performance, fellow seamer Freya Kemp and spinner Charlie Dean took two wickets each in a strong performance.
The win secures a 5-0 clean sweep for England, and was preceded by a dominant 3-0 one-day international series win.
Earlier, the visitors put in their best performance in the field, reducing England to 61-4, but could not capitalise as captain Heather Knight’s unbeaten 46 took the game away.
With 4-22, Fran Jonas led with the wicket of Danni Wyatt from the opening ball of the match, and Nathan Sciver-Brunt was the only one to score for 16 while Eden Carson, a fellow spinner, recorded a 30-23 total.
However, the regular wickets, especially the few overs of pace, were inconsistent, which eased England’s pressure and kept them from posting what would have been their T20 series highest score.
Amelia Kerr’s 43 was the highest score, followed by the well-known middle-order stumble, which resulted in five wickets falling for just 27 runs. The batting line-up was so low on confidence.
England have won 13 games in a summer away from home for the first time since 2002, surpassing their previous record of 12 with a total white-ball victory over Pakistan and New Zealand.
England’s dominant summer performance
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With England looking confident ahead of the World Cup and having a washout against Pakistan in May, it is fair to say that neither series has been a challenge.
It speaks volumes that even after New Zealand’s most competitive year, it still came out in a complete defeat.
They did manage to somewhat silence the healthy Lord’s crowd, including a sold-out pavilion, when Wyatt holed out to mid-wicket first ball and several soft dismissals fell to the spinners.
Maia Bouchier chipped to mid-on for 13, Sciver-Brunt was victim to a sensational one-handed caught and bowled, Alice Capsey was tamely stumped for 25 and Amy Jones was caught at long-on.
Before a flurry of boundaries in the final two overs saw the score drop past 150, Knight remained as England’s rock, surviving the pressure with smart running between the wickets.
England chased down New Zealand’s previous highest score in the series with four wickets to spare, demonstrating the breadth of the task at hand.
In contrast to England, who had Dean putting in a valuable 24 from 19 balls from the eighth, Brooke Halliday was the only batter to add 20 in support of Amelia Kerr.
‘ England are flying towards the World Cup ‘ – reaction
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New Zealand’s Amelia Kerr speaking to BBC Two: “It was a very tough series, not winning a game. The best thing we can do is return home and pick up from this is that England is one of the best in the world.
England captain Heather Knight on BBC Two: “Really pleased. We discussed whether we wanted to finish this summer strong.
” We’ve talked about nailing teams when they’re on top and we’ve done that. I’m a very happy captain. “
Frankie Mackay, a former New Zealand all-rounder, said on BBC Two: “I think this England side’s cricket is brilliant right now.
When Taylor Swift sings “Drop everything now / Meet me in the pouring rain,” she probably wasn’t envisioning a group of drenched Swifties.
Yet, that’s the exact scenario facing fans in Milan today, where Swifties have been spotted queuing in a torrential downpour to shop from the singer’s merchandise truck.
The dedicated fans were caught on camera by a passer-by at the San Siro Stadium, which is hosting the next leg of the singer’s Eras Tour. It’s understood the shop opened on Friday morning, offering early merch shopping for fans ahead of Swift’s weekend shows in Italy. Sharing her amazement on X, @giogiorubbish posted a video of the queue and a tongue-in-cheek caption.
Taylor Swift’s record-breaking Eras Tour has arrived in Milan ( Liam McBurney/PA Wire)
“The swifties in line for merch during the most insane storm in the history of Milan….” she wrote, and people were quick to respond. One impressed viewer wrote: “The dedication.” A second said: “This is actually crazy,” while a third claimed: “The storm woke me up this morning. It was real intense.”
Someone else commented: “Imagine getting there and them not having your size/what you want. I’d cry,” and another said: “Omg. Respect gurls.”
Swift’s highly-anticipated Milan shows follow two sold-out nights in Zurich, Switzerland, earlier this week. The Swiss leg of the tour saw the singer tick the final unplayed Debut song off her surprise songs list, when she performed a mash-up of “A Perfectly Good Heart” and “Closure” on her second night.
Now, fans are patiently waiting to discover which surprise songs Swift has lined up for Milan — and if she has any further tricks up her sleeve — after she shared a rather cryptic post on Instagram ahead of her arrival. Some have gone so far as to speculate the singer will announced Reputation (Taylor’s Version) this weekend. Just as Swift sings in Miss Americana & the Heartbreak Prince, “It’s been a long time coming”.
The Gallagher brothers have been locked in a bitter feud for nearly as long as they’ve been in the public eye.
But now it looks as though their war of words has reached an all time low as Liam and Noel’s children have started to publicly take sides in support of their parents. While at a backstage bar in Glastonbury’s VIP section, Noel was just metres away from his nephew Gene – but was snubbed by the youngster in full view of onlookers.
An reveller told The Sun that Gene was stood just 20 yards from each other with their respective pals but chose to not engage. A source told the publication: “Noel and Gene clocked each other but kept well apart. It was quite sad to see given they are so closely related but there is still a lot of bad blood between Noel and Liam. They were only standing 20 yards apart but neither of them would break rank to say hello.”
Gene Gallagher is the younger son of Liam who snubbed Noel at a backstage bar in Glastonbury
Noel Gallagher’s feud with brother Liam has now spread to his nephew Gene ( GC Images)
It’s believed that Noel headed out of the backstage bar and partied until 3am after watching the band Kneecap in Shangri-La. And last August a similar situation took place when Noel quickly left Chiltern Firehouse restaurant with his daughter Anais, after Liam’s eldest son Lennon rocked up at the venue.
The awkward exchange at the Worthy Farm music festival comes after Liam and Noel individually hinted at a long-awaited reunion. In May, Liam and Noel sent Oasis fans into a state of hysteria after they shared a cryptic video on their X accounts. The band split in 2009 after a backstage row in Paris appeared to be the final straw for Noel.
At the time, he said: “It’s with some sadness and great relief to tell you that I quit Oasis tonight. People will write and say what they like, but I simply could not go on working with Liam a day longer.” But this year, the official Oasis X account posted a video without a caption featuring music from the group as far back as 1994, which was the year their debut album Definitely Maybe soared to the top of the charts.
Liam often posts on the social media platform but Noel rarely gives a nod to his past. But after re-tweeting an Oasis video fans were in hope of a reconciliation. One fan wrote: “This suspense is absolutely killing me…” Another fan said: “This would be Earth-shattering!”
Meanwhile, someone else claimed it was a “signal for a reunion!” Another penned: “I know what this is. Noel probably told Liam, many years ago after the break up, ‘The next time I will play with you will be after [Manchester] City win 4 league titles in a row’. Now, he’s stuck in keeping his word.”
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Birmingham City will start their first season in England’s third tier for 29 years with a home match against Reading, while Wrexham will host Wycombe Wanderers on the Welsh club’s return to League One.
Huddersfield Town and Rotherham United, the two sides relegated from the Championship with Birmingham, will travel to Peterborough United and Exeter City respectively to kick off their campaigns at 17:30 BST on Saturday, 10 August.
League Two title winners Stockport County will host Cambridge United on the opening day, while Mansfield Town, who went up automatically alongside the Hatters and Wrexham, will head to Barnsley for the first game of the new League One season on Friday, 9 August.
Crawley Town, who beat Crewe Alexandra in the League Two play off final to seal promotion in May, will face Blackpool in one of the 11 third-tier games kicking off at 17:30 BST on the first Saturday.
Matches across the three English Football League divisions will be staggered that day, with Championship games kicking off earlier, at 12:30 BST, and League Two games taking the traditional 15:00 BST slot.
All of the opening round of fixtures in all three divisions will be broadcast live on Sky Sports as part of their new £935m five-year deal with the EFL.
The first midweek league fixtures of the campaign follow seven weeks later on Tuesday, 1 October.
First round of fixtures in full
Barnsley v Mansfield Town (Friday, 9 August 20:00 BST)
Birmingham City v Reading
Bristol Rovers v Northampton Town
Burton Albion v Lincoln City
Crawley Town v Blackpool
Exeter City v Rotherham United
Leyton Orient v Bolton Wanderers
Peterborough United v Huddersfield Town
Stevenage v Shrewsbury Town
Stockport County v Cambridge United
Wigan Athletic v Charlton Athletic
Wrexham v Wycombe Wanderers
Next stop, League One for Hollywood Wrexham
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For Wrexham, it will be their first season in League One for 19 years, while fellow promoted clubs Mansfield and Stockport also end long absences – 21 and 15 years respectively – from the division.
While it took 15 years for Wrexham to get out of the National League, the Hollywood-backed Welsh club bounded through League Two at their first attempt to win promotion as runners-up to Stockport last season.
Wrexham’s back-to-back promotions from non-league football has been chronicled in a popular television docuseries, which has been commissioned for a fourth season, as owners Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney continue their quest to get the club to the Championship.
Their match against Birmingham, a club which NFL legend Tom Brady has a minority share in, drew huge attention even before fixtures were released, with it being reported that the EFL turned down a request to move to the game to the United States.
Blues will host Wrexham on Saturday, 14 September, with the reverse fixture on Saturday, 25 January.
Relegated sides Birmingham and Huddersfield are two of seven League One teams that have played in the Premier League in the past 17 years.
Bolton are again among that group of highly-fancied former top-flight clubs trying to now get back to the Championship. They narrowly missed out on automatic promotion before then being beaten in the play-off final by Oxford.
The Trotters travel to Leyton Orient first up next season.
Wigan and Reading, two clubs that dropped out of the Premier League together 11 years ago and have since grappled with financial problems, will start their campaigns against Charlton Athletic and Birmingham respectively.
Wigan started last season on minus eight points because of their financial woes and finished mid-table, while the Royals’ first season in the third tier for 21 years was a turbulent one as they were deducted six points for their financial problems, while owner Dai Yongge began efforts to sell the club.
One takeover bid at Reading collapsed earlier in the summer, forcing the club to move on to talk to potential new suitors in early June.
