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Harry Maguire pay cut proposal, offers in Europe and Man United dressing room stance

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Harry Maguire’s Manchester United future remains up in the air with mere months remaining on his contract

Harry Maguire has been delivering some of the finest performances of his Manchester United career whilst an uncertain future looms over him.

The centre-back’s contract expires at the end of the season and an agreement to prolong his seven-year spell at the Theatre of Dreams has not yet been reached. Reportedly keen to remain in Manchester, the England international has battled his way back into the starting XI under interim manager Michael Carrick, experiencing just one loss in his last eight Premier League starts.

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With fewer than three months of the campaign remaining as United battle to secure Champions League qualification, we examine the latest developments on Maguire’s contract situation, the assessment from his colleagues and potential moves overseas.

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Contract update

In his seventh campaign at Old Trafford, Maguire’s career in Manchester appeared finished merely two months ago, with only four league starts to his name under Ruben Amorim. Yet the appointment of Carrick has revitalised the England international, who has played a crucial role in United’s climb up the Premier League standings.

Whilst a decision is still pending on whether Maguire, 33, will be offered a new contract, The i Paper suggests a proposed deal with reduced wages is under consideration. This would require the defender to cut his £190,000-per-week salary to around £100,000. The report further indicates that Maguire is open to considering these new terms.

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Dressing room stance

As the third-longest serving United player in the current squad and former captain, he commands significant respect among his team-mates, who reportedly want the club to reward the defender with a new contract.

Per The Sun, the general consensus is it would be “madness” if the Englishman didn’t extend his career in Manchester due to his form and the guidance he’s providing to the club’s younger players.

The source stated: “The players think it would be madness if he was not offered a new deal. Harry has endured plenty of ups and downs at United but has come through all that and is playing really well.

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“He’s very well-respected in the dressing room and is passing on a lot of knowledge to some of the younger players like Ayden Heaven and Leny Yoro. Everyone likes him and respects him and the majority of the players want the club to give him a deal.”

Transfer offers abroad

Having spent his entire 15-year senior career in England, a move overseas could present an enticing opportunity for Maguire, particularly given his uncertain contract situation with United.

As his contract expires in the summer, Maguire is entitled to negotiate a pre-contract arrangement with overseas clubs and according to The Athletic, the defender’s representatives have conducted discussions with clubs in Turkey and Italy.

These have not yet progressed beyond initial enquiries and whilst it remains uncertain whether the 33-year-old would even consider a move abroad, it appears Maguire will have numerous options when deciding the next stage of his career.

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Winter Paralympics 2026: Ralf Etienne becomes Haiti’s first Winter Paralympian

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Through skiing, he has achieved that.

He first experienced the sport on a trip with friends, but it was only two years ago that he realised this was his way to make his mark on the world.

“I touched the snow, and I never turned back,” he said. Etienne wanted to become the Caribbean nation’s first Winter Paralympian.

“At first skiing meant freedom to me, and then I realised it was inspiration. That is what the Paralympics are about.

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“It is a message of hope to disabled people and the rest of the world.”

With US restrictions on Haitian immigration rights making it difficult for him to travel to train, last year – supported by his employer Bank of America – Etienne relocated from New York to London to be closer to the mountains of Europe for weekend training.

“Sometimes I’m leaving the office at 2am because I have work I need to finish before I get on a 6am flight to get to Switzerland,” he told the Wall Street Journal, external.

On Friday, after just 80 days on snow in his life, he achieved his dream of racing at the Milan-Cortina Winter Paralympics.

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Aided by a 12-month grant from the International Paralympic Committee’s Sport for Mobility programme, he has joined athletes from El Salvador, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Portugal in making their nations’ debut at the Games.

His result, a disqualification on his second run of the standing giant slalom, is secondary to his story.

“Haiti has a skier. That’s the most beautiful sentence I have heard in a long time,” he said.

“On the first run I proved that Haiti can ski competitively. Before the race, I had won.

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“I get to say that there is hope, I get to tell the Haitian youth that if I can do this today with one leg, they can do anything.

“I’ve gone from the earthquake rubble to the top of the Dolomites with the very best skiers in the world.

“Anything is possible. I get to show young Haitians that all is not lost.”

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What Blue Jays should expect from Scherzer in age-41 season

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When the Toronto Blue Jays signed Max Scherzer less than three weeks ago, it was fair to wonder when he might be ready to start in an MLB game and how he’d fit into a crowded rotation picture in 2026.

Those questions haven’t been completely resolved, but the situation has shifted surprisingly quickly. Scherzer told reporters he’d be ready for Opening Day upon arrival at camp and his first spring outing — a four-inning start where he showed promising velocity — demonstrated that there was more behind those words than empty optimism. 

Meanwhile, the Blue Jays’ rotation has become slightly murkier as Trey Yesavage has built up slowly, and José Berríos’s inability to get insured for the World Baseball Classic has put his health in doubt. Nothing is guaranteed for Scherzer, but his path to a rotation spot already seems clearer today than when he first reunited with the Blue Jays. 

With the future Hall of Famer looking less and less like a pure contingency plan, it’s worth examining what fair expectations for him might be in 2026. Although he had some notable highlights in 2025, the 41-year-old also finished the season with a 5.19 ERA and struggled to both miss bats and avoid home runs down the stretch and into the post-season. 

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His age alone raises questions. Since 2000, just 21 pitchers have started a game in their age-41 season. That cohort has some success stories, like Roger Clemens, Randy Johnson, Greg Maddux and David Wells, who all pitched at least 195 innings with three or more fWAR, but the track record is mixed.

Of that group of 21 pitchers, just under half (eight) produced an above-average ERA by ERA-, but six of those eight pitched between 2004 and 2008. The only more recent strong run suppressors were southpaws Andy Pettite (92 ERA- in 2013) and Rich Hill (92 ERA- in 2021).

In the last 10 seasons, pitchers at Scherzer’s age have become rarer, with just five making MLB starts. Their results as starters do not inspire much confidence.

It’s also notable that in each of these five cases, the pitchers were more effective the previous seasons:

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In recent years, it’s extremely rare for an MLB team to let a 41-year-old start for them. When they have done so, they’ve been emboldened by strong performances from the quadragenarian in question the year before.

Going back to our sample of 21 pitchers who made a start in their age-41 season since 2000, more than half of them posted at least 2.9 fWAR as a 40-year-old, with 15 posting an above-average ERA. The six exceptions are all relatively easy to explain:

Charle Morton (2024) — Narrowly below-average ERA (101 ERA-) with solid durability (165.1 IP).

Tim Wakefield (2007) — The same overall profile as Morton (102 ERA- in 189 IP). He was also a knuckleballer, who are generally understood to age differently than traditional pitchers.

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Orel Hershiser (1999) — Another Morton-type effort (104 ERA- in 179 IP).

Jeff Fassero, Mike Morgan, and Terry Mulholland (2000-2003) — Part-time starters who didn’t top 30 IP in that role as 40-year-olds.

What we haven’t had in the last quarter-century is a pitcher who posted a significantly below-average ERA in a traditional starter role at age 40 (like Scherzer’s 127 in 2025) then got a chance to run it back the next year. Teams just don’t give the benefit of the doubt to players at that stage of their career.

For Scherzer to succeed in 2026, he will have to be a massive outlier. His career accomplishments and the fact that he’s still pitching at his age already grant him that status. Scherzer has been exceeding expectations since he first stepped onto a baseball diamond. It’s impossible to rule out a continuation of that pattern.

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To his credit, he also has some respectable projections for 2026, with FanGraphs’ projection systems predicting an ERA for him between 4.20 and 4.68, a significant improvement from last year. He also has much better velocity than most pitchers his age. In his first spring training outing, his fastball averaged 93.9 m.p.h. Since the beginning of reliable pitch tracking in 2007, 29 pitchers have appeared in the majors in their age-41 season — and just two (Morton in 2025 and Fernando Rodney in 2018) have topped that average. 

Scherzer could be effective in 2026. Even if he isn’t, the Blue Jays may wind up happy with his contributions off the field and feel like no freely available depth starter was going to give them strong production anyway. The success or failure of their campaign is unlikely to rest on what the returning veteran gives them.

At the same time, they won the AL East on a tiebreak in 2025 and are in for a tough divisional battle again this year. They could be operating with minuscule margins, and Scherzer might be a player they count on more than expected. The name on the back of the jersey could make that notion comforting, but the year on the birth certificate adds a level of peril. 

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2026 Fantasy Baseball Draft Prep: 40 deep sleepers for the late rounds include Dominic Canzone, Grant Holmes

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You say my Sleepers 2.0 were too obvious, my Breakouts 2.0 too well known? First of all, rude. But I aim to please, and to that end, I say we take things deeper.

How deep? Deeper than I’m comfortable going, honestly. The draft pool has been chewed over so much by this point that you can’t expect to find anything of sustenance outside of the top 300. You’re just hoping to get lucky.

Casting a wide net makes the most sense, then, which is why I couldn’t bring myself to whittle down this list beyond 40. While these are the players I’m most looking to target if the drafts extends that far, I wouldn’t say I’m pounding the table for any one of them (well, maybe Bryce Eldridge).

And when I say outside of the top 300, I mean in the last week, which I can only determine using NFBC ADP. I don’t want to pass off some recent riser as a deep sleeper because nobody was onto him in late February, skewing his ADP. With that criteria in mind, here are some players who I might have been able to call a deep sleeper at some point during Draft Prep season, but I know longer can:

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And that’s too bad. I like Burrows, Lawlar, Ponce and Rodriguez, especially.

But in the interest of giving you some truly deep names that you may not have considered drafting yet, here’s who I’ve had to settle for instead.

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Mullins’ combine for 50/1 Triumph win with Apolon De Charnie

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Apolon De Charnie followed in the hoofprints of last year’s winner, Poniros, to provide Willie Mullins with another big-price winner of the Grade 1 JCB Triumph Hurdle at Cheltenham.

Poniros was 100/1 in 2025, but Apolon De Charnie was half that price (50/1) this afternoon, as Mullins teamed up with his son, Patrick, in the opening race on the Boodles Gold Cup Day card.

The winner travelled strongly into second position before the final flight of hurdles and was soon ridden clear by Mullins Jnr to run out a one-and-a-half length victor over the Skelton’s Maestro Conti (5/1).

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Minella Study (7/1) from the Adam Nichol yard and ridden by Ryan Mania was a further short-head back in third.

Earlier this morning a bet of £20,000 each-way was placed on the eventual third-placer.


LiveScores Now Available at IrishScores.com

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Shakur Stevenson wants to fight the man who ‘beat’ Gervonta Davis: “Best vs best”

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Shakur Stevenson has welcomed a fight against a former rival of Gervonta Davis.

Stevenson is currently planning his next move after defeating Teofimo Lopez at Madison Square Garden in January to win the WBO super-lightweight title.

That victory saw the American become a four-weight world champion, having also previously reigned at featherweight, super featherweight and lightweight in his career.

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It’s currently unknown if Stevenson’s next fight will be at 135lbs or 140lbs, but one potential fight could come against a man who has competed in both of those weight classes.

Lamont Roach is the fighter in question, who gained prominence last year after a controversial majority decision draw against Gervonta Davis, with a lot of people believing he had done enough to win that fight.

Stevenson is one of them, after he revealed on the Nightcap Show that he thinks Roach should have beaten Davis, even without the controversy in round nine where ‘Tank’ voluntarily took a knee but no knockdown was scored.

“Yeah, I do [think Roach beat him]. I thought without the knee he won that fight.”

Stevenson also explained his willingness to share the ring with Roach.

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“I would love to fight Lamont Roach. Me and Lamont Roach is an amazing fight. The best vs the best.”

Roach’s last fight came in December when he was held to another draw, this time against Isaac Cruz, and he has recently been ordered for a fight against William Zepeda for the vacant WBC lightweight title, which was recently stripped from Stevenson.

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Juan Soto makes emotional dedication to mom, dad, sister & family as World Baseball Classic title hopes with Dominican Republic edge closer

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Team Dominican Republic are heading into the 2026 World Baseball Classic quarterfinals after winning four consecutive pool games. They are up against Team Korea in Quarterfinal 1 on Friday.

New York Mets outfielder Juan Soto, who is participating in his second WBC, shared the motivation behind his goal to win the tournament. Soto dedicated it to his family for standing beside him.

“It’s got to be for my mom and dad,” Soto said. “They’ve been there since Day 1. My sister, my brother, both. I mean my family, they just been there every time. They’ve been pushing me, they’ve been right there to my side every time, so, I’m doing this for them.

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The Dominican Republic are three wins away from clinching the tournament for the first time since 2013. Soto reflected on his dream of winning the World Series and the WBC as a kid.

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“I think it’s gonna means a lot to them,” Soto said. “It’s something that we all dreamed about since I was a little kid. My dad dreamed about winning a World Series, and now when I was growing up, seeing the Dominican team winning in 2013, it was a dreamofor me to come here and try to win it for them.

Mets star Juan Soto praised “special” Dominican Republic team

Juan Soto was an integral part of the Dominican Republic’s 2023 WBC roster. The All-Star slugger has been in similar form in this year’s tournament. Soto was among the four Dominican players to hit a home run against Venezuela in their 7-5 win.

“We know what kind of talent we have in the team,” Soto said. “It’s great. We have guys that can [hit home runs]. Guys that can have power and do all these [things], but we gotta get it done. At the end of the day, I’m a little bit impressed with these guys, with this group. It’s really special.”

The Dominican Republic are on pace to break Team Medico’s record of most home runs (14) in a World Baseball Classic campaign.