Southampton’s Edmondson admits he would have liked to have been more active over the past few years.

At 28, “The Saint” is unbeaten with nine professional wins to his name and Saturday will be his second fight of 2024 after winning a decision over Portsmouth’s Joel McIntyre in May.

“Dan’s been in a lot of hard spars and fights. He’s 35 and I believe he’s slowing down a bit,” Edmondson said.

“At the same time he’s going to give the best account of himself. He knows this is his last chance to put on a good performance and after I’m victorious, I feel like that will be the end of Dan Azeez.”

Edmondson is managed and advised by former world champion Billy Joe Saunders.

Edmondson signed a contract to fight Ben Whittaker, but a fight with the Olympic silver medallist never happened.

However Saturday’s contest in Stratford provides the toughest test of his career, an opportunity to make a name for himself against a well respected rival in Azeez.

“It’s my time now, there’s a big statement coming,” Edmondson added.

“I’ve put the work in this camp, sparring Willy Hutchinson in Marbella and other class operators too. There’s no stone that has been left unturned and I’m ready to put on a show.

“Two British light-heavyweights going at it, what more could you want, it’s what people want to see.”

THE STADIUM hailed as the best in England was almost abandoned by an ex-Premier League club to move next to a prison.

Built in 1904, the ground has hosted three professional clubs since it opened but it’s current tenants have often been keen to relocate.

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However, they currently remain at the 18,439-capacity venue, which has been their home since 1917.

It has also now been named the best stadium in England by talkSPORT’s Adrian Durham.

After completing the 92 by visiting every Premier League and EFL ground, he ranked his top 10 in the country.

Of those, QPR’s Loftus Road came out on top ahead of Elland Road, the home of Leeds.

Explaining his decision, Durham said: “I went to QPR v Crystal Palace in the League Cup and it reminded me how much I loved it.

“It’s in the middle of a housing estate in London. The corners are filled in, it’s tight to the pitch.

“I just absolutely love it. It’s another one where the atmosphere, when they’re doing well, is fantastic.

“That’s how a ground should be, right in the middle of a residential area. I love it.”

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Loftus Road has hosted seven seasons of Premier League football but has been a Championship ground since QPR were relegated in 2015.

Fulham and AFC Wimbledon have also both been short-term tenants in the last 25 years.

However, despite its claim to being the best stadium in the country, QPR have previously looked to move away from Loftus Road.

Back in 2013, the Hoops planned to build a new 40,000-seater stadium down the road from Wormwood Scrubs prison.

Designs were even unveiled for New Queens Park in the Old Oak area, around two-and-a-half miles from their famous home.

Then chairman Tony Fernandes was keen to build the new ground after drawing up plans, only for them to be abandoned after the club dropped out of the top flight.

A move was considered again in 2018, with the club hoping to redevelop Linford Christie Stadium in the same area of West London.

QPR have also since abandoned those plans, though, and remain at Loftus Road, where they have yet to win this season.

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NEW YORK — Friday evening at Citi Field began with The Temptations singing their 1965 hit single “My Girl” in an ode to Francisco Lindor’s walk-up song. Lindor, while warming up on the field, smiled and sang along to the lyrics. Pete Alonso, stretching before what could be his final home game as a Met, joined in, too, and pretty soon the crowd — understandably tense before an elimination game — relaxed a little. Watching the jovial scene unfold in Queens, it was hard to tell that the Mets had lost by eight runs on each of the previous two days and were facing elimination. 

If they seemed loose and carefree mere minutes before southpaw David Peterson threw the first pitch of the game, it’s because that’s how they showed up to Citi Field ahead of Game 5 of the National League Championship Series. Mets manager Carlos Mendoza walked into the hitters’ meeting and everyone was smiling. Hours before their most important game of the year — yes, another one of those — New York’s happy-go-lucky attitude foreshadowed the pain they would inflict on the Dodgers.

“That’s who we are,” Mendoza said. “There’s no tomorrow for us. But we’ve been in this situation before. So, nothing new.”

After Peterson stranded Mookie Betts and Shohei Ohtani on second in the first inning — lifting the crowd’s energy from unease to optimism — Alonso followed by lifting a three-run blast off Jack Flaherty in the bottom of the frame. The Polar Bear’s fourth home run of October was a harbinger of the offensive outburst that was to come. The Mets tallied 14 hits, the second-most in postseason franchise history, in their 12-6 win over the Dodgers in Game 5. 

The onslaught was a product of sticking to the plan, capitalizing on Flaherty’s drop in velocity and refusing to chase outside the zone. The Mets wound up tagging Flaherty, who shut them out five days prior, for eight runs in just three innings. Besides Alonso’s long ball, New York drew key walks, enjoyed timely hitting, and played small ball to overwhelm Los Angeles’ pitching staff. Starling Marte went 4-for-5 with three RBIs, Lindor collected a stand-up RBI triple, Jesse Winker reached base in four of his five plate appearances and catcher Francisco Alvarez went 3-for-4, too. 

On top of all the scoring, the Mets didn’t strike out once — a feat unseen in the postseason since the 2002 World Series by the Angels.

Friday was the kind of complete effort the Mets needed to remind themselves of their ceiling. 

“The quality of at-bats that we had, the intensity that we needed every inning, we understood that,” Lindor said. “And we had to give everything that we had, and that’s what we did.”

As the Dodgers threatened to put an end to this improbable run, the Mets leaned on the experience and the results that got them to this point. Their slugging first baseman, throughout these past few victorious weeks, has been right in the middle of it. Of Alonso’s five career postseason homers, four have given the Mets the lead — including three in the past two weeks alone. Not bad for one of baseball’s most powerful hitters just weeks away from entering free agency. 

Like Betts said on Wednesday, the Mets didn’t become one of the final four teams standing because of luck. They also didn’t reach this point because of a McDonald’s mascot or a hit Latin pop song. On Friday, the Mets reminded everyone why they’re only two wins away from advancing to the World Series: When they’re at their best, they can beat anyone. 

“We’ll be ready. We love opportunities,” Alonso said. “This is what we want to continue to play for. Today was all about, figure it out, get to Game 6. And we have that opportunity, and it’s going to be the same mentality: figure it out, get to 7. That’s what it is. Survive the day. And we did. And we’re really, really excited for the opportunity coming up.”

In a season overloaded with surprises, the Mets have the opportunity to pull off their greatest upset yet. They forced a flight back to Los Angeles for Game 6, which will take place Sunday night at Chavez Ravine, by focusing only on the 27 outs that could save their season rather than getting overwhelmed by the big picture. All baseball teams like to say they don’t look too far ahead, and instead prefer to take things day-to-day, but Mendoza’s Mets have executed that mindset better than most this season.

The Mets are attempting to become the ninth team in LCS history (AL or NL) to come back from a 3-1 hole. For motivation, they’ll be reminding themselves that they’re 2-0 in elimination games this year. 

“We’ve had success focusing on the process for 4-5 months now, and it’s not the time to change it,” Brandon Nimmo said. “We’re just trying to beat on that dam until it finally breaks, and it broke tonight.”

On The Temptations’ official website, the Motown legends bill their story as “an epic journey of courage, struggle, triumphs, setbacks, and ultimately, international superstardom.” 

Sounds a lot like the 2024 Mets.

Deesha Thosar is an MLB reporter for FOX Sports. She previously covered the Mets as a beat reporter for the New York Daily News. The daughter of Indian immigrants, Deesha grew up on Long Island and now lives in Queens. Follow her on Twitter at @DeeshaThosar.

[Want great stories delivered right to your inbox? Create or log in to your FOX Sports account, follow leagues, teams and players to receive a personalized newsletter daily.]

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Thomas was appointed to Hines’ staff last year and has vast experience of coaching across all age groups in America, as well as analysis work with US Soccer.

She is vice-chair for US Soccer’s ‘Black Coaches Community’ and leads on an initiative called ‘Moms Who Coach.’

Thomas says if you work long enough in women’s sport “you either become an activist for women or you quit” but seeing inequality in football has encouraged her passion to drive change.

Her inspiration stemmed from a run-in with former England manager Hope Powell – the first black female coach Thomas had seen while playing football.

“I was playing in the youth teams for Sweden and we played against England. Hope Powell was the coach. That was the first time I saw anyone who looked like me,” Thomas told BBC Sport.

“I had dreadlocks at the time and so did she. I thought ‘wow, she looks like me and she is doing this. I am going to do that.’

“That was the seed planted in me. I didn’t say anything to her but the ability to see someone that looked like me, in that position, inspired me.”

Thomas has never met and spoken to Powell but she remains a key influence on her life.

“I think about it often. I am very aware each time I walk into a stadium, that there are no other black women coaching. It’s not lost on me,” she added.

“I hope my visibility will create an opportunity and a sense of ‘I can do that’ too. I chose a long time ago to not view it as a burden but a privilege.

“If I fail, unfortunately it could impact those after me. That is unfortunate but it’s my reality. I just decide to take on that attitude and think ‘it’s not just for me, but for those who come after me.’”

VINCE RUSSO has claimed that women “could not say no” to controversial WWE co-founder Vince McMahon.

The WWE writer admitted that the females would say “yes” to McMahon when it came to highly sexualised storylines in the ring.

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McMahon, 79, was recently the subject of a Netflix documentary and has been accused of sexual assault, trafficking and physical abuse in a lawsuit.

He has refuted the claims as a “vindictive distortion of the truth” and “lies”.

Speaking on Piers Morgan Uncensored, Russo said: “When I was writing, what the Attitude Era was all about, Piers, was blue collar versus white collar.

“That’s what it was all about. Stone Cold Steve Austin, Vince McMahon. Austin was telling McMahon every single thing a blue collar would want to tell his boss.

“Well, when I left, all of a sudden there was a shift and that shift was all of a sudden Vince is on camera with all these beautiful women, making out with them, kissing them, groping them. They are groping him.

“Now, Piers, you gotta understand something, and everybody here will understand this, as a writer I could have never written any of our female characters in that position because they couldn’t have said ‘no’.

“They would have had to say ‘yes’ because it was with Vince McMahon and they would have thought if they didn’t do this, they were going to be fired.

“So when I saw this type of behaviour, after I left, it never sat well with me. Now, I don’t know if that came from Vince or the writers.

“But like I said, he put all those females in a situation where they could not say no because they felt like their job was on the line.”

Ex-WWE announcer Charley Arnolt has insisted that she was never mistreated in the business.

However, she did admit that in WWE, people need a “thick skin”.

She added that some people “probably put their own self-respect on the backburn” as people also wanted to get good feedback from the “boss of all bosses”.

During the episode of Uncensored the likes of wrestlers Maven Haffman and Jonathan ‘Coach’ Coachman hit out a New York Post reporter.

The pair slammed journalist Phil Mushnik for his investigations into the WWE world.

They also challenged his long-running scathing momentary of McMahon.

Mushnik defended his record and also revealed that he warned Donald Trump about aligning himself with the WWE co-founder.

He said: “On two occasions, I called Donald, who I’ve known for years.

“I called him and I said ‘Donald, I have four boxes, I will deliver them to you, I’ll get a truck and I’ll deliver them to you, with all the Fedex records of the steroids and the opioids delivered to McMahon, the wrestlers. You don’t want to be involved in this?’

“He is the smartest man on earth! He said, ‘don’t you worry about it, I’m going to give the money to charity’.”

But Mushnik said he never saw him giving the million dollars promised to charity.

The basis for the calculations are figures from the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) on average salaries in countries around the world, as well as the salary figures of teams in F1.

The top three teams in F1 have an average salary level of £90,000, while the same number for Sauber, who are last in the world championship this season, is £125,000.

Salaries make up approximately 35-40% of a team’s budget, which means Sauber/Audi are in effect working to a lower budget cap than any other team.

Mattia Binotto, who was last month appointed as chief operating and chief technical officer of Audi, told BBC Sport that it would not be possible for Audi to be competitive in F1 without this adjustment.

He said that Audi had accepted that, as a consequence of changes in exchange rates being reflected in the 2026 recalculation, they would be at a $20m disadvantage.

The other nine teams are opposed to the budget-cap offset being introduced in 2026.

But they are powerless to be able to prevent it happening because none have signed up to their F1 contracts for 2026 and so there is no governance structure in place for them to affect the decision.

However, there will be further discussions on the issue in the next two months, after the teams have studied the figures supplied to them by the FIA, before a final decision is made at the next world council meeting in December.