Two-time Wimbledon champion Carlos Alcaraz narrowly avoided back-to-back singles defeats for the first time in 18 months as Team Europe took a 7-5 lead over Team World at the Laver Cup.

The world number three saved two match points before overcoming Taylor Fritz 6-3 4-6 13-11 in a dramatic deciding tie-break at London’s O2 Arena.

It was Alcaraz’s first singles outing since his late-night quarter-final exit to Ben Shelton at the US Open.

“The drop shot is part of my game,” Alcaraz said after sealing victory with a trademark touch.

“In those really close and important moments, I tried to use it because it was a really good weapon for me in this match.”

American Fritz, whose only previous victory against the Spaniard came during Team World’s triumph in last year’s competition, kept errors to a minimum.

However, Alcaraz struck 42 winners to Fritz’s 20, bringing an audience that included Roger Federer and Andy Murray to their feet.

Facing match point at 8-9 down in the tie break, Alcaraz fired an ace before leaning on a drop shot to stave off a second. He converted his third match point when Fritz failed to retrieve another delicate drop shot over the net.

Earlier on Saturday, Andre Agassi’s Team World had threatened to run away with things.

Alex de Minaur fought back from a set down to shock Alexander Zverev 2-6 7-6 (7-5) 11-9, while American debutant Learner Tien edged Italy’s Flavio Cobolli 6-3 2-6 10-7.

Following Alcaraz’s singles heroics, Zverev returned to the court alongside Casper Ruud to secure an important 6-4 7-6 (9-7) doubles victory over Alexander Bublik and Brandon Nakashima, keeping Europe ahead going into the final day.

Match wins are worth three points on Sunday, with the first team to reach 13 points lifting the trophy.

Europe are chasing their sixth Laver Cup title, while holders Team World are aiming for their third.

Labour descended into open warfare over immigration and the economy on Saturday night, souring Andy Burnham‘s first party conference as Prime Minister.

Cabinet ministers are at loggerheads over a planned crackdown on migrant visas, while another grandee blasted the leadership for putting union demands ahead of economic growth.

The very public rows threaten to overshadow what Mr Burnham had planned would be a triumphant party conference, which gets under way in Liverpool on Sunday.

Those hopes took a blow when Angela Rayner doubled down on her criticism of Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood’s plans to make it harder for migrants to gain permanent residence in the UK, which she previously branded ‘un-British’. 

One Labour MP called the former deputy prime minister’s fresh intervention a ‘drive-by shooting’, while a senior party official told The Mail on Sunday: ‘It’s quite mad she’s chosen this moment to attack.’

The row deepened on Saturday when fellow Cabinet minister Lisa Nandy issued a stern slapdown of Ms Rayner by publicly backing Ms Mahmood.

Meanwhile, another MP suggested that Mr Burnham ‘remind [Rayner] of the benefits of keeping her mouth closed’.

Opening a separate front, former business secretary Peter Kyle accused the Prime Minister of not doing enough to boost growth.

Angela Rayner, pictured in Liverpool on September 26, criticised Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood’s plans to make it harder for migrants to gain permanent residence in the UK

He said Mr Burnham needed to act with ‘more urgency’ and should delay expansions to workers’ rights demanded by the party’s union paymasters that would tie businesses up in more red tape.

Mr Kyle, a close ally of Sir Keir Starmer, compared Britain’s ailing economy to a car ‘on a motorway driving in the right direction but only at 30mph’, adding: ‘Why wouldn’t we put our foot down and get there quicker?’

The bitter rows dividing the party come as:

• Insiders say Mr Burnham is still planning a snap election, despite claims he had ‘bottled it’, claiming the PM’s promised ‘ten-year plan’ is a ‘Trojan horse’ for a manifesto;
• Up to 100 MPs have joined a new group of rebels, led by former minister Darren Jones, who are ‘ready to pounce’ on Mr Burnham if his leadership falters;
• Labour sources warned that Mr Burnham ‘doesn’t have the balls’ to face down union demands to ‘spend, spend, spend’;
• Mr Burnham’s wife Marie-France van Heel quit her job as a senior marketing executive so she can support the Prime Minister full-time as an effective ‘first lady’.

Housing Secretary Ms Rayner fired the first shots of the civil war on Saturday by insisting the visa clampdown effectively ‘changed the goalposts’ for migrants already living in Britain, particularly those working in social care.

A senior party official suggested Ms Rayner intended her intervention to win her more support within Labour’s rank and file, as her profile was in decline since Louise Haigh became de facto deputy PM in July. 

The well-placed insider said: ‘She’s unhappy that she doesn’t have as much support as she did in her last stint – obviously because she isn’t DPM and that hasn’t sunk in. Her nose is out of joint with all the influence Lou has.’

Culture Secretary Ms Nandy sided with the Home Secretary on Radio 4’s Today programme on Saturday. She said Ms Mahmood was ‘taking great care… and she has the support of the Cabinet in doing so’.

As Labour’s internal strife played out, Tory leader Kemi Badenoch said: ‘If Andy Burnham’s Cabinet are already at war with each other over small changes to the immigration system, how can they ever be trusted to stop the boats?’

Meanwhile, Labour peer Lord Glasman, founder of the party’s Blue Labour movement, called for an end to the infighting.

He said: ‘I would expect all ministers to act within the framework of collective responsibility. It is clear that Shabana Mahmood’s approach is the right one.

‘People are rightfully concerned about illegal migration as well as the scale of legal migration. This government’s fate lies in whether it has the courage to confront that.’

But privately some party insiders expressed doubt that Mr Burnham has the resolve to back Ms Mahmood’s reforms. One said: ‘I’m afraid the Prime Minister strikes me as utterly confused.’

Further exposing divisions in the party, Ms Rayner received public support from Folkestone MP Tony Vaughan. He said she was ‘right’ to object to the changes, which would see new arrivals to the UK have to wait ten, or even 15, years to be granted indefinite leave to remain, up from the current five.

He said: ‘Why should workers on health and social care visas who have come here to look after our loved ones have to wait 15 years for settlement? It is economically and morally wrong and will damage our health and social care system.’

Mr Kyle’s critical comments on Mr Burnham’s economic agenda marked his first public intervention since leaving government.

He said that while Labour had ‘inherited a growth emergency’ from the Tories, he believes ‘that emergency persists’ two years on.

Mr Kyle said the Government must be willing to take decisions that involve ‘short-term’ pain in return for longer-term economic gain – including delaying the planned expansion of workers’ rights championed by Ms Rayner.

He argued: ‘We might need to look and have honest conversations with unions about how we sequence some of the rights… to make sure that we get growth into the economy in the shorter term.’

One of Labour’s big plans for an economic boost hit a major setback on Saturday night as it was announced that Heathrow’s third runway is likely to be delayed until 2039, four years later than first planned.

Privately some party insiders expressed doubt that Mr Burnham has the resolve to back Ms Mahmood’s reforms (Pictured: Ms Mahmood on September 15)

Mr Burnham hoped to get his first conference as Labour leader back on track on Saturday night, with a new pledge to help people on to the property ladder.

The Prime Minister said October’s Budget will introduce a new equity loan scheme for first-time buyers, which mean they will require just a 2.5 per cent deposit.

The plan, akin to the Tories’ Help to Buy scheme, will provide a 20 per cent equity loan on new-build homes, with an initial interest-free period. The funding, Labour say, will come from ‘reprioritising existing government budgets’.

On an average first-time home costing £230,000, a buyer could put down a deposit of £5,750 and access a loan of up to £46,000.

There’s no point in having a £340m station in Belfast if train and bus services are going downhill

Belfast’s Grand Central Station epitomises what we want Northern Ireland to look like in 2026. It’s unquestionably an impressive symbol of the city, the kind of welcome you want tourists to get when their bus or train pulls into Belfast for the first time.

Compare it to the Dublin equivalent. Connolly Station is grubby, compact, located in a frankly undesirable part of the city, it’s somewhere to hurry in and out of.

Grand Central Station meanwhile cost an eye-watering £340 million to build with Marks and Spencer food outlet, several premium coffee outlets, a Brewdog and Boots. Bus and train stations are traditionally somewhere you don’t want to spend much time, but this is an exception. You can arrive early for your train and bus, and enjoy a pint or a coffee.

It’s also a world away from the creaking old Great Victoria Street Station. Gone are the days when you used to brave the wind and the rain at the height of winter waiting for a train home. With the proliferation of bays at Grand Central, train delays seem less common that they did before on the Lisburn line that I use to commute to the Belfast Live office.

But a direction of travel has been emerging over recent months and it’s taking us a less promising destination.

Translink, riddled in financial problems, has already said it needs to save £10m and the cutbacks include a cut to late-evening bus and rail services, between Mondays and Wednesdays.

As a snapshot of what that will look like, I attended the CMAT concert on Bank Holiday Monday in Custom House Square. If Translink get their way and the services finish at 10pm, I would have been looking at a taxi or a long walk home. Mind you, the hourly wait between trains on that Monday night wasn’t altogether impressive either.

If Belfast wants to be taken seriously as a nightlife destination, then cutting services on Ulsterbus, Metro and NI Railways isn’t an option.

The Portadown to Belfast railway line meanwhile is the busiest in Northern Ireland. Without doubt, the key times are the morning and evening rush hours. So why, since the schools returned in late August, has the quality of services in the morning peak taken a nosedive?

The least you expect when you turn up for a direct service to Belfast at rush hour is for the service to be as it says on the tin. Lisburn is the busiest station on the route, and yet on numerous occasions during September, passengers arriving for the 8.06am direct service to Grand Central Station have been told that the service has been reduced to just three carriages.

So either you attempt to scramble your way through the crush and squeeze your way onto the 8.06am, or take the alternative all-stops service. What’s the big deal you might ask? Well one service is scheduled to take nine minutes, the other is closer to half an hour. Standing room only is ok for nine minutes, half an hour, not so much.

It reached a nadir on Tuesday morning when passengers were told that they weren’t allowed to board the 8.06am train because it was already full.

The worrying thing has been the Translink reponses to my queries. No confirmation that this is a one-off, a warning that ‘on occasion’ the capacity of services will be reduced. Well unfortunately those occasions have been far too common for everyone’s liking so far since the schools returned.

I used the same service on Wednesday and Thursday and the relief was palpable among my fellow passengers when the proper service pulled in.

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A Scots killer who developed an insatiable appetite for violence gouged, slashed, and stabbed innocent victims with a razor.

Patrick Carraher became the second man hanged at Barlinnie prison as a result of his sickening crimes. The blood-thirsty criminal terrorised the streets of Glasgow with a razor blade which he concealed menacingly in his hand.

The nicknamed “Fiend of the Gorbals” was born in 1906 into a working-class family. He developed a hefty appetite for street fighting from a young age and was sent to a borstal – a type of youth detention centre – aged just 14.

His first experience of imprisonment didn’t set him on the straight and narrow, though. He spent the rest of his life in and out of Scottish prisons while causing bloody mayhem on the streets as a free man.

In 1938, Carraher stabbed 23-year-old James Emden but served just three years behind bars after he was convicted of culpable homicide. Every stint as a lag only made him more of a hardened criminal and he began using violence to maintain his tough exterior and lifestyle.

In fact, he revelled in his time in jail where knife was crime was the norm, and razor slashing became his terrifying act of choice.

Writing in his book Killers, Crooks and Cons: Scotland’s Crimes of the Century, Reg McKay, Daily Record journalist and Scottish author wrote: “By 1938, aged 32, he had stabbed, slashed and gouged his way through life.

“More often than not, the victims were hapless, innocent bystanders. Worse, he had developed a serious booze problem, making his temper simmer constantly.”

Carraher got banged up in Barlinnie just as World War II broke out and Glasgow was safer without his trail of destruction. But when the war ended in 1945 and he was let out, it was clear his violent reign was far from over.

His final act of terror was on 23 November 1945, when he murdered soldier John Gordon during a drunken fight.

Gordon had returned home and was having celebratory drinks at a Glasgow pub with his brothers when he had an argument with Carraher’s right-hand man Daniel Bonnar – who was also the brother of The Fiend’s girlfriend.

The soldier fled the scene but the two thugs tracked him down looking to settle the feud and things quickly turned into a horrifying street fight.

McKay wrote: “When the fight started, Bonnar once again ran but Carraher simply reached out and punched John Gordon in the neck. Well, that’s what it looked like.

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“But as people, including his own girlfriend would later testify, Carraher had slipped a razor sharp chisel into his pocket as he left home.

“He hadn’t punched John Gordon but plunged the blade into his neck. The man died in hospital in less than an hour.”

The Daily Record covered the trial in 1946 which saw Carraher accused of killing Gordon. He denied the charges. We reported that Carraher sat in the dock and “turned frequently to smile at two women in the public seats”.

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The defence tried to argue that the two-inch long chisel blade could not have produced a wound of four inches deep. They also tried to bring in doctors to say he was psychopath, claim diminished responsibility and hope for a lesser sentence. But it wasn’t enough and the jury took just 20 minutes to find The Fiend guilty.

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A total of 10 judicial executions by hanging took place at HMP Barlinnie, replacing the gallows at Duke Street Prison before the death penalty was eventually abolished in the UK in 1969.

In 1946, Carraher was hanged there and by that time he had spent almost half his life locked away for his harrowing crimes.

Many Scots believed that The Fiend of the Gorbals should never have been freed to roam the streets of Glasgow after his first run-in with the law.

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