Terence Crawford has offered his verdict on the emergence of Dana White’s Zuffa Boxing.

After spending over two decades turning mixed martial arts giant UFC into a global powerhouse, White has entered the boxing world to more mixed reviews, as he attempts to take the formula he’s created in MMA and bring it into another combat sport.

Some of the established promoters in boxing don’t appear to have taken too kindly to his arrival, with Matchroom chief Eddie Hearn one of the more critical voices, hitting out at the level of shows that Zuffa have put on so far.

White has made some notable moves so far though, signing former long-term Matchroom fighter Conor Benn in a reported $15 million deal, with the promise of more big names in the future.

One big name that White did work with back in September was Crawford, as the UFC CEO acted as the promoter for the fight between ‘Bud’ and Canelo Alvarez at the Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas.

Crawford won that fight to become undisputed super-middleweight champion before then retiring in December, but the 38-year-old remains an avid watcher of the sport.

With that in mind, he revealed on a live stream with Adin Ross that he thinks the arrival of Zuffa can have a positive impact.

“It’s good for boxing. Anything that draws more eyes to the sport is good for it. They’re putting on great competitive fights.”

Zuffa have staged four events so far this year, all of them at the Meta Apex in Las Vegas, with their next show set for early April.

Real Madrid forward Vinicius Jr scored twice as Manchester City lost 2-1 on the night and 5-1 on aggregate in the Champions League last-16

Real Madrid forward Vinicius Jr insisted he was not attempting to disrespect the Manchester City supporters but was responding to them ‘making fun of him’ on his last trip to the Etihad Stadium. Back in 2024, City fans unveiled a banner that read: “Stop crying your heart out,” with a picture of Rodri winning the Ballon d’Or.

This was in reference to Real Madrid boycotting the awards ceremony after they discovered the City midfielder would win the prestigious prize. Los Blancos felt Vinicius Jr was more deserving of the award and on his first visit back to the Etihad Stadium since, the Brazilian won the game for his side.

After scoring his first of the night in front of the South Stand from the penalty spot, Vinicius Jr ran over to the away end to celebrate. Then, before making his way to the centre circle, the forward could be seen mimicking crying towards the City fans.

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When asked about the celebration on Prime Video, Vinicius Jr said: “The last time we came here, the Manchester City fans were making fun of me. I wasn’t disrespecting City fans but it was a way for me to prove myself to them.”

City were reduced to 10-men when the penalty was awarded after Bernardo Silva handled the ball on the line. However, the Blues put in a spirited performance and equalised just before the break through Erling Haaland. Jeremy Doku and Rayan Ait-Nouri had goals ruled out for offside before Vinicius Jr bundled in a second as he converted Aurelien Tchouameni’s cross.

Reflecting on the result, Vinicius Jr’s manager Alvaro Arbeloa said: “I’m so happy; we have beaten Man City at home, and everyone knows how difficult that is. We won 5-1 in the end, and that’s not easy against a squad like that, with a coach like Pep, so I’m really happy.

“We knew City would press us and try to score in the first 15 or 20 minutes. And maybe we needed the ball a little bit more. But after the penalty, it changed and made it a bit easier for us.”

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The Carabao Cup Final will see Arsenal v Manchester City at London’s Wembley Stadium this March.

This particular run of seven games will define City’s season on all four fronts – losing twice against Real means their trophy prospects have been reduced to three.

That could be down to two on Sunday with a huge clash against the Gunners, who are hungry to rid their tags of ‘nearly men’ by ending a trophy drought which stretches back to 2020.

“On Monday [after Carabao Cup final] hopefully we will wake up and it is a sunny day,” said Guardiola. “It is not crucial, it is a football game, we are going to try to win with a good performance.

“We will challenge against the best team in England so far, the best team in Europe because look at their results in the group phase, they were first and have lost three or four games all season. We will challenge them and we have to see how we are competing against them.”

City were held to a surprise 1-1 draw at relegation strugglers West Ham, which has left them nine points off the pace in the Premier League with eight games to go – and a monumental effort is required to overturn that particular deficit.

And the FA Cup is no formality either, with City hosting rivals Liverpool in the quarter-final on Saturday 4 April after the international break, with league games immediately after against Chelsea and Arsenal.

Guardiola said: “After one or two weeks, we play against them in the Premier League and it is a good mirror to see what we have to do to achieve [like] them. I am old enough to see that one football game is not the big happiness or a loss is the end of the world, it’s just a game.

“In the end, the results have not been good except Newcastle but I have the feeling we are an extraordinary team with many, many, many good things that I love.

“We are still not complete, we are not aware in certain moments and departments, we have to be more clinical but my feeling is it is a question of time.”

Steve Smith will play in the Pakistan Super League© AFP

Minimum fuss in the end, as Arsenal still go for the maximum. It could genuinely be a unique season, as they also may end up the only English club left in the Champions League.

For now, an already good week got even better, as this 2-0 win over Bayer Leverkusen didn’t just put them into the Champions League quarter-final; it puts them in a good place ahead of Sunday’s Carabao Cup final, which may yet be the first of four trophies this season.

Winning the actual quadruple is of course still a fantasy – the sheer number of games tend to catch up with you – but every match right now is making the vision that bit more real.

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Perhaps the most important thing about this last-16 second leg, though, was that it was also Arsenal’s best attacking performance in some time – maybe weeks, maybe since the second half of the 4-1 over Aston Villa.

It also featured what could be the club’s goal of the season: a perfect strike from Eberechi Eze. He may be finally coming into his own, which could be crucial to Arsenal doing the same.

They were far from fully free-flowing, and there were extended spells when an encouraging Leverkusen team put it up to them, but they were back to penning an opposition side in; to moving the ball around at an increasingly disorienting pace.

That was most true of the period before Eze’s goal, which went some way to deciding the tie.

That itself may well have been shaped by Saturday against Everton.

Max Dowman didn’t get to follow that up by coming on here, but his influence was arguably all over this game.

That substitution may yet come to be seen as a before and after in the season. The mood tonight was that different from the majority of Saturday night.

Before it, or really the Dowman cross that brought that 87th-minute Viktor Gyokeres goal, this very stadium had been surrounded by the worst angst yet.

It had looked like the same old story, and certainly the same old frustrated draw at home to of course extinguish any excitement that it might actually happen this season. Worse was what the team were doing, devoid of ideas.

Unwilling to go long due to Everton’s muscularity, David Raya was playing the ball around his backline when they badly needed a goal.

Then, Dowman happened.

A youthful vigour flowed around the stadium again.

You could see it here, even with the 16-year-old on the bench.

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There certainly wasn’t the same trepidation that we’ve seen in so many games, despite this awkward fixture representing a real chance of an upset. Leverkusen had given Arsenal a tough game in that 1-1 first leg. There was even a certain momentum to the round, given the number of English reverses.

Arsenal at least stopped that rot, by starting to properly play against Leverkusen.

The heroics of opposition goalkeeper Janis Blavich may even have helped, forcing them to lift it more.

Eze certainly did that.

It long felt like it was going to take something special to beat Blavich. He’d got a feel for it – literally – when brilliantly palming away an early Leandro Trossard effort, before then bettering that with a close-range stop from the same player.

That really should have been 1-0 as the Belgian turned in the box to finish, only for Blavich to clip the ball away. It was a supreme save.

Arsenal’s domination had been more concerted here, though. Gabriel twice headed narrowly over from set-pieces.

You could feel that momentum growing, but also a certain frustration. It wasn’t like against Everton or in the Premier League but it was something else. The longer Leverkusen went without conceding, the more the game felt like it could see a sting.

Just as that began to creep in, though, Eze let it all out.

On the 35th minute, a nice Trossard touch teed the playmaker up at the edge of the box. Eze flicked it up so fluidly, then drove the fiercest and finest strike right into the top corner.

Is it actually a volley given it bounced up first? Does it matter?

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It was a pleasure to watch.

After that, the contest wasn’t the same, as it felt like a procession until Arsenal’s eventual victory. Leverkusen did have a good spell but just couldn’t get beyond that back line. David Raya, who should be a shout for player of the season, did offer one brilliant save from Christian Michel Kofane.

Declan Rice had already scored the clinching goal, however, powering through to drive the ball into the bottom corner.

Arsenal keep going, unlike most of the Premier League. It may end up the story of the whole season.

First Published: Mar 17 2026 | 6:04 PM IST

England back row Ollie Chessum says the fear of being chased down by Louis Bielle-Biarrey, France’s free-scoring, high-speed wing, spooked him as he went in for a 60m intercept try in England’s 48-46 Six Nations defeat on Saturday.

Chessum, who scored two tries, set up a third and was England’s star performer in Paris, admitted he had “copped a lot of stick” for not scoring closer to the posts as he ran in unopposed in the 51st minute.

Fly-half Fin Smith missed the subsequent conversion from out near the left-hand 10m line and England ultimately came up just short in a 94-point epic.

“I was adamant that there was a red scrum out lurking in the background that was going to bring me down,” said Chessum.

“So I just pinned my ears back and hoped that no-one managed to grab on to my coattails and bring me to the floor.

“I’ve copped a lot of stick, I think, for not heading toward the posts. My brother’s sent me a few things, but it was unfamiliar territory for me to be in a line-break situation like that.

“I’m sure Fin would have thanked me for it being a bit closer, but I can’t turn back the clock now.”

Bielle-Biarrey, who scored four tries in France’s win, was in close attendance as Chessum picked off Matthieu Jalibert’s pass on his own 10m line, but neither he, Jalibert or full-back Thomas Ramos could tun and catch the Leicester man before the line.

Chessum’s score came as no surprise to Tigers’ coach Geoff Parling, who revealed that the 25-year-old’s top sprint speed has been clocked at 9.3 metres per second.

“As soon as he got the intercept I knew he was going to score because I know how fast he is,” said Parling.

“He moves very well for a big man.

“I thought he was exceptional against France – he kept trying to drive the team forward and that is what he does for us too.”

Chessum said England’s final-round display was an improvement but could not mask a miserable Six Nations campaign that returned only one victory from five matches and led to a fifth-place finish.

“It was a frustrating few weeks, there’s no hiding the disappointment and frustration,” he said.

“For the middle of those three weeks [defeats against Scotland, Ireland and Italy], we were nowhere near where we wanted to be and that shows in the table.

“I don’t know about it being a standard-setter, but I think [the France performance] just felt more like us and the way we wanted to play.

“It felt like the way we have played for the majority of last year.

“I suppose, from our perspective, we’d want to try and bottle that feeling as much as possible.”

Chessum landed back at London Heathrow from Paris on Sunday lunchtime and he and Leicester team-mate Jack van Poortvliet took a taxi straight to Mattioli Woods Welford Road to catch the end of Tigers’ 66-14 victory over Leicester in the Prem Rugby Cup final.

Two players from the Iranian women’s football team have joined a practice session with a professional club in Brisbane in their first publicly-shared appearance since it emerged they had been granted asylum in Australia.

Fatemeh Pasandideh and Atefeh Ramezanisadeh were pictured smiling and wearing the club’s colors as they posed alongside a women’s elite squad in photos posted to Instagram by the Brisbane Roar on Monday.

The update came as the rest of Iran’s soccer delegation left Malaysia bound for Oman, apparently capping a tumultuous episode that saw Australia’s government offering most of the squad humanitarian visas after the team was knocked out of the Women’s Asian Cup. Seven women initially accepted the asylum offer before five changed their minds and said they would return to Iran.

Brisbane Roar, which plays in Australia’s elite A-League Women’s domestic competition, posted a welcome to “Fatemeh and Atefeh” on Instagram, along with an emoji of a lioness, a nod to the name the Iranian players are known by.

“We remain committed to providing a supportive environment for them whilst they navigate the next stages,” Brisbane Roar CEO Kaz Patafta wrote.

Both women left comments on the post. “Thank you for everything,” Ramezanisadeh wrote.

The club declined further comment and referred all questions to Australia’s Department of Home Affairs. The Roar last week offered the women “a place to train, play and belong” in a statement on social media. 

They have been moved to an undisclosed safe location and are receiving assistance from the government, officials have said. They have not given interviews but Pasandideh posted to Instagram Monday a photo of herself and FIFA Chief Football Officer Jill Ellis, overlaid with the words, “Everything will be fine.” 
Teammates head home 
Iran’s squad had arrived in Australia for the women’s continental championship shortly before the Iran war began on Feb. 28. They drew global attention after some players stayed silent during Iran’s national anthem before their first game.

The silence was cast as an act of resistance or protest by some commentators and a show of mourning by others. The players didn’t publicly disclose their views or explain their actions and sang the anthem before their next two matches.

When the team was knocked out of the tournament and faced the prospect of returning to a country under bombardment, calls grew for Australia’s government to offer the women asylum. Iranian groups in Australia and United States President Donald Trump were among those who expressed fears for the women’s safety, with some citing remarks by Mohammad Reza Shahbazi, a hardline sports commentator in Iran, who on television referred to the women as “wartime traitors” because they didn’t sing the anthem.

An Iranian official last week dismissed suggestions that the women would be unsafe if they returned home.

“Iran welcomes its children with open arms and the government guarantees their security,” Iranian first Vice President Mohammad Reza Aref said. “No one has the right to interfere in the family affairs of the Iranian nation and play the role of a nanny who is kinder than a mother.” 
It follows a chaotic asylum saga 
================== 
Australian officials publicly divulged details of their asylum offers to the women before the Iranian delegation left Australia, which included private airport meetings with each women without team minders present. A total of six players and one team staffer at first accepted humanitarian visas and guarantees of permanent residence in Australia, while their teammates departed Sydney for Kuala Lumpur on March 10.

Over the next few days, however, five of those who accepted asylum offers changed their minds and flew to join their teammates in Malaysia. No reasons have been given publicly for the reversals, though Australian news outlets reported that local Iranian groups as suggesting the women had faced pressure from Tehran.

The remaining squad flew from Kuala Lumpur to Oman on Monday night. The Asian Football Confederation’s General Secretary Windsor John told The Associated Press the team’s departure was arranged by the Iranian embassy.

Asked if the Confederation was satisfied that the women would be safe in Iran, Windsor said his organization and FIFA would check on them regularly through the Iranian football federation “as they are our girls as well.

A rematch between Ryan Garcia and Devin Haney is fast becoming one of the biggest fights in the sport of boxing, with the fact that both men now hold welterweight world titles only adding to the allure of the second instalment of their fierce rivalry. In anticipation, Tim Bradley has reversed his prediction for the proposed contest.

Haney and Garcia first collided in April 2024, and Garcia looked to have secured a career-best win while simultaneously handing Haney the first defeat of his career.

However, the result of the bout – a majority decision in Garcia’s favour – was later overturned when he tested positive for a performance enhancing drug during, with the official outcome of the clash becoming a no-contest.

Both men have since moved up to the welterweight division and earned a world title, with Haney holding the WBO strap and Garcia in possession of the WBC crown.

A rematch between the duo would not only settle one of the most intense rivalries of recent times, but also a unify belts in a standout division.

When discussing the bout back in November, two-division world champion Tim Bradley spoke with confidence, suggesting that the demons and the mental impact of their initial encounter would mean a Garcia win.

“Just as well as Devin did a great job, I still see a little residue, it’s still there. It could be a part of his strategy, defence first, I get it.

“At the back end of the fight, he was winning easily, he didn’t want to take too many chances, he didn’t want to open himself up, but I saw Norman marching forward, letting his hands go and there was less and less activity from Devin – I can’t ignore that.

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“It could be by design, maybe not. I’m just saying, Garcia has his number.”

Now, four months later, Bradley seems to have adopted a different mindset, releasing a video titled Haney will beat Garcia in the rematch. ‘Desert Storm’ now backs Haney to avoid the mistakes he made first time around.

“Looking at the fight, the first fight. Devin, in that fight, besides the rounds that he got knocked down in, he was winning those rounds, outboxing Ryan.

“He was taking the initiative at times, coming forward, forcing Ryan onto his back foot but keeping his distance at the same time and avoiding getting countered or hit with that big left-hook.”

“If Haney doesn’t touch the canvas, if he doesn’t get caught, if he doesn’t fall asleep, if he controls what is going on at all times and he is on his P’s and Q’s, he should be able to outbox Ryan Garcia with ease. He shouldn’t have a hard time outboxing a Garcia.”

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Before Haney-Garcia II talk can gather too much momentum, ‘The Dream’ looks poised for an alternate unification opportunity, with reports suggesting that he will face off with WBA titleholder Rolando Romero on Saturday, May 30.