Devdutt Padikkal enjoyed a stellar IPL 2026 season as Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) lifted a second successive title. Batting at No. 3, Padikkal smashed 464 runs in 15 innings at a strike-rate of 168.72, powering RCB in the powerplay and middle overs. After a few difficult seasons, Padikkal has been at home again in Bengaluru, the city in which he has played most of his cricket. Reflecting on his campaign, RCB Director of Cricket Mo Bobat heaped praise on Padikkal, even touting him as a potential future captain.

Mo Bobat praised Padikkal for continuing the intent at the top of the order, following on from the momentum set by openers Phil Salt and Virat Kohli.

“We wanted him to really push the boundaries of his intent, and to really deliver an impact. We had Salty (Salt) and Virat going pretty hard at the top, and we wanted Dev (Padikkal) to continue that momentum when he came to the crease. And to his credit, he’s totally bought into that and embraced that. And he’s batted very selflessly, and I think that’s huge credit to Dev,” Bobat said, speaking on the ‘RCB’s Trophy Quest’ documentary on the team’s official YouTube channel.

Bobat then went on to explain why Padikkal could be a leadership option in the future for the franchise.

“I’ve also been really impressed with him as a character. I think he’s very leaderful, actually. I think he’s a potential captain of the future,” Bobat further added.

While Rajat Patidar has led RCB admirable to its first two IPL titles in history, he is eight years older to Padikkal.

Still only 25, Padikkal is yet to hit the peak of his cricket career. Having already spent five IPL seasons with RCB, he could be a natural fit for captaincy in the years to come.

“He’s been an extraordinary performer. First, he’s the only one in this team having the pleasure of being a local. He represents Bengaluru. And he’s a thorough Bengaluru man. He embodies it. He’s able to assess and understand game situations exceedingly well for a man of his age,” said RCB mentor and batting coach Karthik on Padikkal.

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Oscar Onley has been ruled out of next month’s Tour de France with a shoulder injury, his team Netcompany-Ineos have confirmed.

The 23-year-old Scottish rider sustained the injury after crashing on stage six of the Tour Auvergne-Rhone-Alpes in France.

Onley’s team first announced he had dislocated his shoulder but further tests revealed he had suffered a “significant shoulder injury”.

Last year, Onley finished fourth in the Tour de France to equal the best result by a Scottish rider, previously achieved by Philippa York (then known as Robert Millar) in 1984.

“I’m gutted not to be able to line up for the Tour de France this year,” said Onley.

“My focus is now on recovering and getting my shoulder in a good place, but I’m really motivated to try and make something out of this season.”

In a statement, Netcompany-Ineos added Onley has begun rehabilitation and is making encouraging progress.

The Tour de France starts in Barcelona on 4 July and ends at the Champs-Elysees in Paris on 26 July.

Morocco has the youngest squad among the top 10 Fifa-ranked teams competing in this year’s World Cup, with an average age of 25.92 years and seven of its 26 players below the age of 23, according to a study by UK-based Lane Clark & Peacock (LCP).

The study, led by Amlan Roy, investment partner for global macro research at LCP, examined the macro demographics of participating countries in the ongoing tournament.

Spain follows Morocco, with an average squad age of 26.19 years. France is third at 26.58 years, while England is fourth at 26.62 years. Each team has a squad of 26 players and a coach.

Among the top 10 ranked teams, the oldest squads are from Latin America. Brazil has an average squad age of 28.65 years, followed by Argentina at 28.62 years. Argentina’s squad includes 39-year-old Lionel Messi, who has already scored five goals in two matches in the tournament.

Among all 48 teams playing in the World Cup this year, Ecuador has the youngest squad, with an average age of 25.58 years and seven players below 23.

The study also looks at which countries have the highest concentration of professional footballers and clubs, a measure that reflects not only the sport’s popularity but also the opportunities available to players.

Mexico tops the table among the 48 participating countries. It has 9,464 professional footballers and 244 professional football clubs, the highest in both categories.

Spain follows with 8,560 professional footballers, while England has 5,582. Turkey is fourth, with 3,917 professional players.

The growing popularity of football in the US is also striking, particularly because the country is one of the venues for the current World Cup. Once seen largely as the land of American football, the US now has more than 101 professional football clubs, the fourth-highest among the 48 countries. It also has 2,971 professional footballers.

Saudi Arabia, too, is flexing its football muscle. It has the third-highest number of professional football clubs among participating countries, while 1,505 players in the country have turned professional.

Source: LCP’s 2026 World Cup Countries’ Macro Demographics report 

  Football strength does not follow income rankings 

Source: Source: LCP’s 2026 World Cup Countries’ Macro Demographics report

Vaibhav Sooryavanshi‘s family, and the rest of India, would be looking forward to the team sheet on Friday when the side gets down to action against Ireland in the first of two T20Is in Belfast. If Sooryavanshi is named in the XI, he will be the youngest cricketer (15 years, 91 days) to play for the Indian cricket team. Sooryavanshi has also been selected for the India T20I series against England that starts next month, and his chances of making an India debut are high.

Sooryavanshi might be making his India debut before reaching the age of just 16, but his journey has been long and arduous. In fact, it did not even begin with him; it began with his father, Sanjiv, who was a club-level cricketer from the village of Motipur, according to a deep-dive story on Sooryavanshi by The Athletic. He could not fulfill his dream but invested everything when cricket coaches said his son had the potential to make it big.

Brajesh Jha was Sooryavanshi’s first coach. “When he first came, there were very few children playing cricket in Samastipur district,” Jha says. “There was this tiny child among all the seniors… as soon as he was told something, he followed the task very quickly – how to take a stance, how to run, whatever was explained to him.”

He saw Sooryavanshi’s meteoric rise from close quarters. “When we took him to Patna for trials, in the whole area, the news spread that there was a small left-handed batter from Samastipur who had exceptional talent,” Jha says. “He was selected in the state Under-17 team at the age of eight-and-a-half.”

Batting was always his first love. “The level of toughness that he had in his practice sessions – the more I increased it, the more easily he adapted to it,” Ojha says. “His adaptability was amazing.”

“When Vaibhav used to train, if you sent him for fielding, within 10 minutes he would come and say his head was hurting. But if you asked him to even bat at night, he would never say he was tired.”

“Today, Vaibhav is scoring the fastest hundreds in T20 cricket, but I have seen the day when he played 100 balls and scored only 30 runs,” says Jha, recalling Sooryavanshi at the age of nine. “I was so happy because playing 100 balls meant he had the capacity to play 100 balls. He was facing state bowlers sometimes more than twice his age. He wasn’t making runs because he didn’t have the power yet, but he was playing 100 balls.”

Soon, from Samastipur, Sooryavanshi and his father travelled to Patna, Bihar’s capital. He went on to make his IPL debut at the age of 12. Then, at the IPL auction in 2024, Rajasthan Royals secured him for INR 1.10 crore. While many thought it a marketing move, RR knew they had found a gem and played him. He scored a 35-ball ton against Gujarat Titans. There has been no stopping Sooryavanshi since then

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The FIFA World Cup trophy has surged more than two-fold in value since the last tournament in 2022, with its gold content now worth approximately USD 713,000 (approx. Rs 6.73 crore), according to data from financial markets provider LSEG. The trophy, crafted from 6.175 kg of 18-carat gold containing 4.93 kg of pure gold, has climbed in value alongside a broader rally in the precious metal, driven by geopolitical tensions, trade uncertainty, and slowing global growth. “Although gold has eased from its recent highs, the long-term trend in its value remains remarkable,” said Debajit Saha, lead analyst at LSEG Metals Research.

“The FIFA World Cup trophy is ultimately priceless to the players who lift it, but its gold content offers an interesting reminder of how dramatically the value of the precious metal has increased over the years,” he said in a statement.

The trophy was valued at around USD 277,000 when Argentina lifted it in Qatar in 2022, and at roughly USD 25,000 when the current design was introduced ahead of the 1974 tournament.

No other major sporting trophy is made from gold, leaving the World Cup prize unrivalled in melt value. The UEFA Champions League and Europa League trophies, both crafted from sterling silver, carry estimated melt values of USD 16,950 and USD 22,600, respectively.

Among American sports trophies, the Borg-Warner Trophy – presented to the winner of the Indianapolis 500 auto race – ranks as the most valuable and heaviest, standing 1.62 metres tall and containing around 69 kg of sterling silver, giving it a melt value of approximately USD 156,000.

The Woodlawn Vase, awarded to the winner of the Preakness Stakes, carries a melt value of around USD 24,860, while the Vince Lombardi Trophy – produced by Tiffany & Co. and awarded annually to Super Bowl champions – contains 3.2 kg of sterling silver with a melt value of around USD 7,230.

The 2026 FIFA World Cup, which kicked off on June 11 in the US, features an expanded field of 48 teams, up from 32 at the previous tournament

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

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There’s no way of getting around it: It’s been a frustrating season for Nolan McLean. Everyone’s favorite breakout pitcher pick has a 4.03 ERA after giving up six runs in six innings Wednesday, and he’s been even worse lately: A 5.32 ERA over his past eight starts.

And it’s got me thinking: Did we just overrate this guy? 

I think there’s a case to be made. McLean was viewed as a very good prospect, but his success at the end of the season with the Mets definitely pushed him up a tier or two – in BaseballProspectus’ mid-season top-50 rankings last year, he was the No. 34 prospect, but he jumped all the way up to No. 4 by the preseason. It wasn’t all on the strength of his dominant eight-start run at the end of 2025, but that surely played a sizeable role. He had a 2.06 ERA and 30.3% strikeout rate in his first taste of the majors, albeit with a 3.57 xERA and 10.9% swinging strike rate that suggested McLean was more “good” than an immediate ace.

And this is a weird profile for an ostensible ace. McLean gets a lot of strikeouts – 28.5% in 2026! – but he doesn’t actually miss a ton of bats, with Wednesday’s game marking just his sixth start out of 16 with a swinging strike rate over 10%. For all the .gifs McLean’s stuff generates on Baseball Twitter, he actually relies a lot more on called strikes than just about any pitcher in baseball. That’s not an inherently bad thing, but when you look at the list of pitchers with the highest called strike rates over the past decade, Logan Webb and Aaron Nola are probably the only true aces in the top 10.

But hey, a 28% strikeout rate is still great. McLean doesn’t have great control, but a 9% walk rate isn’t awful, either. The problem this season, as was certainly the case Wednesday, has been what happens when guys put the ball in play. He has gone from an elite groundball pitcher (61%) to just a pretty good one (47%), and homers have started to become something of an issue for him. Not a huge one, at least not generally, but he’s now given up multiple homers in three of his past seven games, which, combined with his control starting to back up a bit, has led to a handful of these blow-up starts.

All that being said, I’m not sure it makes sense to panic about McLean. He’s still on pace for 210-plus strikeouts, has a solid 1.12 WHIP, and has peripherals that suggest he should be better than his 4.03 ERA. I can’t guarantee this is as bad as it’ll get for McLean, but if you set the over/under on his ERA at 3.50, I still might lean toward the under just ever so slightly.

He’s not the ace you hoped he could be, and he’ll need to figure out a way to turn all those .gif-able moments into missed bats a bit more consistently to make that leap. But he’s still a super-talented pitcher, and at least a very good one, despite some recent struggles. It’s just about whether he can make the leap beyond that. If not? Well, there’s nothing wrong with being Logan Webb or Aaron Nola, either. 

Pre-game Lineup Card

Here’s what you might have missed from CBSSports.com’s MLB coverage in recent days: 

Prospects Report! Kade Anderson‘s massive first season as a professional has him knocking on the door to the majors even at Double-A. Scott White says he’s worth stashing even with the Mariners‘ crowded rotation. 

Buy-low Pitchers! Scott highlights six pitchers who still have plenty of room to live up to their potential. It’s time to make some trade offers.  

Week 14 Trade Values! My rankings have been updated for both H2H points and Roto leagues for Week 14. Go check out the latest changes and get some guidelines for a deal as we near the halfway point of the season. 

MLB Trends. We’ve talked a lot about Jac Caglianone‘s breakthrough here at the FBT Newsletter recently, and Mike Axisa has another perspective on the blossoming Royals slugger.  

Rumor roundup. Byron Buxton and Logan Webb won’t be on the move this summer, allegedly. Here’s who could be.

Hitting the Wire

The top waiver-wire targets from Wednesday’s action: 

Gage Jump, SP, Athletics (78%) – It’s never a sure thing with young pitchers, but this was what we hoped to see from Jump once he got settled in. He struck out seven in his previous start and then followed it up with nine Wednesday night against the Giants while walking one over five shutout innings. The four-seamer generated six swings of his 11 total swings and misses, and a good fastball from a lefty is always a nice building block. Jump’s home park will hold him back a little with ERA, but I think he’s a very good source of strikeouts and should be worth rostering in all formats moving forward. 

Dansby Swanson, SS, Cubs (67%) – Swanson has been mostly awful this season, and up until a week or so ago, there were vanishingly few reasons to be optimistic. But as I wrote about Bo Bichette last week, when we’re talking about established players, track record is generally going to be more predictive than recent production, even if that recent production is backed by apparent changes in the underlying skill set. It’s still just one good week for Swanson, more or less, but what a week it’s been – he has homered in three of the past six games, including twice Wednesday, while going 5 for 9 with 11 RBI across two games. He has 18 RBI in that span and has even chipped in three stolen bases, and all of a sudden, Swanson is on pace for something like 22 homers and 18 steals. Or more or less what we usually expect from him. The batting average is bad (but improving!), but if he hits .250 the rest of the way, he’s going to be at least a viable middle infielder, and that’s what he’s done throughout his career, so I’d bet on it. 

Griffin Jax, RP, Rays (40%) – You might see another five-inning outing from Jax and think it’s more of the same. But after being limited to 72 pitches or less in his first 10 starts, the Rays let him go 88 Wednesday, so there’s some loosening of the reins going on here. Jax will need to be more efficient moving forward, but I think he’s very similar to Drew Rasmussen last year, where the lack of quality starts will hold him back, but he should be pretty good otherwise.  To wit, he has a 2.40 ERA and 43 strikeouts in 45 innings since moving to the rotation. 

Willi Castro, SS, Rockies (55%) – Castro is having a nice little season, and it’s been getting better, as he is hitting .324 with four homers and two steals in June. Typically, he wouldn’t be a particularly high priority on waivers, but the Rockies are finally playing a full Fantasy week at Coors Field next week, so this is the perfect time to pick him up. With eligibility everywhere but catcher, you’ve surely got somewhere in your lineup to stick Castro. 

Luis Garcia, 2B, Nationals (61%) – Garcia had an awful April but has been pretty great since then, including eight homers in the month of June. He sits against nearly every lefty, which limits his appeal, but Garcia is hitting .270 with 12 homers in 45 games since the start of May, so he does have some appeal as either a middle or corner outfielder – though likely not next week, with three lefties on the schedule out of six games. 

Three Up, Three Down

Three big performances that have players trending up, and three that have the arrow pointing in the opposite direction. 

Three Up

Chandler Simpson is getting back to it

In what might go down as one of the oddest statistical quirks of the season, Chandler Simpson went from May 11 through June 19 without a single stolen base. And the thing about Chandler Simpson is, if he’s not running, he’s really not bringing anything to the table, and that was especially true during this stretch, as he hit .184/.236/.233 and was actively harming your team. He played through some injuries during that stretch and was starting to get some regular time off, but he has started eight straight games after Wednesday, and now has five steals in his past five games after swiping two in this game. It’s still a very limited skill set, and as we just saw, the margin for error here is extremely slim; if he isn’t running unusually high batting averages and stealing a lot of bases, Simpson basically does nothing for you (even in this stretch, he has one run scored in his past five games). But this stretch is also a sign that he isn’t quite done as a contributor yet, so if he’s available in any leagues where you need steals, you can go ahead and add him again. Or at least not drop him. 

Francisco Alvarez is starting to do it

I’ve been in on Alvarez since he came back from his demotion to Triple-A last season, but I can admit he has mostly been pretty underwhelming so far this season. Between that and a knee surgery, it makes sense why his roster rate has dipped to 42%. But that is too low, and he’s starting to show us why. He’s been making better contact for much of the season, but there hasn’t been a ton of power until the past few days. He homered twice in Wednesday’s double-header against the Cubs to give him three in his past two days and four in 13 games since coming off the IL – with a .319 batting average and .934 OPS. Alvarez has long had the potential to be an impact bat; he just hasn’t done it consistently enough. He’s starting to now, and he should be rostered in at least all two-catcher leagues – and I sure don’t think there are more than 12 catchers with a higher ceiling than Alvarez if he’s truly starting to figure it out. He’s hitting .265/.339/.476 with 15 homers in 90 games since coming back from Triple-A last year, by the way. 

I cannot believe how good Otto Lopez has been

I thought I was high on Lopez coming into the season, but I genuinely did not think this kind of stretch was possible. He hit a big homer and went 2 for 3 in Wednesday’s win over the Rangers and is now hitting .340/.374/.483 for the season after three straight multi-hit games in a row. And this isn’t just the result of one hot stretch propping his numbers up – Lopez is now hitting at least .330 in each of the first three months of the season. The underlying data doesn’t buy him being quite this good, but a .292 expected batting average and .441 expected slugging percentage from a guy on a 30-steal pace who could hit 15 homers is nothing to sneeze at, especially with eligibility at both middle infield positions. He’s worth starting, no matter where you put him in the lineup. 

Three Down

Tarik Skubal hasn’t quite looked right

Skubal’s recovery from elbow surgery was remarkable, but it wasn’t necessarily miraculous. In three starts since his return from surgery to clean up a loose body in his left elbow, Skubal has a 4.96 ERA, a far cry from what we’re used to from him. Why is this happening? Wednesday’s start highlighted the problem: He’s just getting hit too hard. He gave up three homers in six innings against the Yankees to give him six in 16.1 across the three starts. It’s not a total disaster, of course – Skubal has 21 strikeouts to just two walks in those 16.1 innings, and his 1.10 WHIP is still fantastic – and it’s not like he’s lost a ton of velocity in a way that suggests there is real reason to panic since his surgery. He’s just been a bit off a few times a game, and opposing hitters have made him pay. It’s weird to see Skubal struggling at all, but I don’t really see any reason to think he won’t be an impact pitcher moving forward. 

Yeah, Jose Soriano has officially turned back into a pumpkin

Remember April? Ah, April, that was fun, wasn’t it? Jose Soriano added a four-seam fastball to his repertoire, was commanding his entire arsenal of pitches well, and looked like one of the best pitchers on the planet, with consecutive double-digit strikeout games and a 0.84 ERA at the end of the month. Ah, April … it was so long ago. Soriano was clubbed for five runs over just three innings of work Wednesday and while his 3.41 ERA is still easily the best mark of his career, everything else looks just about as mediocre as it ever has. His FIP is up to 4.21, and his 4.20 expected ERA entering Wednesday’s start was actually tied for the worst mark of his career. He still has a career-high strikeout rate, but his control is now as bad as it has ever been and he’s lost some of his standout contact suppression skills as a tradeoff for his improved strikeout rate. Getting that tantalizing glimpse of how good Soriano can be in April will make it tough to ever truly give up on him, but it sure looks like that was just a random hot streak at this point. Don’t drop him, but don’t feel like you’ve gotta start Soriano every time out now. 

Shota Imanaga is still getting killed by the long ball

Three more homers allowed by Imanaga on Wednesday bring him to 20 on the season, the third-most in baseball. Everything else about Imanaga’s season looks great, but as it turns out, homers are a pretty big deal. It’s not like Imanaga gets hit unusually hard – his average exit velocity is 88.5 mph on the season and the worst expected wOBA on contact of his career came in 2025 with a .376 mark, hardly worse than the league average of .369. The problem is that, while Imanaga gives up hits less often than nearly any pitcher in baseball – he has a .242 BABIP for his career and .230 mark this season – the hits he does give up tend to be unusually damaging, and it doesn’t seem like a fluke. He’s an extreme flyball pitcher, so the homers are just a part of life with him. I think it’ll lead to better results moving forward than his current 4.40 ERA, but you’re probably still looking at an ERA close to 4.00 in the long run. After his rookie season, we hoped Imanaga might be more than that, but we’re going on two seasons of an ERA at or near 4.00. We probably just have to take him for what he is. 

Extra Innings

Eury Perez wasn’t quite himself in his return

Which is totally understandable. Perez was expected to miss at least eight weeks with a strain on his inner thigh, but he recovered quicker than expected and the Marlins‘ rotation needs saw him return just four weeks later, and he clearly wasn’t 100%. He wasn’t terrible, allowing just one earned run in 4.2 innings of work, but he hardly looked like himself either, generating just one strikeout and four swinging strikes over 68 pitches. His velocity was down a bit across the board, though he did actually ramp up a bit in his final inning, so I’m not too concerned about there being too many lingering issues here. But I’m not surprised Perez wasn’t great in this one, and I’m not really expecting him to be someone you can use in most Fantasy formats until he is fully stretched out and recovered. That may take a few more starts. 

Top trainer Robert Garcia has named a generational talent who, in his mind, will become the face of heavyweight boxing in the next few years.

As of now, Oleksandr Usyk is still widely regarded as the top dog, despite coming off a sub-par performance against former kickboxing champion Rico Verhoeven.

Nevertheless, the Ukrainian retained his WBC, IBF and WBA titles with an 11th-round stoppage last month, maintaining his position as the bona fide kind of his division.

Usyk cemented this status with two victories over Tyson Fury, Anthony Joshua and Daniel Dubois, respectively, crafting a resume that remains unrivalled in the current heavyweight era.

But now, at the age of 39, it seems the two-division undisputed champion could soon be replaced by heavyweight prodigy Moses Itauma.

While yet to test himself at world level, Itauma is widely considered to be a world heavyweight champion in waiting, especially after his fifth-round stoppage of Jermaine Franklin in March.

As a leading contender with the WBO and WBA, the 21-year-old is now gearing up to defend his position against Filip Hrgovic, who he will face at London’s O2 Arena on August 29.

But while Hrgovic represents his toughest opponent thus far, at least on paper, coach Garcia has told Pro Box TV that he believes Itauma will ultimately rise to the challenge.

“I think Moses is ready for those fights. Even though he’s still pretty young, and a lot of people might think [the Hrgovic fight is] too soon, I don’t believe that. I think he’s ready.

“He’s that one fighter that comes every 20-30 years – a special talent. I think he will be the face of the heavyweight division in a few years.”

A win over Hrgovic would solidify Itauma as a genuine world-class contender, putting him in line for a major title shot.

Official lineups

Morocco: Bounou – Hakimi, Halhal, Riad, Salah-Eddine – Amrabat, El Aynaoui, El Khannouss – Brahim, Saibari, El Kaabi.

Haiti: Placide (c) – Duverne, Adé, Delcroix, Expérience – J. Casimir, Jean Jacques,  Bellegarde, R. Providence – Isidor, Joseph.

Lions de l’Atlas need to overcome a two-goal deficit in the group standings to threaten Brazil for top spot. Haiti, making their historic return to the World Cup after 52 years, will be fighting to salvage something from the competition with qualification now impossible. Brazil currently lead the group and their result against Scotland will determine whether they can hold onto first place.

A Morocco victory would allow them to chase top spot depending on Brazil’s result. For Haiti, the odds are stacked against them, but a strong performance could provide a moral victory to take home. Both matches kick off simultaneously from Atlanta and Miami.