Sports, in brief

The AFC, which runs football in Asia, postponed the 2027 Asian Cup on Tuesday. [1] It was due to start in Saudi Arabia on 7 January. [1]

It will now run from 23 December 2027 to 21 January 2028. [2]

The reason is a run of deadly attacks on Saudi Arabia by the Houthis, an armed group from Yemen. [3]

The Asian Cup is the championship for Asia's national teams, and 24 teams have qualified. [1]

For Saudi Arabia it is another blow, after it stopped paying for LIV Golf this year. [3]

Its plan for the 2034 World Cup has also shrunk, from 15 stadiums to 10. [3]

Lawyers call this a fixed-term contract: Popovic's ends in March, and a moved tournament does not move it. [8]

So this month's friendlies may be Popovic's last games under his deal. [9] Australia play Qatar on 11 November and Jordan 6 days later. [5]

A school play moved to next term still loses the pupils who leave at the end of this one.

The death toll is reported 3 ways: 13 by the BBC, 14 by Saudi aviation officials and 17 by ESPN. [4][3][5]

Football Australia wants Popovic's future settled before Christmas. [8]

The AFC put back the Asian Cup after Houthi attacks on its host, Saudi Arabia [1], and six European nations and Canada's government refused to let Russia back on the ice after a sports court ordered its return. [23]

They keep players like Zion Suzuki and Eom Ji-sung through January's league games. [4]

His deal ends in November, so the Korean federation must choose a permanent coach without seeing him at the Asian Cup. [1]

Whether FIFA approves the Asian Cup's new dates.

The AFC has sent them to FIFA, and they fall in one of the busiest weeks of the European club season. [2]

Whether Tony Popovic stays as Australia's coach.

Talks with his agent have begun. [8] Football Australia says other candidates are "knocking at the door". [8]

Baseball's team owners now offer to start a salary cap in 2028, a year later than before. [20]

The cap would limit each team's player pay to $258.2 million, up from $245.3 million in their first offer. [20]

The owners also raised the floor, a lower limit on team pay, to $180.2 million. [20]

12 teams would have to add $636 million in pay, including the champion Brewers. [20] 8 teams would have to cut $528 million. [20]

MLB says "clubs will need a full offseason to prepare" for a cap. [20]

The current labour deal ends on 1 December, and the owners are expected to lock the players out. [12]

The players' union says the cap would cut player pay and end guaranteed contracts. [12]

MLB says it would agree to a $1 million minimum salary only as part of a salary cap. [20]

The 2028 cap and floor are projections that could change with 2027 revenue. [21]

A 2028 start gives them one more season under today's rules before they would have to cut their pay. [20]

In a lockout no player can sign or be traded until a new deal is reached. [20]

How long baseball's expected lockout would last.

The last one ended on 10 March, and a long one would leave clubs no time to fit under a cap in 2027. [12]

6 of the 16 nations in next year's men's hockey world championship say they will not play Russia. [22]

They are Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Latvia and the Czech Republic. [23]

Last week the Court of Arbitration for Sport, sport's highest court, ordered Russia back in. [11]

Russia had been banned since it invaded Ukraine in February 2022. [11]

The court said the safety reasons for the ban were "not supported by sufficient evidence". [11]

Canada's prime minister, Mark Carney, said Russians will not play at the junior championship in Canada next month. [23]

AJ Produkter, a Swedish firm that sponsored the last 37 world championships, will not show its brand in 2027. [24]

Germany, the 2027 host, is unsure whether it can still stage the championship. [22]

The sports court's order binds the hockey body, which must admit Russia. [11] Hosts Canada and Czechia say they will still restrict visas for Russian players. [24]

A club can let a new member into its party, but the house owner decides who comes in.

The hockey body, the IIHF, gave no immediate answer to the boycotts. [10]

As the last team to qualify, it may lose its place at the junior championship if Russia is added. [10]

What happens to a team that refuses to play Russia.

The hockey rulebook leaves the punishment for a forfeit to officials' "discretion". [67]

Rugby Australia, which runs the sport there, wrote to every professional player on Tuesday with its pay offer. [13]

Talks with the players' union, RUPA, failed when their old pay deal expired on 31 October. [13]

The offer raises the players' share of the game's money from 29% to 32%. [13]

Each member of the World Cup squad would get $175,000 for winning the tournament. [13]

The letter says players must keep doing sponsor and media work, as their own contracts require. [13]

The fight is also over image rights, the right to use a player's name and face. [13]

The union is taking that question to the New South Wales Supreme Court, likely on Friday. [13]

Until the court rules, each player's contract, pay and conditions carry on, the letter says. [13]

Rugby Australia separates the expired collective deal from each player's individual contract, as labour law does. [13] It says the duties sit in the individual contracts, so they still apply. [13]

When a class agreement on homework lapses, each pupil's own school rules still apply.

The letter went straight to players after Rugby Australia said the union had stopped it addressing them. [13]

Who holds the Wallabies' image rights.

The union says its new trust holds them from 1 November. [13] Rugby Australia says the players' contracts still decide, and a court is due to rule. [13]

Manchester United beat Roma 3-2 in the Champions League after being 2-0 down. [25]

Roma scored twice in 17 minutes, the earliest any visitor has done so at Old Trafford in Europe. [25]

Fans released 4,000 balloons and threw tennis balls to protest against the club's owners. [26]

Captain Bruno Fernandes had his penalty saved, but it was retaken and he scored. [19]

Matheus Cunha then scored twice in the last 7 minutes, and was later sent off. [19]

It was United's first win in 10 games. [19]

Coach Michael Carrick's job had looked lost while United trailed. [19]

Referees call it encroachment: a player in the penalty area before the kick, so it is retaken. [19]

Roma's Bryan Cristante had a foot in the area as Fernandes struck the first kick. [19]

In a school race, a runner who sets off before the whistle makes everyone line up again.

Fernandes said "a lot of lies" had been reported about him and Carrick. [27]

Barcelona beat Aston Villa 3-0 and ended Villa's perfect start in this season's Champions League. [28]

Villa had won all 3 earlier games, against Club Brugge, Fenerbahce and Viking. [29]

Lamine Yamal scored first, after a Villa pass went straight to him. [28]

Yamal now has 14 Champions League goals, the most by any teenager. [30]

Raphinha, Barcelona's captain, then scored twice in 8 minutes. [28]

Barcelona's chances were worth 1.96 expected goals, against Villa's 0.72. [28]

Both teams now have 9 points from 4 games. [28]

Villa's coach, Unai Emery, has now lost 15 of his 16 games at Barcelona's ground. [29]

Paris Saint-Germain, the European champions, beat Villarreal 6-0 in Spain. [31]

PSG were 4-0 up after 16 minutes. [32] It equalled their biggest winning margin in the Champions League. [31]

Boly, a 17-year-old, scored less than 2 minutes after coming on for his debut. [31]

PSG have won all 4 of their games in this season's league phase. [31]

Bayern Munich beat Atletico Madrid 2-0 away. [32]

Atletico have already lost to Liverpool and Bayern. [33]

Only the top 8 teams go straight to the knockout rounds. [33] Teams 9th to 24th must win a 2-leg playoff in February. [33]

Tenerife striker Jesus de Miguel died on Tuesday, a day after a collision in a match. [34]

He was 30, and leaves a wife and a daughter, Spanish media said. [35]

Andorra's goalkeeper, Jesus Owono, ran to the halfway line and struck him in the chest. [35]

Owono was sent off, and the Spanish second-division game was abandoned at 2-2. [35]

De Miguel's heart stopped after the collision, his club said. [35]

A minute's silence was held before every Champions League match on Tuesday. [36]

Under Spanish law, a death from non-natural causes, accidents included, goes to a judge. [35] So police opened an inquiry into possible involuntary manslaughter. [35]

A bill to set national rules for college sport, the Protect College Sports Act, passed the US Senate 77-22. [37]

It still needs the House of Representatives, which has only 20 session days left this year. [37]

If it does not pass before the new US Congress sits on 3 January, it dies. [37]

Sportico says Democrats who win the House may prefer to wait and write their own version. [37]

Michele Tafoya, a former NBC sideline reporter, lost her Senate race in Minnesota. [38]

Mark Teixeira, a former baseball player, won his seat in Texas. [38]

Team owners gave over $350,000 to Republican Senate candidates in close races, and under a fifth of that to Democrats. [39]

Prediction-market firms such as Kalshi face a bill from both parties to treat sports bets on them as gambling. [40]

US lawmaking runs in two-year terms of the US Congress: a bill not passed by both houses in time dies. [37]

Homework not handed in by the end of term is not marked; it has to be set again.

Critics say the bill's limited shield from competition law could cut players' earnings, Sportico reports. [37]

Spanish golfer Jon Rahm, twice the world's top-ranked player, would accept penalties to rejoin the PGA Tour. [41]

He left it for LIV Golf, the Saudi-funded rival league, at the end of 2023. [41]

LIV sought bankruptcy protection after Saudi Arabia's wealth fund stopped paying for it. [42]

Brooks Koepka returned this year after giving $5 million to charity and losing 5 years of tour shares. [43]

"If I got offered exactly the same penalties as him, I probably would do it," Rahm said. [43]

The tour's chief, Brian Rolapp, has said there are no plans to reopen that route. [43]

Otherwise the usual rule is a 1-year ban from a player's last LIV event; Rahm's was in late August. [43]

Lee Westwood, 53, says he is "currently unemployed" after not signing for LIV's new version. [42]

Rahm says he has not yet talked to the PGA Tour about a way back. [43]

Why baseball's owners tie their gifts to the one thing players refuse

Each side wants something different

One side offers what the other wants

It ties that gift to the thing the other side refuses

The other side cannot take the gift alone

So every new gift makes saying no cost more

Baseball's owners offer the players a $1 million minimum salary and earlier free agency, but only with a salary cap.

The tour let Brooks Koepka back only if he also gave $5 million to charity and gave up tour shares for 5 years, and Rahm says he would accept the same terms.

The plan pairs the team paying for its own stadium with the team paying no property tax on it, so the state's gift and its ask arrive together.

Tying works only while the other side wants the gifts more than it fears the condition.

Players on the minimum, stars on big contracts and owners of small teams all sit inside this one offer, and each judges it by the part that touches them.

Miguel Maduro, a former head of FIFA's governance committee, says Gianni Infantino cannot stand for a 4th term. [44]

Infantino, FIFA's president, has been elected 3 times. [44]

FIFA's own rules say no person may serve as president for more than 3 terms. [44]

Infantino sacked Maduro in 2017, 10 months after he took the job. [44]

Maduro had refused to approve a Russian deputy prime minister for FIFA's ruling council. [44]

He says critics should ask FIFA's review committee to rule, then appeal to the sports court. [44]

Political scientists call this a term limit, and Infantino brought in FIFA's own as one of his first reforms. [44]

A school may let each pupil be class captain only once, so the job passes on.

Maduro has criticised Infantino since being sacked, and spoke on a call run by a rights group, FairSquare. [44]

Maduro says the rule is the "most appropriate" way for critics to end Infantino's time in charge. [44]

Whether Gianni Infantino may stand again.

Maduro reads FIFA's 3-term rule as a bar, and no FIFA body has been asked to rule on it yet. [44]

Illinois lawmakers are preparing a new bill to keep the Chicago Bears, an NFL team, in the state. [14]

Their session runs from 17 November to 3 December. [14]

An earlier bill failed in the spring. [14]

Indiana passed its own law in February to lure the team across the border. [14]

In August the Bears called a site in Hammond, Indiana, their "sole focus". [14]

Under the Illinois plan, the team pays for the stadium and public money pays for the roads around it. [14]

Governor JB Pritzker, expected to be re-elected on Tuesday, says a deal can be done in November. [14]

A stadium authority is a public body that owns the venue, so the building pays no property tax. [14] The Bears would pay a set rent instead. [14]

A shop renting a council-owned building pays rent, and the council pays no tax on its own building.

The plan pairs the team paying for its own stadium with the team paying no property tax on it, so the state's gift and its ask arrive together.

The University of Tennessee calls its $288 million district beside Neyland Stadium "100% privately funded". [15]

Neyland Stadium is the home ground of Tennessee's football team. [15]

Its first part, an $83 million car park, is owned by the university and funded by state bonds. [15]

University leaders said in 2023 the project would need no state funding. [15]

The hotel and shops that would pay rent are covered only by non-binding deals. [15]

If the hotel is cancelled, the university is still left owing the car park debt. [15]

Lenders call the yearly payment on a loan debt service. [15] At an assumed 7.85% rate, Tennessee's would be about $7.3 million. [15]

A phone contract must still be paid every month even if the phone breaks.

A spokesperson now says repayment comes from parking and project revenue, not parking "solely" as the finance chief said. [15]

It has not explained how it would pay the car park's bills if parking money falls short. [15]

Whether Tennessee's car park can pay its own debt.

Its bond rate is set only when the debt is issued. [15] The university's parking already ran a $698,029 shortfall in 2026. [15]

The US Olympic and Paralympic Committee is seeking outside money for a new business arm. [45]

The arm will handle sponsors, licences, content and sales direct to fans. [45]

It hired the Raine Group to explore selling a stake or raising debt, Sky News first reported. [45]

Its partnership with the LA 2028 organisers ends that year, and renewals for 2029 begin in January. [45]

In June, FIFA dropped its own plan to sell stakes after protests from members such as UEFA. [45]

Economists call income that rises and falls with a cycle cyclical revenue. [45] Team USA took $496 million in 2024, a Games year, and $264 million in 2025. [45]

A seaside ice-cream shop earns most in summer and has to last through the winter.

Its chief executive, Sarah Hirshland, would not say what the new business is worth. [45]

Lawyers for college athletes asked a US court for $18.6 million for a year of work on the House settlement. [46]

The settlement set up a pool of money that colleges share with their athletes. [46]

The firms, Hagens Berman and Winston Taylor, logged more than 3,430 hours checking colleges follow it. [46]

A US magistrate judge, Nathanael Cousins, will decide the fee. [46]

Their audits found $88 million colleges had left out, and $44 million more reached athletes this year. [46]

In a class action, a few lawyers act for a whole group, and a judge sets their pay. [46]

The lawyers also said they talked to senators about the Protect College Sports Act. [46]

Most of their $18.6 million request is a fee tied to the athletes' money pool, not hours worked. [46]

Game 7 of the WNBA Finals drew 3.3 million US viewers, the most for any playoff game in league history. [47]

The Golden State Valkyries won it to take the title in only their 2nd season. [47]

If the figure holds, it is the most-watched WNBA game of any kind since 1997. [47]

The 7 games averaged 1.89 million viewers, more than any Finals before. [47]