After both sets of players are introduced to the crowd one by one, we kick off a couple of minutes late.
It’s 26 degrees and overcast in Philadelphia this afternoon, with similar conditions in my spare room some 3,500 miles away. Don’t worry, I’m hydrating. While we wait, here’s the latest Football Daily:
A fake dentist and two assistants who treated dozens of patients after learning the trade on the internet have been charged in the Czech Republic.
The three family members opened a fully equipped dental practice, without a licence or the necessary expertise, in the central Czech town of Havlíčkův Brod in 2023, police said on Wednesday.
Chelsea winger was provisionally suspended last year
‘Presence and/or use of a prohibited substance’ alleged
Chelsea’s Mykhailo Mudryk could face a lengthy ban after being charged by the Football Association with doping offences. Under FA regulations the winger could be banned for as long as four years after providing a positive A sample last year. It is believed the banned performance-enhancing substance meldonium was found in Mudryk’s system.
The Ukraine international has not played since last November and was provisionally suspended while he and Chelsea waited for the results of a B sample.
Prosecutors had expected to rest case by Friday but delay means they are unlikely to finish until Monday
A juror’s vertigo on Wednesday ended another day of the sex trafficking trial for music mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs before it began.
Prosecutors had expected to rest their case by Friday after presenting evidence for the last six weeks, but the delay means they are unlikely to finish until Monday.
While some in Moscow have tried to put positive spin on Israel’s assault, Kremlin risks losing a key strategic partner
When a group of Russian and Iranian foreign policy officials arranged to meet in Moscow on Wednesday for a conference titled “Russian-Iranian cooperation in a changing world”, they probably did not anticipate just how timely that phrase would turn out to be.
Seated around a table at the President hotel near the Kremlin, officials from both sides were forced to confront a stark new reality: Iran’s regime – a key ally of Moscow – is facing its most serious threat in decades.
Researchers say average daily losses for every 1C the planet heats up could add to equivalent of not having breakfast
Some of our critical staple crops could suffer “substantial” production losses due to climate breakdown, a study has found, even if farmers adapt to worsening weather.
Rice, maize, soy, wheat, cassava and sorghum yields are all projected to fall by as much as 120 calories per person per day for every 1C the planet heats up, according to new research in Nature, with average daily losses that could add up to the equivalent of not having breakfast.
Forensic scientist says ‘strong evidence’ links Ryland Headley, 92, with murder and rape of Louisa Dunne
A forensic scientist was able to produce a full DNA profile for the suspected murderer of a woman who died in 1967 after examining her skirt and hair that had been kept in police storage for almost 60 years, a jury has been told.
Andrew Parry told the court there was “strong scientific evidence” to link the skirt Louisa Dunne was wearing when she was found and hair police took from her body with 92-year-old Ryland Headley, who is on trial for her rape and murder.
BBF has not endorsed Manchester for Champions League
Lions, Eagles and Flyers also blocked from competing
The civil war engulfing British Basketball has intensified with the British Basketball Federation attempting to block four of the country’s leading clubs from competing in Europe next season.
The Guardian has learned that the BBF is refusing to endorse applications for European places made by Manchester Basketball, London Lions, Newcastle Eagles and Bristol Flyers, which has put their participation at risk.
Anger is rarely thought of as positive – but the emotion itself exists to protect us, says author of Good Anger, Sam Parker
My friends and I sometimes rank the seven deadly sins in order of personal relevance. For me, “wrath” always comes last. (I shan’t say what’s first – too revealing.)
Anger doesn’t feature in my day-to-day life. I even struggle to feel wrathful when it’s appropriate. World events make me fatalistic and depressed; when my gym instructor says to “let loose” on the ski machine, my effort remains constant. The time I visited a rage room, my main takeaway was that the Metallica song I selected as the soundtrack sounded fantastic on big speakers.
A majority of supporters of Donald Trump are against US military involvement in Israel’s conflict with Iran, a poll published Wednesday found, reflecting a growing Republican backlash to the president’s threats to utilize American firepower.
A wide ranging Economist/YouGov poll conducted over the weekend revealed that 53% of voters who backed Trump in the 2024 presidential election do not want the country to join in Israel’s strikes.
Ted Cruz, the US senator from Texas, and conservative media personality Tucker Carlson have clashed over US military involvement in the Middle East, with the latter shouting: “You don’t know anything about Iran!” in a heated interview that exposes a sharp division within Donald Trump’s coalition as the president considers joining Israel in attacking Iran.
In the confrontation, a short excerpt released ahead of an approximately two-hour interview set to air today, Carlson – an acolyte of the Maga movement which generally argues for American isolationism from foreign wars – challenged Cruz’s knowledge of Iran, which the Republican hawk has advocated attacking.
President Donald Trump initially appeared to discourage attacks but Israeli officials claim they always had his support
Israel’s attack on Iran was carried out with Donald Trump’s approval, government officials in Israel claim, and it appears to have been unleashed in the expectation – but not certainty – that the US would ultimately get drawn into the war.
That assumption is now being put to the test as the US president weighs a decision on whether to join an assault he has increasingly embraced in his public pronouncements.
The anti-Mamdani mobilization is depressingly predictable, with a party that is allergic to fresh blood and new thinking
Who’s afraid of Zohran Mamdani? The answer, it would seem, is the entire establishment. The 33-year-old democratic socialist and New York City mayoral candidate has surged in the polls in recent weeks, netting endorsements not just from progressive voices like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Bernie Sanders but also his fellow candidates for the mayoralty, with Brad Lander and Michael Blake taking advantage of the ranked-choice voting system in the primary and cross-endorsing Mamdani’s campaign.
With the primary just around the corner, polls have Mamdani closing the gap on Andrew Cuomo, the disgraced former governor of New York. This has spooked the establishment, which is now doing everything it can to stop Mamdani’s rise.
Here we are, on the brink of another Middle East conflict with Iran – one that was entirely preventable
As the United States inches closer to direct military confrontation with Iran, it is critical to recognize how avoidable this escalation has been. “We knew everything [about Israel’s plans to strike Iran], and I tried to save Iran humiliation and death,” said Donald Trump on Friday. “I tried to save them very hard because I would have loved to have seen a deal worked out.”
As two of the last analysts from an American thinktank to visit Iran, just three weeks ago, we can report that Iran’s own foreign ministry and members of the nuclear negotiating team were eager to work out a deal with Steve Witkoff, the US special envoy to the Middle East, and showed no indication they were interested in slow-walking talks.
Experts find link between compulsive use of social media, phones and video games and mental health problems
Teenagers who show signs of being addicted to social media, mobile phones or video games are at greater risk of suicidal behaviour and emotional problems, according to research.
A study, which tracked more than 4,000 adolescents for four years, found that nearly one in three reported increasingly addictive use of social media or mobile phones. Those whose use followed an increasingly addictive trajectory had roughly double the risk of suicidal behaviour at the end of the study.
Since federal agents descended on the city, faith leaders have rallied congregants, protested and devoted resources to serve immigrants
Kevin Kang, a pastor at a United Methodist church about 15 miles north of downtown Los Angeles, was furious last Thursday when he heard that the taco stand next door was raided by immigration agents.
Not only did US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) target his favorite vendors, he said, they had also used the church parking lot to prepare for a raid on a host of popular Mexican food trucks on Foothill Boulevard, a major street in the city of Tujunga.
In the new Evita at the London Palladium, Rachel Zegler sings from the theatre’s actual balcony – meaning the big-paying audience doesn’t experience what passersby get for free. Could this gimmick catch on?
In the theatrical tactic “breaking the fourth wall”, characters acknowledge the presence of the audience. As when, in the current National Theatre production of Stephen Sondheim’s final musical, Here We Are, the performers, walking forward, stop in shock at seeing a big room full of strangers.
The director Jamie Lloyd, though, is pioneering a technique that might be called breaking the theatre wall. In his revival of Evita, previewing at the London Palladium, Rachel Zegler’s Eva Perón sings Don’t Cry For Me Argentina – supposedly delivered from the Casa Rosada presidential balcony in Buenos Aires – from the balcony outside the Palladium, while the audience inside has to settle for a video feed.
A Tennessee state law banning gender-affirming care for minors can stand, the US supreme court has ruled, a devastating loss for trans rights supporters in a case that could set a precedent for dozens of other lawsuits involving the rights of transgender children.
The case, United States v Skrmetti, was filed last year by three families of trans children and a provider of gender-affirming care. In oral arguments, the plaintiffs – as well as the US government, then helmed by Joe Biden – argued that Tennessee’s law constituted sex-based discrimination and thus violated the equal protection clause of the 14th amendment. Under Tennessee’s law, someone assigned female at birth could not be prescribed testosterone, but someone assigned male at birth could receive those drugs.
Stratford East, London This show, based on a gone-viral Tinder date in which a woman tried to dispose of her poo unconventionally, tackles the perils of modern love with wit, humour and cracking songs
As bad dating stories go, this one from 2017 is a classic. During a Tinder date, a woman found herself in a pretty awkward situation: her poo wouldn’t flush, and in an attempt to discreetly dispose of it, she ended up wedged between two windows. The story was turned into a viral meme, and even made the headlines. Now, a musical by two of the creators of the hit podcast My Dad Wrote a Porno (Jamie Morton and James Cooper) has been spawned from the incident, too.
The central premise remains, but with a few creative tweaks. Lucy and Peter have been raised on Disney movies but are chronically unlucky in love. Misguided help arrives in the form of Lucy’s cutting anti-guardian-angel, Miseraie, and Peter’s insufferable finance bro flatmate, David. After matching on a dating app, they meet at a Mexican restaurant and do their best to keep up appearances. But, would you believe it – it turns out they might just be each other’s perfect match after all.
Royal Albert Hall, London After a cancelled arena tour, expectations are high for J Hus’s return – but for all his swagger and melody, he ends up falling short due to sound issues and a lack of vision
J Hus’s one-night-only show at the Royal Albert Hall, celebrating the five-year anniversary of his album Big Conspiracy, begins with the British rapper’s sister and collaborator iceè tgm reciting a poem in front of a black curtain. “It all starts with a question,” she posits. “What is the big conspiracy?” By the end, the show leaves even more unanswered questions.
When the curtain falls, it reveals a small symphony orchestra placed behind live band the Compozers. Hus opens with force: Helicopter, Triumph, Fight for Your Right, Fortune Teller, Reckless, and No Denying come in quick succession. He spits with braggadocious swagger, jumping from a protruding platform into the throes of the adoring crowd standing in the stalls. Even looking up towards the gallery, the venue’s grandeur feels entirely fitting for commemorating such a heavy-hitting UK No 1 album, which has become embedded in British rap, Afrobeats, dancehall, and general culture over the past five years.
Men allegedly stole $100m worth of gold, diamonds, rubies, emeralds and luxury watches from an armored truck
Seven men in southern California have been charged in connection with what federal authorities are calling the “largest jewelry heist in US history” after allegedly stealing approximately $100m worth of gold, diamonds, rubies, emeralds, and luxury watches from an armored truck.
The US attorney’s office for California’s central district revealed the charges in a news release on Tuesday.
Annabel Rook, 46, who helped refugees and women fleeing domestic violence, described as ‘profound force for good’
A woman found fatally stabbed in her home after a gas explosion has been described as a “profound force for good” who dedicated her life to supporting women.
Annabel Rook, 46, was found with stab wounds at a house in Dumont Road, Stoke Newington, north London, just before 5am on Tuesday.
Splitgate 2’s Ian Proulx thought his Musk gag was funny – but what it revealed was the major blind spots still in the business
One thing most game developers can agree on in the modern industry is that it’s hard to drum up any awareness for your latest project without a mammoth marketing budget. Last year, almost 20,000 new titles were released on the PC gaming platform Steam alone, the majority disappearing into the content blackhole that is the internet. So when a smaller studio is offered the chance to get on the stage at the Summer Games Fest, an event streamed live to a global audience of around 50 million people, it’s a big deal. Not something that you want to spectacularly misjudge.
Enter Ian Proulx, cofounder of 1047 Games. His short slot at the event earlier this month had him walking on stage with a baseball bat to promote the online shooter Splitgate 2 by announcing that he was “tired of playing the same Call of Duty every year”, while wearing a cap bearing the slogan “Make FPS great again”. It did not go well. Gamers and fellow developers criticised his decision to diss another studio’s game as well as his politically charged use of a Maga/Trump meme, especially with anti-ICE protesters being beaten and arrested just across town. Proulx defended his actions, denying that his use of the cap slogan was political, but four days later he made an apology via X explaining: “We needed something to grab attention, and the honest truth is, we tried to think of something and this is what we came up with.”
A new study probes possible ties to pesticides, nitrates and other farm-related risks
Six months ago, Alex Hammer was diagnosed with colon cancer at the age of 37. Dianne Chambers endured surgery, chemotherapy and dozens of rounds of radiation to fight aggressive breast cancer, and Janan Haugen spends most days helping care for her 16-year-old grandson, who is still being treated for brain cancer he developed at the age of 7.
The three were among a group of about two dozen people who came together last week in a small town in central Iowa to share their experiences of cancer. They are part of a new research project investigating potential environmental causes for what the American Cancer Society’s advocacy arm calls a cancer “crisis.”
Federal and provincial governments are ‘flooding the zone’ with damaging corporate giveaways under the guise of resistance
Steve Bannon calls it “flooding the zone”. Donald Trump demonstrated it in his first weeks back in office, when he introduced over 100 executive orders. Regardless of their legal viability, the sheer volume of policy changes is the point. It is a political strategy to overwhelm institutions, courts and social groups, preventing effective opposition.
In Canada, we are witnessing our own version of “flooding the zone” from our new prime minister, Mark Carney, in coordination with provincial and territorial premiers. Carney is the former governor of the Bank of England. Prior to that, he was the governor of the Bank of Canada. He recently won the federal election by defeating a rightwing opponent Canadians feared would steer them too far towards Trump policies. Yet Carney’s “negotiations” with Trump have so far involved gentle reminders that Canada would never become the 51st state, as threatened by the US president, and capitulations to Trump’s demand to strengthen our border security and increase defense spending. In reality, Canada is moving much closer to the authoritarian rule of Trump.
Shiri Pasternak is an associate professor in criminology at Toronto Metropolitan University. Dayna Nadine Scott is a professor at Osgoode Hall Law School and the Faculty of Environmental & Urban Change at York University. Both authors are members of the Infrastructure Beyond Extractivism research team, a collaboration between critical scholars and Indigenous land defenders across North America
There was one defining image from Keir Starmer’s intense diplomatic shift at the G7 summit in Canada: him bending at Donald Trump’s waist level to collect spilled pages of a UK-US trade deal. Defining, perhaps. But definitely partial.
Arguably more significant was a slightly more prosaic snap slipped out on the Downing Street Flickr feed a day before, showing Starmer engrossed in a chat with four other world leaders, Emmanuel Macron, Mark Carney, Giorgia Meloni and Friedrich Merz.
Department for Work and Pensions publishes text of bill cutting benefits and claims three-month transitional period is ‘one of most generous ever’
Angela Rayner, the deputy PM, will be taking PMQs shortly. And she will be up against Chris Philp, the shadow home secretary.
When Kemi Badenoch became Tory leader, she did not appoint a deputy (or even a “de factor deputy”, a post that has existed in Tory politics in recent years) and she said she would decide who would stand in for her at PMQs on a case by case basis. Alex Burghart, the shadow Cabinet Office minister, got the gig the first time Starmer was away.
Chris Philp follows Alex Burghart in rotating for Kemi Badenoch at PMQs. One Westminster wag asks “When is it going to be Robert Jenrick’s turn?”
We have this profound challenge of the number of people joining the armed forces being outweighed by the outflow the people leaving. So ultimately its about retention.
And the number one issue reason cited in last month’s attitude survey for the armed forces for leaving was family life. We know the quality of housing is unfortunately poor. It’s due to the basically to the structural nature of those homes.
To wrap up this topic, the state of housing for the armed forces is in a poor state because your government did not do enough for it?
[The housing] which is not in a good enough state because of your government?
What did I do about it? I did something that hasn’t been done for 30 years – yes, it completed under Labour – and now we would recommend to the government, when they bring forth their housing defence white paper, that we set up a housing association.
The US bombing campaign of Yemen under Donald Trump led to the deaths of almost as many civilians in two months as in the previous 23 years of US attacks on Islamists and militants in the country.
An analysis of Operation Rough Rider by the monitoring group Airwars has concluded that 224 civilians were killed between March and the end of the campaign in May, compared with 258 between 2002 and 2024.
Mamdani’s campaign deserves credit for offering a clear, inspiring, progressive message. But ranked-choice voting is also helping make him competitive
With a week left until New York’s Democratic mayoral primary, one might have thought that the former governor Andrew Cuomo would be measuring the drapes at Gracie Mansion. Real estate developers, corporations like Doordash, a smattering of billionaires and even Billy Joel have shoveled cash into his campaign, with his Super Pac spending more money than any other outside force in the city’s political history. This is on top of his entering the race with major name recognition advantage, amounting to a 20- or 30-point lead as recently as May.
But according to a new poll, Zohran Mamdani – the insurgent state assemblyman and democratic socialist whom the Nation recently co-endorsed along with fellow mayoral candidate and New York City comptroller Brad Lander – has pulled aheadof Cuomo for the first time.
Katrina vanden Heuvel is editorial director and publisher of the Nation, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and a contributor to the Washington Post, the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times
XV features Marcus Smith, Alex Mitchell and Fin Smith
Tadhg Furlong also has the chance to prove his fitness
Maro Itoje will captain the British & Irish Lions for the first time in their non-cap international against Argentina in Dublin on Friday.
The England skipper Itoje leads a starting XV that features Marcus Smith at full-back and will be directed by England half-backs Alex Mitchell and Fin Smith.
Withdrawal from event follows string of appearances as Catherine seeks right balance after cancer treatment
The Princess of Wales has pulled out of attending Royal Ascot as she continues to seek the right balance of public engagements after her treatment for cancer.
Catherine was said to be disappointed not to attend the race meeting on Wednesday with her husband and King Charles and Queen Camilla.
Inflation pressures remain sticky in the UK, according to Rob Wood, chief UK economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics.
Looking ahead, we continue to expect CPI inflation to average 3.4% for the rest of the year as strong wage growth, minimum wage hikes and tax increases pass through to retail prices. We think headline inflation will struggle to dip below 3% before April 2026. By that point, inflation will have been above target almost continuously for five years, risking further deanchoring of inflation expectations and persistent wage pressure.
Granted, US president Trump’s trade war could lead to some diversion of Chinese exports previously bound to the US, which could cut UK inflation. But war in the Middle-East has boosted oil and natural gas prices, adding 10bp to our forecast inflation peak and risks probably lie to the upside. We think the MPC will have to proceed cautiously.
Food and drink inflation shot up in May 2025, reaching 4.4% compared to 3.4% in April. These figures are being driven by rising energy and ingredients costs. Food manufacturing is an energy intensive sector, and wholesale gas prices are 7.8% higher compared to last May, as UK businesses face significantly higher industrial energy costs compared to other nations.
Meanwhile, the price of ingredients has also surged. For example, in the last two years, the price of cocoa has tripled, while wholesale butter prices are also 55% higher than last year. Recent and upcoming regulations are also bringing additional costs to manufacturers.
After Hurricane Helene’s flood waters slammed into Lake Lure’s century-old dam last September, the resort town was spurred on to seek federal funding for an ambitious rebuilding plan. While the initial response from the Federal Emergency Management Agency seemed encouraging when Joe Biden was president, Donald Trump’s plans to shrink or even abolish Fema – and push some of the costs of disaster response on to states – have injected uncertainty into the North Carolina town’s recovery
This season’s three hot looks: the barn jacket, the leather blouson and the haute anorak
The summer jacket is one of the trickiest bits of your wardrobe to get right, because nobody really wants to wear one. I mean, isn’t summer supposed to be lovely and warm? Isn’t that sort of the whole point of a summer wardrobe? Sandals and shorts exist to celebrate carefree, balmy days. Sunshine is the raison d’etre of a sundress. The very existence of a jacket is a summer buzzkill. But you need one. Sorry, but you do. Seasons are unpredictable, heatwaves break, darkness brings a chill. So you definitely have to put some thought into a summer jacket unless you want your fabulous summer outfits to end up hidden beneath some random hoodie you grabbed off the banister.
Your summer jacket needs to do two things. It needs to keep you warm and dry when the weather turns chilly or wet. And somehow, at the same time, it needs to keep your summer vibe bouncing along, rather than kill the mood. Like I said: tricky.
Visitors could be more sensitive, while the authorities should seek sustainable solutions for residents and tourists. But just staying at home is no answer
After coordinated protests across Europe last weekend, it’s easy for the ethically conscious tourist to feel uncertain. Across southern Europe – and particularly in Spain, Italy and Portugal – there are headlines blaming visitors for everything from overcrowding to housing shortages. In gentrifying neighbourhoods, slogans such as “Tourists go home” have appeared on walls and windows, with some angry residents grabbing headlines by squirting water pistols at tourists.
Does that mean a golden age of tourism is over? No. Does the complicated relationship between those who want to visit the world’s most interesting places and those who live in them need a reset? Probably.
Ayatollah Khamenei says his country will not surrender, as reports say it is preparing missiles to strike US bases
Iran’s supreme leader rejected US calls for surrender and warned that joining the war would lead to “irreparable damage”, as Israel ramped up rhetoric about regime change and ordered civilians to evacuate a district in Tehran.
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei also said Israel made a “huge mistake” by launching the war, in his first comments since Friday.
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