• Serbian keeps dream of record 25th grand slam title alive

• 38-year-old battles past world No 2 in five gripping sets

Never before had Novak Djokovic been such an underdog in such a significant match. His mere presence in the Australian Open semi-finals, after all, had been the result of a significant slice of good fortune. As he faced off against one of the dominant players in his sport, for many a competitive match would be close enough to a win.

This special champion has achieved so much for so long, but in the early hours of Saturday morning the 38-year-old pulled off one of the greatest upsets of his legendary career, recovering from a two sets to one deficit to topple the two-time defending champion and second seed Jannik Sinner 3-6, 6-3, 4-6, 6-4, 6-4 to improbably return to the Australian Open final.

Deng Chol Majek stabbed Rhiannon Whyte 23 times in ‘sadistic’ attack at railway station

A Sudanese asylum seeker has been jailed for at least 29 years for the “sadistic” murder of a woman who was working at the hotel where he lived.

Deng Chol Majek is believed to have entered the UK by small boat less than three months before stabbing Rhiannon Whyte, 27, with a screwdriver 23 times at Bescot Stadium station in Walsall in October 2024.

Updates from the first T20 in Kandy, delayed start to play
T20 row sounds alarm for India’s Olympic bid | Mail James

Here we go – official news of a toss in fifteen minutes (2.55pm) and a 3.10pm start.

Still no news on an inspection or toss time from the ground, as soon as I get some intel you’ll be the first to know.

Starmer confirms immediate removal, but it is unclear if sanctions remain on former MP, academic and barrister

• UK politics live – latest updates

China has lifted the sanctions it imposed on serving British MPs and peers in a significant sign of warming relations after Keir Starmer travelled to Beijing for landmark talks with Xi Jinping.

Nine UK citizens were banned from China in 2021, including five Conservative MPs and two members of the House of Lords, targeted for highlighting human rights violations against the Muslim Uyghur community.

The first lady’s premiere was marked by conspicuous absences. It turns out chumminess with the president might just come at a cost

Who wasn’t on the red carpet at the official Melania documentary premiere in New York was so much more intriguing than who was. No offence to defence secretary Pete Hegseth, but if I wanted to see formalwear struggling to contain Crusades tattoos, I’d hang around outside the Spartak Moscow Christmas party. Not that it was a red carpet, because the carpet at the “Trump-Kennedy” Center was black. No one bothers hiding the grift any more, with the movie’s own producer openly explaining that this aesthetic was “all about supporting this luxury brand that [Melania’s] creating”. They should have dressed the event like a colon, since Donald’s is effectively where it was being held.

Anyway: arrivals. There was Melania and Donald Trump – she finally got him out of hair and makeup – who were holding hands, a coincidentally convenient way to cover his skin if his glam squad didn’t truck in enough concealer. In recent months, Trump has had terrible bruises on the tops of his hands and even more terrible excuses for why they keep appearing. Aspirin, Swiss furniture, shaking lots of hands – the list of things that aren’t cannula sites grows longer every week.

Marina Hyde is a Guardian columnist

Lemon’s lawyer said he was taken into custody after attending protest in which demonstrators disrupted a church service earlier in January

• US politics live – latest updates

Don Lemon, the former CNN anchor, was arrested late on Thursday on charges that he violated federal law during a protest at a church in Minnesota earlier this month, according to his lawyer.

Abbe Lowell, a lawyer for Lemon, said that Lemon was “taken into custody by federal agents last night in Los Angeles, where he was covering the Grammy awards”.

Mike White’s show will begin production in April at a five-star Saint-Tropez resort known for its old-world opulence

Will it be a fatal attack with a pétanque boule under the parasol palms? Some skulduggery in the swimming pool of a €21,000-a-night private villa? Perhaps a poisoned cocktail on the terrace overlooking the luxury yachts in the Mediterranean?

Bienvenue to season four of The White Lotus on the Côte d’Azur; judging by past series, someone is not making it out of the French Riviera alive.

The space opera to end them all once blasted everything in its path. But a muddled approach has led to indecision and paralysis

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, Star Wars was an actual movie that people watched. It drew people to cinemas in huge numbers, largely because it was completely unembarrassed about being a pulpy space adventure about comic wizards and laser swords. Nowadays, it is something else entirely. A TV show about a likable space dad and his cute, cheeky, telekinetically powered adopted alien son, or perhaps a divisive culture-war bellwether that vacillates between trying to destroy itself in a blaze of operatic self-importance and hamfistedly rebuilding itself.

These days Star Wars also seems mainly to be press releases and announcements, throwaway comments in interviews that gesture mournfully towards what once was and what might, one day, be again. Which brings us to Taika Waititi, the Oscar-winning director from New Zealand, who has been giving fresh updates on his episode in the long-running space saga. “I’m just trying to sort of go back and harness a little bit more of the fun from the original films,” he told Variety, adding of George Lucas’ original trilogy: “The stakes were very high [and] there were serious things going on but also there was a lot fun to be had in those films. That’s what I was trying to bring back.”

Ariel Seidman declared persona non grata and given 72 hours to leave country after remarks on social media

South Africa has ordered Israel’s top diplomat to the country to leave within 72 hours, citing “insulting attacks” on South Africa’s president Cyril Ramaphosa on social media and the “abuse of diplomatic privilege”.

Ariel Seidman, the chargé d’affaires at Israel’s embassy in Pretoria, was declared persona non grata by South Africa’s department for international relations and cooperation (DIRCO) in a statement on its website on Friday afternoon. Israel’s embassy did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Work, duty and responsibility are not always seen to yield joy and delight, but there is a deep satisfaction in achievement

• Read more in the Home truths series

It’s amazing how lucky you get if you work really hard.

It’s the family motto. My father, one of five children, left school after grade 9 and immediately started work. In his early 20s, Dad went back to night school and then served in the public service for more than 40 years. Mum had a career as a secretary too, and together they worked hard to ensure we had the best education they could offer us.

Audrey Niffenegger’s follow-up to her global bestseller focuses on Alba, the daughter of Henry and Clare, as she negotiates two marriages and various modern-era dystopias

A follow-up to the 2003 blockbuster novel The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger is set to be published this autumn.

Life Out of Order, which Niffenegger worked on for 13 years, is set in the same world as the original novel. The Time Traveler’s Wife has sold more than 9m copies globally since its publication, and was adapted into a 2009 film starring Rachel McAdams, as well as an HBO series and a musical.

While it’s a love letter to a Lagos he has never actually lived in, the Gangs of London actor says his Cannes-conquering new film My Father’s Shadow has themes that will touch audiences all over the world, from Nigeria to Korea

When Ṣọpẹ́ Dìrísù becomes animated during conversation, his speaking voice – ordinarily a sort of polished inner-city London dialect – dances into a smooth Nigerian accent. As it happens, his shoulders ease, his eyes smile, he is totally relaxed. If it is true that we become the most distilled versions of ourselves when we are at our most comfortable, then it is clear here that the very essence of Dìrísù’s personhood is a Nigerian man.

The opportunity to nurture his Nigerian identity was a significant factor in Dìrísù’s decision to take on his latest film, the Bafta-nominated My Father’s Shadow. The entire project – on which he serves both as lead actor and executive producer – was shot on location in Lagos, the country’s former capital city, over an eight-week period in early 2024. “I’d have said yes if the script was half as good,” Dìrísù says. “When I first got it I was excited to just be working in Nigeria: it was so important for me not only to work there, but also to be in the country independently as an adult. And to get to see my grandma more than once in a year! On top of this, not a lot of actors get to tell a story as tender, beautiful and considered as this one.”

Panama’s president says strategic waterway will operate as normal after ruling that advances US policy aims

Panama’s president said ports at each end of the Panama canal would operate as usual after the country’s supreme court ruled the concession held by a subsidiary of a Chinese company was unconstitutional.

The court’s decision on Thursday, which helps US attempts to block any Chinese influence over the strategic waterway, immediately drew a sharp rebuke from Beijing.

The Guardian’s picture editors select photographs from around the world

Donald Trump now has the firepower in place, but using it might not end well

A fortnight ago, when Donald Trump first threatened Iran’s regime, telling protesters in the country that “help is coming”, there were not enough US military assets in the Middle East to back up the rhetoric. That has now changed, although plenty of questions remain about what an attack on Iran could achieve.

An aircraft carrier, the USS Abraham Lincoln, has arrived in the Indian Ocean, dispatched from the South China Sea alongside three destroyers equipped with Tomahawk cruise missiles. Its eight-squadron air wing includes F-35C and F/A-18 jets and, critically, EA-18G Growlers to suppress anything that is left of Iran’s air defences after last year’s war with Israel.

Mobile Fortify lets agents obtain vast amounts of information on anyone by scanning their face

The lethal force Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is meting out on American streets is rightly drawing loud condemnations from politicians and editorial boards across the nation and around the world. Now is the time we must start paying attention to another highly damaging part of ICE’s arsenal: the agency’s deployment of mass surveillance.

I’m referring specifically to Mobile Fortify, a specialized app ICE has been using at least since May 2025. (Usage of the app was first reported last June by 404Media.) What is Mobile Fortify? It’s an app for facial recognition that can additionally take “contactless fingerprints” of someone simply by snapping a picture of a person’s fingers. The app has been used more than 100,000 times, including on children, as alleged in a lawsuit filed by the State of Illinois and the City of Chicago. And it’s dangerous.

Moustafa Bayoumi is a Guardian US columnist

A sherry old-fashioned with added southern Spanish sizzle

This reimagining of the old fashioned, in which American whiskey meets Andalusian flair, is a well-earned indulgence for the depths of winter. Deep, dark and full of Spanish warmth, it’s a cocktail that wraps you up like a velvet jacket with bourbon spice, sherry sweetness and a glint of orange zest.

Neki Xhilaga, head bartender, El Pirata, London W1

• Concern raised over politicisation of sport

• Bangladesh pulled out of men’s World T20 after row

Bangladesh’s withdrawal from the men’s T20 World Cup could have implications for India’s 2036 Olympic bid amid concern at the International Olympic Committee over the potential politicisation of sport.

Bangladesh pulled out of next month’s tournament last weekend after the International Cricket Council declined a request to move their group matches from India to the cohosts Sri Lanka, after a long-running political row triggered by Kolkata Knight Riders’ decision to remove the Bangladeshi bowler Mustafizur Rahman from their Indian Premier League squad.

Pilloried as a multimillion-dollar sweetener, Amazon’s Brett Ratner-directed portrait of the first lady has opened with a grand ‘black-carpet’ premiere in Washington and mysteriously empty cinemas around the planet

Thursday night in Washington saw the world premiere of Melania, Brett Ratner’s $40m film about the first lady and one of the most expensive documentaries ever made. At the lately renamed Donald J Trump and John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, guests including House speaker Mike Johnson and health secretary Robert F Kennedy waved to reporters from the black carpet (which was paying homage to the first lady’s favourite colour) before making their way up steps emblazoned with her name in glowing monochrome block capitals. Once the film began, unreeling its profile of Melania Trump over the 20 days leading up to her husband’s January 2025 inauguration, press were barred.

Everyone was welcome to attend the UK’s first screening on Friday morning, yet all tickets to the 9.40am screening at Sittingbourne’s Light cinema’s 34-seater screen three remained unsold – until I bought one. Ten minutes before it began, doors to the multiplex were still locked and only gulls were patrolling the puddles outside the entrance. Screenings this early were unusual, an usher confirmed, “usually it’s just kids films”.

Twelve showings are scheduled over the film’s week-long Sittingbourne run, for which a total of six seats have so far been sold. By contrast, 59 seats have already been snapped up for the first-day screenings of Wuthering Heights in a fortnight, and 33 for Being Victoria Wood next Tuesday.

Have you been following the big stories in football, rugby, cycling, tennis, cricket, NFL and winter sports?

The Night Manager’s Diego Calva and James Norton are also helping to build hype around small singular hoops

While Chloé Zhao’s Hamnet has been nominated for eight Academy Awards including best picture, for many it is a tiny silver hoop earring worn by Paul Mescal in his portrayal of William Shakespeare that steals the show. Worn in his left ear lobe, the barely there hoop has people fixated online.

“Begging my boyfriend to get a tiny hoop earring too,” reads one post dedicated to the accessory. “I cried for over half of Hamnet, but Paul Mescal’s slutty little earring made me feel conflicted,” reads another.

A sip in the glass and the rest in a little carafe, please – and make sure it’s ice-cold, otherwise it’s an absolutely degenerate drink

There is very little in life as elegant as the martini. You select vodka or gin. But really, you’re an adult, you select gin. A whisper of vermouth, then it’s chilled. A twist of lemon is added or an olive and her brine, then it’s served. And it’s served – we pray – with a sidecar.

All martinis should have sidecars. You know when you get a martini and there’s only a sip in the glass and the rest is in a little baby carafe sitting on ice? That’s a sidecar and it should be the law.

Josh Sharp is a New York-based comedian. His show, Josh Sharp: ta-da!, is at Soho Theatre, London, from 9 to 28 February

Tour guide reports drawing of naked woman pointing knife at baby and coded writing at Old Calton burial ground

The tomb of the philosopher David Hume and two other memorials at a historic cemetery in Edinburgh have been vandalised with “disturbing occult-style paraphernalia”.

A tour guide made the discovery at the Old Calton burial ground. It included a drawing of a naked woman pointing a bloodied knife at a baby with a noose around its neck, and coded writing on red electrical tape attached to the David Hume mausoleum and two nearby memorial stones.

I played out a torturous, all-too-familar dance after the Gunners’ title-race stumble. But if we’re suffering like this in January, how will we feel in May?

I sometimes joke that I’m not sure I actually like football, just Arsenal. Hate-watching rivals aside, if a game doesn’t concern the Gunners it probably doesn’t concern me, such is my one-club tunnel vision. Even then, there are occasions where my love of Arsenal appears debatable. As a friend recently put it to me: “I’ve watched Arsenal games with you. I’m not sure you like Arsenal and yet you’re possibly the most fervent Gooner I know.”

Ah, the torturous dance between joy and torment. I relived it again last Sunday evening, when Arsenal lost to Manchester United. On paper, it should have been simple enough to compartmentalise: you can’t win them all and we’re still four points clear at the top of the league table and looking strong in all three cups. And yet, for the first time this season, I succumbed to true result-induced head loss.