Author: Chief Editor

Manchester United manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer said Tuesday he is confident of having Paul Pogba and Marcus Rashford fit should the Premier League season restart next month. Pogba has missed the majority of the campaign with an ongoing ankle injury, while Rashford seemed set to miss the rest of the season when he suffered a double stress fracture in his back in January. United returned to training in small groups last week and preparations are expected to be ramped up further for a return to action when Premier League clubs vote on resuming contact training on Wednesday. “Hopefully now we’ve…

One of the major concerns across the globe is the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on food security, as the United Nations World Food Program UNWFP warned that the number of people facing food insecurity may double by the end of the pandemic. Following the outbreak of the Covid-19 disease in Wuhan, China, and its widespread to many nations globally, a lot of countries have shut down their borders and restricted movement within to control the spread. Coronavirus disease which is highly contagious has spread from a single case to over a hundred countries, infected 2,626,321  persons, and caused  181,938 deaths. In Nigeria alone (April 25, 2020),…

Bournemouth goalkeeper Aaron Ramsdale described finding out he had tested positive for coronavirus as “scary and worrying”, despite displaying no symptoms. The England under-21 international was one of two positive cases from the second round of testing carried out by Premier League clubs as they gear up for a return to action next month. “It’s definitely a shock — I’ve not been in contact with anybody and I’ve now got it,” Ramsdale told The Sun. “I’m showing no symptoms so the fact that a healthy young person could potentially have it is definitely scary and worrying.” Ramsdale tested negative in…

Zlatan Ibrahimovic has picked up a calf injury and not ruptured his Achilles tendon as feared, AC Milan confirmed on Tuesday. “Ibrahimovic has sustained an injury to his right soleus muscle during yesterday’s training session,” the Serie A team said in a statement. “The Achilles tendon is perfectly intact. The player will undergo a scan in 10 days time.” Milan did not say for how long the 38-year-old would be out of action, although Italian media reports say he could be facing four weeks on the sidelines, as Serie A eyes a potential restart next month. Ibrahimovic rejoined the seven-time…

Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola believes the protocols he and his players must follow for football to return are a small sacrifice compared to those risking their lives on the frontline of the coronavirus crisis. Guardiola’s mother died at the age of 82 in April after contracting COVID-19. “We follow the rules, the protocol. We have to. That’s the most important thing. We don’t do anything special,” Guardiola told the City website. “The special ones are the doctors, nurses, scientists, cleaners –- they put their own lives at risk to save ours. “When it’s a special situation around the world,…

The number of prosecutions related to corruption in China nearly doubled last year, according to a report by Beijing’s top prosecutor, as President Xi Jinping ramped up his crackdown on graft. According to the annual report from the Supreme People’s Procuratorate submitted to the national parliament, 18,585 people were prosecuted for crimes related to corruption in 2019, a 90 percent year-on-year increase. Sixteen cases involved former provincial or ministerial-level Communist Party cadres, including former Yunnan party chief Qin Guangrong, who was accused of taking bribes. China’s prosecutions overwhelmingly end in convictions. Last year, from nearly 1.3 million criminal cases, only…

Striker Odion Ighalo looks set to return to China when his loan deal expires on 31 May after Manchester United were unable to agree an extension with Shanghai Shenhua. The Nigerian, 30, was signed on a short-term loan deal in January as cover for striker Marcus Rashford, who had been ruled out by a back injury. However, the impact of the coronavirus pandemic means Ighalo’s loan will end before the Premier League’s intended June return date, by which time Rashford is also expected to be fit. United have already decided not to sign Ighalo permanently, but manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer…

The Senate and the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) bickered yesterday over alleged inclusion of projects worth N80 billion in the commission’s 2019 Budget by the National Assembly without the consent of the executive. The Executive Director, Projects (EDP) of NDDC, Dr. Cairo Ojougboh, had made the allegations yesterday while featuring on The Morning Show, a programme on ARISE NEWS Channel, the broadcast arm of THSIDAY Newspapers. He stated that unknown to the National Assembly and other members of the Committee on NDDC in both Senate and the House of Representatives, the two chairmen, Senator Peter Nwaoboshi and Hon. Olubunmi…

United States Treasury Secretary, Mr. Steven Mnuchin, has canvassed an independent investigation into allegations of wrongdoing against the President of the African Development Bank (AfDB), Dr. Akinwumi Adesina, despite Adesina’s clearance by the ethics committee of the bank. The ethics committee headed by a Japanese Executive Director of the bank, Mr. Takuji Yano, had cleared Adesina of all allegations of impropriety and fraud levelled against him by a group that described itself as concerned staff of the bank. The committee described the allegations that Adesina violated the code of conduct of the institution as “spurious and unfounded.” But Mnuchin rejected…

The World Health Organization said Monday it had “temporarily” suspended clinical trials of hydroxychloriquine as a potential treatment for COVID-19 being carried out across a range of countries as a precautionary measure. The decision came after the publication last week of a study in the Lancet indicating that using the drug on COVID-19 patients could increase their likelihood of dying, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told a virtual press conference. Tedros said that the executive group of the so-called Solidarity Trial, in which hundreds of hospitals across several countries have enrolled patients to test several possible treatments for the novel…