Referee: Mike Dean Kick-off: 8:30 PM (IST), Saturday, 9th of February In an interesting fixture, Wigan Athletic travel to London to pay a visit to Roman Abramovich’s Chelsea, who are currently precariously perched in third position, well within reach of the chasing pack. With 46 points from their 25 games thus far, Chelsea are just 1 point clear of London rivals Tottenham, 4 clear of Everton, and just 5 clear of yet another London rival, Arsenal....
So maybe he’s not perfect. Until then, there was hardly any hint of a misstep for Chen, who lived up to his own impressive standard by winning his third straight title at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships. The reigning world champion, Chen was biggest star at this competition coming in, and he won the final event Sunday with a score of 342.22 — over 58 points more than runner-up Vincent Zhou....
Cheteshwar Pujara, India’s current No.3 in Test cricket, has just surpassed his predecessor Rahul Dravid in terms of number of balls faced, as by the end of his marathon knock at the SCG in the first innings of the 4th Test against Australia, he had faced 1258 deliveries in this series, eclipsing The Wall’s record of 1203 deliveries faced, which he did way back in 2003-04. This has been a bowler’s series so far and batsmen on either side with a very few exceptions have struggled throughout the series....
This place right here exhausts superlatives. One can go on and on endlessly about the marvel Rajesh Patel and co have being doing in Chhattisgarh for basketball over decades. And we’ll get to that, for now let the facts do the talking. This place is the bedrock of basketball in India. A player-producing powerhouse. Just look at the remarkable achievements of the organization: In last 20 years, they’ve had 43 Gold, 14 Silver and 21 Bronze Medals at the national level....
Polster suffered the Grade II strain during Thursday’s training session in Fort Myers, Florida. The 23-year-old will return to Chicago on Wednesday to continue treatment. Atlanta United adds Chile international An option at defensive midfield and right back, Polster found himself in a battle for playing time this preseason following the recent additions of midfielders Dax McCarty and Juninho. The defender-midfielder has made 57 appearances (51 starts) over two MLS campaigns....
LGBT+ groups expressed concerns about Chick-fil-A’s views on LGBT+ rights and the company’s donations to perceived anti-LGBT+ organizations. The Oracle shopping mall said it would not renew Chick-fil-A’s six-month lease, telling the BBC it’s the “right thing to do.” “We always look to introduce new concepts for our customers, however, we have decided on this occasion that the right thing to do is to only allow Chick-fil-A to trade with us for the initial six-month pilot period, and not to extend the lease any further,” an Oracle spokesperson told the BBC....
According to multiple reports — the first from TMZ Sports — Clark was pulled over in Los Angeles Sunday night due to a vehicle violation at 9:20 p.m. PT. It was at that point that an arresting officer from the Los Angeles Police Department noticed an open duffel bag inside Clark’s Lamborghini SUV. Sticking out of the bag in plain sight was a submachine gun. According to a statement from LAPD public information officer Tony Im to the Associated Press, the gun in question was an Uzi....
Blues 13/2 to beat Swansea 1-0 N’Golo Kante and Danny Drinkwater performed their duties well in midfield, but Bakayoko wasn’t matching their performances on the left-hand side, leaving Gary Cahill and Marcos Alonso exposed. Chelsea got a 1-1 draw and Antonio Conte’s player rotation was mostly a success. His side only arrived back into London at 5am on Thursday morning after a Champions League trip to Azerbaijan, then had to travel to Anfield for their match on Saturday due to television scheduling....
Mudryk, 22, joined Chelsea from Ukrainian outfit Shakhtar Donetsk for an initial fee of around £61 million. Graham Potter’s side beat fellow London rivals Arsenal in the race to secure the highly-rated attacker’s signature. According to the aforementioned source, there are more performance-based add-ons as part of the deal, which amount to around £26 million. Mudryk seems to be a long-term signing and has penned an eight-and-a-half year contract which will keep him at Stamford Bridge until the summer of 2031....
You can count Middlesbrough’s Spanish coach Aitor Karanka as one of them. Speaking to SkySports ahead of the game, the former Real Madrid assistant coach went as far as proclaiming that Antonio Conte’s men are the favourites for the title “Antonio [Conte] has done very well and is settling into the league very well. They are second within a couple of months and showing they are a really consistent team....
Chelsea play on Saturday afternoon against Newcastle United having had less than three days to prepare having faced Swansea City on Wednesday evening. Conte rested Eden Hazard, Tiemoue Bakayoko and Cesar Azpilicueta midweek so the trio would be fresh for the clash against Rafael Benitez’s side but he thinks that the Magpies’ extra day of rest gives them the advantage. “Yes, I must be honest,” Conte said in a news conference at Cobham Training Ground....
Pulisic, 21, was an unused substitute in Chelsea’s 2-0 Premier League win over Brighton and Hove Albion on Saturday. Pulisic moved to Chelsea from Bundesliga runners-up Borussia Dortmund in the offseason amid plenty of hype following a $73 million transfer. However, the United States international has only appeared in one of the club’s last five matches — the 7-1 EFL Cup rout of Grimsby Town on Wednesday. “Yeah, of course, it is very frustrating, but I will continue to work my hardest because I want to play,” Pulisic told NBC Sports after Saturday’s game....
Musonda has been unable to make the breakthrough at Stamford Bridge after joining from Anderlecht in 2012 and is expected to be sold this summer. Speculation has claimed that the 20-year-old is on his way to Celtic in a £5 million deal, with Rodgers looking to add creativity to his squad for next season. Time is right for Alexis to ditch Arsenal “It’s been a period of six months,” said Rodgers when talking about his prospective signing....
According to the Daily Mail, Rudiger is ready to make a compromise with regards to his contract demands. The club are willing to offer the 28-year-old a £200,000-per-week salary package, which still reportedly falls short of the German’s demands. Reports have, however, suggested Rudiger is happy and ‘fully open to staying’ at Chelsea. Antonio Rudiger joined Chelsea from AS Roma in the summer of 2017 in a deal worth £29 million....
The defender was heavily linked with a move to Chelsea ahead of the 2016-17 campaign, with Napoli president Aurelio De Laurentiis claiming Antonio Conte’s men were ready to pay €58million to secure a deal. But Koulibaly is under contract with Napoli until 2021 having signed a new deal last September and he is not expecting to be on the move. The 25-year-old, though, appears to be a fan of England’s top flight and played in the country during Senegal’s 1-1 draw with Nigeria in Barnet on Thursday....
Belgium international Hazard returned from two weeks out with a back problem when he came on in the 64th minute of Sunday’s 3-1 victory over Crystal Palace. Chelsea head coach Maurizio Sarri will continue to restrict the 27-year-old’s game time in Belarus, though he insists it is not a gamble to include him in the squad. “From our doctor there is no risk, otherwise he would stay at Cobham [training ground],” said Sarri....
In case you didn’t know… Loftus-Cheek is presently one of the brightest prospects in Europe, owing to his dynamism and footballing intelligence. He has been at Chelsea since 2004 and at the moment, is fighting for a regular place in the first team. The heart of the matter Although he hasn’t started a single league game, the England international has netted five goals in his last six appearances, including a Champions League hat-trick....
Meanwhile, Cardiff will be hoping to churn out a result against the Blues as even a single point away at Stamford Bridge would be a remarkable result for the Bluebirds. Chelsea vs Cardiff City: Kick-Off information Date: 14 September Kickoff: 15:00 (local time), 19:30 (IST) Venue: Stamford Bridge Team news Chelsea: Cesc Fabregas is not yet match fit, whereas Emerson Palmieri, Davide Zappacosta and Ruben Loftus-Cheek have endured knocks....
After the Kepa incident which took place in the dying moments of the Carabao Cup final between Chelsea and Manchester City, the headlines just spoke about the fallout of the players and the manager Maurizio Sarri. Chelsea lost to Manchester City 4-3 on penalties, as the blue half of Manchester rejoiced, lifting the Carabao Cup trophy. Putting behind all the rumours of walking away from the club, Sarri had a positive pre-match press conference yesterday....
A contributing factor in the excitement was the fact that both Chelsea and Liverpool were looking for a win in the hope they could reduce the deficit behind Man City to single digits. As it stands, Chelsea (2nd, 43 points) is 10 points back and Liverpool (3rd, 42 points) is 11 points away though the Reds have a game in hand. Liverpool looked to be cruising early with Sadio Mane and Mohamed Salah staking it out to a 2-0 lead after just 16 minutes, exposing the Chelsea defense on both goals....
