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      Top ten highest-paid athletes of 2022 released by Forbes with Lionel Messi still top despite struggles at PSG

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      LIONEL MESSI is the highest-paid sports star in the world for 2022 – and now earns as much as Cristiano Ronaldo off the pitch.The legendary Argentine has endured a tough first season at Paris Saint-Germain following his shock Barcelona exit.
      Neymar and Lionel Messi both feature in the top four for highest-paid athletes in 2022Credit: AFP

      But he has continued to rake the cash in from his new club and his various sponsors.
      And that sees him return to the top of the Forbes rankings for 2022 after doing so in 2019.
      However, last year’s top dog, Conor McGregor, does not even make the top ten this time around – with the majority of his £148million earnings coming from selling his Proper No. Twelve whiskey brand.
      Other notable absentees this time around include F1 pair Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton, Naomi Osaka, Tiger Woods, Tyson Fury and Kylian Mbappe.
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Sun;font-size:18px;line-height:1.333;font-weight:700;letter-spacing:0%;font-stretch:normal;display:inline;}.css-i1acvs:hover:not(:disabled){-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}BISH BASH DOSH .css-8h3gc3{margin:0;padding:0;color:rgba(34,37,38,1);-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;font-family:The Sun;font-size:18px;line-height:1.333;font-weight:700;letter-spacing:0%;font-stretch:normal;display:inline;}.css-8h3gc3:hover:not(:disabled){-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;}Fury leading McGregor in sport rich list for 2022 with Canelo top fighter
      So who are the world’s top-earning athletes right now?
      10. Giannis Antetokounmpo – Basketball – £66m
      The ‘Greek Freak’, 27, has pretty much an even split of on-court and off-court earnings and is the youngest member of this exclusive club – in fact he is the only one still in his 20s.
      Giannis Antetokounmpo completes the top ten and is the youngest of the groupCredit: Getty Images – Getty
      The Milwaukee Bucks’ two-time MVP boasts the biggest contract in NBA history and has plenty of sponsors including WhatsApp and Google as well as an NFT platform and Disney+ biopic on the way.
      9. Tom Brady – NFL – £69m
      Brady’s short-lived retirement means the iconic quarterback will be back on the pitch for Tampa Bay Buccaneers later this year.
      Tom Brady already earns big before his mega-deal with Fox Sports startsCredit: Getty
      Not that the 44-year-old needs the extra cash, with £43m of his money coming from various ventures including NFTs, production companies and a clothing label – plus he has a £307m deal as a Fox Sports commentator when he does retire.
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      8. Canelo Alvarez – Boxing – £74m
      He may have just lost his second career fight with a shock defeat to Dmitry Bivol, but one look at his bank balance will soon boost the Mexican, 31, and top-paid boxer in the world.
      Canelo Alvarez is the only combat sportsperson in the top ten and has the highest percentage of on-field earningsCredit: Reuters
      A whopping 95 per cent of his earnings came from inside the ring thanks to two PPV fights earning as least £33m each – the Bivol fight was not included in the current list – supplemented by his taco restaurant and Hennessy deal.
      7. Roger Federer – Tennis – £74m
      For a 40-year-old man who won just nine tennis matches since February 2020 – none since last summer – and is currently in rehab from another knee surgery, Federer is doing alright for himself.
      Federer has not won a tennis match since July 2021 but is the No1 for sponsorshipsCredit: Getty
      The Swiss maestro is world sport’s No1 brand ambassador with £73.5m of his £74m coming from sponsors such as Uniqlo, Rolex and Swiss shoe brand On.
      6. Kevin Durant – Basketball – £76m
      The Brooklyn Nets hero, 33, brings in the majority of his cash from commercial deals and a business empire, with £23m alone for wearing Nike trainers.
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      A whole host of business ventures help Kevin Durant earn the big bucksCredit: AP
      Other sources of incoming include Coinbase, Weepmaps, Boardroom, Thirty Five Ventures, an NFT platform and a digital fitness startup.
      5. Steph Curry – Basketball – £76m
      No NBA player earned more this season on the court than Curry – and that £38m figure is only going up after he signed a whopping new contract to see him pocket nearly £50m by 2025-26.
      As one of the most marketable NBA players, Steph Curry has huge incoming on and off the courtCredit: Getty Images – Getty
      Away from Golden State, the 34-year-old has an FTX endorsement which includes an equity stake and NFTs in three metaverses – although he pledged to donate the earnings – as well as a production company Unanimous Media.

      Neymar, 30, is on around £600,000 a week as his basic wage at PSG, delivering just 12 goals in all competitions this term and only a Ligue 1 winners medal to show.
      Neymar is one of the top-paid footballers in the world before considering his dealsCredit: AFP
      But Forbes have him down as earning another £500,000 per week on average from various bonuses and signing-on fees – plus £20m from endorsements such as Puma, Red Bull, Netflix and his recent launch of an electric car in Germany alongside Alica Schmidt.

      Time for the big hitters and no surprise to see Ronaldo’s name right among them with his mammoth Manchester United wages and various extra bonuses.
      Cristiano Ronaldo is forced to settle behind Lionel Messi once againCredit: Getty
      Just shy of half of the 37-year-old’s £94m came from off-field payments including mega bucks from Nike, Herbalife and Clear shampoo while the Portuguese icon rakes it in from the likes of ZujuGP as the most-followed person on Instagram.
      2. LeBron James – Basketball – £99m
      James’ basketball accolades speak for themselves with the LA Lakers great continuing to be paid huge wages in the NBA.
      LeBron James is the top-paid athlete in all of American sportsCredit: Getty
      But two-thirds of his 2022 comes from elsewhere including featuring in Space Jam, his The Shop talk show, selling his stake in a production company and various endorsements including with Crypto.com – together they made James, 37, the tenth athlete to pass the 12-month $100m landmark.
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      Top of the pile is Messi, 34, who bags an eye-watering £1.2m per WEEK simply by being a PSG player once bonus fees are added to his monster wages – although apparently that £61m is £18m less than his annual wage during his last year at Barcelona.
      The £16m deal with Socios, together with being on the payroll of adidas, Budweiser, PepsiCo and Hard Rock International means the Ballon d’Or winner made the same amount off the field (£45m) as Ronaldo for the first time since 2013.
      PSG money pagnet Messi is crowned king once again – just as he was in 2019Credit: Getty More

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      Naomi Osaka Leaves IMG to Start Her Own Agency, Evolve

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      Already the world’s top-earning female athlete, Osaka is leaving IMG to start a sports representation company with her longtime agent, Stuart Duguid.The tennis career of Naomi Osaka, one of the biggest sports celebrities in the world, has taken on certain familiar characteristics during the past 16 months.Her achievements have been limited on the court because of a series of self-imposed layoffs to manage her struggles with mental health, motivation challenges and the occasional physical ailment, but she has enjoyed wild success off the court, solidifying her status as one of the world’s highest-paid athletes and by far the highest-paid female athlete.As she sits out the Italian Open to nurse an Achilles’ injury and prepare for the year’s second Grand Slam event, the French Open, set for later this month, Osaka announced that she would be starting a representation agency to take further control of her mounting business portfolio. Osaka and her longtime agent, Stuart Duguid, have left IMG, the sports and entertainment conglomerate, to begin Evolve, which will manage Osaka’s business interests and potentially those of other clients the agency may sign.News of Osaka’s decision to start Evolve was first reported by Sportico.A four-time Grand Slam singles champion, Osaka, 24, earned roughly $60 million last year, according to Forbes, with an estimated $55 million coming from more than a dozen corporate sponsors. She was tied for 12th on the Forbes list of top-earning athletes with Tiger Woods. Conor McGregor, the mixed martial artist, held the top spot on the list, earning $180 million.In an interview Wednesday, Duguid said Osaka’s main priority remained winning tennis matches and tournaments. He said her typical day involves training and treatments with her physiotherapist in the morning followed by lunch, but once that is over, she almost always wants to engage in her cultural or business interests.“She’s not someone who likes to play video games and binge Netflix all day,” said Duguid, who has worked closely with Osaka since she was a teenager.Osaka’s ranking has tumbled in the past year and a half, largely because she has played so little. She was ranked second in the world at the beginning of 2021, but dropped to 85th this year. She made the finals of the Miami Open in April, and is up to 38th, and she hopes to climb back into the top 10 by the end of the year.“I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want to be No. 1 again,” she said at the tournament in Miami.A spokesman for IMG declined to comment.Osaka during the women’s singles final at the Miami Open in April.Wilfredo Lee/Associated PressLosing a star of Osaka’s magnitude is a significant loss for the company, though it will most likely continue to earn money on existing endorsement deals that it negotiated on her behalf. She is one of a handful of transcendent tennis stars IMG has represented in the past two decades. Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal left the IMG fold in recent years to start businesses with their agents, Tony Godsick and Carlos Costa.For Osaka, the goal of Evolve is not simply to save money on paying commissions to a third party, but also to grow her business portfolio to $150 million annually in the coming years, from roughly $50 million today, but not by signing deals that put more company logos on her tennis outfits.Duguid said Osaka might actually pare down her endorsement portfolio. The model for Evolve is similar to businesses set up by several of Osaka’s role models in the sports industry, many of whom have become close friends, including LeBron James and Stephen Curry. Osaka was also close with Kobe Bryant, who died in 2020 in a helicopter crash and who was an early mentor to her.She has been weighing a venture like Evolve since the Tokyo Olympics, where she lit the Olympic cauldron and was the face of the Games in Japan, her home country. Osaka has wanted more leeway to invest in businesses, have an ownership stake in them and grow her own. She started Kinlò, a skin care products company focused on people with melanated, or darker, skin tones, last year.That announcement came days after Osaka exited the U.S. Open after being upset by Leylah Fernandez, an unseeded Canadian, in the third round. She announced in a teary news conference after the match that she planned to take an indefinite break from tennis. She had previously taken seven weeks off after she dropped out of the French Open last spring following a conflict with tournament organizers. Osaka had stated that she would not participate in mandatory news conferences after matches. Organizers had threatened to throw her out of the tournament if she did not fulfill her news media obligations, so Osaka withdrew.Neither the breaks nor her drop in the rankings appears to have affected her ability to grow her business off the court. Now, Duguid said, she will try to retain her leading position off the court as she tries to regain the one she once had on it.“This is something that scratches an itch on the side for her,” he said. More

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      Are the Next Global Tennis Stars Among These ’Tweens?

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      ACHARNES, Greece — Behold Dominik Defoe. Ten years old and barely taller than the net. Golden brown shoulder-length curls bouncing in the air as he chases and crushes tennis balls, which he does better than just about any kid his age.Defoe loves to fiddle with the GPS in his mother’s car, so in the morning when they head to school, the phone directs them to Roland Garros, site of the French Open. He does it so often that his mother knows Roland Garros is 2 hours 47 minutes away from their home in Belgium.Defoe was nearly in tears earlier this year when he received one of the 48 invitations from IMG, the sports and entertainment conglomerate, to attend the first Future Stars Invitational Tournament at the posh Tatoi Club in the northern suburbs of Athens. The event, for boys and girls aged 12 and under, is both a tournament and a weeklong education in the life that might await Defoe and his rarefied peers, complete with seminars led by executives at Nike and the men’s and women’s pro tours, the ATP and the WTA.The race to find the sport’s next stars has come to this: With eight-figure fortunes potentially at stake, agents and scouts are evaluating and cultivating players even younger than 10 who are just getting started in serious competition. Future Stars is the newest and most extravagant recruitment effort for IMG, the company that essentially invented the sports representation business and dominated tennis for years.“Nobody wants to have a tournament for 11- and 12-year-olds,” said Max Eisenbud, who leads the company’s tennis division. “I’d rather wait, but the competition forced us into this situation.”For years, IMG’s agents collected future stars in two ways: Tweens and young teens (Maria Sharapova for example) either showed up at its academy in Bradenton, Fla., once the premier training ground in the sport, looking for one of the plentiful scholarships; or the agents showed up in Tarbes, France, for Les Petit As, the world’s premier tournament for players younger than 14. There, they often had something close to the pick of the litter.Max Eisenbud, onetime agent to Maria Sharapova and today a senior vice president of IMG Tennis, poses for a portrait on an indoor court at the Tatoi Club.Myrto Papadopoulos for The New York TimesDuring the past decade though, rival academies opened across Europe and IMG’s academy focused more on profiting from families paying tuition rather than making long-shot bets on teenagers. Also, in recent years, when Eisenbud and his colleagues made their annual trips to Les Petit As, they found that nearly all the most promising players had already signed contracts with other management companies, many of them well-funded boutique operations that were offering generous financial guarantees, sometimes stretching well beyond covering the roughly $50,000 annual cost for coaching and travel on the junior circuit.And so, in a sign of cutthroat times in tennis, IMG is aiming younger, even if prospecting preteen talent can be nearly impossible and highly fraught, risking increasing the pressure on children who already put plenty on themselves and, in some cases, carry the financial responsibilities for their struggling families.If stars like Naomi Osaka and Bianca Andreescu, Grand Slam tournament champions who are in their 20s, have had to take breaks from tennis to care for their mental health, it’s not a stretch to consider the risks of raising expectations so explicitly for prepubescent children. During a talk for the girls on how to stay physically and mentally healthy, Saga Shermis, an athlete development specialist with the WTA, said she expected to see them on the tour in the coming years. It can be a lot.“At this age they are still learning,” said Adam Molenda, a youth coach with Poland’s tennis federation, after watching two of his players, Antonina Snochowska and Maja Schweika, rally for an hour on Monday. “You never can say who will make it. Life is full of surprises.”And decisions.Grace Bernstein, a young Swedish standout, floated across the court and blasted balls against a boy as her mother watched from the fence. Whether she plays tennis or cards, Bernstein competes relentlessly, said her mother, Catharina, a former player whose singles ranking peaked at 286 in 1991. She plays at an academy run by Magnus Norman, once the world’s second-ranked men’s singles player. She is also a top soccer player.“She goes back and forth, but for now it’s tennis, so she plays tennis,” Catharina Bernstein said.Dominik Defoe, far right, participated in outdoor games organized on the sidelines of the event; these games aim to provide the children with an opportunity to decompress and bond.Myrto Papadopoulos for The New York TimesFor some, fame and fortune really can seem inevitable. Eisenbud famously signed Sharapova when she was 11 years old after watching her hit for 45 minutes with an intensity and flawlessness he had never before seen. Carlos Alcaraz, who turns 19 on Thursday and is already the hottest young player in the men’s game, was deemed worthy of investment as a can’t-miss 11-year-old, too. Then again, Eisenbud was sure the first player he signed, Horia Tecau of Romania, was destined for greatness. Tecau became a top doubles specialist but never cracked the top 300 in singles.Eisenbud hatched his plan 18 months ago for a lavish competition with most expenses covered and all the perks of a professional event — ball kids, chair umpires, immaculate red clay courts, Beats headphones and swag from Nike for all the kids.“We want to treat them like professional athletes,” said Elli Vizantiou, the chief executive of the Tatoi Club.Not entirely forgetting they are kids, there was also a treasure hunt, group dinners each night and a tour of the Parthenon. IMG brought in Alcaraz, fresh off his win in the Barcelona Open final, to play an exhibition against Hubert Hurkacz, the 14th-ranked men’s singles player.Assembling the Future Stars field required months of interviews with coaches and tennis federation officials all over the world, evaluating resumes and tournament results, and scouring videos, looking for the magical combination of athleticism and skill. Creating a globally representative field was important, too. Finding a future top 50 player from a country or a demographic group that has never produced a tennis star could be groundbreaking and incredibly lucrative. Players had to come with a chaperone, which in most cases was a parent, and a coach, giving IMG the chance to build relationships..Maria Sharapova at age 11 at the Bollettieri Sports Academy in Bradenton, Fla., in 1998. Gary I. Rothstein for The New York TimesEisenbud encouraged the coaches to pepper the Italian coach Riccardo Piatti, who led a coaching seminar, with questions, describing him as the “best” in the world.Piatti spent Tuesday morning with an eye on Tyson Grant, a top under-12 player whose family he has been working with for nearly seven years. Piatti also oversees the coaching for Tyson’s 14-year-old sister, Tyra, who is already an IMG client. Tyson and Tyra’s father, Tyrone Grant, is nearly 6-foot-8 and played basketball professionally for a decade in Europe. With good genes, an early start and guidance from a renowned coach, Tyson Grant could be a decent bet.A few courts over, Haniya Minhas was ripping one of the great young backhands, which she begins with the nub of her racket handle just about resting on her back hip.“My favorite shot,” she said. “Everyone tells me to extend my arms, but I like the way I do it.”Minhas, 11, is Pakistani and Muslim. She plays in a hijab, long sleeves and tights, and already looks like a billboard in the making. She has been winning tournaments since she was 5 years old. Her search for suitable competition has taken her from Pakistan, where there is little support for girls’ sports and where she competed against and beat all of the boys her age, to Turkey. Her mother, Annie, said she and her daughter want to prove that someone who looks and dresses differently from most players and is from a country that has never had a tennis star can beat anyone. They expect to sign with an agent when Haniya turns 12.“We are trying to change the thinking,” Annie Minhas said.Sevil Parviz, 12 and from Great Britain, rested after practicing on one of the Tatoi Club’s indoor courts.Myrto Papadopoulos for The New York TimesTeo Davidov has a neat trick. Davidov, arguably the top boys’ player under 12, lives in Florida. His parents moved from Bulgaria to Colorado a decade ago when his father won the green card lottery. Born right-handed, he hits forehands on both sides and can serve with either hand, too. His father and coach, Kalin, started trying to make Teo ambidextrous in tennis when he was 8 years old because he was hyperactive. Kalin thought that stimulating the right hemisphere of his brain, which controls attention and memory, and the left side of the body, with left-handed exercises, would make him calmer.“Hopefully it also helps his game,” said Kalin Davidov. The technique is devastating for now, but a top player has never succeeded by playing that way.The Davidovs first got to know Eisenbud and IMG three years ago, after Kalin posted a video of his son’s double-forehand game on Facebook. Soon, the phone rang. Babolat, the French racket maker, is a sponsor.Michael Chang, who won the French Open in 1989 at 17, came with his daughter, Lani, who displayed an awfully familiar-looking drop shot and buried her nose in a Rick Riordan novel on the shuttle bus between the courts and the hotel. Chang said the circuit for young juniors has transformed since his childhood, with far more travel and international competition.“They’re getting a taste of what it’s like,” he said.In 1989 Michael Chang won the French Open at age 17. Now, Chang watches his daughter Lani play at the Tatoi Club.From left: Associated Press; Matthew FuttermanGunther Darkey, a former middling pro from Britain, brought his son, Denzell, a top prospect and one of the few Black elite juniors for the Lawn Tennis Association. Alcaraz has a 10-year-old brother, Jaime, who was good enough to receive an invitation. So was Meghan Knight, the daughter of a well-known cricketer from England.“You’ve got to be the kind of person who from 9 years old can improve consistently while taking losses every week for 10 or 15 years,” said Seb Lavie, who brought two players from his academy in Auckland, New Zealand.Dominik Defoe insisted he is prepared for whatever it takes to make it. He was just about the smallest of the two dozen boys. He still plays with a junior-size racket and struggled to keep up with Grant in his first match. His opponents all try to hit with heavy topspin to bury him in the backcourt. He swats the ball back on a short hop before it kicks above his head.Young players at the IMG tennis camp.Matthew FuttermanDefoe, who is fluent in four languages, promised himself as a toddler that he would win the French Open. He has built his existence around giving himself the best chance to make that happen.He attends school in the morning for math and language lessons, but he works independently on the rest of his studies to free up more hours for tennis. Studying the pros closely, he decided not to have one favorite but built a composite player who has Dominic Thiem’s forehand, Nick Kyrgios’s serve, Novak Djokovic’s backhand, Rafael Nadal’s attitude, Roger Federer’s net game and Felix Auger-Aliassime’s footwork. He practices mindfulness by writing in a journal.“He told me when we were coming here that this journey was like a train ride,” said his mother, Rachel, who was his first coach. “This is just one stop, one station. Then the train goes on.” More

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      Boris Becker Sentenced to Two and a Half Years for Hiding Assets in Bankruptcy

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      The former tennis champion was found guilty by a London court on charges related to his 2017 insolvency.LONDON — Boris Becker, the six-time Grand Slam tennis champion, was sentenced to two and a half years in prison on Friday in his bankruptcy case, after he was found guilty by a London court of hiding millions of dollars’ worth of assets and loans to avoid paying his debts.The sentence punctuated a startling fall from grace for Mr. Becker, 54, who parlayed his tennis skill, ebullient personality and business ambitions into a personal fortune before he was found guilty this month at Southwark Crown Court of four charges related to his June 2017 bankruptcy.The bankruptcy case meant Mr. Becker was legally obliged to disclose all of his assets so that they could be used to pay his creditors, but the court found several instances in which he failed to meet his obligations for disclosure.Mr. Becker failed to disclose a property he owned in his home country of Germany, concealed a loan of €825,000 (around $872,000) and assets valued at €426,930.90, and did not disclose shares owned in a gambling tech firm, according to Britain’s Insolvency Service. He was acquitted of 20 other counts relating to his bankruptcy.Mr. Becker made tennis history in 1985 when at age 17, he became the youngest champion in the history of men’s singles at Wimbledon. He went on to win there two more times, in 1986 and 1989, and took three other Grand Slam singles titles: the U.S. Open in 1989 and the Australian Open in 1991 and 1996. He retired from professional tennis in 1999.The tennis star was the subject of enormous attention not just for his success on the court. The tabloids also kept a close watch on his tumultuous love life, including a divorce and a fleeting affair with a Russian woman with whom he fathered a child.The precarious financial situation of Mr. Becker has been under scrutiny for several years.In 2017, a private bank in London, Arbuthnot Latham, made an application for bankruptcy proceedings against Mr. Becker, claiming that payment of a large debt owed by him was nearly two years overdue. He was soon declared officially bankrupt by a London court, which found that he could not repay his debts.That same year, a Swiss court rejected a claim by a former Swiss business partner, who claimed Mr. Becker owed him more than $40 million.As he fended off his creditors, in 2018, Mr. Becker sought to claim diplomatic immunity, because the Central African Republic had named him as its attaché to the European Union for sports, culture and humanitarian affairs.If that claim had been granted, any action against Mr. Becker would have required the approval of the foreign secretary, who at the time was Boris Johnson, the current prime minister. But Mr. Becker eventually dropped the claim.In 2002, Mr. Becker was convicted in Germany of income tax evasion, given two years’ probation and fined nearly $300,000. The verdict came six years after German tax investigators raided Mr. Becker’s home in Munich.Mr. Becker is said to have won millions of dollars in prize money and sponsorship deals. He has had several business ventures over the years, including a line of branded tennis gear. He has often appeared as a television commentator for the BBC at Wimbledon, and he coached Novak Djokovic, the world’s top-ranked men’s singles player, for a few years. More

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      Top 10 sporting rivalries revealed with Cristiano Ronaldo vs Lionel Messi just second

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      Bjorn Borg’s tennis battle with John McEnroe has been voted the best sporting rivalry of all time.The two court stars played head-to-head 14 times between 1978 and 1981, competing in the biggest tennis tournaments around the world. 
      And a poll of 2,000 adults saw Cristiano Ronaldo versus Lionel Messi, and the England football team versus Germany land in second and third.
      John McEnroe and Bjorn Borg just before the Men’s singles final at Wimbledon in 1981, their rivalry has been voted the best in sporting historyCredit: Getty
      Cristiano Ronaldo vs Lionel Messi came in second place in the pollCredit: Getty
      Muhammad Ali versus Joe Frazier, and more recent tennis opposition, Roger Federer versus Rafael Nadal, completed the top five.
      It also emerged adults prefer sporting rivalries over quarrels between reality TV stars, or fictional spats in films.
      And three in 10 said a competitive element within TV or film is much more likely to drive their enthusiasm for it.
      Nintendo, which commissioned the research, will be recreating one of the greatest fictional rivalries of all time, Harry Potter’s Gryffindor and Slytherin – according to 14 per cent of respondents – to compete head-to-head in a battle of fast thumbs and expert video gameplay.
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      On-screen rivals Tom Felton and Matt Lewis battled it out in a series of sporting matches on Nintendo Switch Sports at London’s Westfield White City today.
      The duo juked it out in front of a crowd of onlookers, which saw the cinematic rivals go toe-to-toe, reminiscent of their past on-screen fictional rivalry.
      The study also found that many love to see a strong sporting rivalry play out with three in 10 saying it can make watching a sporting event more exciting.
      But 46 per cent think football creates the best rivalries, followed by Formula One racing (23 per cent) and tennis (22.6 per cent).
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      England’s football rivalry with Germany also made the listCredit: AP
      While 32 per cent even find themselves getting emotionally invested in watching two sporting sides compete against one another, for one to come out victorious.
      And nearly half (46 per cent) of those who enjoy the thrill of a celebrity spat will talk about the latest gossip with friends and family.
      The study, conducted via OnePoll, also found more than four in 10 said some of the most amusing famous squabbles are those between close friends who have later made up.
      TOP 10 SPORTING RIVALRIES:
      1.        Bjorn Borg vs John McEnroe
      2.        Cristiano Ronaldo vs Lionel Messi
      3.        England vs Germany
      4.        Muhammed Ali vs Joe Frazier
      5.        Roger Federer vs Rafael Nadal
      6.        Nigel Benn vs Chris Eubank
      7.        Roy Keane vs Patrick Vieira
      8.        Oxford vs Cambridge – Boat Race
      9.        Liverpool vs Manchester United
      10.      Ayrton Senna vs Alain Prost More

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      Wimbledon Will Bar Russian and Belarusian Players

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      Wimbledon officials have confirmed that they intend to bar Russian and Belarusian players from playing in this year’s tournament because of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and Belarus’s support of the war.The ban would make Wimbledon the first Grand Slam tennis event to restrict individual Russian and Belarusian athletes from competing. In a statement Wednesday afternoon, Wimbledon confirmed that other tennis tournaments to be held this year in the United Kingdom plan to take the same approach.“Given the profile of The Championships in the United Kingdom and around the world, it is our responsibility to play our part in the widespread efforts of government, industry, sporting and creative institutions to limit Russia’s global influence through the strongest means possible,” the statement read.“In the circumstances of such unjustified and unprecedented military aggression, it would be unacceptable for the Russian regime to derive any benefits from the involvement of Russian or Belarusian players with The Championships.”Wimbledon, one of the four Grand Slam tournaments, is scheduled to begin in late June. The tournament, in its statement, left open the possibility of revising its position, stating that “if circumstances change materially between now and June, we will consider and respond accordingly.”The decision would exclude a number of highly ranked players. Four Russian men are ranked in the top 30 on the ATP Tour, including No. 2 Daniil Medvedev, who is the reigning U.S. Open men’s singles champion, although he is recovering from a hernia operation. Russia has five women in the top 40 of the WTA Tour rankings, led by No. 15 Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova. Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus is ranked No. 4 and was a Wimbledon semifinalist last year. Her compatriot Victoria Azarenka, a former No. 1, is ranked No. 18.After the war began in February, professional tennis organizers were quick to bar the Russians and their Belarusian allies from team events like the Davis Cup and the Billie Jean King Cup, both of which were won by Russian teams in 2021. The sport’s seven governing bodies announced that ban collectively on March 1.And the men’s and women’s tour events in Moscow later this season were canceled, as were a number of lower-tier events in Russia and Belarus. The International Tennis Federation also announced the suspension of the Russian Tennis Federation and Belarusian Tennis Federation from I.T.F. membership.But Russian and Belarusian players have been permitted to continue competing on the professional tours as individuals albeit without any national identification. There are no longer flags or countries listed next to their names on scoreboards, in draws or in the published computer rankings.Russia’s Daniil Medvedev during the 2021 Wimbledon tournament. He is currently ranked No. 2 in men’s singles.Adrian Dennis/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesBut there have been calls for a full ban from several former and current Ukrainian players, including the rising women’s star Marta Kostyuk and the former player Olga Savchuk, the captain of Ukraine’s Billie Jean King Cup team, which competed against the United States in Asheville, N.C., last week.“I think it’s just a matter of time,” Savchuk said in an interview. “It’s not me who’s making the decision, but I think they should also be banned from playing as individuals. It cannot just be a sanction against 90 percent of the Russian people and 10 percent not.”“It has to be even,” Savchuk added. “And I think it’s collective guilt.”But while some other international sports, including track and field and figure skating, have barred individual Russian and Belarusian athletes from some competitions, professional tennis had adopted a more conservative approach.Russia-Ukraine War: Key DevelopmentsCard 1 of 3A new phase of the war. More

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      in Tennis

      Ukraine Team Finds Escape, and Almost an Upset, Against U.S.

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      A supportive tennis crowd in Asheville, N.C., watched the Ukrainians nearly pull off an upset of the United States in a Billie Jean King Cup qualifier.ASHEVILLE, N.C. — The Ukrainian comeback attempt had come up just short, and Dayana Yastremska and her four teammates were preparing to pose for their final formal photograph at this Billie Jean King Cup qualifier.The blue and yellow ribbon representing Ukraine that had been stenciled onto the tennis court by special permission was no longer visible, obscured by the red, white and blue streamers that had fallen to the ground as part of the Americans’ celebration after their 3-2 victory Saturday night.The Ukrainians, with some help from the United States’ team captain, Kathy Rinaldi, cleared away some of the streamers. But as another official began removing them altogether, Yastremska insisted that they remained next to the ribbon for the photograph.“They were in the colors of U.S.A., and I wanted to leave this near the Ukrainian colors,” she said in an interview. “Because I think it’s a good sign of the support we got here and a sign for peace. I wanted it to stay.”It was that kind of week in Asheville: The symbolic gestures were more indelible than the results, and the usual rules of engagement were rewritten in an attempt to dull the edges of a national team competition.“It’s been hard not to cry,” said Billie Jean King, 78, the American who once starred in this competition, which was formerly known as the Fed Cup long before it was renamed for her in 2020. She visited both teams on Friday shortly before play began. “I just hope the Ukrainians had a moment of escapism.”After Russia invaded Ukraine in February, United States Tennis Association officials offered to postpone this qualifying-round match. The Ukrainians demurred, but when it came time to book hotels in Asheville, they conceded they no longer had the money for the usual visiting team expenses.“We said, ‘No problem, we will cover all your local costs,’” said Stacey Allaster, the chief executive for professional tennis at the U.S.T.A., which also provided support staff to the delegation. “With the war, it’s so horrifying what’s going on. What can any individual do? But we can all do little things, and what we can do is provide a platform for the Ukrainians to demonstrate that they are strong and fighting and are not going to quit.”The posters around this city in the Blue Ridge Mountains did not read, “U.S.A. vs. Ukraine.” They read, “U.S.A. hosts Ukraine.” On changeovers, the scoreboard flashed information on how to donate to the Ukraine Crisis Relief Fund, and about $225,000 was raised in connection with the matches. The American cheering squad supported individual players instead of chanting, “Go U.S.A.!”“We were just trying to find the proper tone and balance,” Allaster said.The Ukrainian players, all of whom still have family members in their embattled country, felt the job was done right: from the informal dinner for the teams at an Asheville restaurant on Tuesday night to the stirring a cappella rendition of the Ukrainian national anthem by Julia Kashirets that left members of both teams in tears minutes before the matches began.Julia Kashirets sang the Ukrainian national anthem at the Billie Jean King Cup qualifier on Saturday.Eakin Howard/Getty Images“We came here to play not against the U.S.A. but with the U.S.A. for Ukraine, and that’s how it felt to me,” Katarina Zavatska said. That was in part because of the numerous fans with Ukrainian connections and flags. Christina Dyakiv, 15, from William Floyd High School in Mastic Beach on Long Island, traveled to Asheville with her Ukrainian-born parents. Juliia Sherrod, a Ukrainian former leading junior player who now lives in Knoxville, Tenn., made the two-hour drive on short notice.“Every little win counts in any field for Ukraine right now,” said Sherrod, 35, who also goes by Yulia. “In the big scheme of things, a tennis match is no big deal, but it still means a lot.”In that supportive atmosphere, the Ukrainians nearly managed the upset. After falling behind, 0-2, on Friday, they won both singles matches on Saturday in straight sets. Yastremska, a former top-25 player now ranked 93rd on the WTA Tour, often overwhelmed No. 14 Jessica Pegula. More surprisingly, the 201st-ranked Zavatska defeated No. 46 Shelby Rogers.That meant the concluding doubles match would be decisive, and Pegula and Asia Muhammad, making her King Cup debut, earned a 7-6 (5), 6-3 victory over Yastremska and Lyudmyla Kichenok.“All day we just really felt that fighting spirit of Ukraine,” Rogers said. “It was really special to see, but really tough to go against. I’m just so proud of my team for stepping up to that, having nerves of steel.”Asia Muhammad, left, celebrated with Jessica Pegula after winning the concluding doubles match that qualified the U.S. team for the Billie Jean King Cup finals.Susan Mullane/USA Today Sports, via ReutersThe first set of the doubles match came down to very little. With Muhammad serving at 5-6, 30-30, the Americans had to scramble to win the longest, most spectacular rally of the match, and at 5-5 in the tiebreaker, Kichenok’s full-cut passing shot struck the very top of the tape.“She wanted to take a little bit of risk,” Yastremska said, making a tiny space between her right thumb and index finger. “Just like this, in the net!”The victory qualified the Americans for the 12-team King Cup finals in November, but the Ukrainians are not necessarily eliminated. One wild-card slot is available, and depending on which nation is selected to host the finals, it might be available to Ukraine.A full-strength Ukrainian team could be formidable: No. 25 Elina Svitolina and No. 53 Marta Kostyuk, the country’s two highest-ranked singles players, missed this match because of injuries and personal issues.“I don’t want to be arrogant, but maybe we deserve this,” Zavatska said.Russia won the King Cup last year before being barred from this year’s competition because of the invasion. Olga Savchuk, the Ukrainian team captain in Asheville, believes tennis needs to take the next step and bar Russian players from individual events as well, something Wimbledon is considering.“Why is somebody who works in McDonald’s in Russia losing their job because of sanctions and the tennis players are exceptions?” Savchuk said.Zavatska, 22, who is based in southern France, believes the Russians need to take responsibility and “feel discomfort too, as long as people and children are dying in Ukraine.” She said some Russian and Belarusian players had told her the news of atrocities coming out of Ukraine was “fake.” The guilt some of the players felt in the first month at being safe while other Ukrainians were in so much peril has been superseded by the belief that they can be sporting ambassadors.“With people watching us back home on TV, you want them just to take a couple of hours to enjoy the tennis and to see that some Ukrainian girls are fighting for the country as well,” Yastremska said.Katarina Zavatska of Ukraine celebrated her win against Shelby Rogers of the United States on Saturday, which put the countries in a 2-2 tie.Susan Mullane/USA Today Sports, via ReutersSusan Mullane/USA Today Sports, via ReutersThe arena in Asheville, in scale and design, reminded Savchuk and Yastremska of where the Ukrainian team played home matches in Kharkiv, which has been heavily damaged by Russian bombardments.Savchuk, now based in London, was born and raised in Donetsk in the disputed Donbas region and her father remains in Donetsk. “He decided to stay because it’s home,” said Savchuk, who said her relatives have spent long stretches in bomb shelters.Kichenok fled the country after the war started and needed 31 hours to get from Kyiv to Moldova with her parents. Her twin, Nadiia, also part of Ukraine’s team, left Kyiv just before Russia invaded, traveling to California with her husband.“It was two days of hell for me until they got to a safe place,” Nadiia said of her family. “I had constant panic attacks. I never experienced anything like that, like 40 minutes your body is shaking, and you don’t know what to do besides deep breaths.”The Kichenoks’ father, who is 64, has since returned to Ukraine and tried to volunteer for the military despite exceeding the age limit.“They told him, ‘Grandfather, go back home,’” Nadiia Kichenok said. “‘We have too many people here. We will call you when we need you.’”Yastremska, 21, fled Odesa, her home city, with her 15-year-old sister, Ivanna, crossing into Romania after saying goodbye to their parents on the Ukrainian side of the Danube River. The sisters have been traveling on tour together for nearly two months while their parents remain in Odesa, where one of their tasks has been organizing relief efforts through Yastremska’s charitable foundation.Unable to return home, the Yastremska sisters remain without a fixed training base, but they will head next to Madrid to prepare for the clay-court season. The Kichenok twins will travel to Stuttgart, Germany, for a tournament, and Zavatska will return to Cannes, France, where she is sharing her small apartment with her mother and other relations who fled Ukraine.After a week of togetherness and a final night of karaoke with the Americans on Saturday, the Ukrainians will move on, but with the hope that Asheville and the wider world do not move on too quickly.“I don’t want people to get used to this grief that we are experiencing,” Nadiia Kichenok said. “We don’t want people to be sorry for us. We want them to stay strong with us, fighting for freedom and humanity.” More

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      in Soccer

      David Beckham bumps into Eugenie Bouchard at plush sushi restaurant in Miami to leave tennis ace delighted

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      MANCHESTER UNITED and England legend David Beckham bumped into tennis star Eugenie Bouchard at a plush sushi restaurant in Miami.Bouchard, 28, was having fun with friends at Watr, a fancy restaurant at 1 Hotel South Beach.
      Bouchard ran into football legend Beckham in MiamiCredit: TWITTER
      The Canadian is said to have broken up with NFL boyfriend RudolphCredit: INSTAGRAM
      Bouchard last competed in March 2021Credit: NEWS GROUP
      But it appears the tennis ace also ran into Inter Miami owner Beckham, who managed a smile despite his team’s woes in the MLS.
      Inter are yet to win a game this term.
      Under Phil Neville, they’ve lost four out of their five games played in the Eastern Conference.
      She shared a snap with Becks on Twitter, saying: “Guess who came to dinner.”
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      The rooftop restaurant isn’t cheap to eat at, with a wagyu steak costing £65.
      And salmon nikkei comes in at a hefty £32.
      Bouchard is in Miami and reportedly newly single.
      The Canadian is said to have broken up with NFL boyfriend Mason Rudolph.
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      JOIN SUN VEGAS: GET A FREE £10 BONUS WITH 100s OF GAMES TO PLAY AND NO DEPOSIT REQUIRED (Ts&Cs apply)
      It is believed the pair began dating in 2020 and they often shared their adventures and love for each other on social media.
      It was reportedly an amicable split and the pair will remain friends.
      Bouchard was last on a tennis court in March last year.
      She competed in Mexico at the Abierto Zapopan but lost to Chinese world No101 Lin Zhu 5-7 6-7.
      Bouchard’s career earnings to date stand at a reported £5million. More