Nick Ames

Special envoy to Donald Trump suggested the idea ‘Firstly not possible … secondly not appropriate’ The Italian sports minister, Andrea Abodi, has described a proposal for his country to replace Iran at the World Cup as “not appropriate”, rejecting any idea that the Azzurri will be granted a last-minute berth at this summer’s tournament. On Wednesday it emerged that Paolo Zampolli, a special envoy to Donald Trump, had suggested Italy should be fast-tracked to the World Cup despite their shock defeat by Bosnia and Herzegovina in last month’s playoffs. Zampolli proposed the four-time winners Italy replace Iran and said they would “have the pedigree to justify their inclusion”. But Abodi said football’s showpiece tournament should remain meritocratic.

The first woman to manage a men’s team in Europe’s major leagues on ‘shouting back’, her coaching influences and fighting the drop It was shaping up to be a standard Saturday night of homework for Marie-Louise Eta when the telephone rang and sent her life into overdrive. A nosediving Union Berlin had decided to part ways with their manager, Steffen Baumgart, and had a quick solution in mind. They wanted the talented coach of their under-19 team to step up for the rest of the season and it meant tearing her away from plans to face Mainz’s youngsters the following day. “I was at home on my laptop preparing,” she says. “Then our president, Dirk Zingler, called me and said: ‘You’re doing it now. I’m counting on you.’ The call didn’t last long. It wasn’t easy for me to announce in our under-19 group chat that I wouldn’t be able to take the game any more.”