SAN DIEGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Aug 15, 2023--

It’s been less than a year since one euro was worth a dollar, and talk of the common

Trevor Francis, British football’s first £1million player, has died at the age of 69. The ex-Birmingham striker, who scored Nottingham Forest’s winner in their 1979 European Cup final triumph, earned 52 England caps and later guided Sheffield Wednesday and Birmingham to major finals as a manager. Plymouth-born Francis burst onto the scene as a teenager with Birmingham, making his first-team debut at 16 in 1970. “He died in Spain this morning from a heart attack,” said a spokesman. Forest shattered the British transfer record when they paid £1.15million for him in 1979, although manager Brian Clough famously claimed the fee was £999,999 to take pressure off the player. He started his career at Birmingham, playing 328 times and scoring 133 goals. In 1971, at just 16-years-old, he became the youngest ever player to score four times in Football League history in Blues’ 4-0 win over Bolton. He earned his record move to Forest in 1979 and headed the winner in the 1-0 victory over Malmo to win the European Cup just a few months later. Francis missed the European Cup win over Hamburg a year later through injury and joined Manchester City in 1981. Spells at Sampdoria, where he won the Coppa Italia, Atalanta, Rangers and QPR – where he was player-manager – followed. He moved to Sheffield Wednesday in 1990 before he replaced Ron Atkinson as manager. Under Francis, the Owls finished third in the old First Division in his first season in charge before finishing seventh in the newly created Premier League while also being runners up in the FA Cup and League Cup. He left in 1995 and returned to Birmingham the following year, reaching the play-offs three times and also the 2001 League Cup final where they lost to Liverpool. Francis left St Andrew’s in October 2001 and joined Crystal Palace soon after, leaving the Eagles in 2003 in what was his last job. Francis spent half a year in Spain and the rest in Solihull. He suffered a heart attack 11 years ago and had kept himself fit with daily power walks. He had an annual health check through the League Managers’ Association and, according to his spokesman, was “enjoying life very much having eventually got over the death of his wife”. Helen passed away in 2017 after a battle with cancer.

CD Projekt Red have announced that the next-gen upgrade for The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt will be released next month, on Dec. 14.

Yankees skipper Aaron Boone might have blown the first game of their series vs the Rangers because of these managerial mishapsThroughout his stint as the Yankees manager, Aaron Boone has picked up a lot of heat from Yankees fans due to poor team performance, bad bullpen management, bench/injury ...

League of Legends August 2022 patch scheduling detailing when fans can expect Patch 12.15 and Patch 12.16.

By Brad Brooks, Daniel Trotta (Reuters) -The first fatal accident aboard a deep-sea tourist submersible is certain to raise calls

Gareth Southgate is looking forward to another really good test and “important learning step” as England head to Scotland for their first friendly in 18 months. The Euro 2020 runners-up are among the favourites to win next year’s finals in Germany, which they are within touching distance of despite Saturday’s 1-1 qualification draw against Ukraine. Long-serving Kyle Walker’s first-ever England goal cancelled out Oleksandr Zinchenko’s opener in front of a yellow and blue wall at the rocking Tarczynski Arena in Wroclaw, Poland. It felt like a home game despite Ukraine being forced to play away from their homeland due to Russia’s ongoing invasion, leaving Southgate to reflect on an important point and valuable learning experience. The 53-year-old is expecting a similar test when they face in-form Scotland at Hampden Park on Tuesday evening in England’s first friendly since beating the Ivory Coast at Wembley in March 2022. “We can have everybody in the squad involved for the next one,” Southgate said after 16 successive competitive matches, covering last year’s Nations League campaign, the 2022 World Cup and this qualifying campaign. “We’ll assess everybody over there over the next 24 to 48 hours because it’s another really good test. “Another hostile environment, a team that are playing really well. “You know, they’re in great form, full of confidence so it’s another important learning step for us.” The nations last faced one another in June 2021, when they played out a hard-fought 0-0 draw at Wembley in the European Championship group stage. Scotland, like England, are on the cusp of qualification for next summer’s Euros, with Friday’s 3-0 triumph in Cyprus extending their outstanding winning start in Group A to a fifth match. Southgate’s side do not head into the friendly on the same high having failed to click against Ukraine, after which James Maddison said it was important to dig in and take a point if the attack is not firing. “James would be one that won’t have played in an England game like that in the past,” the England manager said. “Marc (Guehi), Chilly [Ben Chilwell] wouldn’t have played a huge number of those games for us either. “So, the only way to learn and grow as a team is to have those sorts of experiences. “To go behind in a game like that is a challenge, but we stayed calm. “I’m not so sure it was a case of digging in because I think we were in control of the game. “But we had to defend some counter-attack moments and a couple of set plays well. “And, yeah, without a doubt, to go through that sort of experience is good learning for several of the players. “I think on a night like this the experienced players were really important for the team and I thought they all did a very, very good job.” Southgate rued too many turnovers and a lack of attacking fluency on Saturday night, when skipper Harry Kane took it upon himself to spark England into life. Ukraine stood off the striker and watched him fire an exceptional diagonal ball from just outside the centre circle over Vitaliy Mykolenko to put in Walker to score. “In the end, it was difficult for all of the forward players to find space between Ukraine’s midfield and defence,” Southgate said. “I thought they did that as a team very well. “I thought occasionally we were coming too deep outside of the block, but when you do that, if you’ve got players with that range of passing, then it’s an alternative way of breaking them down. “The important thing was as he was dropping, Kyle making the run he did. “He’s got outstanding vision but also technical quality to make those passes.”

The retired officer was convicted of recruiting active-duty officers to give China military secrets.

Pay attention to Greenland. The land's colossal ice sheet — around three times the size

South Africa captain Siya Kolisi warned the "hard work starts now" after the reigning champions completed their World Cup preparations with a 35-7 win over 14-man New Zealand at Twickenham on Friday, the...

South Korean powerhouse T1 take on China's Weibo Gaming in the League of Legends world final in Seoul on Sunday, aiming for a record fourth win in an event widely...