分类： sports

As the Melbourne Demons push toward a top-four finish and the September finals series, two key injured players are gearing up for a return through the club’s Victorian Football League (VFL) affiliate — but one of the team’s most decorated stars will not get a free pass back to the senior side based on his career legacy.

Vice-captain Jack Viney has not featured in a senior AFL match since the final round of the 2023 season, sidelined first by an Achilles tendon injury that required off-season surgery, followed by a persistent back problem that kept him off the field for the entire 2024 campaign to date. Young forward Latrelle Pickett, meanwhile, has missed the past two weeks of game time after sustaining a concussion.

Both players will hit the field for Melbourne’s VFL side this weekend, when the affiliate team faces Box Hill in its final regular season match Sunday. Speaking to reporters Tuesday morning, Demons interim senior coach Steven King clarified that while selection is not a matter of “earning” a spot through a grueling trial, the star midfielder will not be handed a senior game purely off his reputation.

“The first thing for him is just to get through a whole game,” King explained. “It’s just about making sure he’s had a great runway to set him up to succeed. He’s coming from a back injury that has held him out for the whole season, so we have to respect what he’s been through. I feel like you can’t just get given a game on reputation and you have to actually perform.”

King also addressed off-field speculation surrounding first-year player Pickett, dismissing recent reports in the *Herald Sun* that claimed club officials had confronted Pickett over drinking alcohol following his concussion. King labeled the story a “bit of a non-story” and said he was caught off guard by the published report.

“He’s a first-year player who’s still just finding the balance between being a professional and a first-year player,” King said. “From me, there was no sanction, no conversation. I was surprised it was an article this morning.”

The coach also provided an injury update on star forward Brody Mihocek, who was ruled out for the remainder of the 2024 season after sustaining a neck injury during the annual King’s Birthday match in June. Mihocek has progressed to light jogging as part of his rehabilitation, but King confirmed he would not return to competitive play this year.

For the Demons’ senior side, the next fortnight will shape their finals aspirations. This weekend, the team travels to Adelaide to face Port Adelaide, before closing out the regular season at home against the Western Bulldogs. Melbourne is currently vying for a top-four finish that would grant them a home qualifying final to open the September finals series.

With just four weeks remaining in the regular NRL season, the race for the top eight has reached a fever pitch, as two of Sydney’s most storied clubs, the Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs and South Sydney Rabbitohs, prepare for a do-or-die showdown that will largely shape their post-season fates on Friday night. Though the finals series itself is still a month out, the stakes of this Accor Stadium clash could not be higher: with a slim two-point gap separating the two 2014 grand finalists on the competition ladder, the loser will face an uphill battle to secure a spot in the finals, thanks to punishing remaining fixture lists for both sides.

South Sydney currently holds the narrow advantage over the Bulldogs, having held on for a hard-fought win against the Parramatta Eels last week. In contrast, Canterbury suffered a gut-wrenching late loss to the Sydney Roosters, surrendering a 10-point lead in the final 10 minutes of play after the Roosters crossed for two late tries to steal the victory. Reflecting on the defeat, Bulldogs prop Max King opened up about the mixed emotions running through the club this week.

“There are two sides to how we’re all feeling right now,” King explained. “Obviously, there’s a lot of disappointment. We didn’t put out our best performance — we had too many dropped passes, too many unforced errors that threw our rhythm off. To be up 10 points with just 10 minutes left to play and walk away with a loss is incredibly frustrating. That’s two competition points we absolutely should have had. But even with that loss, there’s confidence too: we went toe-to-toe with one of the best sides in the league, fresh off their 82-point rout of the North Queensland Cowboys. We know we can match it with any team in the competition when we play our best footy.”

The blockbuster has been framed as a virtual elimination final by both camps, given the difficult run home each side faces after Friday’s clash. Canterbury still has fixtures against the in-form St George Illawarra Dragons, ladder-leading Penrith Panthers, and defending premiers Brisbane Broncos left to close out the season. For South Sydney, their remaining schedule is equally challenging: they face a red-hot New Zealand Warriors side fresh off an upset win over Penrith, followed by a match against Gold Coast Titans, before closing out the regular season with a grudge match against their cross-city rivals the Roosters.

Bulldogs utility Kurt Mann noted that every remaining match for his side carries the same pressure as a finals fixture, with the club sitting on the cusp of the top eight. “It kind of already felt like a finals game last weekend, so there’s no secret about how high the stakes are this week,” Mann said. “We need a strong month over these next four weeks, every single game is going to have that finals-level intensity for us. We know we’ve got a tough run home, and we need to get results if we want to make the eight.”

While a tough closing fixture list would rattle most sides, Mann argued that challenging matches against top competition is the best preparation for a deep finals run, rather than easy games that create a false sense of security. The Bulldogs have already proven they can beat the league’s best this season, notching wins against both the Panthers and Warriors already this year.

“You don’t want easy games leading into finals, because that gives you a false sense of how tough the post-season is going to be,” Mann explained. “If you earn your spot by beating top-four side after top-four side, you know exactly what it takes to get it done when it matters. We’ve already shown we can beat any team in the competition when we’re at our best. We were pretty unlucky to lose to the Roosters last week — I thought we’d done enough to get the win, it just slipped away at the end. But on our day, when we play to our potential, we can beat anyone.”

BIRMINGHAM, UK – The 2024 European Athletics Championships delivered one of the most dramatic comeback stories in modern track and field on Monday, as Norway’s Jakob Ingebrigtsen capped a 324-day layoff following Achilles tendon surgery with a sensational gold medal in the men’s 5000m, extending his record to seven career European Championship titles.

The 25-year-old Norwegian delivered his signature devastating final sprint to cross the finish line in 13 minutes 15.29 seconds, securing his status as the most decorated male athlete in the history of the European Athletics Championships. Ingebrigtsen has remained undefeated at the continental event since his breakout 1500m/5000m double as a teenager at the 2018 Berlin Championships, a streak that looked seriously in doubt after he underwent surgery following a disappointing 10th-place finish in the 10000m at the 2023 World Athletics Championships in Tokyo.

Monday’s race marked Ingebrigtsen’s first competitive outing since that 2023 race, and even the athlete himself admitted he never expected to return to the top step of the podium so quickly. “Coming from the lowest of lows to be European champion again means the world to me. Not even I believed it could happen coming here,” Ingebrigtsen told reporters after the race. “I doubted myself every day coming in to this and every minute leading up to the last lap today, but I’m always hoping to do my best.”

Germany’s Florian Bremm took silver, while France’s Etienne Daguinos claimed bronze. Daguinos paid tribute to Ingebrigtsen’s legacy, calling him “a legend of our sport. We knew if he’s here tonight it was because he is good shape.”

Ingebrigtsen’s fairy tale comeback headlined a day of standout results at Birmingham’s Alexander Stadium, which also saw home-crowd favorite Amy Hunt claim gold in the women’s 100m. Hunt clocked 11.00 seconds to secure victory, holding off Poland’s Ewa Swoboda (silver) and Belgium’s Delphine Nkansa (bronze). Defending champion Dina Asher-Smith of Great Britain finished out of the medals in fifth place.

Dutch shot put star Jessica Schilder made history of her own, securing a third consecutive European women’s shot put title with a winning throw of 20.73m on her final attempt. Schilder’s win made her the first woman to win three European titles in the event since Soviet Union icon Nadezhda Chizhova claimed four straight golds between 1966 and 1974. Teammate Jorinde van Klinken took silver with a personal best 19.64m, while Germany’s Olympic champion Yemisi Ogunleye (now Yemisi Mabry) rounded out the podium with 19.50m.

“This was the easiest (of the three European titles). There was quite a gap with the other competitors,” Schilder said after the win, adding “I will never get tired of this feeling, I will never get bored of winning these medals.”

Italy matched the Netherlands’ one-two finish in the men’s shot put, where defending champion Leonardo Fabbri successfully retained his title with a throw of 22.31m. Zane Weir took silver for Italy, while Sweden’s Wictor Petterson claimed bronze.

Norway closed out the day with another gold, as three-time 400m hurdles champion Karsten Warholm anchored the Norwegian mixed 4x400m relay quartet to victory. Amalie Iuel, Andreas Ofstad Kulseng and Henriette Jaeger joined Warholm to clock a new championship record of 3:09.62, finishing ahead of Great Britain and the Netherlands.

Norwegian distance running icon Jakob Ingebrigtsen etched his name deeper into European athletics history on Monday, storming to victory in the men’s 5,000m final at Birmingham’s Alexander Stadium to secure his seventh individual continental championship gold medal. The milestone win cements his status as the most decorated male athlete in the history of the European Athletics Championships.

The 25-year-old crossing the finish line in a tight 13 minutes 15.29 seconds, edging out Germany’s Florian Bremm who took silver just 0.31 seconds behind at 13:15.60. France’s Etienne Daguinos rounded out the podium with a bronze medal in 13:16.09, a result that left the young Frenchman visibly honored to share the stage with Ingebrigtsen.

This win extends Ingebrigtsen’s extraordinary unbeaten streak at the European championships, a run that stretches all the way back to the 2018 Berlin championships, where a 17-year-old Ingebrigtsen announced his arrival by claiming a historic 1,500m/5,000m double. He repeated that double-double feat at both the 2022 Munich championships and the 2024 Rome edition, building an unmatched legacy of continental dominance.

Monday’s victory is all the more remarkable given Ingebrigtsen’s turbulent lead-up to the event. He sat out the entire 2025 season prior to Birmingham recovering from an Achilles tendon injury that required surgical intervention. The competition marked his first return to top-level racing after a disappointing 2025 World Athletics Championships in Tokyo, where he was unexpectedly knocked out of the 1,500m heats and could only manage a 10th-place finish in the 5,000m.

Ahead of the Birmingham championships, Ingebrigtsen chose to only contest the 5,000m to manage his comeback, and he showed no visible signs of rust or ring rust upon stepping onto the track. Sticking to his signature race strategy, he spent the opening laps tucked comfortably at the back of the tight leading pack, letting other runners set a blistering early pace. The field included Tokyo Worlds medalists Jimmy Gressier of France and Isaac Kimeli of Belgium, plus 2024 Rome European champion Dominic Lobalu of Switzerland, who entered the race fresh off an impressive Diamond League win in Monaco.

As laps ticked down, Lobalu surged to the front, splitting the dense pack into a single line and ratcheting up the speed. With five laps remaining, Gressier moved past Lobalu into the lead, leaving Ingebrigtsen still biding his time at the back of the field. When the pace dipped, the pack bunched up, with runners lining up four wide at multiple points, but Ingebrigtsen glided effortlessly into the top six, even exchanging brief words with Gressier as the race approached its climax.

With two laps left, Gressier held the lead, with Ingebrigtsen sitting right on his shoulder and Lobalu stalking the group from the outside. The trio pulled away from the rest of the field, with Bremm surprising many by bridging the gap to the front group by the final bell. With just 200 meters remaining, the race was still wide open, with any of the four front-runners in position to claim gold.

Gressier hit the home straight first, but faded quickly as Bremm powered past him into the lead. Boxed in briefly behind the pair, Ingebrigtsen made a neat, precise step to the right to open up running room, before exploding past Bremm in a perfectly timed final sprint that sealed the win. Speaking after the race, Ingebrigtsen reflected on the emotion of his comeback.

“I dreamt of this moment two weeks ago when I put my name on the list,” he told reporters. “It was just enough.” He added: “With 600 metres to go I knew I was going to win. I doubted myself every minute leading up to the last lap. Being healthy again, back racing, feeling something like myself… I am happy.”

When asked about his seven gold medals, Ingebrigtsen made clear he has no plans to slow down any time soon. “Hopefully it’s not halfway,” he said. “I’m still extremely young, so I think I’ll be back in coming years.”

Other competitors were quick to praise the Norwegian’s legacy after the race. Bronze medalist Daguinos said: “He’s a legend of our sport. We knew if he’s here tonight it was because he is good shape. He’s so strong. He showed that tonight. I am so proud to share a podium with him.”

Fourth-place finisher Gressier echoed that sentiment, calling Ingebrigtsen “a champion” and “the best runner of all time.” “He has humility, class,” Gressier added. “Everything he has shown in athletics, everything he still continues to show while being maybe even at 75% of his abilities.”

Gianni Infantino’s bid to weather growing criticism and retain control of global football’s governing body suffered a fresh blow this week, after three of FIFA’s six regional confederations launched an unprecedented coordinated attack on the FIFA president’s leadership just days after he backed away from a controversial commercial restructuring plan.

It has been more than seven days since Infantino was forced to abandon his proposal for FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE), a private-investment-backed commercial subsidiary that would have taken over management of World Cup commercial operations. The plan drew fierce pushback from member associations and confederations over its lack of transparency and concentrated power in the hands of senior FIFA leadership.

Infantino had gambled that a combative public statement decrying a “concerted and ongoing effort” to undermine his authority would calm tensions and win time to shore up support. Instead, the move backfired spectacularly on Monday, when UEFA (European football’s governing body), CONCACAF (North and Central America and the Caribbean), and the AFC (Asian Football Confederation) published an open letter that laid bare their complete lack of confidence in Infantino’s leadership. While all sides publicly pay lip service to the need for unity within FIFA, deep divides over how the organization should be governed have made any compromise unlikely for the foreseeable future.

AFP Sport has broken down the current state of play, mapping out where blocs of support stand and what possible outcomes could unfold in the coming months:

### Who Stands With Infantino?
The 56-year-old Swiss incumbent has built a solid base of support over 10 years in office, largely through expanded development funding distributed to FIFA’s 211 member associations—a strategy that has paid dividends in loyalty.

The Confederation of African Football (CAF), whose member Morocco will co-host the 2030 men’s World Cup, has remained unwavering in its backing. Last week, CAF’s executive committee issued a statement “unanimously reconfirm[ing] its support for FIFA President Gianni Infantino and thanked him for his support for African football, over the years.”

South America’s governing body CONMEBOL has also retained its support, though it did join critics in condemning the sloppy planning and lack of consultation around the scrapped FFE plan. CONMEBOL has insisted that Infantino’s future should only be decided at the scheduled presidential election in Rabat next March, rather than through any early intervention.

A number of individual member associations have even broken ranks with their own regional confederations to back the incumbent. These include Mexico (a 2026 World Cup co-host that belongs to CONCACAF), and Kuwait and Qatar (AFC members that have both publicly voiced support for Infantino).

### The Growing Opposition Bloc
UEFA, CONCACAF, and AFC doubled down on their scathing rejection of Infantino’s leadership in Monday’s open letter, branding the scrapped FFE plan a “shabby, opaque, backroom deal.”

UEFA’s explicit threat to boycott all FIFA competitions—including the men’s and women’s World Cup—is widely credited as the decisive pressure that forced Infantino to abandon the FFE plan in a humiliating climbdown. The confederation reiterated that boycott threat last week, just one day after the FIFA senior leadership issued a statement of full backing for Infantino. At that time, CONCACAF and the AFC had not yet joined the public criticism, leaving UEFA isolated. Monday’s open letter made clear that the opposition is now a coordinated three-confederation bloc.

“When trust is broken through deception, when an individual places himself above the collective that entrusted him with authority, that duty has been abandoned,” the three confederations wrote in their joint statement.

UEFA’s boycott threat will face its first real test as early as September, when the Women’s Under-20 World Cup is scheduled to kick off in Poland.

The calls for Infantino to step down immediately have grown louder in recent days: Lise Klaveness, the outspoken president of the Norwegian Football Federation and one of Infantino’s most prominent critics, publicly called for his resignation last Friday. A growing number of European national associations have also publicly withdrawn their backing for his re-election, including Denmark, Finland, Sweden, Serbia and Wales.

### What Could Happen Next?
Infantino is currently standing for a fourth and final four-year term as president, with the election scheduled to take place at the FIFA Congress in Rabat on March 18 next year. The deadline for any rival candidate to officially register their candidacy is November 18.

Historical precedent favors incumbents in FIFA presidential votes: the last time a sitting president was unseated was in 1974, when Brazil’s Joao Havelange defeated incumbent Stanley Rous of England. That means unseating Infantino at the scheduled ballot would be an uphill battle for opponents.

However, critics who want to remove Infantino before next March do have a procedural path to force an early vote. The most likely option is a motion of no confidence, which requires support from 20 percent of FIFA’s member associations—equal to 43 national bodies—to trigger an emergency FIFA Congress to vote on the motion.

Every member association holds one equal vote at FIFA congresses, meaning a small football federation like Gabon has the same voting weight as the German Football Association. It remains unclear whether a simple majority would be enough to remove Infantino from office early.

### Who Could Challenge Infantino?
While Klaveness has been the most vocal critic of the incumbent, she is not seen as a likely candidate. FIFA’s electorate has historically favored a non-European president to balance the leadership of the global body, and no European has held the FIFA presidency only since 1998 (Sepp Blatter, followed by Infantino, with African football chief Issa Hayatou serving as caretaker between Blatter’s 2015 resignation and Infantino’s election). Even after Kirsty Coventry’s historic election as IOC president last year, the prospect of a woman leading FIFA remains remote for now.

UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin has repeatedly ruled himself out of the running, which narrows the field of credible potential challengers considerably. Two high-profile confederation leaders are seen as the most likely candidates to stand against Infantino:

* **Victor Montagliani**: The president of CONCACAF was once viewed as a close ally of Infantino, but the two have fallen out completely over the FFE plan, with CONCACAF now calling for “a comprehensive reckoning with this presidency.” The 60-year-old Canadian is a charismatic administrator who played a key role in delivering the successful 2026 World Cup hosting process, and counts legendary football figure Carlo Ancelotti among his close contacts in the global game.

* **Sheikh Salman bin Ibrahim al-Khalifa**: The AFC president previously ran for the FIFA presidency in 2016, when the vacancy opened up after Blatter’s resignation. He finished second behind Infantino in that vote. Now 60, Sheikh Salman has led Asian football since 2013, and his fourth term as AFC president ends next year, leading to widespread speculation that he will launch a second bid for the top FIFA job.

Port Adelaide’s standout young talent Jason Horne-Francis has avoided a serious long-term knee injury, but his availability for this weekend’s clash against Melbourne remains hanging in the balance, according to Power assistant coach Stuart Dew.

The 20-year-old midfielder was forced to hobble off the Sydney Cricket Ground pitch midway through Port Adelaide’s loss to the Swans on Saturday afternoon, leaving fans and coaching staff fearing the worst after he immediately clutched at his knee following a contested play. Follow-up scans have delivered a far more positive diagnosis than initial fears suggested, revealing only bone bruising rather than the structural ligament damage many expected.

Despite the welcome news on his injury, Dew confirmed on Monday that the club’s medical team will continue monitoring the young gun’s recovery over the coming 48 hours to determine whether he can take the field against the Demons. “He’ll be touch and go this week, obviously with a little bit of bone bruising when that happens for anyone,” Dew told reporters. “But from where we thought it could’ve been from when he came off, it’s a great result. You see how it settles down, like a normal game under any circumstance it will end up being a medical call. I am sure he will want to play, but we’ll see how it settles down the next couple of days and once he gets moving we’ll get a little bit more information.”

The fitness question mark extends beyond Horne-Francis to another of Port Adelaide’s key midfielders, Zak Butters, who has been sidelined since sustaining a syndesmosis injury in Round 18. Butters is widely tipped to request a trade back to Victoria during the upcoming offseason, meaning a Round 24 clash against Essendon next week could mark his farewell appearance for the Power.

The star midfielder has been vocal about his desire to return in time for the final round of the regular season, but Dew made clear the club will not rush his recovery to put him back on the field prematurely. Dew joked that much of the growing optimism around Butters’ potential return has been driven by the player himself, emphasizing that the club’s priority is his long-term health over a single farewell match.

“He’s pushing to try and get back and I think that’s a good mindset but again, there will be no risk taken,” Dew said. “In terms of the side, he’s going to have to have put in a bit of work on the training track and at the moment he’s still getting up and running. It’ll be, not a miracle, but again just a medical call at the end of the day to see how he’s going, but there’s no need to rush. He’s got another week or so to continue to get moving and try to get back into training but no risk will be taken.”

For Port Adelaide, the outcomes of these two fitness battles will do little to shift the club’s position on the 2024 AFL ladder. Following the Gold Coast Suns’ victory over GWS on Sunday, the Power are all but locked into 15th place for the season with just two rounds remaining, ending any mathematical chance of reaching the finals series.