Scott Murray's Blog, page 4

Switzerland 1-2 Norway: Women’s Euro 2025 – as it happened

Norway didn’t convince, but the sheer presence of Ada Hegerberg proved the difference as they downed their impressive hosts in Basel

2 min: The corner’s only half cleared by Norway, and Maritz comes back at them down the right. Her low, hard cross nearly reaches Xhemaili, six yards out, but it’s hacked clear properly in the second instance. A fast start from the hosts.

1 min: Beney runs at Bratberg Lund down the right. She crosses. The ball pings up off Bratberg Lund’s foot and onto her hand, which isn’t that close to her body. Beney wants a penalty, and you’ve seen them given for far less, but the referee’s not interested. VAR won’t poke its neb in either. Just a corner.

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Internazionale 0-2 Fluminense: Club World Cup round of 16 – as it happened

Fluminense hit Inter early via Germán Cano and the Brazilians never looked back

7 min: Darmian comes through the back of Cano, and is fortunate not to go into the book. Inter have already committed a couple of fouls, so their next miscreant might not be so fortunate.

5 min: Inter try to reply immediately, Darmian making good down the right. But his cross is no use. What a start by Flu, though; the Brazilians, well, flew out of the traps and got right up in Inter’s collective grille. They got their reward.

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Benfica 1-4 Chelsea (aet): Club World Cup, last 16 – as it happened

Chelsea shrugged off a long weather delay and the dramatic concession of an injury-time equaliser to make it to the quarters

2 min: … so Benfica slow it down with a bit of passing around at the back.

43 seconds: Chelsea are immediately on the front foot, Neto chasing after a long pass down the right. He makes it all the way into the box, and whips a shot towards the bottom right. Trubin parries and claims, albeit in a slightly clumsy style. There’s an early statement, then.

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Juventus 2-5 Manchester City: Club World Cup 2025 – as it happened

City swept aside Juve with a statement victory in Orlando to progress to the last 16 as group winners

4 min: Ait-Nouri turns Locatelli inside out down the left and crosses long for Silva, whose downward header is awkwardly kicked off the line by Di Gregorio. The ball pings back to Silva but he’s swarmed and the chance is gone. Ait-Nouri’s impressive start at his new club continues apace.

3 min: … and after that brief sortie, City quickly get into ping-it-about mode. Juve pressing but they can’t get a sniff.

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US Open golf: JJ Spaun holes long-range putt on 18 for victory – as it happened

JJ Spaun sunk three monster putts on the back nine to hold off Robert MacIntyre and claim his first major title at Oakmont

Robert MacIntyre starts the day just about within striking distance of the leaders. But at +3 he’s not got much margin for error. So he could do without sending a wild Hovland-esque drive towards the bushes down the right. It stops just short, but he’s still hacking out of the thick stuff, and the errant tee shot leads inevitably to bogey. He’s now +4 and the look on his face suggests he knows any slim hope of a sensational Arnold Palmer style comeback is gone. He’s +4.

Seems clearing out the pipes last night did Rory some good. A weight lifted. He should bollock the press pack more often.

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US Open golf 2025: Sam Burns keeps hold of lead at Oakmont – as it happened

Sam Burns leads Adam Scott and JJ Spaun by one after Moving Day

Official live leaderboard

Back-to-back birdies for Sam Stevens. The 28-year-old from Wichita picks up shots at 3 and 4 to move to +1 overall. All together now: ♫♪ I know I need a small vacation, but it don’t look like rain ♪♫ … except … “Those clouds are not looking friendly,” notes Rich Beem on Sky, snapping us out of our Campbell-Webb reverie. Indeed they do look dark and menacing in the middle distance. A fair chance we could have an enforced weather break sooner rather than later. Fingers crossed it doesn’t happen, but it doesn’t look promising.

This is Matt Wallace’s first appearance at a US Open for four years. The 35-year-old Londoner is grabbing the opportunity with both hands: decent opening rounds of 72 and 74, and he’s on the move today, with birdies at 4, 11 and now 13, the latter the reward for a glorious tee shot sent over the flag to six feet. He’s +3 overall.

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US Open golf 2025: big names toiling at Oakmont during second round – as it happened

Sam Burns shot 65 on a day Oakmont took a chunk out of the rest of the field

Brooks Koepka finds the par-five 12th in two big bloots, then nearly makes the eagle putt from 26 feet. Not quite, but that’s back-to-back birdies for Brooks, a fine response to that opening bogey. He closes in on the lead at -3. But not such good news for his playing partner Justin Thomas, who three-putts from three feet and chalks up a double bogey. JT shot 76 yesterday, and surviving the cut is already looking like a pipe dream. He’s +9.

Jordan Spieth can’t make his par putt on 2. He slips back to +1. Also heading in the wrong direction is his playing partner, the 2021 champion Jon Rahm. The 30-year-old Spaniard is busy rediscovering his major-championship form after some mixed experiences of late, and opened with a fine 69 yesterday. But his first shot this morning found a fairway bunker and led to bogey. He’s level par now, and has just hit another wild tee shot, this time so far left at 3 that he clears the Church Pew bunker and ends up on the 4th fairway. No real harm done there.

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US Open golf 2025: Spaun leads at Oakmont as McIlroy and Scheffler struggle in first round – as it happened

J.J. Spaun shot a superb 66 to lead the way after day one of the US Open but brutal Oakmont left its mark on plenty of the big names

JJ Spaun can’t make his birdie putt on 13. But he’s now sole leader of the US Open, because Ludvig Åberg makes a mess of the par-five 12th, going for the pin with his third and finding sand, then only splashing out into the rough. After bundling his chip eight feet past the hole, he does extremely well to make the putt coming back and limit the damage to bogey. Meanwhile Adam Scott bounces back from an opening bogey at 10 with birdies at 11 and 12, while Eric Cole does the same with birdies at 12 and 14. All change at the top!

-2: Spaun (4*)

-1: Cole (5*), Åberg (3*), Scott (3*), McIlroy (2*), S Kim (2*)

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Paris Saint-Germain 5-0 Internazionale: Champions League final – as it happened

PSG finally became champions of Europe after routing Inter as they recorded the biggest margin of victory in any European Cup or Champions League final

Pennant watch. Here’s what PSG captain Marquinhos will be handing over during the pre-match niceties. A typically classy piece in the retro-poster style, here it’s the centrepiece of an enigmatic pop-art collage also featuring a fruit platter, several hundred toothpicks, some power bars, three toilet rolls, a carry case of assorted hardware, and what may or may not be a box of Terry’s Chocolate Orange in the top-right corner. If this was an LP cover you’d stay up half the night trying to decode it.

Inter are playing in their third-choice yellow strip this evening. So that means their pennant will clash with captain Lautaro Martínez’s shirt, but what a gorgeous thing it is anyway (the current Volkswagen-adjacent monstrosity of a crest, not half as good as the old interlapping FCIM logo, notwithstanding).

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Football Daily | PSG and Inter to serve up continental treat in Champions League final

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With the 2024-25 season in Uefa-land drawing to its glamorous close, is there a better time to assess how the whole thing went down with everything considered in the round? Yes! But Football Daily doesn’t publish on Sunday morning, so let’s make the best of a bad lot. And it’s been a good year for English football all right. Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester United went to the artistic and creative mecca of Bilbao and staged what can only be described as a dirty protest, a Chelsea squad worth £1,400,000,000 struggled against (though eventually steamrollered) a team collectively priced at 0.96% of a Mykhailo Mudryk, and it’s fair to say the rest of the continent will be extremely glad to see the back of us.

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