Manchester United threw down the gauntlet last night, with 9-0 win against a nine-man Southampton side.  

Alexandre Jankewitz was sent off inside the first two minutes of the game, followed by Jan Bednarek being shown a second red card towards the closing stages of the match. 

A rare goal for Aaron Wan-Bissaka opened the scoring for the hosts in the first half, with goals for Marcus Rashford, Ederson Cavani and an own goal for Bednarek before half time. 

Southampton had a glimpse of a comeback in the second half, with a chance from Che Adams which was ultimately deemed offside. 

The 9 goals were completed by Scott McTominay, a converted Bruno Fernandes penalty, two from Anthony Martial, and an unlikely Dan James strike.

It was a case of déjà vu for the Saints, their 9-0 loss to Leicester City last season having been cited as a crucial turning point in Hasenhüttl’s tenure at the club.

The Hundred strikes back

The retention window for England’s new cricket competition, The Hundred has now closed.

Aaron Finch, Australian one-day captain will play alongside England’s, Ben Stokes for the Northern Superchargers while Mark Wood joins London Spirit.

Finch, who played county cricket for Yorkshire in 2014 and 2015, said: “I loved my time as a player at Yorkshire and I’m really looking forward to getting back up there and hopefully putting on a show.

The male and female teams continue to shape up, with a maximum of 3 overseas players on each team.

The teams include: Birmingham Pheonix, London Spirit, Manchester Originals, Super Northern Chargers, Oval Invincibles London, Southern Brave, Trent Rockers and Welsh Fire.

After playing in the winning team in the World Cup 2017, Alex Hartley will compete for the Manchester Originals while Freya Davies will stick with London Spirit.

Defeat for Britain at the Australian Open warm-up 

Katie Boulter lost to US Open Champion Naomi Osaka, 3-6 6-3 6-1, while Johanna Konta lost to the Romanian player Irina Camelia-Begu.  

Boulter took the first set against the Japanese Player Osaka but an early break in Boulter’s serve gave Osaka an advantage over the second.

Konta also won the first set again rival Begu 4-6, but then went on to to lose the second and third sets in tiebreaks.

Begu and Osaka will now face each other in the second round.

In the Men’s game, Britian’s No 1. fellow Dan-Evans has advanced well in the Australian open and has reached the third round of Murray River Open.  

The Davis cup Champion Evans first played Portugal’s Pedro Sousa and beat him with a score of 6-3 7-5 and moved on to setting up a meeting with Marcos Giron of the United States.  

Super Bowl set for Sunday

The Super Bowl Sunday, the biggest US sporting event of the year, is going ahead this Sunday [7th February] with a range of COVID-19 safety protocols in place.

Hosted this year in Tampa Florida, the game between the Kansas City Chiefs  and Tampa Bay Buccaneers will only see a crowd of 22,000 in their stadium and everyone attending will have been tested and provided with protective equipment including masks and hand sanitizer.

The NFL have invited 7,500 vaccinated health workers to join for free.

Despite all the health and safety protocols that have been put in place for the game, many feel that it “could send out the wrong message” at a time where COVID-19 infections and deaths are very high throughout America.

The Super Bowl LV: Kansas City Chiefs vs. Tampa Bay Buccaneers will start around 11:30pm UK time, running until around 3am.

English Netball at Home

English Netball have renewed a multi-year broadcasting and streaming deal with Sky.

The expanded deal with Sky will ensure that all matches in the Vitality Netball Superleague 2021 will be available to watch on Sky Sports channels, with the option to watch across Youtube.

This is a significant development in the sport as this is the largest publicity push it has received to date, marking the first-time live broadcasting of the sport has been available.

Starting on the 12^th of February, the broadcast will cover the league across two venues.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the League has been moved behind closed doors allowing for stringent social distancing measures to be put in place along with an extensive testing programme across the league.