Fate has a way of setting up enticing Champions League encounters and Chelsea’s showdown against Porto tomorrow is up there with the best, writes David Shonfield.

Irish elections will soon loom large for investors as political uncertainty yesterday helped send the borrowing costs of Portugal and Spain significantly higher.

Ricardo Quaresma is one of football’s greatest nearly men.

Gary Cahill has been taken out of the line of fire by Jose Mourinho, who will rest the defender who was accused of diving for tonight’s Capital One Cup quarter-final at Derby (kick-off 7:45pm on Sky Sports 1).

Jose Mourinho insists Chelsea versus Schalke on Tuesday night should not be billed as a clash between him and his opposite number Roberto Di Matteo.

With regard to Mrs U Forinton’s letter (Irish Examiner, Oct 9), the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership Agreement, which is being negotiated in Brussels, is of grave concern to me and to many of my constituents.

Portugal will spend €4.9bn to rescue its largest listed bank, testing the eurozone’s resilience to another banking crisis just months after Lisbon exited an international bailout.

Brussels is considering scrapping the troika that supervises Greek reforms to allow Athens to pursue its own plan to bolster the economy — in return for a drip-feed of debt relief, according to European officials.

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Celtic boss Neil Lennon says the Parkhead club have not given up on their pursuit of Schalke striker Teemu Pukki.

Greece secured a €6.8bn lifeline from the eurozone last night, but was told it must keep its promises on cutting public sector jobs and other reforms in order to get all the cash.

Talks between Portugal’s prime minister and his coalition partner were said yesterday to be progressing to defuse a political crisis that has jolted Lisbon’s hope of a smooth exit from its international bailout.

Europe is set for a restless summer as the slumbering financial crisis reawakens. Luke Baker looks a problem that refuses to go away.

Portuguese people will suffer from cuts to schools and hospitals to protect civil service benefits after the constitutional court rejected austerity measures that would have reduced holiday bonuses and other public sector perks.

Portugal’s prime minister last night told his country to brace for harder times after a court ruling forced his government to find more savings through spending cuts.

Benfica and Porto are once again locked in mortal combat at the top of the league in Portugal.

Fraser Forster revealed he played during Celtic's 2-1 Champions League win over Spartak Moscow at Parkhead last night believing Barcelona had made the Hoops chances of qualifying for the last-16 easier by taking the lead against Benfica in the other Group G tie.

Tarcisio Burgnich couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

A judge who was among the first to call for children’s rights to be enshrined in the Constitution has warned about a long and irrelevant debate on the issue.

Four first-phase clashes at Euro 2012 have a historical resonance, says Paul Kelly.

IRELAND has been voting on European issues for about 40 years with the fiscal treaty the ninth such referendum on the country’s position within the EU.

The agreement is not as controversial as Lisbon and Nice were, says Tom O’Malley

It was hardly the best omen for a yes campaign that has already got off to a shaky start when the “Stability Treaty” placard proved so unstable it toppled over in the light breeze.

Manchester United’s conquerors Athletic Bilbao scored three late goals to beat Schalke 4-2 in their Europa League quarter-final first leg last night.

There seems little point in giving priority to closing down the Vatican embassy at the Villa Spada, re-designating these premises as the Embassy to Italy, spending €1m on “refurbishment”, and then handing the whole thing over to the EU.

Ireland is in no position to “put a gun to anybody’s head” and demand sweeteners for a yes vote in the fiscal treaty referendum, Agriculture Minister Simon Coveney has said.

Research shows caution, not anger, will determine the treaty referendum, writes political editor Paul O’Brien.

The best efforts of the Brussels bureaucrats, it seems, were not enough.

WE are showing serious signs of ambivalence and ambiguity towards the EU, which may cause us to do a U-turn on our continued accession.

I DON’T see why the Government should express either embarrassment or shock at revelations that the German parliament is examining our budget.

A Portuguese court has denied a US request for the extradition of American fugitive George Wright who has spent more than four decades on the run.

NEXT week’s summit of EU leaders has been postponed for a week as France and Germany desperately try to agree a way of refinancing banks.

Nicholas Sarkozy and Angela Merkel’s proposed debt limits for EU member states would require a referendum in Ireland.

SPAIN vowed yesterday it would not follow ailing neighbour Portugal in seeking a European bailout, and a successful Spanish bond auction suggested markets do not immediately fear contagion.

PORTUGAL’S caretaker government said it had decided to seek financing from the European Union in an abrupt turnaround after resisting a bailout for months despite sharply deteriorating financial conditions.

THE Lisbon Treaty will have to be amended to pave the way for a permanent eurozone rescue fund but the Government will not hold a referendum on the change.

PORTUGAL has vowed to “do all it can” to avert a bailout after Prime Minister Jose Socrates stepped down following a showdown with parliament over his minority government’s latest austerity plan.

Portugal's prime minister has quit after opposition parties overwhelmingly rejected his last-ditch round of austerity measures aimed at preventing the eurozone's weakest economy from plunging into chaos.

DOES anyone else feel angry because of the bully boy tactics of Germany and France on the corporate tax rate?

Sinn Féin’s Mary Lou McDonald has said the EU’s "encroachment on Ireland’s sovereignty" is "the inevitable result of bad deals negotiated by this Government and supported by Fine Gael and Labour."