For several years, it was not so much smoke but thick clouds of cynicism that hung over Salazar’s work as head coach at the Nike Oregon Project.

Ireland has will have a “mammoth task” to secure a seat on the UN Security Council but at the moment “we’re winning”, claims Tánaiste Simon Coveney.

They were patting down sweat-filled brows around RTÉ’s control bunker yesterday as Montrose battled technical glitches at the start of Hugh Cahill and Donal Lenihan’s television commentary from Yokohama.

In the realm of Irish distance-running, this was the best performance for many years – a two-hour, 24-minute reminder to those in Athletics Ireland of what might have been.

From all corners of the island, across all demographics, and on a wide range of issues, grassroots activism has gone mainstream. From first-time marchers to advocates with decades of experience, campaigners have made their political power felt this year, writes Joyce Fegan

Because of low wages, Africans already spend a huge amount of their income on food, but the absence of consumer protection is resulting in a crisis, writes Ndidi Okonkwo Nwuneli.

Chris Hatherall looks ahead to today’s World Cup action as eight teams go into Day 13 looking to finish the group stage on a high.

Black people, Travellers, lone parents, people with disabilities, and young males are suffering blatant discrimination in accessing housing.

Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Coveney has said that boycotts never work. Could it be that he has never heard of the Land League or of Michael Davitt?

Yaya Toure has accused Pep Guardiola, his former manager at Manchester City and Barcelona, of spoiling his farewell party from the Etihad and claimed the Catalan has “problems with Africans”.

The award-winning Keogh’s Farm in north Co Dublin has committed to a three-year partnership with Vita, which will see it become the first Irish food business to go carbon neutral.

Here's your morning news bulletin...

West Ham have suspended their director of player recruitment Tony Henry while they investigate claims he told agents the club do not want to sign any more African players.

She ran her heart out, just like always, but as has increasingly been the case for Fionnuala McCormack at the European Cross Country, it just wasn’t enough.

Stuck in unsanitary camps and a bureaucratic nightmare, asylum-seekers live in limbo on the Greek island of Lesbos, say Yanis Varoufakis and George Tyrikos-Ergas.

Progress has been made but malaria remains a serious threat to the wellbeing of millions of Africans, write Julie Essiam and Joy Phumaphi. 

ETHIOPIA will forever leave images of solitary walkers in my mind’s eye, lone men and women walking beside country roads or on paths across endless plains, miles from villages or any habitation, writes Damien Enright.

The country’s unemployment rate is predicted to be as low as 6.3% over the course of 2017 — after hitting a high of 15.1% at the peak of the financial crisis.

‘Unheard-of’ idea discussed as 14 people die off coast of Turkey.

Sean Hehir and Pauline Curley stole the headlines winning the national titles at the SSE Airtricity Dublin marathon as Alemu Gemechu and Nataliya Lehonkova took overall glory ahead of a record entry of more than 15,000.

The race is on to become the first marathon runner to break the two-hour mark

An image of a drowned toddler washed up on the beach in one of Turkey’s prime tourist resorts swept across social media after at least 12 Syrian refugees died trying to reach the Greek island of Kos.

Austria said 71 refugees including a baby girl were found dead in an abandoned freezer truck, while Libya recovered the bodies of 82 migrants washed ashore after their overcrowded boat sank on its way to Europe and scores more were feared dead.

The upsurge of migrants heading to Europe from Africa is threatening to undermine living standards and social structures in the EU, British foreign secretary Philip Hammond has warned.

ITALIAN police yesterday arrested three Libyans and two Algerians accused of human trafficking and multiple homicide in connection with the presumed death by drowning of more than 200 migrants after a ship capsized in the Mediterranean on Wednesday. 

With many Africans denouncing the International Criminal Court as ‘white man’s justice’, the trial of Chad’s former dictator in Senegal on charges of crimes against humanity offers the continent a chance to show it can hold its leaders to account.

It is a sunny morning on Sicily’s east coast and Mount Etna is a postcard, rising from a green-blue sea up through olive groves, orange orchards and steep hill towns to ascend a towering snowy cone ringed by cotton-wool clouds.

It’s remarkable how selective apologists for the myth of a Palestinian state are about what offends them.

Fifa boss Blatter presents himself as a champion of developing nations to deflect from shady, most likely criminal dealings, writes Ian Buruma.

Kenya’s deputy president has said there is “no room” for homosexuality in Kenyan society, the latest comments from an African government to anger activists and likely also to annoy Western donors who say gay people are targeted on the continent.

Nigeria’s electoral commission is to postpone presidential and legislative elections for six weeks to give a new multinational force time to secure north-eastern areas under the sway of Boko Haram, an official has said.

This is not another story about how drugs can screw you up. This is a story about how Europe’s appetite for drugs screws up the lives of hundreds of millions of others, writes Alex Perry

Yesterday’s plea from the United Nations urging rich nations to support Syria’s neighbours by offering the most vulnerable Syrian refugees, including torture victims and women caring for children on their own, an opportunity to resettle in their country is another indication that we have not woken up to the world’s escalating migration and refugee crisis.

Concern in Sierra Leone have buried thousands of bodies in the last few weeks from the ebola virus. Even if you hate the song — buy it, urges Dominic McSorley

So Bob Geldof is re-running his Band Aid single, ‘Do They Know It’s Christmas’. Did you know the combined wealth of the new generation of Band Aid singers is €3 billion? The combined wealth of the original Band Aid singers is nearly €20 billion.

Alex Perry on how George Clooney and his celebrity friends helped engineer the birth of a new African country and then saw it implode

A specialist family court is urgently needed to deal with the current number of cases, according to the author of the latest interim Child Law Report.