Preston boss Alan Irvine has admitted he is powerless to prevent highly-rated defender Sean St Ledger joining Coca-Cola Championship rivals Middlesbrough.

New Zealand 29 South Africa 32

Ospreys 11 Leinster 18

It’s time, surely, to blow the whistle on the endless stream of mindless films about football hooligans, time to show the red card to anybody with a story of terrace yobs.

Nelson Piquet Snr is threatening to take Flavio Briatore to court in the hope of extricating his son from the deal in place with the disgraced Renault team boss.

Liverpool 1 Debrecen 0

British sportswear chain JJB Sports said today it had blown the whistle on alleged cartel activity in the UK sports retail market.

Kilkenny manager Brian Cody hailed his side's historic achievement of an All-Ireland SHC four in-a-row as "outstanding" and "terrific", as he came to terms with the magnitude of it all.

Kilkenny 2-22 Tipperary 0-23

Newport Gwent Dragons 23 Ulster 6

Edinburgh 19 Leinster 21

Fulham 0 Arsenal 1

Everton have called on Blackburn striker El-Hadji Diouf to apologise and retract his claim that he was subjected to racial abuse during Sunday’s Premier League match at Goodison Park.

Rangers striker Kyle Lafferty is facing a race to be fit for the key World Cup qualifier against Slovakia and will have a scan on his knee tomorrow.

Scotland 2 Macedonia 0

Foot-tapping, tune-whistling it ain’t … which is more than a bit unfortunate for a film touting itself as a musical.

Gloucester 19 Glasgow Warriors 6

Chelsea 2 APOEL 2

Next season’s European Tour – starting in South Africa on Thursday – will feature a minimum of 47 tournaments, including six new ones, and will once again culminate in the Dubai World Championship.

Thousands of riot police and Revolutionary Guard members armed with tear gas, batons and firearms were deployed outside Tehran University today to prevent student demonstrations backed by the opposition.