Montenegro boss Zoran Filipovic has backed the Republic of Ireland to emerge from the play-offs to reach the World Cup finals in South Africa.

Republic of Ireland 0 Montenegro 0

A Derry hotel has declined to host a meeting of the local policing partnership after two previous events were disrupted by dissident republicans.

Shay Given has hit out at the reaction of the Aston Villa fans towards Gareth Barry on his first return to the midlands club.

Nelson Piquet Junior claims his former team Renault had “threatened” to withdraw his contract unless he agreed to purposefully crash during the 2008 Singapore Grand Prix.

Leinster 30 Munster 0

Ospreys 16 Ulster 20

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

Sunderland striker Kenwyne Jones has been fined by the club for his sending-off against West Ham.

Bayern Munich 0 Bordeaux 2

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

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.

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.