Zinedine Zidane has offered a way back for Gareth Bale, Isco and Marcelo at Real Madrid as he prepares for his first game against Celta Vigo on Saturday since being re-appointed as coach.
Bale, Isco and Marcelo have all endured difficult seasons under Julen Lopetegui and Santiago Solari, with Bale heavily criticised for his form while Isco and Marcelo have been dropped.
Zidane's return puts Bale's future in further doubt, given the pair's relationship became strained last season, before the Welshman said he was considering his future at the club.
"I am not going to talk about Bale's season, I only talk about the 11 games we have left," Zidane said on Friday.
"We all know the player that Gareth is. I am counting on him like everyone else, we are ready and Gareth is ready."
Whether Zidane's words come with a place for Bale in his first starting line-up at the Santiago Bernabeu remains to be seen, as Madrid look to rebuild following a turbulent few months.
Isco never started a single La .

Zidane keeps options open for outcasts at Real Madrid

PTI Automatic

Cristiano Ronaldo was named in defending European champions Portugal's squad on Friday nine months after his last international appearance at the 2018 World Cup in Russia.
With Euro 2020 qualifiers against Ukraine and Serbia coming up, coach Fernando Santos has recalled Ronaldo, who has 85 goals in 154 international appearances.
He was rested for the last six Portugal games while he settled at new club Juventus, where the 34-year-old has silenced sceptics with a steady stream of goals and a hat-trick in Juve's 3-2 aggregate Champions League last-16 win over Atletico Madrid.
"After the World Cup I needed a break to settle in at Juventus," he said after the Atletico win.
"In the coming matches I hope to bring my contribution to the national side. I also miss that," Ronaldo told DAZN.
In his absence Portugal finished top of their Nations League group ahead of Italy and Poland and qualified for the inaugural Final Four tournament to be held in Portugal in June.
Ronaldo, the five-time ...

Ronaldo back in Portugal squad after nine-month absence

Italian World Cup-winning captain Fabio Cannavaro was named coach of China on Friday, spearheading the ambitious country's attempts to become a footballing force at last.
It was not immediately clear if the former Juventus and Real Madrid star will lead the team on a temporary or permanent basis -- Chinese media speculated that the upcoming China Cup may amount to a job audition.
The 45-year-old former defender will combine the job with being coach of Chinese Super League (CSL) giants Guangzhou Evergrande, making him one of the most powerful figures in Chinese football history.
He takes the post vacated in January by his mentor and compatriot Marcello Lippi, under whom Cannavaro lifted the World Cup in 2006.
The 70-year-old Lippi will be a consultant under the new coaching set-up named for next week's China Cup, the Chinese Football Association (CFA) said.
"The association has carefully made this decision based on comprehensive research of his experience and technical and tactical ...

Italian legend Cannavaro named new coach of China

Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Friday condemned the deadly attack on two mosques in New Zealand, saying it illustrated the growing hostility towards Islam "idly" watched by the world.
The attacks on the Christchurch mosques left at least 49 dead, with one gunman -- identified as an Australian extremist -- apparently livestreaming the assault and publishing a manifesto online.
"With this attack, hostility towards Islam, that the world has been idly watching and even encouraging for some time, has gone beyond individual harassment to reach the level of mass killing," Erdogan said at the funeral of a former Turkish minister.
Turkish media reported the manifesto contained specific references to Turkey and ridding the famed Hagia Sophia in Istanbul of its minarets. Now a museum, the building was once a church before being turned into a mosque during the Ottoman empire.
"It is clear that the understanding represented by the killer that also targets our country, our people and ...

Erdogan says New Zealand attack shows growing hostility to Islam

The British government must offer a "clear" answer on its intentions for Brexit before a EU summit next week, the French presidency said Friday, after UK lawmakers voted to seek a delay if no withdrawal deal is reached soon.
"Without any clarity, no solution is possible," President Emmanuel Macron's office said, adding that if the current withdrawal deal is rejected, a "clear and new alternative plan" must be presented or else Britain will have to leave the EU with no deal.
The summit next week is seen as the last chance for Prime Minister Theresa May to secure unanimous approval from the other 27 EU members for any Brexit delay.
May is expected to again submit the withdrawal deal to lawmakers next week, though it has already been rejected twice.
"That's the best option," the French presidency said, in which case no EU state is expected to oppose a "technical extension" that would give Britain time to vote on a series of laws for ensuring a smooth Brexit.
But if the deal is again ...

UK must offer 'clear' Brexit response ahead of EU summit: France

Facebook said Friday it had "quickly" removed a live video from the suspected gunman in twin mosque shootings that killed at least 49 people in New Zealand.
The 28-year-old shooter, who has been arrested, published a racist manifesto on Twitter before livestreaming his rampage showing him repeatedly shooting at worshipers from close range.
"Police alerted us to a video on Faceook shortly after the livestream commenced and we quickly removed both the shooter's Facebook and Instragram accounts and the video," the social network said.
"We're also removing any praise or support for the crime and the shooter or shooters as soon as we're aware."
The Facebook Live video, taken with a camera that appeared to be mounted on the gunman's body, shows a clean-shaven, Caucasian man with short hair driving to the Masjid al Noor mosque in central Christchurch.
He enters the building and fires repeatedly at worshipers as he moves from room to room.
AFP determined the video was genuine through a ...

Facebook says it 'quickly' removed New Zealand shooter's video

EU leaders on Friday called for clarity from Britain before considering any delay to Brexit after a series of chaotic votes by MPs just two weeks before the deeply divided country is due to leave the bloc.
Quitting the EU after 46 years  on March 29 remains the legal default unless EU leaders unanimously grant Britain an extension, with the issue likely to dominate a March 21-22 EU summit in Brussels.
The length of any possible delay will depend on the outcome of another parliamentary vote on the twice massively rejected Brexit deal struck by Prime Minister Theresa May with EU leaders.
The government said it would ask for a "technical" delay until June 30 to pass necessary legislation if MPs finally approve the deal next week.
If MPs vote against it for a third time, the government has warned it will be forced to seek a much longer delay.
"It is very clear that the next steps, the next proposal on how to move forward must come from Britain," German Chancellor Angela Merkel's spokesman 

EU leaders urge clarity from Britain before Brexit delay

In San Francisco, far from the picturesque, winding streets in the hills, a glistening skyscraper represents how the country's tech titans have transformed the city  -- and made it one of the world's most expensive places to live.
The figures are mind-boggling: average monthly rent for a two-room apartment in the city by the bay now runs to USD 3,700, the highest in the United States.
And a household of four with annual earnings of less than USD 117,400 is officially considered "low income."
Want to go visit the Facebook headquarters in the close suburbs? It'll take you two hours to go 45 kilometres, day and night.
The Salesforce Tower -- named for a cloud-based software company -- now dominates the skyline. Each day, huge buses transport tech workers to the suburban offices of Facebook, Google and Apple.
All this wealth has sent real estate prices soaring across the Bay Area -- from Silicon Valley in the south to Oakland in the east -- and widened the rich-poor divide in a striking ..

In San Francisco, tech boom has left people priced out of housing

An Australian gunman whose assaults on two New Zealand mosques Friday left at least 49 people dead, published a racist manifesto on Twitter before livestreaming his rampage.
The New Zealand government said it could be illegal to share the video, which showed the gunman repeatedly shooting at worshippers from close range.
The Facebook Live video, taken with a camera that appeared to be mounted on the gunman's body, shows a clean-shaven, Caucasian man with short hair driving to the Masjid al Noor mosque in central Christchurch.  He enters the building and fires repeatedly at worshippers as he moves from room to room.
AFP determined the video was genuine through a digital investigation that included matching screenshots of the mosque taken from the gunman's footage with images available online showing the same areas.
The "manifesto" detailing motivations for the attack was posted on Friday morning onto a Twitter account with the same name and profile image as the Facebook page that ...

New Zealand mosque gunman livestreamed shooting, published manifesto

Australia will launch a seven-nation Indian Ocean military exercise next week, starting in Sri Lanka where China has invested in strategic ports and loaned huge amounts to build other infrastructure, Canberra's envoy said Friday.
Some 1,000 Australian security personnel in four naval ships and a military aircraft will participate in the biggest joint exercise yet with their Sri Lankan counterparts, Canberra's top envoy in Colombo, Jon Philp, said.
"Sri Lanka and Australia are increasingly like-minded on maritime security and Indian Ocean issues," Philp said adding that the two countries will improve cooperation and familiarity with each other's defence forces.
Australian forces will move to neighbouring India on March 26 and thereafter travel to Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia and Singapore before returning to Darwin after two and a half months.
The joint exercise comes as concerns grow over Beijing's influence on Sri Lanka's economy and Chinese control over two key ...

Australia to launch Indian Ocean military exercises from Colombo

Luis Enrique named a much-changed Spain squad on Friday as Isco, Saul Niguez and Koke were all left out while the 33-year-old Jesus Navas earned a surprise recall.
Eight players were recalled to the squad with Navas, Sergi Gomez, Juan Bernat, Fabian Ruiz, Dani Parejo, Sergio Canales, Iker Muniain and Jaime Mata all coming in.
Among those to miss out were Isco, who will be hoping for more games under new Real Madrid coach Zinedine Zidane, as well as Atletico Madrid pair Saul and Koke.
Spain play two qualifiers for the European Championships later this month. They are at home to Norway on March 23 before playing away in Malta on March 26.
Luis Enrique will be looking for a response after Spain endured a disappointing end to their Nations League campaign at the end of last year, when losses to England and Croatia saw them miss out on the semi-finals.
Navas has not appeared for the national team since October 2013 but the former Manchester City winger has been in excellent form for ...

Luis Enrique rings the changes for Spain

Germany on Friday said the ball remained in Britain's court to propose a viable exit plan from the European Union as the Brexit deadline looms.
Ahead of a crunch summit next week, Chancellor Angela Merkel's spokesman Steffen Seibert said Berlin welcomed the British parliament's vote on Wednesday against a no-deal Brexit.
"Nevertheless it is clear that the next steps, the next proposal on how to move forward must come from Britain," he told reporters.  Seibert stressed it was in "no one's interest" for London to crash out of the EU on March 29 without an agreement on the future relationship with the bloc.  He noted that the EU summit on March 21-22 in Brussels "will of course deal with the (Brexit) issue intensively".
But after British MPs on Thursday voted to ask the EU to delay Brexit, Seibert said any such request would have to be formally submitted to the other 27 member states, debated and decided on.
"I do not want to pre-empt those talks," he said.
EU leaders have repeatedly ...

Germany says up to Britain to propose Brexit solution to EU

Attacks on two mosques in New Zealand which left at least 49 people dead on Friday -- the Muslim day of prayer -- have sparked horror, revulsion and dismay around the world.
"It is clear that this can now only be described as a terrorist attack," said Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, describing it as "one of New Zealand's darkest days."
One of the gunmen -- believed to be an Australian extremist -- livestreamed the deadly assault, stoking outrage and fear that others may be targeted in copy-cat attacks.
"With this attack, hostility towards Islam that the world has been has been idly watching and even encouraging for some time, has gone beyond the boundaries of individual harassment to reach the level of mass killing," said Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
"If measures are not taken right away, news of other disasters will follow this one... I am calling on the world, in particular the West, to take quick measures," he said.
Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg urged the ...

NZealand mosque killings spark global horror

Queen Elizabeth II, New Zealand's head of state, said she was "deeply saddened" by the attacks on two mosques on Friday which left 49 people dead.
"I have been deeply saddened by the appalling events in Christchurch... At this tragic time, my thoughts and prayers are with all New Zealanders," she said in a message.
"Prince Philip and I send our condolences to the families and friends of those who have lost their lives," she said, paying tribute to emergency workers and volunteers providing support to the injured.
Queen Elizabeth, 92, the world's oldest and longest-serving living monarch, is queen of 15 other realms besides Britain, including Australia, Canada and New Zealand.
She last visited New Zealand in 2002 as part of celebrations to mark the 50th anniversary of her accession to the throne.

Queen 'deeply saddened' by New Zealand mosque attacks

Pope Francis assured "all New Zealanders, and in particular the Muslim community, of his heartfelt solidarity," after Friday's attacks on two mosques which left 49 people dead.
The pope was "deeply saddened to learn of the injury and loss of life caused by the senseless acts of violence," Vatican Secretary of State Pietro Parolin said in a telegram.

Pope voices solidarity with Muslims after New Zealand attacks

Lewis Hamilton made a mockery of his claim that Ferrari would be half-a-second quicker at the Australian Grand Prix by easily clocking the fastest times in the season's opening practice runs Friday.
The Briton led a Mercedes one-two in the second session as he powered round Melbourne's Albert Park circuit under clear skies with a best of one minute 22.600 seconds.
It bettered his pace-setting 1:23.599 in the opening practice as he kick-started his bid for a sixth world title.
Valtteri Bottas was second (1:22.648) with Red Bull's Max Verstappen third (1:23.400), marginally ahead of impressive new teammate Pierre Gasly, who was promoted this year from Toro Rosso.
Sebastian Vettel, who has won in Melbourne for the past two years, could only manage fifth, nearly a second adrift of arch-rival Hamilton, while Ferrari partner Charles Leclerc struggled to ninth, straddling the kerb and spinning as he pushed hard late in the day.
The man Leclerc replaced, Finnish former world champion Kimi ...

Hamilton on top as Ferrari struggle in season's first exchanges

A French investigation into the Ethiopian Airlines 737 MAX  crash that killed 157 passengers and crew opened Friday as US aerospace giant Boeing stopped delivering the top-selling aircraft.
The MAX has been grounded worldwide following the disaster -- the second involving the model in five months -- and the fallout has left the company, regulators and airlines scrambling to respond.
"We are pausing the delivery of the 737 MAX until we come up with a solution," a Boeing spokesman said Thursday, adding: "We are going to continue the production but we are assessing our capacities." An Ethiopian delegation delivered the black boxes to France's BEA air safety agency "and the investigation process has started in Paris", Ethiopian Airlines said Friday on Twitter.
The BEA confirmed it had received the black box recorders from the plane, which was just four months old and crashed minutes after takeoff from Addis Ababa on Sunday.  BEA investigators will now try to retrieve information from the .

France probes 737 MAX black boxes as Boeing halts deliveries

A Japanese court sentenced the former high-flying creator of the MtGox bitcoin exchange to a suspended jail sentence of two and a half years Friday after finding him guilty of data manipulation.
The Tokyo District Court convicted Mark Karpeles, a 33-year-old computer whizz from France, for tampering with computer data but acquitted him over charges of embezzling millions from client accounts.
The sentence was suspended for four years.
In a summary of the ruling, the court said Karpeles had "harmed the users' trust greatly" by manipulating data and "abused his expertise as an IT engineer and his position and authority".
Prosecutors had claimed that Karpeles had pocketed some 341 million yen (USD 3 million) of client's money and splashed it on a lavish lifestyle. They called for him to serve 10 years behind bars.
However, in throwing out the embezzlement charges, the judge said there was no financial damage done to MtGox and ruled that Karpeles did not intend to cause any damage.
The ...

MtGox bitcoin founder gets suspended sentence for data tampering

Sixty years after the Dalai Lama fled into permanent Indian exile, the cause of Tibetan freedom that earned him a Nobel prize and a celebrity-studded international following has lost much of its momentum -- neutralised, analysts say, by the passage of time and China's rising global power.
Inside Tibet, Beijing has effectively wiped out any organised opposition to its iron-clad rule, while outside, the once-vocal support of sympathetic governments and world leaders has dwindled to near-silence in recent years despite the 14th Dalai Lama's enduring personal popularity.
"The fate of Tibet is in the hands of the Chinese state... Tibetans outside the region are not very relevant to the fate of Tibet, and this includes the Dalai Lama", said Nathan Hill, convener of Tibetan studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London.
In 2007, the Buddhist spiritual leader said his homeland was facing its "darkest period in 2,000 years". The following year, with the world's eyes on 

Tibet struggle's slow slide off the global radar as Dalai Lama ages

US stock regulators have sued Volkswagen over the emissions cheating scandal, alleging the German automaker committed fraud by raising billions in corporate bonds while lying to investors about the environmental impact of its cars.
In a filing Thursday night in California, the Securities and Exchange Commission said that from April 2014 to May 2015, Volkswagen issued more than USD 13 billion in bonds and asset-backed securities in US markets while senior executives knew that more than 500,000 vehicles in the US grossly exceeded legal vehicle emissions limits.
By hiding the emissions scheme, Volkswagen reaped hundreds of millions of dollars in benefit by issuing securities at more attractive rates, the SEC complaint alleges.
"Issuers availing themselves of American capital markets must provide investors with accurate and complete information," said Stephanie Avakian, co-director of the SEC enforcement division.
"As we allege, Volkswagen hid its decade-long emissions scheme while it was 

US regulators sue VW over emissions scandal

More than 2,000 people, including many children, have fallen ill after toxic waste was dumped in a Malaysian river and emitted hazardous fumes over a wide area, an official said Friday.
About 200 schools and nurseries have been closed in the affected area in southern Johor state after a lorry dumped the waste last week.
People who inhaled the fumes suffered from nausea and vomiting, and a handful were left in critical condition.
The number of those needing medical treatment has been slowly rising since the crisis began and on Friday the figure stood at 2,355, including 113 still in hospital, local lawmaker Sahruddin Jamal told AFP.
No one has died.
Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad visited victims in hospital on Thursday and praised the response of emergency workers.
"They have done their job well even though such a case has never occurred (here)," he said, according to official news agency Bernama.
The military has been deployed along with hazardous waste experts, wearing protective ...

AFP

AFP

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