Lucas Moura kept Tottenham's FA Cup hopes alive with the equaliser in their 1-1 draw at second tier Middlesbrough, while Callum Hudson-Odoi got back in the groove as Chelsea cruised to a 2-0 win over Nottingham Forest in the third round on Sunday.
Tottenham haven't lifted a major trophy since 2008 when current Middlesbrough manager Jonathan Woodgate scored the League Cup winner against Chelsea.
Woodgate was on course to dent Tottenham's bid to end that wretched run when Ashley Fletcher put Middlesbrough ahead in the second half at the Riverside Stadium.
But Brazilian winger Lucas headed the equaliser to send the tie to a replay in north London later in January.
Keen to win silverware in his first season, Tottenham boss Jose Mourinho had made just three changes, with Son Heung-min returning from a three-match suspension and replacing the injured Harry Kane.
Son twice came close to putting Tottenham ahead in the first half and the visitors should have gone in front when Ryan Sessegnon ..

Lucas rescues Spurs, Chelsea in FA Cup stroll

PTI Automatic

Iran has cancelled a Tehran ceremony on Sunday night to honour slain general Qasem Soleimani due to an overwhelming turnout by mourners in second city Mashhad, the Revolutionary Guards said.
"Considering the glorious, intense and million-man presence of the revolutionary people of Mashhad in the ceremony to bid farewell to Islam and Iran's great general Qasem Soleimani and since the program is still continuing... it is not possible to hold the event in Tehran," the Guards said.
The statement called on people to attend a ceremony scheduled to take place at Tehran University on Monday.

Iran cancels Soleimani ceremony in Tehran after huge turnout in second city

Iraq said Sunday it had submitted complaints to the United Nations Security Council over US strikes on Iraq that killed an Iranian general, an Iraqi commander and other local forces.
The foreign ministry said it had submitted two letters to the UN and asked the Security Council to condemn the "assassination" of Iranian Major General Qasem Soleimani in an American drone strike on Baghdad.

Iraq says it complained to UN Security Council over US strike

The military adviser to Iran's supreme leader said the Islamic republic's response to a US strike that killed one of the country's top commanders will be military, CNN reported Sunday.
Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei vowed "severe revenge" after a US drone strike Friday in Baghdad killed Qasem Soleimani, the powerful commander of the Revolutionary Guards' Quds Force foreign operations arm.
"The response for sure will be military and against military sites," Brigadier General Hossein Dehghan told CNN in Farsi, according to a translation by the US news network.
In a televised news conference on Sunday, foreign ministry spokesman Abbas Mousavi said "Iran is not seeking a war but is ready for any situation".
Mousavi said the final decision would be made by "the system's leadership".
It would try to "devise a response in a way that would both make the enemy regret" the assassination and "not bring the Iranian nation to a war".
In his interview with CNN, Dehghan said: "It was America .

Khamenei adviser says Iran response to US to be military: CNN

World number five Daniil Medvedev blunted big-serving John Isner in an almost flawless straight sets victory at the ATP Cup on Sunday.
The US Open finalist hit 24 winners and made just two unforced errors in the 6-3, 6-1 rout in one hour to ensure Russia clinched the tie against the United States ahead of the doubles.
Unbeaten Russia are top of Group D, while winless United States are all but out of contention for the knockout stages in Sydney. World number 19 Isner has struggled in Perth. He lost his opening match to young Norwegian Casper Ruud in three sets.
Medvedev overwhelmed Isner, who consistently misfired his booming serve, and broke the towering American four times.
"I was very scared of his serve, so I knew I had to just wait for my chances. I was really good on return," he said.
Medvedev even out-aced Isner, who for the last four years has been the ATP's year-end ace leader.
"If you asked me before the match, I didn't think it would be possible," he said.
"I was really ...

Medvedev blunts Isner's serve as Russia roll on

Machine-gun wielding jihadists killed four Nigerian soldiers and wounded 11 more during an attack on an army base in the northeast, military officials said on Sunday.
Fighters from the Islamic State West African Province (ISWAP) arrived in six trucks to attack the Jakana base, near the city of Maiduguri, on Saturday evening, the officials told AFP.
The troops forced the jihadists to retreat after a prolonged gunfight.
In recent weeks, ISWAP, an off-shoot of regional jihadist group Boko Haram, has intensified attacks in the region, targeting soldiers but also mounting fake checkpoints, killing and abducting civilians.
The decade-long insurgency in northeast Nigeria has killed 36,000 people, according the UN and displaced a further two million.
The conflict has spilt into Niger, Cameroon and Chad -- prompting them to set up a joint military force to combat the threat.
Some 1,200 Chadian soldiers returned to Chad this week after a months-long deployment in Nigeria, sparking panic among ..

Nigeria jihadists kill four soldiers in base attack

Espanyol's Wu Lei became the first Chinese footballer to score against Barcelona on Saturday and has revealed how the goal that went viral was planned while he was warming up.
Wu earned Espanyol a dramatic 2-2 draw at the RCDE Stadium after he fired in an 88th-minute equaliser to salvage a point in the all-Catalan clash of La Liga's top against bottom.
The 28-year-old drove decisively past Barcelona's stand-in goalkeeper Neto and into the far corner but his goal owed much to a brilliant reverse pass too, executed by his team-mate Matias Vargas.
Both players had been introduced by new coach Abelardo Fernandez in the second half and Wu said after the match that Vargas had predicted he would give him a chance.
"I am very happy, not just because I scored but because of that assist," Wu told Espanyol TV.
"When we were warming up, Matias told me he was going to put me in with a through ball. After 10 minutes he played one to me and I scored."
Chinese media on Sunday declared the strike as ..

Barca strike was planned, says Wu Lei as China hails Espanyol hero

Stefanos Tsitsipas whipped an error-strewn Alexander Zverev to win the battle of the big guns at the ATP Cup on Sunday, inflicting a second successive defeat on the German in his warm-up for the Australian Open.
On day three of the inaugural 24-nation team event in Sydney, Brisbane and Perth, world number 11 David Goffin was another loser, along with Italy's Fabio Fognini, ranked one place below him.
Greek star Tsitsipas, who won the 2019 season-ending ATP Finals in London and is now ranked six, was in a different league to Zverev, who only began hitting balls a week ago after an off-season curtailed by a lucrative exhibition tour.
The lacklustre German world number seven sent down 10 double faults and made just 45 percent of his first serves, a worrying sign ahead of the opening Grand Slam of the year.
He lost to Australia's Alex de Minaur in his opening match on Friday, throwing away a one-set lead.
"I worked very hard for this win, I found solutions, found my rhythm and my pace and 

Tsitsipas whips Zverev as top names crash at ATP Cup

Carlos Ghosn's escape from Japan is "unjustifiable" and he is thought to have left the country using "illegal methods", the Japanese justice minister said Sunday, in the first official public comments on the case.
The 65-year-old former Nissan boss skipped bail and fled Japan where he was awaiting trial over multiple counts of financial misconduct that he denies.
It was the latest twist in a saga that has gripped the business world and his escape from Japan has left authorities there red-faced and scrambling to defend their justice system from fierce international criticism.
"Our country's criminal justice system sets out appropriate procedures to clarify the truth of cases and is administered appropriately, while guaranteeing basic individual human rights. The flight by a defendant on bail is unjustifiable," said Masako Mori.
"It is clear that we do not have records of the defendant Ghosn departing Japan. It is believed that he used some wrongful methods to illegally leave the ...

Japan blasts 'unjustifiable' Ghosn's escape

The US-led coalition on Sunday announced it was "pausing" its fight against the Islamic State group in Iraq, where US troops training local forces have faced a spate of rocket attacks.
"This has limited our capacity to conduct training with partners and to support their operations against Daesh (IS) and we have therefore paused these activities, subject to continuous review," the coalition said in a statement.
On Saturday, the coalition said its forces in Baghdad and in an airfield north of the capital had faced new attacks, bringing the total rocket strikes in the last two months to 13.

US-led coalition says 'paused' IS fight in Iraq after rockets

Saudi Aramco shares hit the lowest level since their market debut on Sunday, as Gulf bourses were hit by a panicky sell-off amid Iranian vows of retaliation over the US killing of a top general.
All seven bourses in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states closed in the red, on the first trading day since the death of powerful military commander Qasem Soleimani.
All six member states -- Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates -- are US allies and lie on the opposite side of the narrow Gulf, making them easy targets for the Islamic republic.
Some of the GCC members, notably Kuwait, Qatar and Bahrain, are home to major US military bases while Washington maintains hundreds of troops in Saudi Arabia.
Kuwait's Boursa led the slide, shedding 3.7 per cent as jitters gripped trading in the Gulf state which lies very close to Iran and is home to one of the largest US bases in the Middle East.
Dubai Financial Market, the Gulf stock exchange most exposed to ...

Aramco sinks as Gulf bourses rocked by Iran-US tensions

Britain on Sunday urged Iran to "do the right thing" and seize the opportunity to come in from the cold by de-escalating tensions with the United States.
Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said a war was in no one's interest as he described Iran's assassinated top general Qasem Soleimani as a "regional menace".
Britain is preparing to deploy the Royal Navy to escort UK-flagged commercial shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.
The US on Friday killed Soleimani in a drone strike near Baghdad international airport that raised fears of a new war in the Middle East.
"The US will take their own operational judgement call but they've got the right of self defence," Raab told Sky News television.  Raab said he spoke to Iraq's President Barham Saleh on Saturday and Prime Minister Adel Abdel Mahdi on Sunday.
"We want to see de-escalation, we're going to do everything we can to protect the UK diplomatic missions and we're going about that business," he said.
Raab said there needed to be "a route ...

Britain urges Iran to come in from the cold

Mourners flooded the Iranian cities of Ahvaz and Mashhad Sunday, weeping and beating their chests in homage to top general Qasem Soleimani who was killed in a US strike in Baghdad.
"Death to America," they chanted as they packed Ahvaz's streets and a long bridge spanning a river in the southwestern city to receive the casket containing Soleimani's remains.
As Shiite chants resonated in the air, people held portraits of the man seen as a hero of the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war and for spearheading Iran's Middle East operations as commander of the Revolutionary Guards' Quds Force.
In the northeastern city of Mashhad, scores took to streets around the Imam Reza shrine and, addressing the US, chanted "Be afraid of your own shadow".
Soleimani was killed in a US drone strike Friday near Baghdad airport, shocking the Islamic republic. He was 62.
The attack was ordered by President Donald Trump, who said the Quds commander had been planning an "imminent" attack on US diplomats and forces in ...

Mourners flood Iran cities as top general's remains return

Dom Sibley and Joe Denly stretched England's lead on an attritional third afternoon of the second Test against South Africa at Newlands on Sunday after James Anderson had polished off the home side's first innings in the morning.
England were 109 for two in their second innings at tea, an overall lead of 155 runs.
Sibley and Denly put on 73 for the second wicket before Denly was out for 31 when he hooked a short-pitched ball from Anrich Nortje and was caught by Dwaine Pretorius at fine leg.
It was slow going, with the partnership taking up 33 overs, but it consolidated England's advantage on a pitch where batsmen have struggled to bat fluently.
Denly faced 111 balls, while Sibley was unbeaten on 44 off 127 deliveries at tea.
Anderson completed a five-wicket haul and Ben Stokes set an England catching record at the start of the day when South Africa were bowled out for 223, giving England a first innings lead of 46.
Anderson took both South Africa's remaining wickets as the hosts were .

Sibley, Denly build England lead against South Africa

Port Vale striker Tom Pope claims Manchester City defender John Stones refused to talk to him after their FA Cup clash because of a social media feud.
FA Cup holders City cruised to a 4-1 win over fourth tier Vale in the third round on Saturday.
But Pope's goal for Vale was the highlight as the 34-year-old backed up his now-famous taunting of Stones.
Unimpressed by one of his performances for England, Pope mocked Stones in a tweet last year, claiming he would score 40 goals a season if he faced the defender every week.
All eyes were on their duel and Pope insisted he proved his point by cancelling out Oleksandr Zinchenko's opener with a fine header and later intercepting a Stones pass to create another chance.
"It was only banter and people have dug it up because we've drawn Man City. He's a world-class centre-half. I was just saying he wasn't very physical and that's it. If people think I'm wrong, well, I don't care," Pope said.
"I spoke to (Benjamin) Mendy and he said all their ...

Vale striker reveals Stones silence after FA Cup taunts

Manchester United manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer says Harry Maguire faces a race to prove his fitness in time for the League Cup semi-final first leg against Manchester City on Tuesday.
Maguire appeared to be limping following a first-half challenge on Adama Traore during United's 0-0 draw with Wolves in the FA Cup third round on Saturday.
Phil Jones was preparing to come on for Maguire but the centre-back eventually completed the 90 minutes and Jones was an unused substitute.
Solskjaer admitted he considered taking Maguire off at half-time and, when asked whether the defender would be fit for the first leg against City at Old Trafford, he replied: "I don't know.
"We were close to taking him off at half-time, but he battled through. Let's see how he recovers. We hope so."
England star Maguire has only missed four games in all competitions this season and has played every minute of the club's Premier League campaign.
United are already missing defenders Axel Tuanzebe, Marcos Rojo and ...

Maguire faces race to be fit for Manchester derby

The Iraqi foreign ministry on Sunday summoned US ambassador Matthew Tueller to condemn American strikes on Iraq that killed a top Iranian general, an Iraqi commander and other local fighters.
"They were a blatant violation of Iraqi sovereignty," the ministry said in a statement, and "contradict the agreed-upon missions of the international coalition.

Iraq summons US envoy over 'violation of sovereignty': ministry

The Russian government has published a plan to adapt the economy and population to climate change, aiming to mitigate damage but also "use the advantages" of warmer temperatures.
The document, published on the government website on Saturday, outlines a plan of action and admits that "consequences of (climate) change have a prominent and increasing effect on socio-economic development, people's lives," health and industry.
Russia is warming 2.5 times quicker than the planet on average, and the two-year "first stage" plan is an indication that the government officially recognises this as a problem, even though
President Vladimir Putin denies it is man-made.
The plan is needed in order to "lower the losses and use the advangages".
It says climate change increases risks to public health and  permafrost, of infections, turbulent weather and will have consequences for other species.
Possible "positive" effects are decreased energy use in cold regions, expanding agricultural areas and ...

Russia unveils climate 'adaptation' plan

Jihadists from Somalia's Al-Shabaab group  on Sunday stormed a military base used by US forces in Kenya's coastal Lamu region, destroying aircraft and military vehicles, according to Kenyan police and army officials.
A group of attackers breached security at Camp Simba in the early hours but were repelled and four jihadists were killed, said army Colonel Paul Njuguna.
Al-Shabaab has launched regular cross-border attacks since Kenya sent troops into Somalia in 2011 as part of an African Union force protecting the internationally backed government -- which the jihadists have been trying to overthrow for more than a decade.
Lamu region, which includes the Lamu Island tourist hub, lies close to the Somali frontier and has suffered frequent attacks often carried out with roadside bombs.
Njuguna said "an attempt was made to breach security at Manda Air Strip" at 5:30am but the attack was repulsed.
"Four terrorists' bodies have so far been found. The airstrip is safe," he said, adding that a 

Somali jihadists attack military base in Kenya

Regime air strikes on Sunday killed five civilians in the embattled opposition stronghold of Idlib in northwest Syria, a Britain-based war monitor said.
Jihadist-run Idlib has come under mounting bombardment in recent weeks, forcing tens of thousands to flee their homes in the region of some three million people.
"Regime air raids killed five civilians in the town of Ariha," said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which relies on sources inside the war-torn country.
The Damascus government has repeatedly vowed to take back control of Idlib, which is run by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, a group dominated by Syria's former Al-Qaeda affiliate.
A ceasefire announced in late August was supposed to stem Russia-backed regime bombardment of the region after it killed around 1,000 civilians in four months.
But the Observatory says sporadic bombardment and clashes continued, before intensifying in the past month.
On January 1, missiles fired by regime forces killed nine civilians including five ..

Regime air strikes kill five in northwest Syria: monitor

Spain's parliament rejected Socialist leader Pedro Sanchez's bid to be reappointed prime minister on Sunday but he appeared on track to win a second confidence vote later in the coming week.
Sanchez needed 176 votes -- an absolute majority in the 350-seat assembly -- to be confirmed as prime minister for another term.
He lost the vote as expected, with 166 in favour, 165 against and 18 abstentions. One lawmaker did not attend the vote due to illness.
Sanchez will face parliament again on Tuesday and this time he needs a simple majority -- more yes votes than no -- to be become premier for another term.
While the political math works in his favour after he struck a deal for the 13 lawmakers from Catalan separatist party ERC to abstain, the numbers still look tight.
At the latest count Sanchez could win on Tuesday by a margin of just two votes.
Spain, the eurozone's fourth-largest economy, has been in political gridlock without a proper government for most of the past year after two ...

AFP

AFP

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