1. #CHAMPIONS LEAGUE European football’s top competition returned with a bang last night as Real Madrid snatched a 3-2 win in a frantic finale against Manchester City.
Aleksandar Kolarov looked to have gotten Roberto Mancini’s men off to a winning start when he put them 2-1 up in the 85th minute, but a late double blow from Karim Benzema and Cristiano Ronaldo sent Jose Mourinho sliding across the Bernabeu turf in celebration.
In France, Lukas Podolski and Gervinho scored as Arsenal beat Montepellier 2-1. Here’s a round-up of all the evening’s action.
2. #WORLD T20 Ireland open their World T20 campaign when they take on Australia in Colombo this morning. The action begins at 11am — as does our over-by-over liveblog — but if you need to get up to speed on the ins and outs of T20 cricket before then, here’s a quick explainer.
On Tuesday, tournament hosts Sri Lanka beat Zimbabwe by 82 runs in the opening game.
3. #SFC 2012 It’s getting spicy ahead of Sunday’s All-Ireland Football final. Former Dublin manager — and Mayo native — Tommy Lyons on Tuesday accused Martin McHugh of indulging in ‘cute hoorism’ by trying to prevent teams from man-marking his son, Donegal playmaker Mark.
“He was being the cute auld hoor on the telly and Tony Davis and the boys didn’t respond to it,” Lyons said of McHugh’s punditry on RTÉ. “That auld cute hoorism, we’re not all gobshites.”
4. #AIRTRICITY LEAGUE Brian Laws, the new director of football at Shamrock Rovers, says that he won’t have time to implement any radical changes in Tallaght and will focus instead on trying to bring the spark back to the Hoops for their final six games.
Laws, who takes charge of the first team in Saturday’s EA Sports Cup final, met the media for the first time since taking the post yesterday. Read the interview here.
5. #REBELS Cork GAA bosses announced a radical administrative shake up of the county board last night, confirming plans to bring in an administrator who will absorb many of secretary Frank Murphy’s responsibilities.
However Murphy, who has served as secretary since 1972, will retain his title and continue to oversee plans to redevelop Páirc Uí Chaoimh.
