MANCHESTER UNITED have ditched the role of sporting director after their failed Dan Ashworth experiment. Sir Jim Ratcliffe axed Ashworth following Saturday’s 3-2 home loss to Nottingham Forest . Ashworth, now a target for Prem rivals Arsenal , was United’s first ever sporting director. But he is gone after just five months — with the post consigned to history . Red Devils part-owner Ratcliffe decided that his Ineos right-hand man Sir Dave Brailsford , United chief exec Omar Berrada and technical director Jason Wilcox will share the responsibilities of the position. Ashworth, 53, was forced out of Old Trafford after losing a power battle with ex-City executive Berrada. The pair had a huge fall-out over how the club should move forward in a bid to get back to the top of English football . But Ashworth, who worked at Newcastle, Brighton, West Brom and the FA , could be offered a swift return. Arsenal are assessing options to replace Edu as sporting director at the Emirates and Ashworth’s unexpected availability has caught their eye. Ashworth has a close relationship with Gunners managing director Richard Garlick, who is leading the search to land a new sporting director. FOOTBALL FREE BETS AND SIGN UP DEALS THE blame game has another victim as things go from bad to worse at Old Trafford. Manchester United’s first sporting director, Dan Ashworth, arrived in the summer and is gone before Christmas. SunSport exclusively revealed last month that there was trouble at mill. That the new senior management team were already blaming each other for the mess the club were in. Chief executive Omar Berrada and Ashworth were trying to wash their hands of it all, claiming they had arrived too late after serving their gardening leave. New part owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe said making decisions was all down to them. Meanwhile, Jason Wilcox thought it was all a mess under previous boss Erik ten Hag but was part of the team that encouraged him to stay after every other candidate ran for cover. There is word Ashworth did not favour appointing his successor and new head coach Ruben Amorim, preferring an English manager with more experience in our game. Perhaps that was why ex-England gaffer Gareth Southgate’s name was always mentioned after they worked together at the FA. Either way, Saturday’s showing against Nottingham Forest, after their second-half capitulation at Arsenal a few days previously, proved too much. The pair worked together at West Brom for three years. Garlick was legal director at The Hawthorns and worked under Ashworth before replacing him as the club’s sporting director when he left to join the FA in 2013. Everton are also monitoring Ashworth as they wait for The Friedkin Group to complete a takeover. The club’s prospective new owners are in the process of conducting a structural review , which will lead to new appointments including a chief executive and technical director. SunSport can reveal Ashworth’s axe will also open the door to further cuts at United . Ashworth fought against too many cutbacks despite Ratcliffe wanting more . In total, 250 staff have been made redundant. But that is not the end as Carrington is set to be targeted again — with the academy and women’s footballing section likely to be streamlined.Mikaela Shiffrin suffers abrasion on hip during crash on final run of World Cup giant slalom
CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Margaret Sanchez is the new president and CEO of Esperanza, a Cleveland nonprofit that focuses on education in the Hispanic/Latinix communities. Sanchez previously served as the vice president of development at YWCA Greater Cleveland, a statement from Esperanza said. Throughout her career, she has advocated for minority communities, through her work at various nonprofits, such as Hispanic Unity of Florida and the National Association of Latino Elected Officials, Esperanza added. She was chosen after a yearlong search. She serves as a board member for the Northeast Ohio Hispanic Business Center, the Latin American Presidential Mission and on the city of Cleveland Hispanic Advisory Board. Pamela Hobe, Esperanza’s board president, said in a statement that the organization was “fortunate to find the ideal candidate right here in Northeast Ohio.” “Margaret’s broad experience, unique perspective, understanding of our community and collaborative leadership style will foster growth and lead us to the future,” Hobe said. Sanchez replaces Victor Ruiz, who announced in December 2023 that he was stepping down as president and CEO after 15 years . The organization worked with Koya Partners, a firm that specializes in executive searches and recruiting, particularly for mission-driven roles, on the national search for the new president and CEO. “Her passion for Esperanza’s mission and her diverse experience makes her the ideal leader to drive strategic solutions for our growing Latino community and successfully expand support services to learners of all ages,” he said. Esperanza offers programs for kids, adult learners and post-secondary students. It also has a Hispanic youth and leadership program, mentoring and a STEAM summer camp for students interested in science, technology, engineering, arts and math. It provides over 100 scholarships to local students.
BATON ROUGE, La. – Louisiana’s GOP-dominated legislature passed tax cuts on personal and corporate income on Friday in exchange for a statewide sales tax increase, giving Gov. Jeff Landry much of what he wanted after his original tax reform package faced mounting resistance from lawmakers and lobbyists. The final passage of the tax measures wrapped up a special legislative session launched Nov. 6 by the governor and his allies. They said their purpose was to make the state’s tax code more business friendly, create jobs and reverse trends of outward migration from the state. It was the third special legislative session called by Landry, a Republican, since he assumed office in January. Recommended Videos Critics warned the tax reforms would primarily benefit corporate shareholders and wealthy taxpayers while the sales tax increase would exacerbate Louisiana's regressive tax system where poorer households pay a higher percentage of their income on taxes. Landry called the tax reforms “historic” and said that they allowed all Louisianans to keep more money in their pockets and would spur business investment. “Today we have made generational change in this state,” Landry said. “We now stand at the threshold of a new era for Louisiana.” A flat 3% income tax Lawmakers approved a flat 3% individual income tax rate, leading to a $1.3 billion cut. Previously, the personal income tax rate had stood at 4.25% for people earning $50,000 or more. Louisiana Republicans said the measure advanced their goal of ultimately eliminating the income tax in the future. “Income tax is a mandate; you have to pay it. You get punished for making more money,” said Republican Rep. Julie Emerson, who spearheaded the legislation. She argued consumption-based taxes were fairer: “Sales tax is a choice,” Emerson said. Lawmakers also noted that other Southern states like Arkansas , Mississippi and North Carolina have recently reduced their income taxes. “We’re on the same trajectory as other states around us to be competitive,” Republican Sen. Franklin Foil said. As part of the legislative package, lawmakers doubled the standard deduction for seniors and nearly tripled the standard deduction for individuals, effectively eliminating income tax on the lowest income households. Lawmakers also redirected $280 million in vehicle sales tax funds from several major infrastructure projects for the next two years in order to help offset the income tax cut. Corporate tax cuts The state’s new corporate income tax rate will be a flat 5.5%, reducing the highest tier from 7.5%. Landry had wanted a 3.5% flat rate. Louisiana's corporate income tax rate had been the highest in the South according to the Tax Foundation, a conservative think tank. Lawmakers repealed the 0.275% corporate franchise tax, a levy on businesses operating on the state worth more than $500 million in annual revenue that went to a state savings account. Republican lawmakers had decried the tax as an arbitrary penalty on business. Landry and other Republican lawmakers had touted these tax cuts as crucial to removing obstacles to attract job-generating companies to the state and to improve Louisiana's place on Tax Foundation's rankings for business climate. “Louisiana just became a much more attractive place to do business,” Louisiana Economic Development Secretary Susan Bourgeois said. Sales tax hike With the personal income tax reductions reducing annual revenue by $1.3 billion, Landry’s original plan had called for applying sales taxes to dozens of services like car-washing, dog-grooming and lobbying. He also sought to eliminate large tax incentives for the restoration of historic buildings and the film industry. Those proposals were defeated — except for a new sales tax on digital goods and services — following stiff opposition from Republicans and special interest groups, leading to a bigger sales tax hike than Landry initially proposed. Lawmakers raised the state sales tax to 5%, equivalent to an increase of one cent on every dollar spent. In 2030, the state sales tax will be reduced to 4.75%. The state's current sales tax stood at 4%, along with a temporary 0.45% sales tax that had been set to expire next year. Louisiana already had the highest combined state and average local sales tax in the country at 9.56%, according to the Tax Foundation. Louisiana has the 10th most regressive tax system in the country, according to the left-leaning Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. Jan Moller, executive director of the liberal think tank Invest in Louisiana, said the sales tax hike and other changes take the state “in the wrong direction.” “I think it will ensure that low- and moderate-income families continue to pay a higher effective tax rate in Louisiana than those at the very top,” he said. Republican leaders said they did not believe the increased sales tax would cancel out the benefits of the income tax cut for lower- and middle-income families. Sen. Minority Leader Gerald Boudreaux said the Democratic Caucus had supported the bills — only one Democratic Senator dissented — in order to have a seat at the table in shaping the process, such as pushing to preserve the film industry tax credit. “All of those changes represent what's best for the state, and they're now in a document — that was not previously there,” Boudreaux said on the Senate floor. House Democrats were more fractured than their Senate counterparts, but many still voted in support of the overall tax package. Constitutional changes The tax reform package included a significant rewrite to a notoriously convoluted section of the state's constitution, Article 7. The amendment, which will go before voters on March 29, removes large amounts of tax exemptions from constitutional protection and intends to give lawmakers more latitude to end these exemptions in the future. The constitutional amendment also enables a permanent $2,000 raise for teachers, made possible by liquidating several education trust funds to pay off early nearly $2 billion in school district debt. And it inserts a “growth limit” on the amount of money lawmakers can direct to recurring expenses each year based on calculations of economic growth in the state — a measure proposed by conservative lawmakers. ___ Associated Press writer Kevin McGill contributed to this report. ___ Brook is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. Follow Brook on the social platform X: @jack_brook96Bill Belichick had just been introduced Thursday as North Carolina's next football coach when chancellor Lee Roberts came armed with a gift: a short-sleeved gray hoodie — a bit of a trademark from Belichick's NFL coaching days — bearing a blue interlocking “NC” logo. It was the visual confirmation, which will take some getting used to, that the six-time Super Bowl-winning head coach whose name became synonymous with NFL success has taken an unexpected first dive into college coaching. He now leads a program at a school with a national name brand but one that has been unable to sustain fleeting pockets of high-level success when it comes to football. “I've always wanted to coach in college football,” Belichick said during his introductory campus news conference. “It just never really worked out. Had some good years in the NFL, so that was OK.” The school's trustees approved terms of the deal to hire Belichick as the new football coach earlier Thursday. Specific terms have yet to be released, though the school said Wednesday there was a five-year agreement. Belichick arrived wearing a dark suit, a light blue dress shirt and a tie bearing a white-and-light-blue pattern. He sat between Roberts and athletic director Bubba Cunningham, who paid his own tribute by donning a suit jacket with the sleeves cut off to mimic Belichick's cut-off sideline look. “I’m here to, as Bubba said, teach, develop and build a program in the way that I believe in,” Belichick said. Moving on from the 73-year-old Mack Brown to hire the 72-year-old Belichick means UNC is turning to a coach who has never worked at the college level, yet had incredible success in the NFL alongside quarterback Tom Brady throughout most of his 24-year tenure with the Patriots, which ended last season. Belichick holds 333 career regular-season and postseason wins in the NFL, trailing only Don Shula’s 347 for the NFL record, while his 31 playoff wins are the most in league history. He had been linked to NFL jobs in the time since his departure from the Patriots, notably the Atlanta Falcons in January. That’s why word of Belichick’s conversations with UNC — first reported by Inside Carolina and confirmed by the AP last week — stirred such surprise as an unexpected and unconventional candidate. There’s also at least a small family tie to the UNC program for Belichick; his late father, Steve, was an assistant coach for the Tar Heels from 1953-55. When asked about fan concerns that he might leave quickly for the next NFL job, Belichick said: “I didn't come here to leave." And when asked how long he might want to keep coaching, he quipped: “It beats working. My dad told me this: when you love what you do, it's not work. I love what I do. I love coaching." He’s arriving on campus at a time of rapid changes in college athletics, from free player movement through the transfer portal and athletes’ ability to cash in on endorsements to the looming arrival of revenue sharing. And he's taking over a program that for a school with a national name-brand — particularly as a tradition-rich blueblood in college basketball — has never sustained elite football success in its long history. RODRIGUEZ RETURNING TO WEST VIRGINIA Rich Rodriguez is returning to West Virginia for a second stint as head coach at his alma mater. Athletic director Wren Baker announced the hiring on Thursday, 17 years after Rodriguez made a hasty exit for what became a disastrous three-year experiment at Michigan. “We are thrilled to welcome Coach Rich Rodriguez and his family back home,” Baker said in a statement. “Coach Rodriguez understands what it takes to win at West Virginia, and I believe he will pour his heart, soul and every ounce of his energy into our program. I am convinced Coach Rodriguez wants what is best for West Virginia, WVU and West Virginia football, and I am excited about the future of our program.” Rodriguez, who is the current coach at Jacksonville State, an architect of the spread offense and a polarizing figure in his home state, replaces Neal Brown, who was fired on Dec. 1 after going 37-35 in six seasons, including 6-6 this year. “I am thrilled to have the opportunity to be the head football coach at West Virginia University,” Rodriguez said. “My family and I are filled with gratitude to lead the Mountaineer football program again and look forward to working with the many supporters, fans, and friends to build the best football program in America! Take Me Home!” Rodriguez, 61, will be tasked with restoring a consistent winning climate at West Virginia, which hasn’t been ranked or had back-to-back winning seasons since 2018. The Mountaineers have yet to qualify for the Big 12 championship game since joining the league in 2012. Its best finish was a tie for second place in 2016. Success was a standard at West Virginia under Rodriguez, who went 60-26 from 2001 to 2007 after replacing Hall of Fame coach Don Nehlen. With star players such as quarterback Pat White and running back Steve Slaton, Rodriguez led the Mountaineers to four Big East titles in five years and one of the greatest victories in school history, an upset win over Georgia in the Sugar Bowl following the 2005 season. But many in the West Virginia fanbase remain jaded over his long-ago exit. Needing a win in their 2007 regular season finale to advance to the BCS national championship game, the Mountaineers lost at home to heavy underdog Pittsburgh, 13-9. “We picked an awful time to have our worst offensive game in years,” Rodriguez said after the game. Despite earning a berth in the Fiesta Bowl against Oklahoma as a consolation prize, Rodriguez was gone two weeks later, taking some of his assistant coaches and recruits with him to Michigan. Rodriguez has insisted the Pitt loss had nothing to do with him leaving. He has said promises made by the school’s administration were not kept and his request for more money for his assistant coaches was rejected. Rodriguez said his relationship with then-athletic director Ed Pastilong had disintegrated by August 2007 to the point that the two men barely spoke.Osun gov lauds efforts to improve education infrastructureWEBER STATE 68, PEPPERDINE 53
Stocks shook off a choppy start to finish higher Monday, as Wall Street kicked off a holiday-shortened week. The S&P 500 ended 0.7% higher after having been down 0.5% in the early going. The Dow Jones Industrial Average also recovered from an early slide to eke out a 0.2% gain. The tech-heavy Nasdaq composite rose 1%. Gains in technology and communications stocks accounted for much of the gains, outweighing losses in consumer goods companies and elsewhere in the market. Semiconductor giant Nvidia, whose enormous valuation gives it an outsize influence on indexes, rose 3.7%. Broadcom climbed 5.5% to also help support the broader market. Walmart fell 2% and PepsiCo slid 1%. Japanese automakers Honda and Nissan said they are talking about combining in a deal that might also include Mitsubishi Motors. U.S.-listed shares in Honda jumped 12.7%, while Nissan ended flat. Eli Lilly rose 3.7% after announcing that regulators approved Zepbound as the first prescription medicine for adults with sleep apnea. Department store Nordstrom fell 1.5% after it agreed to be taken private by Nordstrom family members and a Mexican retail group in a $6.25 billion deal. All told, the S&P 500 rose 43.22 points to 5,974.07. The Dow gained 66.69 points to 42,906.95. The Nasdaq rose 192.29 points to 19,764.89. Traders got a look at a new snapshot of U.S. consumer confidence Monday. The Conference Board said that consumer confidence slipped in December. Its consumer confidence index fell back to 104.7 from 112.8 in November. Wall Street was expecting a reading of 113.8. The unexpectedly weak consumer confidence update follows several generally strong economic reports last week. One report showed the overall economy grew at a 3.1% annualized rate during the summer, faster than earlier thought. The latest report on unemployment benefit applications showed that the job market remains solid. A report on Friday said a measure of inflation the Federal Reserve likes to use was slightly lower last month than economists expected. Worries about inflation edging higher again had been weighing on Wall Street and the Fed. The central bank just delivered its third cut to interest rates this year, but inflation has hovered stubbornly above its target of 2%. It has signaled that it could deliver fewer cuts to interest rates next year than it earlier anticipated because of concerns over inflation. Expectations for more interest rate cuts helped drive a roughly 25% gain for the S&P 500 in 2024. That drive included 57 all-time highs this year. Treasury yields rose in the bond market. The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.59% from 4.53% late Friday. Get local news delivered to your inbox!
The Lions continue to get healthier on offense. Defensive tackle D.J. Reader returned to practice on Thursday for the first time since injuring his shoulder in the team’s Thanksgiving win over the Bears. Reader was listed as a limited participant in practice. Defensive end Josh Paschal (knee) returned to practice on Wednesday and he moved up to full participation on Thursday. Paschal’s last appearance was also on Thanksgiving. Defensive lineman Levi Onwuzurike (hamstring) was limited for the second day in a row while left tackle Taylor Decker (knee) and defensive lineman Alim McNeill (concussion) remained full practice participants. Linebacker Trevor Nowaske was added to the injury report with a concussion and did not practice. He’s likely out for Sunday’s game against the Bills and the team will issue injury designations for any of their other players on Friday afternoon.The world is rushing head first towards a new “Electro-Digital Age” marked by high-tech commodities and extractive mining operations. Large, resource-intensive lithium ion batteries powering emerging electric vehicle fleets are . Nearly last year was electric, a ratio that’s expected to increase rapidly in the coming years. Carmakers and governments alike are rushing to shore up more lithium, cobalt, and other “critical minerals” needed to build those batteries. But new research suggests these batteries, once thought to have short-lived, inherently expendable shelf-lives, may actually last significantly longer than expected. In some cases, properly cared for EVs may even outlive their fossil fuel counterparts. That’s potentially good news: longer-lasting EVs might buy manufacturers much-need time to fabricate components needed to meet increasing global demands. The new findings, by researchers from the SLAC-Stanford Battery Center, suggest EV batteries may actually last about a third longer than previous forecasts. That means drivers could potentially keep driving their modern EV without replacing the battery for several additional years. The researchers note the shocking disparity in battery life estimates stems from fundamentally unrealistic testing environments that became an industry standard. When the researchers tested batteries for two years in ways they say are more closely aligned with how drivers actually use EVs day-to-day, the battery life expectancy improved significantly. “We’ve not been testing EV batteries the right way,” Stanford associate professor and paper senior author Simona Onori . “To our surprise, real driving with frequent acceleration, braking that charges the batteries a bit, stopping to pop into a store, and letting the batteries rest for hours at a time, helps batteries last longer than we had thought based on industry standard lab tests.” SLAC-Stanford Battery Center that its ultimate goal is to “accelerate the deployment of battery and energy storage technologies at scale,” in an effort to address climate change. The research paper was primarily funded by the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program and the Stanford Chevron Fellowship in Energy. Researchers tested 92 commercial lithium ion EV batteries over two years across four different types of driving profiles. The industry standard approach uses a “constant rate of [battery] discharge” followed immediately by a recharge. In the real world, this would look like someone driving their vehicle until the battery is almost fully diminished and then plugging it in to charge completely. This process of constant battery expenditure and recharging resembles how most people use a smartphone. But that’s not how many drivers actually use their vehicles. EV owners, the researchers note, who drive their vehicle in short bursts to and from work or around town, may go several days or even a week without recharging. The researchers attempted to represent that more realistic, periodic driving method in one of the driving profiles. In the end, the more realistic profile resulted in an increased battery lifetime by up to 38%. “This work illustrates the importance of testing batteries under realistic conditions of use and challenges the broadly adopted convention of constant current discharge in the laboratory,” the researchers wrote in the paper. The findings similarly seem to contradict commonly held assumptions about what types of driving quickly degrades batteries. Though many drivers believe rapidly accelerating and braking degrades EV batteries faster than steady driving, the researchers found a correlation in their data suggesting sharp, short accelerations may actually lead to slower battery degradation. Pressing down hard on pedals with a lead foot didn’t seem to speed up battery aging. It may have actually had the opposite effect. “For consumers using their EVs to get to work, pick up their kids, go to the grocery store, but mostly not using them or even charging them, time becomes the predominant cause of aging over cycling,” Stanford school of engineering PhD student and paper coauthor Alexis Geslin said in a statement. The findings build on a growing body of optimistic research newer EVs may last longer than than previous iterations. A recent analysis of 5,000 EV batteries by telematics company Geotab, found an average battery degradation of around 1.8% per year. That’s compared to 2.3% average battery degradation for older EVs studied in 2019. Those findings suggest battery management systems are improving. Some estimates suggest an EV vehicle , which is a longer life expectancy than some cars with internal combustion engines. Whether or not car owners actually use the same car for that long remains to be seen. The average in particular are older than in previous years though the . It’s possible that will change as EV costs trickle down and more drivers make the switch away from more traditional internal combustion engines. Longer lasting EVs could potentially ease the burden on global supply chains which are currently racing to open new mineral mineral and battery facilities.OAP, 95, was forced to wait on pavement with broken hip for hours after being told by NHS staff she’s ‘not a priority’
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