Andrew McDermott
Excitement is growing about the impact Lorenzo Insigne can make for Toronto but his debut will be next week. His new team suffered a ninth defeat of the season in midweek despite being the better team for long periods and are languishing in 12th in the Eastern Conference.
Mexico and Poland could immediately face their most decisive group game at the World Cup in the opening round of Qatar 2022 fixtures. These two teams will likely battle it out for second spot behind favourites Argentina in Group C, which also features outsiders Saudi Arabia.
NYRB have won just one of their last six games, but they can get back on track when they take on lowly Toronto at the weekend. The Canadians ended a six-match winless run against bottom-of-the-table Chicago Fire in their last outing but are yet to win away from home.
Rory McIlroy is the favourite at Brookline this week and the Northern Irishman is hard to ignore as we select our US Open golf tips. The Country Club is the venue for the 122nd staging of the tournament, where John Rahm is the defending champion.
The PGA Tour makes a welcome return to Canada this week and we’ve got three golfers for punters to follow in our Canadian Open tips. This is the first staging of the event since 2019 due to the pandemic and Justin Thomas is one of five entries from the world’s top 10.
Italy take on Argentina as the champions of Europe and South America meet at Wembley in the 2022 Finalissima. The match is a one-off tie over 90 minutes and will go straight to penalties if it ends in a draw and should be an entertaining spectacle, with tickets selling out.
Austin and Vancouver ended last week’s matches in contrasting moods and are at opposite ends of the Western Conference. The 3-2 victory at DC United was a fourth win of the campaign for Austin, while 13th-placed Vancouver have just one win and four points from seven games.
The regular season is over and we have looked at the postseason odds to make some NBA playoff picks as the road to the finals gets under way. Bwin has a whole range of betting markets on every match and regular price boost offers on all basketball leagues for punters to consider.
CF Montreal return home after taking seven points from three successive road trips and are expected to maintain that momentum in Saturday’s all-Canadian showdown. Back-to-back wins at Cincinnati and New York Red Bulls have sparked Montreal’s season into life and they have climbed to ninth in the Eastern Conference.
Liverpool’s dominant first-leg performance in the Estadio da Luz means Jurgen Klopp’s side have one foot in the semi-finals, with Benfica a massive 26.00 to progress to the last four. January signing Luis Diaz, signed from Benfica’s rivals Porto, returned to haunt the Portuguese giants with a starring role for the Reds as he netted a late third to put Liverpool in full control of the tie.
The Champions League quarter-finals take place next week and the draw for the semi-finals has already been made so each team knows their potential route to the final in June. Six of the eight remaining teams hail from England and Spain – three each – with one German and one Portuguese side also among the quarter-finalists.
The Canadian Football League returns in June for a full season after a pandemic-shortened schedule in 2021. Here we have taken a look at the competition and what could happen this year.
Canada need one more win to book their place at the 2022 World Cup and will hope to do so at the first opportunity when they face Costa Rica. Securing a trip to Qatar looks almost certain with Canada four points clear at the top of the CONCACAF qualifying table.
The United States have never won in Mexico in World Cup qualifying but will be on the verge of qualification for Qatar 2022 if they can buck that trend. Both teams are level on 21 points and are four points clear of fourth-placed Panama with three games to go.