Manchester United and Liverpool will remind themselves what top billing in the Premier League feels like when they lock horns for the 191st time at Old Trafford on Sunday.

Chelsea and Manchester City seem destined to duke it out for this season's title, but contests between United and Liverpool often serve to show why it is their rivalry that remains the most enduring in English football.

Slumping attendances, a rising tide of debt and a home World Cup thumping by Germany. Brazilian football has not had the best of years amid signs the national game is losing its luster.

On May 18, just a few short weeks before the Germans dealt out a 7-1 hiding to the Selecao to bury dreams of a sixth World Cup triumph, the domestic game reached a nadir when the top flight match between Atletico Paranaense of Curitiba and Chapecoense attracted a crowd of just 766, the worst ever first-division gate.

Sometime between Ed Davis' phantom basket and his short jumper that rattled around the rim and out, Kobe Bryant realized this wasn't going to be his milestone night.

The Los Angeles Lakers star came into Friday's NBA game needing 31 points to pass Hall of Famer Michael Jordan for third place on the NBA's all-time scoring list as he seeks to finally escape Jordan's shadow.

Short-course 1500m world champion Spain's Mireia Belmonte broke the discipline world record by almost three seconds at her national championships on Friday.

The new mark of 15 minutes, 19.71 seconds set during the Spanish short-course national championships at Sabadell takes over from New Zealander Lauren Boyle's previous world record mark of 15min 22.68sec.

Petr Cech will make his first Premier League start of the season this weekend after regular keeper Thibaut Courtois was ruled out of Chelsea’s meeting with Hull City this weekend.

Cech has been sidelined this season after Joss Mourinho installed Courtois as his number one, managing just 66 minutes of domestic league action after replacing the young Belgian during the October victory over Arsenal.

The entire Italian league stands to benefit after Torino came back to beat nine-man Copenhagen 5-1 Thursday and complete a clean sweep with all four Serie A clubs advancing from the group phase of the Europa League.

Inter Milan, Fiorentina and Napoli had already reached the last 32 and Roma dropped down to the continent's secondary competition by finishing third in its Champions League group.

Elizaveta Tuktamysheva led a Russian teen sweep of the short program at the Grand Prix of Figure Skating Final on Thursday.

The 17-year-old Tuktamysheva earned a top score of 67.52 points performing to Ravel's "Bolero" on the temporary rink inside Barcelona's International Convention Center.

Once mumps invades a professional sports dressing room, it finds a fertile breeding ground and the NHL is finding that it is not easy to get rid of.

Multiple players on multiple teams from coast to coast have come down with the mumps, an illness more typically associated with children.

LeBron James is sitting out the Cleveland Cavaliers' game at Oklahoma City because of a sore left knee.

Cleveland coach David Blatt announced the decision Thursday night during his pregame media session.

With nine different winners in the last 11 years, no one could ever accuse the Champions League of being predictable.

It does appear, however, that an established "Big 4" has been created in Europe's premier club competition — and this year's group stage backs up the theory.