If trying to compete with Real Madrid and newly arrived Kylian Mbappé wasn't daunting enough, now Hansi Flick's Barcelona squad is being thinned out by departures.

Barcelona looks set to lose both Ilkay Gundogan and Vitor Roque in the coming days — or even hours — with both players reportedly close to exits.

Fulham completed the signing of Sander Berge from relegated Burnley for a reported 25 million pounds ($32.8 million) on a five-year contract on Thursday, with the Norway international set to replace the departed Joao Palhinha as the club's holding midfielder.

Palhinha left for Bayern Munich in the transfer window.

Germany goalkeeper Manuel Neuer said Wednesday he is retiring from the national team after 15 years and 124 games. He is staying in club football with Bayern Munich.

The 38-year-old Neuer made his debut for Germany in 2009 and won the World Cup in 2014. His last game for the national team was the 2-1 extra-time loss to eventual champion Spain in the quarterfinals as Germany hosted Euro 2024.

Two weeks after organizers scrubbed Taylor Swift's concerts in Vienna amid a foiled terror plot, the singer issued her first statement on the cancellations.

"Having our Vienna shows cancelled was devastating," she wrote in a statement posted to Instagram on Wednesday. "The reason for the cancellations filled me with a new sense of fear, and a tremendous amount of guilt because so many people had planned on coming to those shows."

Global shares mostly rose Thursday, as market optimism got a boost from a rally on Wall Street on better-than-expected profit reports from major companies.

France's CAC 40 rose 0.4% to 7,556.62 in early trading, while Germany's DAX added 0.4% to 18,515.22. Britain's FTSE 100 rose 0.4% to 8,314.16. U.S. shares were set to drift higher with Dow futures rising 0.1% to 41,055.00. S&P 500 futures gained nearly 0.1% to 5,646.50.

Summer heat scorched Texas and the Southwest on Wednesday, pushing Phoenix to nearly 90 consecutive days of triple-digit temperatures and putting millions of people under excessive heat warnings.

Meanwhile, energy demand in Texas hit an unofficial all-time high Tuesday, according to data from the state's grid operator.

Floodwaters have stranded hundreds of thousands of people in India's northeast and neighboring Bangladesh's eastern region, causing at least 15 deaths as rescuers struggled to reach those who needed help, officials and media reports said Thursday.

At least 11 people were killed and thousands displaced from homes as floods and mudslides have ravaged India's northeastern Tripura state, bordering Bangladesh, since Wednesday.

President Voldymyr Zelensky toured the northeastern Ukrainian region of Sumy on Thursday in his first visit to the border area since his forces entered Russian territory more than two weeks ago.

During a meeting with Ukraine's military commander, Zelensky said Ukrainian forces have claimed control of another settlement in the Russian region of Kursk and taken more Russian prisoners of war whom he hopes to exchange for captured Ukrainians.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has met with Chinese premier Li Qiang, hailing growing trade relations as Moscow becomes increasingly dependent on Beijing for political and economic support.

"Our trade relations are developing, developing successfully ... The attention that the governments of the two countries on both sides are paying to trade and economic ties is yielding results," Putin said at the meeting in the Kremlin Wednesday.

A drone attack sparked a fire at a military facility in the Volgograd region of southern Russia on Thursday, regional officials and the country's Ministry of Defense said.

Regional Volgograd Governor Andrei Bocharov said on Telegram that a "defense ministry facility" was on fire after being attacked with drones in the area of Marinovka. There were no casualties, he said.