Steve McClaren has been sacked as manager of English Premier League strugglers Newcastle United with "immediate effect", the north-east club announced Friday.

Newcastle are second-bottom in the table and facing relegation despite spending some £29 million ($41 million, 37 million euros) on new players during the January transfer window in a bid to avoid the drop.

When the Formula One season begins next week, spare a thought for the staff in the marketing department.

They do have some good promotional material to work with: Ferrari's times in preseason testing have raised hopes of a genuine challenger to Mercedes; the entry of the Haas team creates an overdue American presence; Renault returns as a team owner a decade after its most recent championship; and the Manor team has a couple of intriguing new drivers.

Liverpool outclassed Manchester United but relied on two defensive blunders to win 2-0 in a high-profile all-English match in the Europa League last 16 on Thursday, with only David de Gea's brilliant saves sparing the visitors a heavier first-leg beating.

Daniel Sturridge — from a penalty — and Roberto Firmino found a way past De Gea to make Liverpool a strong favorite to advance after next week's return leg, as United's players failed to handle a white-hot atmosphere at Anfield and Liverpool's fierce pressing game.

McLaren struggled so badly last year that the relative success of preseason testing almost felt like stepping on the podium for success-starved drivers Fernando Alonso and Jenson Button.

Although a genuine podium finish is a long shot at the season-opening Australian Grand Prix next weekend, there is a renewed enthusiasm that it is a realistic goal sometime in 2016.

With his appeasing smile and calm voice, it would be easy to miss Nico Rosberg's growing frustration after two seasons finishing second behind world champion Lewis Hamilton.

Behind his ever-courteous demeanor, and although he jokingly says "I wasn't permanently frustrated" last year, the 30-year-old German driver is consumed by a desire to finally outdo his more illustrious Mercedes teammate.

Japan's Olympics minister says he hopes Fukushima prefecture can host preliminary rounds of baseball and softball at the 2020 Games.

Toshiaki Endo made the comments Friday on the fifth anniversary of a magnitude 9.0-earthquake that struck offshore and triggered a devastating tsunami, killing more than 18,000 people.

A French appeals court has lifted the order preventing Karim Benzema from meeting with Mathieu Valbuena, bringing the Real Madrid striker closer to being cleared to play on France's national team.

Benzema's lawyer, Sylvain Cormier, described Friday's decision as "a first step." Benzema, who is currently sidelined with an injury, is facing preliminary charges of conspiracy to blackmail relating to an extortion scam over a sex tape involving France teammate Valbuena.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic demonstrated his enduring attacking threat Wednesday by steering Paris Saint-Germain into the Champions League quarterfinals with a goal and an assist in a 2-1 victory at Chelsea.

By replicating the first-leg triumph in the French capital last month, PSG eliminated Chelsea for the second successive season in the round of 16 but it is far more damaging for the London club this time.

Agnieszka Radwanska said she was "shocked, like everyone else" when Maria Sharapova revealed Monday that she failed a drug test in January at the Australian Open.

"It was a very sad day for tennis, that's for sure," Radwanska said Wednesday at BNP Paribas Open at The Indian Wells Tennis Garden.

Stephen Curry sank a 55-foot shot at the halftime buzzer as the Golden State Warriors extended their NBA record regular-season home winning streak to 46 games by beating the Utah Jazz 115-94 on Wednesday.

Klay Thompson scored 23 points while Curry wound up with 12 points and 10 assists on a quiet night in which he struggled to find his range early as the Warriors (57-6) improved to 28-0 at Oracle Arena this season.