• United manager admits a lot of wins would be needed

• Carrick: ‘You can’t rule anything out in football’

Michael Carrick has refused to rule out Manchester United catching Arsenal and challenging for the title, though the interim manager admitted a lot of wins would be needed.

United recorded a sixth victory under Carrick when defeating Crystal Palace 2-1 at Old Trafford on Sunday, making it 19 points from 21 since he took over. Their form is the best in the Premier League over that period but United trail Arsenal by 13 points with a game in hand and have 10 matches to play. Carrick was asked before United’s game at Newcastle on Wednesday whether he would rule out catching Mikel Arteta’s team.

Push to give English same status as Māori and NZ sign languages sparks backlash from opposition parties and linguistic experts

A bill to recognise English as an official language of New Zealand has cleared its first hurdle in parliament amid ridicule from opposition parties and linguists who say it is “unnecessary” and “cynical”.

The bill seeks to give English, which is spoken by 95% of the country, the same official status as te reo Māori (Māori language) and New Zealand sign language. The bill said the status and use of the existing official languages would not be affected.

Only five days earlier Rob Edwards had streamed down the touchline and pulled his calf, he said, celebrating Wolves’s second goal in a rare victory against rivals Aston Villa. This time he cut loose again deep into six minutes of second-half stoppage time, as André’s deflected strike floored Liverpool. Edwards booted a ball off a pitch-side cone and went to drink in the moment with the locals. Joe Gomez dragged his red Liverpool shirt over his face. Arne Slot was punch-drunk. Liverpool were beaten by the league’s bottom club.

Wolves had stunned the visitors by taking the lead with 12 minutes of regular time to play, Rodrigo Gomes’s clinical finish capping a well-worked attack that Virgil van Dijk will not want to see again in a hurry. Liverpool were toiling but then, after another anonymous display, Mohamed Salah came to life with an equaliser.

Sunderland departed West Yorkshire 13 months ago on a snowy February night with their hopes of automatic promotion from the Championship seemingly in tatters.

Leeds had come from behind to clinch a 95th-minute victory that took them top of the second tier and only the most optimistic visiting fans expected a rematch this season.

Texas showdowns between Republicans John Cornyn v Ken Paxton as well as Democrats James Talarico v Jasmine Crockett have made US Senate seat most expensive primary on record

On the Democratic side of the Texas Senate primary, two rising stars in the party are going head to head with completely different playbooks.

US House representative Jasmine Crockett, the Associated Press notes, has made a name for herself through confrontation. She is a fierce critic of president Donald Trump. My colleague Lauren Gambino writes, “Casting herself as a ‘proven fighter’ who ‘drives the president crazy’, Crockett contends that high turnout among young voters and voters of color – not ideological moderation – is the key to winning statewide.”

Nigel Farage’s attempts to appeal to centre-ground voters may cause tension in his party, according to Hope Not Hate

More than half of Reform UK members believe non-white British citizens born abroad should be deported or encouraged to leave, according to the first publicly available poll of those in Nigel Farage’s party.

The findings come as the Reform leader attempts to court centre-ground voters while facing pressure from his right-flank, including a hardline new party launched by Rupert Lowe, who left Reform after falling out with Farage.

Regularly bracketed together, holding the same ambition of European football for the first time, Brentford continue to hold the advantage. The chase may come down to one of these much-admired teams and Bournemouth were frustrated by a 13th drawn game of the season. On a midweek night where the Premier League resembles Prem Rugby, all hustle, grappling, kicking for territory and physicality closing off creativity, Brentford toughed it out.

The Bees remain the only team in the Premier League that Bournemouth have never beaten.

LLMs are getting pretty good at unmasking pseudonymous users — their success rate is “far greater” than humans alone can manage.

MASHHAD (ANP/AFP) - De hoogste leider van Iran, ayatollah Ali Khamenei, wordt begraven in zijn thuisstad Mashhad, meldt persbureau Fars. Khamenei kwam zaterdag om het leven bij bombardementen van Israël en de Verenigde Staten. Hij was 36 jaar aan de macht.

Volgens de Revolutionaire Garde vindt er voor de begrafenis een grote afscheidsceremonie plaats. Een datum voor de uitvaart is nog niet bekendgemaakt.

Na de dood van Ali Khamenei is een interim-bestuur aangesteld. Een 88-koppige Assemblee van Experts moet een opvolger kiezen, maar zou de vergadering hierover mogelijk uitstellen tot na de begrafenis, om veiligheidsredenen.

Dinsdag werd bekend dat een gebouw van de Assemblee van Experts is gebombardeerd door Israël en de VS. Het is niet bekend of daar doden bij zijn gevallen. Het hoofdkantoor in Teheran werd een dag eerder ook al getroffen.