Joe Schmidt's Irish team were hammered 57-15 by England at Twickenham last Saturday, in what was a record defeat in that fixture and O'Driscoll is concerned their confidence could suffer.

Italian giants Napoli are reportedly waiting on the outcome of Mauro Icardi's meeting with his club Inter Milan, before deciding whether to make a late move for the player. 

The 35-year-old, who recently announced he would be bringing his 19-year career to a close, has revealed he might consider making a comeback if he can maintain his fitness levels.

Moeen Ali believes that 'legend in the making' Ben Stokes is England's greatest ever all-rounder. Moeen has ranked his England colleague above the likes of Sir Ian Botham and Andrew Flintoff.

Gary Neville feels his former club should take the drastic move of selling the naming rights to their famous Old Trafford stadium, and use the cash to slash match tickets down to around £10.

Bury are now almost certain to be expelled from the Football League after a takeover by C&N Sporting Risk fell through, just 90 minutes before a league-set deadline for the deal to be completed.

Sharing pictures on his Instagram, the Champions League winner was in goal wearing an eye-catching protective kit, stopping flying pucks instead of footballs.

Danny Drinkwater is set to make his Burnley debut in Wednesday's Carabao Cup clash with Sunderland as Sean Dyche plans a raft of changes.

Spurs face North London rivals Arsenal at the weekend in dire need of three points having taken just four from their opening three games of the season.

The Foxes, who caused a huge upset when they were crowned English champions in 2016, launch their Carabao Cup campaign with a second-round trip to top-flight rivals Newcastle.

Ben Stokes' epic performance in England's miraculous one-wicket win over Australia at Headingley has seen him rise to a career-high 13th in the official Test batting rankings.

Sportsmail's racing expert Robin Goodfellow dishes out his tips for Wednesday's meetings at Musselburgh, Catterick, Worcester, Lingfield and Kempton.

Tudhope's wins on Hot Affair, Knightly Spirit and World Title took him to 101 during the period which currently decides the title race - from May 4 to British Champions day on October 19.

If England could have chosen an Australian cricketer to make the fatal fumble that may just have handed them the Ashes then the name of Nathan Lyon would have been on many lips.

MARTIN KEOWN: Twenty-five years ago today, me and my Arsenal team-mates were caught up in a storm at Anfield as Robbie Fowler - just 19 at the time - scored three times in four minutes.

Steve Bruce did not know Sean Longstaff had a younger brother on Newcastle's books until five weeks ago - but is now ready to start sibling Matty against Leicester on Wednesday.

Jimmy Anderson successfully came through an extensive workout in the heat of Chester on Tuesday and looks certain to be named in England's squad for the fourth Test at Old Trafford.

Stoke City are facing a legal fight after failing to pay a mandated agent when they signed their former striker Eric Maxim Choupo-Moting.

PAUL FARBRACE: What we saw at Headingley from Ben Stokes was the performance of a cricketer who has matured as a person and now fully understands what he's capable of.

MAX WINTERS AT THE CITY GROUND: Albert Adomah opened the scoring for the home side in the 25th minute before Joe Lolley added a second just 10 minutes later. Joao Carvalho added a third.

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW BY JEFF POWELL: The most extraordinary maestro the world of boxing has ever seen was born in Ukraine two years after the horrors of Chernobyl.

JASON GILLESPIE: It is very hard to avoid the conclusion we are now in for one of the classic Ashes series, maybe even up there with 2005 in terms of excitement and drama. It's fantastic.

EXCLUSIVE BY KIERAN GILL: Premier League refereeing chiefs will resist calls for officials to start using their pitch-side monitors for VAR checks as they feel it will slow the game down too much.

UFC lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov has claimed he isn't 'scared' to settle his rivalry with Conor McGregor outside of the Octagon.

Germany provided the first installment of live post-lockdown sporting action on Thursday by hosting a dozen races in Hanover. Many jockeys wore face masks while others used transparent plastic visors.

Stars' careers are being put at risk by the imminent resumption of competition, according to a union representing nearly 100,000 athletes. German football has been cleared to resume next week.

Walker was spotted travelling from Cheshire to Yorkshire, where his sister was celebrating her birthday, before then briefly moving on to his parents' house nearby.

Ministers are determined not to see the British Grand Prix postponed or cancelled in its 70th anniversary year and so plans are reportedly being drawn up to 'televise without spectators' there.

French racing has been on hold since March due to the coronavirus crisis, but is set to make a high-profile return with no less than four Group races on the card.

The middleweight was supposed to fight American Uriah Hall in Jacksonville, Florida on Saturday after the original bout on April 18 was cancelled due to the pandemic.

The 32-year-old, known in his early coaching days as the 'Baby Mourinho', has a well-earned reputation for attention to detail and will use practice games this weekend to get used to the peculiarities.

A report suggested a late challenge may be made to the decision to allow racing to return, with France Galop and its trotting equivalent saying they had been in talks regarding resumption plans.

Technical director Paolo Maldini and his son, Daniel, were thought to have been the only coronavirus cases within Serie A outfit AC Milan's camp.

UFC 249 is experiencing an 'unbelievable pacing of buys' as pay-per-view purchases have already doubled from the last event UFC 248.

Mr Lavery is an ally of the current Labour leader, and could split senior left-wing party figures, including Mr Corbyn, who are believed to favour Rebecca Long-Bailey.

The outgoing leader used his New Year message to rail against billionaires and champion the 'movement' he built, but failed to address his party's cataclysmic election UK election defeat.

The display in London, broadcast by the BBC, kicked off with the roar of football anthems but some claimed they could hear Jeremy Corbyn's name being chanted.

A motion believed to have been drawn up by activists in Dulwich says Jeremy Corbyn deserves 'heartfelt gratitude and appreciation' for his 'remarkable contribution'.

Samuel Naylor, 37, wrongly described Mr Corbyn as leader of the Liberal Democrats and also called for an end to leaflets being delivered to his home in Eastwood, Nottinghamshire.

The Birmingham Yardley MP said she 'would have absolutely no problem in confronting Donald Trump' as she launched a bid to become the Labour party's next leader this evening.

Labour leadership hopeful Jess Phillips has backtracked after she suggested she would campaign to take the UK back into the European Union if she takes over from Jeremy Corbyn.

Jeremy Corbyn was mocked by Tory MPs this afternoon after he claimed to have 'long spoken out against the Iranian government's human rights record'.

The party's business spokesman lavished praise on the outgoing leader during her campaign launch despite him overseeing Labour's worst British election defeat since 1935.

The Parliamentary Labour Party has long been at odds with Mr Corbyn over his policies and attitude to Brexit and her speech on the party's future went down badly according to MPs in the room.

The shadow foreign secretary, an outsider in the leadership race to succeed him, said she had no option but to give him zero after the party suffered its worst defeat in 85 years.

Shadow international trade secretary Barry Gardiner as received £500,000 from a firm with links to Beijing and another £100,000 to finance a string of Parliamentary 'fact-finding trips.

Labour's Jess Phillips was forced to suspend her key aide Salma Hamid (pictured) on Friday for posting 'offensive' tweets including a description of Israel as a 'murderer', between 2014 and 2016.

The shadow business secretary hit out at a scatter-gun approach that saw people and resources wasted on seats that were unwinnable, at the expense of marginal seats lost to the Conservatives.

Journalists poring over her policies and private life to glean a better understanding of the would-be leader have, until now, been split over whether to hyphenate her surname.

Shadow business secretary Rebecca Long-Bailey said she would unveil a package of radical constitutional measures if she won the race to succeed Jeremy Corbyn.