England have fast-tracked the New Zealand-reared Brad Shields straight into their matchday squad for the first Test against South Africa in Johannesburg on Saturday. The 27-year-old Hurricanes captain, who is qualified though his English parents, has been named on the bench after only a handful of training sessions with his new team-mates.

Only last Friday the uncapped Shields was playing Super Rugby against the Highlanders in Dunedin and, having grown up in Wellington, has yet to play rugby in England. Normally a back-row forward, he has been invited to provide second-row cover after Joe Launchbury, as expected, failed to recover in time from a calf problem.

The so-called “big six” Premier League clubs have won their persistent battle to be paid a greater share of the league’s burgeoning international TV rights, which have for 26 years been shared equally between all the league’s clubs.

Led by Manchester City and Liverpool, supported by Manchester United, Arsenal, Chelsea and Tottenham Hotspur, the six clubs have pressed the case that as they are the prime attractions for global audiences and money paid by international broadcasters, they should receive more of the money.

The former Portugal legend selects an incredibly strong side with a decent front pairing of Eusébio and Ronaldo

I’m going to stick with the team of the century chosen by the Portuguese people in 2015 in a poll created by the national football association.

I played with Manuel Bento and Vítor Damas in the national team, and now we have Rui Patrício, a European champion, but my keeper is Vítor Baía. I saw him when he first started to train with Porto’s squad, and I later played with him in the national team. He was good at every aspect: one to one, high balls or playing the game with his feet. He conveyed enormous serenity.

The unadulterated delight Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo displayed after winning in Monaco was entirely understandable. After finally claiming the Monte Carlo victory he so desperately wanted, riding a wave of ecstatic emotion was wholly deserved. This week at the Canadian Grand Prix, however, the Australian will be brought back to earth with a painful reminder of the realities of Formula One. He will doubtless still be grinning but likely through gritted teeth in Montreal.

Ricciardo’s joy in Monaco came in the redemption he had sought after a pit‑stop error by the team cost him a win in 2016. He also did it against the odds. When his MGU-K gave out he was leading but spent the remaining 65% of the race 161bhp down on the pursuing Sebastian Vettel and Lewis Hamilton. The race was no thriller but Ricciardo’s achievement in managing a partly crippled car and this most demanding of tracks with flawless precision could only be admired.

Everyone is pulling in the right direction in a multi-cultural squad but Vladimir Petkovic is aware of his team’s limits

This article is part of the Guardian’s 2018 World Cup Experts’ Network, a cooperation between some of the best media organisations from the 32 countries who have qualified for Russia. theguardian.com is running previews from two countries each day in the run-up to the tournament kicking off on 14 June.

This is a team very similar to the one at Euro 2016 but they have come together as a squad in the past three years and may benefit from that in Russia.

• Golden State star scores 43 points in 110-102 Game 3 victory
  
• Warriors now lead Cavaliers 3-0 in best-of-seven series

LeBron James has pulled his Cleveland Cavaliers to an improbable NBA finals. But by early Thursday morning as he quietly walked out of his home arena in a purple warmup jacket, it was clear he probably won’t be able to drag the Cavs to one last title before becoming a free agent at season’s end.

The Golden State Warriors are too much for him and for his Cavaliers. In Wednesday night’s Game 3, finished just an hour before, James scored 33 points (in logging a 10th career NBA finals triple-double), limited Warriors star Steph Curry to just one three-point shot and still Cleveland lost, 110-102. Now, down three games to none in the championship round, his dream of winning more than one ring with the Cavaliers is all but over. Friday’s Game 4 could be his last with his hometown franchise.

The Capitals have put their fans through agony, but that’s no different than the fans of every other D.C. team since the 1991 Super Bowl. Now the Caps are a win away from ending the drought.