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Ferguson hungry for more
Soccer/ FA Premiership: Alex Ferguson, holding a flute of champagne and with a broad smile suffusing his face, celebrated his ninth championship with Manchester United last night by announcing that he planned to stay on at Old Trafford for several more years. p

Keane's men do it in style
English League Championship/ Luton Town 0 Sunderland 5: Sunderland are champions of the English Championship and Roy Keane has a trophy in his debut season as a manager. p

European Cup deal expected
Rugby/ Heineken European Cup: A meeting between all of the Heineken European Cup stakeholders tomorrow is expected to see resolution to the dispute that has ripped apart relations in international rugby and threatened the existence of the most successful rugby club competition in the world. p

Soccer

Chelsea draw hands United title
FA Premiership: Arsenal 1 Chelsea 1: Who would have thought that Chelsea could turn themselves into gallant losers? If a third consecutive Premiership title was to be denied the Stamford Bridge side, they failed with a show of strength and talent. p
United triumph over City rivals
Manchester City 0 Manchester Utd 1 : In an ideal world Alex Ferguson would rather have won the league at Old Trafford, but as an alternative Manchester United's supporters will cherish the fact their ninth coronation in 14 years was preordained at a stadium where employees are forbidden to have red company cars and, no kidding, diners in the executive lounges splash blue ketchup on their chips. p
Title Talk: What the managers said yesterday
Jose Mourinho: "I have to congratulate the champions, the players, the manager, the fans, the board; all the people that help them be champions. p
Roeder quits Newcastle job
News: Glenn Roeder has resigned as Newcastle manager after reaching the point of no return. It is understood that the 51-year-old parted company with the club yesterday after 15 months in charge at St James' Park including his spell as caretaker. p
Inspirational Tevez rises above the controversy
West Ham Utd 3 Bolton 1: Eggert Magnusson yesterday risked further deterioration in his relationship with West Ham's relegation rivals by delivering a "put up or shut up" message to those planning to challenge the decision not to dock points over the Tevez-Mascherano affair. p
Robson suffers health setback again
The ability of Bobby Robson to see out the eight months remaining on his contract with the FAI to act as adviser to Republic of Ireland manager Steve Staunton was thrown into renewed doubt over the weekend when it was revealed the Englishman has again been diagnosed with cancer. p
Ferguson's successor will have to wait
Andrew Fifield On The Premiership : My optician claims to have the inside track on events in Manchester. He comes from Bolton and apparently used to holiday with Mike Summerbee. During a sojourn in Portugal, they even persuaded Eusebio to give them an autograph: it now hangs on his practice wall. p
Scottish League Roundup
Rangers 2 Celtic 0 : Rangers clinched a Champions League slot with a 2-0 home win over Scottish champions Celtic on Saturday in the final Old Firm derby clash of the season. p
Spanish La Liga Roundup
Real Madrid came from behind to beat Sevilla 3-2 at the Bernabeu last night, in a game marked by three red cards and a flurry of yellows. p
Italian Serie A Roundup
Ascoli and Messina were relegated from Italy's top tier after defeats yesterday while Champions League finalists AC Milan could only draw 0-0 at home to Fiorentina. p
Why I won't ditch my faded first love
Locker Room : You might as well hear it from me as from somebody else, writes Tom Humphries . Things haven't been so good lately and I'm not embarrassed to say I've looked into the possibility of finding a way out. I've examined the ramifications of divorce, annulment, judicial separation. p
Nasty initial reaction
Planet Football : To the 967,000 of you who sent this jersey to your Manchester United-supporting buddies last Thursday: Stop - now. Here it is, one last time. And let that be an end to it. p

Gaelic Games

Resilient Cork have the final say
All-Ireland Under-21 FC Final/ Cork 2-10 Laois 0-15 : If the lesson that life is hard has value, Laois can take something from Saturday night's Cadbury All-Ireland under-21 football final in Thurles. At the final whistle they fell to the ground almost in unison, as if there had been some chemical attack on blue-and-white jerseys. p
Staunton propels Mayo to victory
Women's Football National League finals/ Mayo 1-13 Galway 0-06 : A commanding second-half performance propelled Mayo to victory over Connacht rivals Galway in a surprisingly one-sided Suzuki National Football League Division One final at Hyde Park yesterday. p
Dublin hold their nerve
Womens NFL Division 2 Final/ Dublin 1-13 Wexford 1-06 : Dublin survived a late scare before confirming their return to the top tier of the women's National Football League as Division Two champions with victory over Wexford at Semple Stadium on Saturday evening. p
O'Leary strikes late as Cork triumph
Camogie Round-up : Camogie is in a healthy state if yesterday's National League finals at Nowlan Park, Kilkenny, are anything to go by as Limerick, trained by former senior hurler Ciarán Carey, took a first Division One B title, defeating Cork by 1-14 to 0-5. p
Carlow well in control
Leinster MHC and Connacht MFC Round-up : Carlow, beaten finalists last year, proved much too good for Meath as they advanced to the quarter-final stage of the Leinster minor hurling championship on a 2-15 to 1-4 scoreline at Kilmessan on Saturday. p
Brady returns to the Mayo line-up
News : David Brady returned to Mayo's colours for the first time in four months as they defeated Kildare 0-18 to 0-12 in a challenge game to mark the opening of a pitch in Old Grange, St Laurence's, yesterday. p

Rugby

Hickey secures title for Garryowen
All-Ireland League Division One final/ Garryowen 16 Cork Constitution 15 : Suddenly an epic was unfolding before our eyes. It took most of the 80 minutes but when the AIB All-Ireland League final eventually caught fire, man, the 3,087 crowd were treated to the mother of all endgames. p
Sporadic brilliance does it for Leinster
Celtic League/ Leinster 31 Border Reivers 0: This victory was far from facile; a couple of late tries - the first of which guaranteed the all-important bonus point - managed to put a gloss finish on a matt performance. p
Howard aiming to go out on treble high
English Preniership: Pat Howard insists reaching three finals in a season will mean little if Leicester fail to "finish the job" at Twickenham over the next fortnight. p
Bellower silenced
Planet Rugby : For those people who have been lucky enough to spend some time in Trinity College in the past, their visit, be it long or short, would surely have been enhanced had they come across a students' rugby match in College Park. p

Golf

Dougherty loses by a neck again
Italian Open : Nick Dougherty refused to blame a pain in the neck for yet another squandered victory chance in the Italian Open here at Castello di Tolcinasco yesterday. p
McIlroy finishes second
Golf Digest/LYTHAM TROPHY : Rory McIIroy put up a tenacious fight before fellow Walker Cup squad member Lloyd Saltman finally got the better of him in the Lytham Trophy to complete a wire-to-wire victory. p

Racing

Finsceal Beo puts the smile back for Bolger
Finsceal Beo turned around a disappointing week for Jim Bolger as she blitzed her field to earn Classic glory in the fastest-ever Stan James 1,000 Guineas at Newmarket yesterday. p
Chariots of Fire is poised
The David Wachman team has been in notably good form so far this flat season and Chariots Of Fire could be a value bet to keep that hot-streak going in today's Aussie Rules Tetrarch Stakes at the Curragh. p
Salford City one to watch
Gordon Elliot brought the former crock Silver Birch back from obscurity to win a memorable Grand National last month and the young trainer's followers will be hoping he can work the oracle with Salford City as well at Limerick today. p

Other

Higgins in prime position
Snooker/ World Championship : John Higgins, appearing in his first final here since he was runner-up in 1997 and champion a year later, led Mark Selby, a 23-year-old qualifier from Leicester who had already exceeded the wildest expectations attached to him, 11-4 more than halfway into the second of the four sessions that make up the best-of-35-frames final of the world championship. p
Mayweather lands the title but few admirers
Boxing/ WBC light-middleweight title fight : In the end the action did not quite match the hype. Always absorbing but never a classic, the fight touted as the biggest money-spinner in history produced a new WBC super-middleweight champion in Floyd Mayweather Jr after he scored a split-decision victory over Oscar De La Hoya to maintain his undefeated professional record and add weight to his claim to be ranked as the best pound-for-pound fighter in the sport. p
Botha feels the pain as Ireland go down tamely
Cricket/ Ireland v Somerset : Ireland lost by 128 runs to Somerset yesterday and face a battle to regroup ahead of today's match against Hampshire in the Friends Provident Trophy at the Rosebowl in Southampton. p
Irish European hopes boosted by clear rounds
Equestrian Sport/ Badminton three-day event : Ireland's hopes of an improved performance at this year's European three-day event championships in Italy were given a huge boost with superb cross-country clears from all three of the Irish runners at the British three-day event in Badminton, but Saturday's action was marred by two equine fatalities and an unprecedented - for Badminton at least - 22 withdrawals in protest at the state of the ground. p
Clijsters announces retirement
Sports Digest/ Tennis : Former world number one Kim Clijsters announced her immediate retirement from tennis on her website yesterday. p
Shiny, happy Gabby winkles home truths out of Terry
TV View : The trailer for the BBC's spanking-new magazine-type show Inside Sport promised plenty, not least through its boast that it would be "as big as an Olympic budget", although whether that was the budget for, say, the 1896 Games in Athens or the ones scheduled for London in 2012 wasn't made clear. p

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