with graham potter heading to east london. spurs turn to a teenager to take the lead in their english league cup semifinal against liverpool. and — going solo — the rower looking to break records for her transatlantic crossing. hello again. welcome along. west ham have acted swiftly to replace the man they took a little longer than some expected to sack. julen lopetegui is gone afterjust six months at the london stadium, where the premier league club's next manager graham potter will speak to the media on thursday morning. ben croucher has the story on how the spaniards short tenure in east london came to an end. the final act before the axe fell on a hammer.

commentator: manchester city beating west ham 4-1. _ julen lopetegui's tenure at west ham ended as it started in defeat. there are two ways to see this. we can look at this and try to keep the good things that the team did, knowing it is not enough and we have to improve in other things. as it turned out, he wasn't one of the good things. the west ham board deciding getting rid of the spaniard is the best way to improve them. he leaves for just seven wins, five draws, ten losses, 14th in the premier league and with an alarming defensive record. he never looked good, never looked sustainable, looked too weak at the back. the fourth worst defensive record in the league. he was too stubborn, the new players he brought in, carlos soler, guido rodriguez made our midfield hugely worse. itjust never looked at me like it's going to work out. in the end, it was a slow, ignominious demise. news emerged on tuesday his job was injeopardy.

on wednesday morning, he took training. the club cancelled the lunchtime press conference. by 3:15, he was gone. performance not aligned with the club's ambitions, read a west ham statement. a familiar tale. for this is not lopetegui's first uncomfortable uncoupling. two days before the 2018 world cup, spain sacked him after he was named real madrid boss. he waved farewell to wolves on the eve of last season after differences of opinions. at 191 days, his is the shortest tenure of any permanent west ham manager. six months to see lopetegui's bubble burst. ben croucher, bbc news. graham potter has already agreed a 2.5—year deal to take over. the former chelsea and brighton boss has been out of work since leaving stamford bridge nearly two years ago and his first game will be at aston villa in the fa cup on friday. graham is a very thought—provoking manager.

he knows exactly what he wants, but he wants feedback from the players. it's a collective, rather than a dictatorship. and he will meticulously study each and every opponent, and he will best plan the way to try and penetrate that opponent, to try and hurt that opponent an obviously win games at the end of the week. what type of player does well under graham? someone that works extremely hard. he is very big on next action, so if something goes wrong, he doesn't want a disappointment or arms in the air, it's about that next action, about getting up on your feet and getting back in the game and not pausing, staying in the game effectively from a mental capacity point of view. i think anyone that buys into graham's philosophy will successful under him. this i do believe he is notjust a manager, but he's a coach, he makes people better around him. and, i mean, ithink the talent that he could have at his disposal at west ham,

it's there for all to see. i think they have a good number of players. your kudus�*s. your bowen's. alvarez in midfield. they've got a nice balance which unfortunately lopetegui just hasn't been able to seem to put his finger on. tottenham have handed liverpool a rare defeat, taking a 1—0 lead after the first leg of their english league cup semi—final at the spurs stadium. the game was delayed significantly early on, after rodrigo bentancur looked to have suffered a bad injury. after ten minutes of attention, he was stretchered off. spurs have said the uruguayan is conscious, talking and is due to go to hospital for further checks. spurs did have the ball in the net earlier than their winner, but dominic solanke was ruled offside by the var, then with four minutes of normal time to go, 18—year—old lucas bergvall�*s goal did stand, the swede poking home to give his side the advantage heading into the second leg. celtic have extended their lead at the top

of the scottish premiership to 16 points after beating dundee united 2—0. they've now played a game more than second placed rangers. but increased their advantage over their glasgow rivals. wednesday night's other game finished goalless. france manager didier deschamps has said he will step down from the role after next year's world cup. he's the nation's longest—serving coach and since taking over in 2012 he's guided france to the world cup in 2018. as well as two other major finals in tournaments. becoming only the third man to win it as both player and a manager. his former team—mate zinedine zidane is the early favourite to take over. the belgian grand prix at spa has secured its place on the formula one calendar until 2031 but in a first deal of its kind, the circuit has agreed to only host races in four of those next six years. f1 is seeking to find ways of accommodating new events in an already crowded calendar with a maximum of 25 contractually allowed. so spa has agreed not to have a grand prix in either 2028 or 2030, with its slot going to another race. zara lachlan is aiming to become the first woman,

and, at 21, the youngest person to ever row across the atlantic solo and unsupported. she set off from portugal on october 27th and aims to reach french guiana by the end of this month, having travelled over 4,000 miles. she's two thirds of the way there and it hasn't been easy, as debbie tubby reports. this is life on the ocean waves for zahra lachlan after she said goodbye to land in october last year. if you don't know, i am on day 60 of rowing from mainland to south america. and as long as i get there, i will be the first person to row solo unsupported and nonstop cross that reach. since leaving portugal, her solo voyage hasn't been plain sailing. she had a full capsize around the canaries where the boat went completely upside down, she lost a little mast with a couple of flags on, she lost that. broke her phone, one of her phones, a broken oar. had a small cut that just bled a lot.

i'm fine. and i was cleaning it, and then, washing it off in the sea, and then a couple of minutes later, a shark appeared. there are killer whales. oh, my god, i'm shaking. i don't want to do. we filmed zara before she set off. she had never rode on the ocean. now she is sculling 16.5 hours a day and facing her fear of cleaning the boat to reduce drag. because i'm don't like being in the water, because i'm not a good swimmer, i don't like the feeling of being out of breath underwater, i don't like having to know i need to come up for air because it means i've been under for a long time. her parents back home are closely tracking her 3600 nautical mile journey from portugal to the coast of french guyana. the biggest challenge is the mental aspect of being on your own 2a hours a day, seven days a week, for weeks on end. all she's done is take one day at a time. she has put everything aside

and just concentrated on forgetting about fear and being hungry or being tired, or being, you know, or being hurt. she'sjust carried on rowing. so just by sheer determination has she got to where she is right now. while we were filming how parents, she phoned home. today, i do feel a bit more down, because it hasn't really felt real for the past ten days, and it'sjust difficult when we are injanuary now and i want to be home in january. and i'm not sure i'll be able to do that anymore. she is well and truly out of her comfort zone in the middle of the atlantic. and so she wants to just inspire women and girls to just try something that they wouldn't normally try, in the way of sporting activity, so that they can improve themselves. zara is determined to push away the depths of despair as she rose across the pond and into the record books. they might be about to renew one of cricket's most bitter

rivalries, but an australian and englishwoman are both on the same page about one thing, that they want their ashes to last longer. the two sides will contest the women's series over six white ball games and one test match, and a playerfrom each of the teams agrees that the longest format should provide more. i would love to see three, three, three. i think the best thing about the ashes is the narrative, the rivalry, how it builds over time, and actually, you saw in the india—australia men's test series that the narratives built in a five—match series, and even then a three—match series, the kind of things with bumrah always getting the same people out or things like that, and as an opening batter, that is part of reason why you love the game, that battle of trying to maybe get one up on a bowler, and i think it builds even more in test cricket, and that's why i love getting the whites on and i would love to see more of it. i know personally i would have to pay more test cricket against england. playing the one test kind of feels like a bit

of a novelty sometimes. so, i guess being able to find out more of a test championship where we have some really good white ball games against england, and other nations around the world, but i think the way that our two teams match up, i think it would be a really cool test series to see who would come out on top for that, but i don't think that's probably going to change anytime soon. plenty more build—up to the women's ashes over the coming days before the series gets under way. you can find that at the bbc sport website. that is where you will be able to get all of the reaction to the english league cup semifinal with spurs beating liverpool. that's it from here. thanks for watching. bye—bye for now. hello there. this cold, icy weather set to continue for the rest of the working week. we've also had some fairly disruptive snow across parts of southern england, areas that haven't seen any snow for during this cold spell so far. so we continue with the sharp

overnight frosts, further snow and ice in places, mainly around coasts, but as we head into the weekend, finally start to see a change to something less cold. as that area of low pressure clears away from the south, which brought the sleet and snow to southern england, it will leave a legacy of ice here. but there will be further sleet and snow showers across northern scotland, northern ireland, some into north and west wales, and ice could be a problem here, as well, but for most, it's going to be a very cold, frosty start, with plenty of sunshine, as we head into the afternoon, most places staying dry. but despite the sunshine, after that very cold start, temperatures will struggle to get much above two or three degrees. we could reach four degrees, or maybe even five degrees across the south west. these will be the warmest spots, but it's a cold day, generally. as we head through thursday night, temperatures fall like a stone under the clear skies. further wintry showers across northern and eastern coastal areas, and those temperatures really dip away. in fact, thursday night could be the coldest night of this spell so far,

perhaps down to —17, or maybe even lower than that, across the snowfields of scotland. for most, though, these are the towns and city values. something a little less cold for the far south west. that's because we start to see a change. as we head into friday, this weather front will start to edge northwards and eastwards, very slowly pushing into this area of high pressure and it will tend to fizzle out. so it's the south—west of england, south wales will see the cloud, maybe some sleet and snow. for most, though, apart from a few coastal wintry showers, it's going to be a cold, dry, sunny day, and again those temperatures struggling, after that very cold start. friday afternoon, we're looking at freezing to around two or three degrees, but something less cold there for plymouth, and then that's the theme as we head into the weekend. this area of high pressure will bring quite a bit of sunshine, but we start to see south—westerly winds pushing in across the uk. that'll start to bring this milder air across scotland, northern ireland, initially, and then gradually across parts of england and wales. here, it will be a slower change. as we head into next week, though, it will be evident. so we're into the low teens, as we head into next week, for scotland and northern

ireland, and it'll be slowly getting less cold for england and wales, too. that's it from me.

live from london. this is bbc news new wildfires in los angeles break out as the number of confirmed dead rises to 5. more than 130,000 people have been evacuated. this is the scene live from los angeles, where firefighters are struggling to contain at least six separate fires. mps in the uk have voted to reject the conservatives�* demand for a fresh national inquiry into grooming gangs. we hear stories of venezuelan migrants who are trying to reach the us through the darien gap, ahead of trump's return. hello, i'm sally bundock. we start in the us where the death toll

from california's wildfires has risen to five.