but gian piero ventura, perhaps not. an piero ventura, perhaps not at the right age at 69 to be able to adapt to the level required of the national team. there are nowjust three spots left at the world cup in russia next year. one of those will go to either the republic of ireland or denmark on tuesday night. the second leg of their playoff is in dublin, with honours even after a goalless draw in copenhagen. denmark had the better of the chances in the first leg, while ireland were criticised for a lack of creativity. you have to try and cover all eventualities but it only takes a second to score a goal, so the minute a goal is scored in the game, that eradicates a lot of things, it iraq decay is extra time, it eradicates penalty kicks and things like that —— it eradicates. we may need a couple of goals to keep out denmark for two games might be tough. we talk about a game that takes us to the world cup so of course we have to fight and have them on to go through that even if it goes to extra time. we can fight with them

win for the swedes in stockholm last week proved the difference, while the italian manager gian piero venturannounced his retirement from the international game. a short time ago i spoke to football journalist mina rzouki who questioned what type of italian team this was.

it probably won't come as a huge surprise to hear that italy manager, gian piero ventura, has been sackedaled italy's fate — meaning they won't play on football's biggest stage for the first time since 1958. and, after being given his marching orders, ventura complained that he lost only two games in two years. now team celebrations are always good value on social media, and tim cahill led the ones in australia's dressing room as they qualified for a fourth successive world cup. here's what he posted after their win against honduras, on wednesday. he was back from injury for that second leg. he also scored twice in their asian play—off win over syria. another image which has been getting lots of clicks comes from iranian weightlifter kianoush rostami. he's putting his rio 2016 gold medal up for auction, to raise money for the victims of last week's earthquake near the iran—iraq border. as always, you can get all the latest sports news at our website — that's bbc.com/sport. but that is your sport briefing for now. your business briefing is next. i will see you soon. hi there. for many of u

0 win for the swedes in stockholm last week proved the difference while the italian manager gian piero venturaw come under serious presssure. rafael nadal is out of the season—ending atp world tour finals. the spaniard withdrew with a knee injury after losing his opening match to belgium's david goffin in a tough three set match that took more than two and a half hours to complete against the 26—year—old, meaning nadal‘s fellow spaniard pablo carreno busta comes in as the alternate for the next two matches. now, cyclist chris froome has won the tour de france four times but he's still hungry for more! at 32 the british rider says he's still excited by the prospect of racing and he's hungry for a fifth tour title. it's a good question. i definitely don't feel as if i'm there yet. i guess i'll know when the time is right. but for the time being i'm still hungry, still motivated to keep trying to win another tour de france and i'm just going to take it one year at a time. so long as the body's able to do this then i'm going to keep going. four—time champions italy failed to reach the world cup fo

gian piero ventura has paid the price for italy still eager to qualify for next year's world cup he's been fired as italy's national coach in the wake of the country's playoff loss to sweden the four time champions failed to reach the world cup for the first time since nine hundred fifty eight. seven expect. a two thousand and twenty three rugby world cup and despite an official evaluation finding south africa awarded the tournament supports in london. the world rugby bosses arrived in london with the expectation that come from south africa as host of the twenty twenty three world cup instead france. france getting the vote by twenty four to fifth day after was eliminated in the first round south africa were recommended by an independent evaluation report on the council for advice to back them awkward questions for the man in charge there's always going to be one recommendation in the. in the valuation process and the recommendation of south africa but just because it went to france it doesn't mean that there's humiliation whatsoever we tried to make it the most transparent process po