Leinster will not have to face up against Owen Farrell when they meet Saracens in the Champions Cup quarter-finals after the 28-year-old last night received a five match ban for a high and reckless tackle on 18-year-old Wasps replacement full-back Charlie Atkinson on Saturday. Farrell had accepted the charge but it means that the controversy-hit club will be without one of their main players for their biggest game of the season. Meanwhile, Gordon D'Arcy writes this morning that Munster's latest semi-final loss comes as they persist at a game they are under-resourced to play. "I am blaming the failure to build an academy that produces a sufficient amount of talent. I am also blaming the IRFU set-up that has transformed non-Leinster provinces into feeder systems for the national squad," he writes. That semi-final loss to Leinster last weekend means that it is Leo Cullen's side who will face Ulster in this weekend's final and Andrew Porter says that their season will mean nothing if they don't turn up.
On to GAA and Seán Moran writes in his column this morning about the dogged perseverance of Bernard Brogan which epitomised Dublin's transformation. In his new book Brogan talks about his career but also about the frustrations he felt when left out and the conversations he had with Jim Gavin. Meanwhile, Malachy Clerkin has been looking at some of the GAA archive treasure trove released by the Irish Film Institute recently. "As keepers of the Irish Film Archive, the IFI have had a collection of All-Ireland final films from the 1940s, '50s and '60s in their possession down through the decades, without always putting them to the optimum use," he writes.
In soccer, our Sporting Upsets series this morning focuses on the 1982 World Cup as John O'Sullivan writes about his teenage love for that Brazil team and how it all changed when they were beaten by Italy. "Brazil's formation has been described as 4-2-2-2 or 2-7-1 but as Zico once observed that the players circulated and interchanged, never hemmed in by conventional roles," he writes. Meanwhile, England could only manage a draw in their Nations League encounter with Denmark last night after an experimental side failed to click in Copenhagen.
Yesterday's Tour de France stage win was a career high-point for Ireland's Sam Bennett and that was clear afterwards as the Carrick-on-Suir rider fought to keep his emotions in check. "You dream of it, you never think it will happen. Sorry, I don't mean to be a cry baby," he said afterwards.
At the US Open in New York, Alexander Zverev reached the semi-finals by seeing off Borna Coric while Naomi Osaka kept her hopes alive of setting up another final showdown with Serena Williams by comfortably beating Shelby Rogers.
