Spain’s Ballon d’Or holder, Aitana Bonmati, is hospitalised with meningitis two weeks before the Euro 2025 championships.

Spain midfielder Aitana Bonmati, the two-time Ballon d’Or holder, has been hospitalised with viral meningitis less than a week before the Women’s European football championship begins.

Spain coach Montse Tome said late on Friday that her star player had felt ill and was taken to a hospital in Madrid where she tested positive for meningitis.

Spain’s team is set to travel to Switzerland on Sunday for the tournament. Its first game is against Portugal on Thursday in Bern. It will also face Belgium and Italy in Group B at Euro 2025.

“Aitana is a very important player for us and we will wait for her,” Tome said after Bonmati missed Friday’s friendly against Japan in the Spanish capital when Spain beat the visitors 3-1.

Tome said that Bonmati started feeling bad with a fever during practice early on Friday.

“She has authorised me to say that she has viral meningitis,” Tome said. “The word is scary, but the doctor tells me that she is under control. She will remain in the hospital and we don’t know for how long.”

The 27-year-old Bonmati has won the top individual award for women for the past two years. The Barcelona player was key in Spain winning the 2023 Women’s World Cup.

Bonmati’s vision, dribbling skills, passing and goals have also been vital to Barcelona reaching five consecutive Champions League finals, with the Catalan club winning three titles.

Her absence would put more pressure on Alexia Putellas, herself a two-time Ballon d’Or winner, and fellow Barcelona midfielder Patricia Guijarro, to lead Spain. Against Japan, Tome started 18-year-old Vicky Lopez in place of Bonmati.

Three years ago, Putellas tore her ACL three days before starting the 2022 European Championship. Spain was eliminated in the quarterfinals without its then-top player.

Aljazeera.com

The FIFA Club World Cup continues. After the 5-0 victory in their opening match, Juventus await the challenge against the Moroccans of Wydad AC, fresh from their defeat against Manchester City in their opening match of the competition. From home of the Philadelphia Eagles, in the usual pre-match press conference, Coach Igor Tudor previewed the match, scheduled for Sunday 22 June at 12:00 LT (18:00 CEST).

WYDAD AC
“It’s a different opponent, with the match being played at a different time. We have prepared for it as best we can, as always. It will be an important match against a quality team and we will have to give our best, going full throttle for 90 minutes. The heat? We will have to prepare to face it, but it’s something both teams will face and then we will have to forget it, to focus on what we have to do. Wydad could have scored two goals against City in the first half – it is impossible to make comparisons between one match and another, each match has its own particularities.

FATIGUE
“I don’t see any tiredness in the team, I only see enthusiasm and great spirit in playing together. The lads approached the match against Al Ain the way I like, also thanks to the work we are doing. I am happy, I have felt good with the team since day one and I feel a great energy around us, even in the Club. I hope we can do great things together, because the history of this Club is to do great things. John Elkann’s presence? He is a constant, a strong and important presence. If I may, he makes his presence felt also with the right ways and with the right words. I really liked how he spoke to the players in Turin. There is great energy from him, the players appreciated it and took it as further motivation. After the match he was happy with the performance and the energy seen on the pitch.

PRESENT AND FUTURE
“Qualifying early would be nice, of course, but you can’t plan anything. You have to think match after match. Surprises in the tournament? There certainly are, we have to try not to be a negative surprise, and avoiding that is my job and the players’ job. More optimistic than when we started? It’s too early to tell, we’ve only played had one match. I don’t look at these things, I don’t think about the finish line, I think about what we have to do, training session after training session. You have to live in the present, you learn from the past and we build the future today.”

Juventus.com

French Open 2025 men’s singles semi-finals

Date: Friday, 6 June Time: 13:30 BST Venue: Roland Garros

Coverage: Live radio commentaries across 5 Live Sport and BBC Sounds, plus live text commentaries on the BBC Sport website and app

The era of the ‘Big Three’ may be coming to an end – but the threat has not disappeared.

Players born in the 1990s were restricted to just two Grand Slam singles titles between them as Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic diced up the major prizes for more than two decades.

Two players born after 2000 have captured seven major titles between them.

That is the current top two of Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz, who are on a collision course in Paris.

But Novak Djokovic still looms large as the ‘Gen Z’ players look to add to their hauls.

The 38-year-old faces Sinner – who is 15 years younger than him – in Friday’s first French Open semi-final, having become the oldest man to reach the last four since 1968.

“I think at the moment he’s a bit underrated,” world number three Alexander Zverev said after falling to Djokovic in four sets on Wednesday.

“I think a lot of people count him out already, but this year he’s had wins over Carlos at the Australian Open, he has beaten me at the French Open.

“Forget the age. For any player, those are pretty good results.”

Defending champion Alcaraz, meanwhile, will look to continue his recent dominance over Lorenzo Musetti in the second semi-final.

Djokovic is bidding for another slice of history. Win in Paris and he will secure a record-breaking 25th major singles title.

But no man has defeated the top three men’s players to win a major since the ATP rankings were introduced.

Djokovic is on a nine-match winning streak heading into the 51st major semi-final of his career. Victory in Geneva last month secured him the 100th tour-level title of his career – a timely confidence boost following a run of three successive defeats.

That run included consecutive opening-round defeats to begin his clay-court season, and the Olympic champion entered Roland Garros in the unusual position of sixth seed.

But he showed age is not inhibiting him as he won a 41-shot rally to save a break point in the fourth set on his way to beating Zverev in three hours and 18 minutes.

He displayed impressive variety to disrupt the German’s baseline dominance with drop shots and serve-and-volley tactics.

Sinner, however, will pose a sterner test.

While their head-to-head record stands at 4-4, the Italian has won their past three meetings.

The reigning US Open and Australian Open champion is on a 19-match winning streak at Grand Slam tournaments – the fourth longest this century after the Djokovic (30), Federer (27) and Nadal (25).

He is chasing history of his own at Roland Garros, seeking to become the first Italian man to win the tournament since Adriano Panatta in 1976.

In his 52nd week as world number one – despite serving a three-month doping suspension between February and May – Sinner could become the first man to win three consecutive majors since Djokovic in 2021.

With unshakeable consistency and devastating precision, Sinner is yet to drop a set this fortnight before attempting to break down arguably the greatest defensive player the game has seen.

Alcaraz looks to continue dominance over Musetti

Alcaraz appears to have hit top gear at the perfect time.

After losing just five games in his straight-set quarter-final win over American Tommy Paul, the Spaniard said: “I could close my eyes and everything [would have gone] in.

“My feeling today was unbelievable. I was trying to hit every shot at 100% – not thinking about anything else, just hitting.”

The four-time major winner did not face a single break point in that match and will now target a sixth successive win over Musetti, having lost just one set in their previous five meetings.

Musetti, whose sole victory over Alcaraz came in their first meeting back in 2022, has risen to sixth in the live rankings after moving to the brink of a first major final.

The Italian will hope to offer greater resistance in their latest meeting after working to improve his serve in the off-season.

“We shortened a bit the motion to have more control, and then I got more confidence in what I was having as a motion,” Musetti said.

“Right now in really difficult situations, I make an ace or have my serve as a weapon, and it was a pretty big change for my game.”

Bbc.com