Steward steers Leicester to victory at Bristol to boost title push
In theory it was a day for Bristol to consolidate second place and reaffirm their Premiership title credentials.The sun shone, the pitch was hard and fast and the free-scoring Bears welcomed back the inspirational wing, Gabriel Ibitoye, after a four-month injury absence.In reality what materialised was a largely dominant Leicester victory that took them past their opponents into second, on points difference, with four games remaining.Michael Cheika’s one-year assignment as Tigers coach will soon be over but the possibility of him departing a champion cannot be discounted.Looming over the buildup was the memory of the game last December when Pat Lam’s side won 54-24 at Welford Road.
The Tigers were hurt by that humiliation, no doubt, but might also have reminded themselves that the Bears were thrashed 38-0 by Sale at home a week later,“For me personally, and for us as a team, we wanted to play this game for the fans,” Cheika said,“We were poor the day they came, and we really wanted to turn that around,I hope they’ll be happy with that performance,”True to form, Bristol seamlessly switched from the sublime to ridiculous here.
Adam Radwan’s try had put Leicester in front when Kalaveti Ravouvou made a burst into the visitors’ 22.The Bears centre looked isolated after being dragged down, but the covering defenders could not have imagined the vision and accuracy of a frankly ludicrous one‑handed offload fizzed to Ibitoye, lurking near the touchline.The wing applied a simple finish.“Fiji flair,” Lam said of Ravouvou’s outrageous skill.“With those Fijian boys, just expect the pass.
For him to pull it out like that and for Gabs to read it was class.”Ireland earned their second Women’s Six Nations win with a 40-14 bonus-point victory over Wales at Rodney Parade.Wales took the lead following a mistake from Ireland wing Amee-Leigh Costigan and the loose ball was quickly scooped up by Carys Cox to ground before Keira Bevan added the extras.The visitors responded when Linda Djougang broke through the Welsh defence to score before another brilliant spell of pressure on the home try line saw Aoife Wafer able to reach over and ground, with Dannah O’Brien converting both tries.Although Ireland were reduced to 14 when O’Brien was sent to the sin-bin, Dorothy Wall added their third try just before the break and Enya Breen’s resulting kick was successful.
A dominant afternoon for the visitors continued when a driving maul allowed Wall to cross and secure the bonus point before Djougang weaved through to score underneath the posts, with O’Brien converting.Wales pulled one back through replacement Hannah Bluck, who touched down moments after coming on and Bevan converted, but Wafer extended the visitors’ advantage after breaking from a scrum to score, with Breen’s kick squeezing through the posts to ensure a winless Wales stay bottom.PA MediaSoon came the ridiculous.Ibitoye’s ambitious pass drifted into the grateful hands of Ollie Hassell-Collins, near halfway, gifting the wing a clear run to the line.Jack van Poortvliet scored a third try for Leicester and when Handré Pollard added a penalty to two conversions it created a 22-5 half‑time lead for the Tigers.
The only downside for them was losing Joe Heyes to the sin-bin for a high shot on Fitz Harding,This being Bristol it felt unlikely that Leicester would serenely close out the win,Ravouvou was duly sent scorching under the posts six minutes after the break and when AJ MacGinty converted the Bears trailed by 10,England’s Ollie Chessum was putting in a huge shift at lock, personifying the old‑fashioned mongrel that Cheika insists on, but Bristol’s attacking potency remained a concern,The basics still had to be done and when the Bears fluffed a lineout on 63 minutes the full-back Freddie Steward applied a classy finish from turnover ball, ghosting easily away from Benjamín Elizalde and securing a Leicester try bonus point.
Game over? Not quite.Harry Randall’s sniping effort again made it a 10-point game and Bristol’s offloading excellence continued to ask questions of the tiring Tigers.Sign up to The BreakdownThe latest rugby union news and analysis, plus all the week's action reviewedafter newsletter promotionAfter Solomone Kata received Leicester’s second yellow card, Randall touched down again with six minutes left, after being hauled down near the posts by Leicester’s replacement scrum-half Ben Youngs.But Randall had knocked on.A converted try then would have reduced Bristol’s arrears to three with a couple of minutes remaining.
It wasn’t to be: Cameron Henderson smashed over for a fifth Leicester try, converted by Jamie Shillcock with the final kick.Considering Bristol’s tricky run‑in – Northampton and Sale away, Bath and Harlequins at home – if they don’t improve on this performance their season could go south quickly.“We were just messy,” said Lam, who pointed to Bristol’s injury issues, particularly in the second row.“We’ve got to dust ourselves off, with a six-day turnaround, and go and get some points at Northampton next Saturday.Everyone’s pretty gutted … but if we can get five [points] next week it makes a big difference.
”Chessum said: “We owed it firstly to people back home, after what happened,” referring to that painful thrashing last December.“But we owed it to ourselves, too.” Does he like the idea of a trip to Australia with the British & Irish Lions this summer? “No comment.” Another tight spot successfully negotiated.
British firms urged to hold video or in-person interviews amid North Korea job scam
British companies are being urged to carry out job interviews for IT workers on video or in person to head off the threat of giving jobs to fake North Korean employees.The warning was made after analysts said that the UK had become a prime target for hoax IT workers deployed by the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. They are typically hired to work remotely, enabling them to escape detection and send their wages to Kim Jong-un’s state.Google said in a report this month that a case uncovered last year involved a single North Korean worker deploying at least 12 personae across Europe and the US. The IT worker was seeking jobs within the defence industry and government sectors
‘Don’t ask what AI can do for us, ask what it is doing to us’: are ChatGPT and co harming human intelligence?
Recent research suggests our brain power is in decline. Is offloading our cognitive work to AI driving this trend?Imagine for a moment you are a child in 1941, sitting the common entrance exam for public schools with nothing but a pencil and paper. You read the following: “Write, for no more than a quarter of an hour, about a British author.”Today, most of us wouldn’t need 15 minutes to ponder such a question. We’d get the answer instantly by turning to AI tools such as Google Gemini, ChatGPT or Siri
Italian opposition file complaint over far-right party’s use of ‘racist’ AI images
Centre-left parties slam ‘racist, Islamophobic and xenophobic’ faked images posted on social media by League partyOpposition parties in Italy have complained to the communications watchdog about a series of AI-generated images published on social media by deputy prime minister Matteo Salvini’s far-right party, calling them “racist, Islamophobic and xenophobic”, the Guardian has learned.The centre-left Democratic party (PD), with the Greens and Left Alliance, filed a complaint on Thursday with Agcom, the Italian communications regulatory authority, alleging the fake images used by the League contained “almost all categories of hate speech”.Over the past month, dozens of apparently AI‑generated photos have appeared on the League’s social channels, including on Facebook, Instagram and X. The images frequently depict men of colour, often armed with knives, attacking women or police officers.Antonio Nicita, a PD senator, said: “In the images published by Salvini’s party and generated by AI there are almost all categories of hate speech, from racism and xenophobia to Islamophobia
From Sidemen to MrBeast: how YouTube and its creator economy took over TV
From MrBeast creating the world’s most expensive reality TV show and Jake Paul’s record-breaking clash with Mike Tyson to the British supergroup Sidemen’s Netflix deal, YouTube’s superstar creators are taking over mainstream television.Last month Netflix launched the second series of Inside, the Sidemen’s reality show that was a hit when the first run of episodes premiered on YouTube.The deep-pocketed streamer has such confidence in the format from the septet – whose members include the content creator, rapper and some-time boxer KSI – that it has already commissioned a US version, which is to be broadcast later this year.The TV breakthrough comes just weeks after the Sidemen, who have more than 150 million YouTube subscribers, sold out the 90,000-seat Wembley stadium for a charity football match against a YouTube Allstars team.Attenders and players at the 18-goal extravaganza included Paul, whose Netflix boxing match against Tyson in November made history as the most-streamed sporting event ever
Microsoft faces growing unrest over role in Israel’s war on Gaza: ‘Close to a tipping point’
Turmoil spreads at company over Israel’s extensive use of its AI and cloud computing services in Gaza warFor the second time in the last month, Microsoft employees disrupted high-level executives speaking at an event celebrating the company’s 50th anniversary on 4 April, in protest against the company’s role in Israel’s ongoing siege on Gaza.The AI executive Mustafa Suleyman was interrupted by the employees Ibtihal Aboussad and Vaniya Agrawal. The two were fired within days. The Microsoft president, Brad Smith, and the former CEO Steve Ballmer were shouted down at Seattle’s Great Hall on 20 March by a current and former employee.The March event was preceded by a rally outside that also included current and former employees of the tech giant
Opt out: how to protect your data and privacy if you own a Tesla
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