Houston Rockets superstar James Harden has purchased a minority stake in the investment group that controls MLS' Houston Dynamo, the NWSL's Houston Dash and BBVA Stadium, the Dynamo announced on Thursday.

"I'm very excited about the opportunity to join the ownership group of the Houston Dynamo and Houston Dash and proud to be a part of a club with tremendous history and a great future," Harden said in a statement issued on the Dynamo's website.

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"Houston is my home now, and I saw this as a way to invest in my city and expand my business interests at the same time. Soccer in general, and especially MLS, have exploded in this country throughout my lifetime. I've been a fan of the game for several years, and I know that Houston has a massive soccer fanbase, so it was an easy decision for me when this opportunity arose."

Front Office Sports was among the first report the transaction, adding that the Rockets star has purchased a 5% stake. According to the outlet, the overall valuation of the Dynamo, Dash and BBVA Stadium -- where the Dynamo and Dash play their home games -- is "at least $475 million."

Great day in the H@JHarden13 joins the #ForeverOrange family?

— Houston Dynamo (@HoustonDynamo) July 18, 2019

The seven-time NBA All-Star signed a guaranteed $228 million contract with the Rockets in 2017. He joins an ownership group that includes majority owner Gabriel Brener, boxing legend and promoter Oscar De La Hoya, White Deer Energy managing partner Ben Guill and Portland, Oregon-based investor Jake Silverstein. All are expected to remain in the Dynamo/Dash/BBVA Stadium investor group.

"We are thrilled to welcome James into our club. He's an icon in the Houston community, and not only is he a great basketball player, he has an extremely smart and savvy mind for business," Brener said. "James will bring a very unique perspective to our ownership group, and I'm looking forward to hearing his thoughts and opinions on the club going forward."

De La Hoya, who founded Golden Boy Promotions in 2002, said Harden's success as an athlete will help him in business as well.

"James is already at the top of the game in his sport, so it's only natural to want to take on new challenges beyond the court," De La Hoya said. "He knows the drive and the determination it takes to be the absolute best, and I'm excited that he's going to bring that attitude to our club."

Brener acquired controlling interest in the Dynamo from previous owners AEG in 2015 after first investing in the Dynamo in 2008. BBVA Stadium opened in 2012 and the ownership group later bought into the NWSL in 2013.

LOS ANGELES -- Early June, morning. Zlatan has just finished wind-sprinting, vomiting and showering (in that order). The hurling -- it's standard. "I need to suffer today," he tells the LA Galaxy's physical trainer upon arriving at the team's facility. Which the trainer took to mean: again.

"I need to work," Zlatan explains. "When I suffer, I feel good." It's a theatrical and self-regarding thing to say. He clearly knows it, and knows that I know it, too. Which is why, being Zlatan, he then issues a pirate's grin and doubles down. "You just missed it! Five minutes ago, I could not breathe, I was throwing up so hard. You see? This is the way I work: very hard. I always say, 'Let's drag out the maximum from my body.'"

It's working -- and how. Thirty-seven years old, this guy! To behold Zlatan is to pose a series of rhetorical questions. Do you know how old that is for a professional athlete of any stripe? But especially for a soccer player and for a center forward at that? By all rights, Zlatan ought to be a past-tense figure by now, remembered for being the John McEnroe of soccer: touched, insolent, dazzling, infuriating, balletic, mouthy, inventive, clownish, immortal. He blew out his right knee playing for Manchester United in the spring of 2017, for crying out loud. Should have been game over, right?

But you know Zlatan. And you know what came next. If you don't on either count, first: You've been off planet. Second: The surname is Ibrahimovic; he's known in the soccer world as "Ibra" or, simply, Zlatan.

Also, a reminder: On March 29, 2018, Zlatan and his English bulldog flew from his home country of Sweden to California. On the 30th, after being introduced to his new LA Galaxy coaches and teammates and practicing for 20 minutes, he submitted to an examination by a team doctor, who strapped him to a machine, scanned the readout and told him what he already knew. "You're very tired. You shouldn't play tomorrow." On the 31st, in the first-ever El Trafico game against LAFC, Ibra sat on the bench while the home crowd chanted his name. Thunderously. Ceaselessly. Until coach Sigi Schmid couldn't take it anymore and, 26 minutes into the second half, sent his new No. 9 onto the pitch. Six minutes later, LAFC goalkeeper Tyler Miller cleared the ball about 70 meters, from the right side of his box. A Galaxy defender headed the ball back over the center circle in a slow, bloopy arc. It took one high bounce, then anoth... no, actually, it didn't.

Before we go any further, you need to know that what happened next was, is, uniquely Zlatan. Now, in statistical and analytical terms, he's probably the third-greatest player of this era after Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo. All three are not only great finishers but great creators who elevate the play of their teammates. Messi's genius is low to the ground, squirrelly, a quick accretion of darts and scurries dictated by his bat-gene echolocation. Ronaldo's genius is all about aerial beauty -- that perfectly balanced matador's chassis of his -- and his dribbling and, once upon a time, blinding pace. Zlatan's is a pirate's genius, full of drunken daring and sword-through-the-Gordian-knot solutions. He possesses an inventiveness, a gleeful and childlike (haters would say childish) willingness to envision superheroic possibilities for himself that is unique in this era, and maybe in the history of the game. Goals that can be described as artful and transcendent, yes, but also as silly, preposterous, wacky, arrogant, jejune and just straight-up stupid.

Know this, then, about that El Trafico ball that didn't take a second bounce because it can be said of countless goals Zlatan has scored since his professional debut with Malmo in 1999: Ninety-nine out of 100 wouldn't have dared it. Wouldn't even have thought it. They'd have let that ball settle, controlled it and looked for options. But Ibra took the ball at chest level and volleyed a 41-freaking-meter line drive over Miller's head and into the back of the net. Six minutes in. Virtually his first touch as a Major League Soccer player after being sidelined for nearly a year.

With that one touch, along with a stoppage-time header that helped the Galaxy overcome a 3-0 deficit to win 4-3, Ibra instantly became what he remains today, on the eve of another El Trafico: one of the greatest players in MLS history. And to be clear, we're not talking "greatest" in the Pele-NASL sense -- as in a football deity who was great a long, long time ago on a pitch far, far away in Europe or South America, then came to America to capitalize on his name recognition. Zlatan's is a present-tense "greatest."

"From the moment he arrived, his goal ratio has been ridiculous, nearly one-a-game. And these volleys and bicycles where this 6-foot-5 giant is flipping himself all over the place with the power and control of a 5-foot-5 gymnast? At the age of 37!" says the Galaxy's technical director, Jovan Kirovski, who played professionally in Europe for more than a decade. "It's getting to a place where I'm saying, and I know the coaches are saying, 'Stay high and score goals -- don't worry about chasing!' But he keeps delivering."

"I don't come here because of what I did before," Zlatan says. "I come here to demonstrate who I am. I come here to provide."

Provide? An interesting word choice. Not wrong, but not exactly right, either. The first time he uses it, I chalk up its use to the fact that Zlatan's English is very good but not great -- not yet attuned to idiom. But as he continues, not only to use it but to stress it, it becomes clear that he's fully aware of all the extra-soccer connotations the word carries. In fact, that's his point: He wants you to know that he's come to Los Angeles not to score goals, but to give and provide them.

"I believe I see things before it happens," he says.

"There are many things about you that don't make sense," I reply, nonresponsively, thinking of how odd it is for a muscle-bound guy to have some of the finest needle-threading foot skills the world has seen.

"Like the goal against England," he continues.

"I was going to ask you about that next!"

"You see? I know the future. Now tell me: How many would do that?" He answers before I can: "Only a crazy man!"

People will forever argue about which goal is the greatest ever scored. But the greatest volley goal -- this is it, right?

November of 2012, playing for the Swedish national squad in a friendly against England, Ibra departed this Earth, scoring one goal, then a second, then a third. And then there was the fourth. England goalkeeper Joe Hart ventured outside his box to clear a long ball with his head. Before he could, though, Ibra, who was chasing, did something spooky. He ... stopped. Because like all transcendent athletes, he'd seen several seconds into the future. His third eye had solved the chaos math in real time. He knew, not only that Hart would head the ball but precisely where. Which is how Zlatan wound up leaping into the air and bicycling a shot without ever eyeing the goal; without letting the ball bounce; and with his back parallel to and at least 4 feet off the ground -- into the goal from 35 meters out. It cleared the crossbar by 1 foot, about two-tenths of a second before a sliding defender could block it.

Perhaps the daftest thing about this goal was that it was not a reflex. Ibra had a lot of time -- full seconds! -- to think it over. The moment is now 7 years old, but Zlatan recalls it in the present tense: "I know he will head the ball. That's the only chance he has. If he lets the ball go down, I will steal it from him. I have two opportunities. Either I go against him and take away, or I wait for where the ball comes. So when he jumps up, I back off. I know where he will try to put it is behind me ... "

To think: Yes, this is in my arsenal, fire away. ... The delusion, the punk-ass hubris of that! This goal, which even England's captain, Steven Gerrard, called "the best I've ever seen," remains the ultimate example of Zlatan's not playing by the rules. Not in the sense that he's cheating or playing dirty, but that he's defying the rules of physics, geometry, human physiology, common sense and good taste -- and constantly getting away with it.

Even so, when Ibra talks of providing, he's talking about something larger and less manifest than "mere" goals.

"[I] Don't come to MLS because I am 'Ibrahimovic,'" Ibrahimovic says. "I come because I want to show you what football is. I come because I want to show U.S. what my game is about."

Grandiose? Given! But Zlatan put his money where his mouth is. "I said to Galaxy, we sign this deal now. If you not happy in one month, we can cancel, and I go." This would seem tall if there weren't a precedent. When he was no longer able to provide after blowing out his knee, Ibrahimovic offered to reimburse Manchester United for the games he missed.

Eventually, it dawns on me that what Zlatan wishes to provide is nothing less than "Zlatan" -- in quotes, fully meta -- and everything that entails. Not just his beautiful game but also his unbeautiful game: his long history of cards and bans for unleashing his ire, fists and feet on opponents and teammates. Only when fans see the whole Zlatan package, the lovely and the ugly, can they comprehend the passion and anger he feels for the game.

The weeks preceding our early June interview had been pure Zlatan. In May, the ugly: He served a two-game suspension for grabbing NYCFC goalkeeper Sean Johnson by the neck. ("Ah! That clown fall down fainting and almost died, and I said, 'Let's call the ambulance because you are dying!' Then he send a picture to MLS showing a scratch on his neck! Listen, I've played 800 games. I've played against animals that almost broke my legs. But what happens in the game stays in the game. In Europe, if he send a picture of a scratch on his neck? They eat him alive.")

And then, on June 2, the beautiful: In a 2-1 upset loss to the New England Revolution, Ibra provided one of the most crazy-stupid-brilliant goals of his career. Late in the game, with his back to the goal, he settled a cross on his chest, flicked it up just so and bicycled the rock -- hard, a missile -- home.

He dissects each of these moments with the same evangelical zeal.

"I gave you the last goal, yes?" he says.

Me? You gave it to me? I think, then remember this is the guy who, upon signing with the Galaxy, took out an ad in the Los Angeles Times that read "Dear Los Angeles, You're Welcome" with a hand-signed "Zlatan" at the bottom.

"Yes," Zlatan says, answering his own question. "That was good."

Zlatan will be the first to tell you that Zlatan has never fit in. That the essence of Zlatan is outsiderness and, with it, a ceaseless and nourishing anger. The son of émigrés, a Bosnian caretaker (dad) and Croatian cleaner (mom), Ibrahimovic was born and raised in Sweden. He was, by his own admission, a gangly, dark-eyed, raven-haired, big-nosed, lisping punk. He fought, he stole (candy, bikes, cars, whatever), he footballed, he didn't get along.

"I've been at this school 33 years," his former headmistress told BBC Sport in 2013, "and Zlatan is easily in the top five of the most unruly pupils we have ever had. He was the No. 1 bad boy, a one-man show, a prototype of the kind of child that ends up in serious trouble."

"School was OK," Zlatan says. "I got free food."

"They made me feel different," he continues. "Soccer in Sweden was only Swedish players with Swedish background. And then I come -- big. Not just big nose, dark hair, brown eyes. But I was playing big style, not typical Swedish."

"What was your playing style, and what was 'wrong' with it?" I ask.

"Swedish way was 'Work hard for each other.' Where I came from, we were all challenging each other, trying to become individual type of player. Who was the best to dribble? Who was the best to shoot? Who was the best to put it on the crossbar? Who was best to put between the legs? Who was strongest? I learn to resolve my own things: Give me the ball, and I will take care of it. I will score the goal. I will make one against one. I will dribble him. I will put between his leg. I will make this crazy goal."

In other words, a purely Darwinian, me-against-the-world ethos.

"We did not think '11 against 11.' It was not that kind of game," he says. "It was more individual competition. Like I show I'm the best. I will make a fool of you now. Pop! Pop! I will dribble you, put it between your legs, then make fun of you. That is what we stood for. It was more physical, and it was technical football. But it was not the Swedish game."

Such a great malapropism there, the notion that little Zlatan would not only dribble between your legs but dribble you, kicking you in whichever direction he pleased.

"It was not 'I run here for you and you pass,'" he says. "No. It was 'I will run where the ball goes because I want the ball.' So they were on me all the time: 'You are a spoiled player. You are a diva. You cannot play like that.'"

Indeed, even after Ibra joined his hometown's professional club at 17, the parents of one of his teammates petitioned to have him booted from the league. "This was the moment I said to myself, 'Now I will destroy everyone. I will not have respect for nobody.'"

"I was not even a talent in their eyes, just a little s--- from Rosengard," he adds.

A question presents itself: Was football fun for the young Zlatan?

"It was competition, always," Zlatan says. "You were No. 1, or you were nobody."

Is it fun now?

"I look at him and ask myself that question all the time," Kirovski says. "Me, I still love it. I play all the time. I'm competitive, I want to win, too. But when I look at this guy, the intensity of his training, of his mindset, I wonder if he's ever having fun out there. And I think that if he doesn't score and win, it's not fun for him."

If you've followed Ibra's long and glorious career, his triumphant march from Malmo to Ajax to Juventus to Inter Milan to Barcelona (the only place things didn't work out, thanks to seismic clashes with manager Pep Guardiola) to AC Milan to Paris St-Germain to Manchester United, it's hard not to suspect that, as flamboyant and funny as he is off the field, he doesn't experience fun on the field. When he scores one of his crazy goals, there is joy, yes, but it's a joy born of grim, gladiatorial satisfaction. There. I've showed you. Now do you believe?

You can see this. Watch any of Zlatan's-greatest-goals compilations fans have put on the internet. Compare them to those of his generational peers like Messi, Ronaldo and Gareth Bale. The others inevitably seem as amazed by what they've just done as their fans. They're stricken, their joy unabashed and beyond their control; they're like birthday boys caught in the deluge of candy under a shattered piñata. Ibra, he's different. Childlike glee, though present, is secondary. It's interesting that his list of transcendent athletes -- that is, athletes who in his view don't just play their sport but embody it -- includes Mike Tyson. Because the look on Ibra's face after many of his craziest goals uncannily resembles the mask of joyless vindication Tyson used to don after flattening yet another patsy.

It's the darnedest thing because, off the field, Ibra is nothing but playful. At one point, as we're talking about his daily routine, I ask if he dreams about soccer.

"Dream? No, I don't need to dream. When I was young, I was dreaming. Now I'm in the dream. Now I am the dream."

I laugh and nod in a game "Of course you are, Zlatan" way, and he issues a grin, conceding that he has slipped seamlessly from being Zlatan into performing "Zlatan."

Interestingly, these moments where Ibra slips, perhaps unconsciously, between answering my questions in earnest and playing (toying?) with me, are never off-putting. Others around him feel this way, too. "He's always coming out and saying these ... things," says one Galaxy executive. "If these things came out of anybody else's mouth, you'd think 'What a jerk.' But when Ibra says them, it's always charming."

I've interviewed highly intelligent athletes who, like Ibra, have a meta understanding of themselves and use the interview process to test and mock the interviewer. But when Ibra plays with an interviewer, there's a startling absence of malice; there's no sulk in his toying, no insinuation that he's trying to alleviate boredom. To him, the role of "Ibra" is just good, clean fun. I can't help but wonder if he seeks out and capitalizes on this fun because fun is not part of the equation when he's on the field. There, it's all about the anger and vindication. (For opponents, refs and even teammates, yes, but mainly for himself.)

"Do you play well when you're angry?" I ask him.

"YESSSSsssss!" Ibra says, slowly, with more than a few extra S's thrown in to make the sentiment imprint. "That is when I get the best out of myself. That's the way I feel my life."

"Some athletes are eaten alive by anger."

"Not Zlatan," says Zlatan. "I need to be angry because I need to feel alive. When I relax, when I play without anger? It becomes sloppy, and it might appear I get violent." A startling possibility there -- that without anger and the focus it gives him, Zlatan succumbs to petulance and pettiness, which in turn leads to sloppy, violent play and red cards. "When I'm angry, then I'm on my toes."

"Anger creates energy?"

"Yesssss. I see the whole environment when I'm angry. Now, anger to hurt somebody? Never. That's not part of my DNA." (Nedum Onuoha of Real Salt Lake would beg to differ. After Zlatan threw him to the ground during a 2-1 Galaxy victory this spring, Onuoha dubbed him a "complete thug" and then predicted that "it will get spun into a story about how he's really competitive and this is what gets him going, this is why he's one of the best of all time. That's just the way that it works. I'm not the type of person to say that the better MLS players get preferential treatment, but from what I've seen so far, it's a lot easier to be Zlatan than it is to be the striker for Real Salt Lake.")

To Zlatan, 50% of soccer is mental. Mental toughness, that is. Which is something he thinks American soccer players lack. This lack, he believes, is institutional and largely explains why MLS has always stood in the shadow of the international game. Kirovski agrees. "In Europe, if you don't pass me the ball, I can really have a go at you and yell at you, and it's no big deal. Here that kind of thing is taken personally. Our youth players are getting better at handling pressure, but there's still a way to go."

When I asked Zlatan what it will take for MLS to achieve parity with Europe and South America, he responds with a question.

"Do they want to make it?"

"Who is 'they'?"

"They that control it. The owners. Do they want it to be big?"

"Yeah. Of course."

"You think?"

"You don't?"

"I don't."

"Why?"

"Because you don't make money in soccer," he tells me. "In Europe, I can pick two clubs that make money. The rest don't; they do it out of passion. Here, with the sports, you make money. That's it. And I think with all the rules you have here, you are not boosting up the soccer."

What rules?

"The budget things. The salary cap. You cannot bring in players you want. They have more rules here than I have in my home."

He paused for a moment, measuring the thought that came to him, then let it go.

"I will tell you that of all the places I've been in my life as a professional, this is the most difficult."

Zlatan says the American game needs to continue to evolve.

"MLS is not the level of Europe, to be honest. Before, I played with players either on my level or close to it. Which makes the game connect easier. ... Here, I am like a Ferrari among Fiats. And it can happen that the Ferrari can become the Fiat, or the Fiat can become the Ferrari. I had the same issue with the national [Swedish] team, though not as much. I said, 'I don't accept it. I don't accept when the ball doesn't arrive, or arrives too late. I want them to come up to my level.' All of this makes me slow down a bit. The game here [in America] could be so much faster, so much more tactical, so much more rhythmic."

Then there are the regrets. It is striking that, having won everywhere he has gone, and despite his ongoing ability to score, Zlatan was unable to get the Galaxy into the playoffs last year (and that his team is not even the best in its own city). The issue rankles Ibra, not just the failure to get in but also the "playoff mentality" itself.

"Here, you can lose five games and it's still, 'Don't worry, we are in the playoffs.' So why even play first eight months of season? No, I don't accept. To be best, you have to be best every day. You know, in Euro, if you come in last, you go down to Division 2. That is pressure. ... So last year, we fight for six position to go to playoff, but came in seven. If we had made sixth position, people would have said we had a 'good season.' I say, 'Fighting for the sixth position? That means we had s--- season!" We need to fight for No. 1, not 6."

When, inevitably, we talk about his injury, Zlatan was at his sincerest and most unperformative. "It was not easy," he said in a whisper, as if speaking the sentiment aloud might make real the prospect of not being able to play. What would, what will, it do to a man like him, once his anger can no longer find purchase on the pitch?

"It was not easy," he says again.

After a beat, he mentioned that the night before, he'd been watching the NBA Finals. "When Kevin Durant got injured? I turned off the TV. Because for me he is the best. He is the game. Once he was hurt, there was nothing to see."

Or, perhaps, he couldn't bear to see an all-time great, past the 50% point of his career, felled and with a long and painful recovery ahead of him. "I feel my body has always followed what I want. I feel it's answering to me now. When it's starting to not answer, then I will know: It's time."

The passion is what makes him so good at the age of 37, but it will also make the game all but impossible for him to let go of.

"I think it will be very difficult to stop. When I got injured, I went away from my family to do my rehab. I did not want them to see me in a bed paralyzed, not moving. I am so emotional with my game. But emotional with control. You're not gonna see me jump in front of a car because I cannot play football anymore, OK?"

I sit for a moment, thinking about Zlatan and his anger and where in his life he finds fun. Then I remember a story Brendan Hannan, the Galaxy's vice president of marketing, communications and digital, told me. He was talking about how incredibly accessible Ibra has made himself in LA, both to fans who show up at training sessions looking for autographs and pictures and to those employed by the Galaxy in promotions. Shortly after he arrived at the club, Ibra agreed to film a promotion with Mickey Mouse.

"Ibra had just gotten here," Hannan recalls. "He hadn't played in months, and nobody really knew what kind of condition his knee was in. Some people doubted he'd score more than 10 goals" -- so far he has notched 35 goals in 43 appearances -- "and some even doubted if he'd even play."

Which was why the whole Galaxy staff froze when Zlatan began playing with Mickey Mouse and, according to Hanna, "doing crazy stuff." Juggling. Nutmegging the Mick. Striking the ball 30 feet in the air, then assuming a full limbo posture with his legs bent back and his chest facing the sky before trapping the ball there -- no bounce, as if the ball were a rotten grapefruit -- then flexing his chest in order to pop the ball 3 feet up. The coup de grace: bicycle-kicking the thing off into the ether. Zlatan was going full Zlatan. For the love of God, why?

"I just wanted to make Mickey Mouse happy. He was not answering me!" Zlatan protests. "Just blinking. So I kept doing tricks and asking, 'You like that, Mickey?' But I didn't get any answer. Just more blinking. So I'm like, OK, let's try this, and this, and this."

"That's not normal," I said.

"I am not normal," Zlatan agreed. Then, apropos of absolutely nothing and everything, he whispered: "It is a beautiful game, no?"

Former Australia captain-turned-commentator Ian Chappell has revealed he has been undergoing intense radiotherapy after being diagnosed with skin cancer.

The 75-year-old Chappell, who played 75 Tests for Australia from 1964 to 1980, said he had completed five weeks of treatment, having cancers removed from his shoulder, neck and underarm. The pathology has come back clear, according to him, and he expects to be fit to commentate during Channel Nine's Ashes coverage in August.

"I didn't tell too many people early on. Mainly because I just wasn't sure what the radiotherapy would involve and how weary I'd be," Chappell told The Daily Telegraph.

"But as it turned out, it wasn't so bad. A bit of tiredness at night and a bit of skin irritation, but other than that I'm feeling pretty good. I told family and gradually a couple of my team-mates and I've been getting calls from them pretty regularly which is nice.

"With the Ashes coming up now, I'll speak to Nine and just say, 'look, I'm ready to go if you need me."

Chappell, who made 5345 Test runs at an average of 42.42, also revealed that he enjoyed a family reunion with his brothers Greg and Trevor.

"When you hit 70 you feel (vulnerable) anyhow, but I guess I've got so used to bloody skin cancers over the years, and the fact that none of them have been melanomas, probably provides a bit of comfort. It may be naivety on my part," he said. "I've had multiple skin cancers cut off, burnt off and every other way you can get rid of them.

"When Richie [Benaud] and Tony [Greig] went … again, it was just a reminder that it happens to everybody."

Benaud, who also suffered from skin cancer, died in 2015 after a long battle with the illness, while Greig died in 2012 having battled lung cancer. Both were Chappell's long-time commentary colleagues.

Chappell had reportedly continued to commentate for Macquire Sports Radio during his radiotherapy, but had stepped back during the World Cup due to late working hours.

Gloucestershire 504 for 9 dec (Dent 125, J Taylor 99, Smith 84, Howell 76) and 48 for 4 beat Leicestershire 252 (Dexter 56, M Taylor 3-39) and 299 (Azad 121, Higgins 5-71) by six wickets

Ryan Higgins claimed five wickets as Gloucestershire moved into the Division Two promotion race with a thrilling six-wicket Specsavers County Championship win over Leicestershire at Cheltenham.

Hassan Azad's battling last-day hundred helped the visitors extend their second-innings total from an overnight 78 for 2 to 299 all out, Higgins returning 5 for 71, but did not prove enough in an exciting finale.

The visitors collapsed from 255 for 4 at tea and Gloucestershire were left with eight overs to score the 48 needed for victory. They got home with three balls to spare, Gareth Roderick ending the game with an amazing six over point off Chris Wright. The home side took 22 points to move within ten of third-placed Northamptonshire with a game in hand, while Leicestershire had to be content with four.

Azad, who had hit 137 and 100 not out in the corresponding game at Grace Road this summer, began the day on 38, with occupation of the crease was his primary objective as his side chased the 174 more runs needed to make Gloucestershire bat again. He offered just one chance in the morning session, on 69 when Jack Taylor could not grasp a sharp catch at short-leg off the bowling of left-arm spinner Tom Smith.

Colin Ackerman helped frustrate the home attack on a fourth-day pitch offering little other than some variable bounce for the seamers, although there was some evidence of turn out of the rough. He and Azad maintained their third-wicket partnership until lunch, which was taken at 168 for 2, Azad having progressed to 82 after reaching a 134-ball fifty.

The second ball after lunch saw Ackerman edge Matt Taylor to wicketkeeper Roderick and depart for 41. Leicestershire still trailed by 83 and it looked an important breakthrough with a new ball not far away. It was taken at 205 for 3 and Higgins made good use, sending Harry Dearden's middle stump cartwheeling after he had made 19.

Azad remained unruffled, having combined excellent defensive technique with neat footwork against spinners Smith and Graeme van Buuren to reach his hundred off 256 balls.

By tea, he and Ben Mike had taken the total to 255 for 4, a lead of three runs. But the first ball after the break raised Gloucestershire hopes again as Azad edged Ethan Bamber to Miles Hammond at slip to end six hours and 22 minutes of intense concentration.

Mike was caught behind off Taylor, whose hostile post-tea spell brought him 1 for 6 from seven overs. Then, after Harry Swindells and Callum Parkinson had added 33 to take Leicestershire to the brink of safety, both fell in quick succession. Swindells was well caught by Benny Howell at first slip off Higgins and the following over saw Parkinson nick Chadd Sayers to Hammond at second slip. When Will Davis was lbw to Higgins for a duck, three wickets had fallen in 14 balls.

There were still more than 15 overs remaining and the Foxes led by only 41 at 293 for 9. Amid growing tension, Sayers ripped through Wright's defence to bowl him and end the innings with only six runs added.

Gloucestershire's frantic second innings saw Chris Dent bowled by Wright, who also had Miles Hammond caught on the boundary, while Abbas had Jack Taylor caught in the deep before a Higgins straight six off Abbas off the last ball of the penultimate over left nine runs needed.

Benny Howell was run out seeking a second run off the first ball of the final over. But Roderick marched out to hit a two before his extraordinary match-winning shot.

Australia Women 265 for 3 (Perry 84*, Haynes 54*) v England Women

Is it too soon to say that Australia have retained the Ashes? Technically, yes, but such was the ease with which a succession of their batsmen mastered the opening day of the one-off Test in Taunton, it is already nigh on impossible to see how England can claim the 20 wickets required to win the match and stay in the series … unless, of course, the pitch starts ragging like a Ciderabad bad'un, in which case the 265 runs that Australia already have on the board will surely prove decisive.

Trailing 6-0 on points after losing all three of the recent ODIs, Heather Knight's team needed nothing less than the four points available for this Test to keep their hopes alive going into next week's T20s. And they appeared to have thrown in their lot with Taunton's reputation as a spinner's paradise, omitting their Test-specialist seamer Kate Cross for the left-arm debutant Kirstie Gordon, with Sophie Ecclestone and Laura Marsh completing a three-prong spin attack.

But then Knight lost the toss, and the chance to bowl last on a used surface, and by the close of a one-sided first day, everything that could go wrong for England had gone wrong. Four of Australia's top five posted half-centuries, including Ellyse Perry, who picked up the same indomitable form she had shown in her last Test innings - 213 not out at Bankstown in the 2017-18 Ashes - to reach the close on 84 not out, making a new record aggregate of 297 consecutive runs for a women's Test batsman.

Furthermore, England's focus and threat was fundamentally undermined by two key injuries in the course of the day - first when Ecclestone, their attack-leading left-arm spinner, was forced to leave the field midway through her third over, having bruised her shoulder badly while diving in vain for a catch in the outfield.

Though she returned to the attack after lunch, and bowled creditably in picking up the big wicket of Meg Lanning for 57, the moment had already been lost for England, who were pushed emphatically on to the defensive by an impressive morning onslaught from Alyssa Healy, whose 58 from 81 balls included 12 fours, four of which came in the space of nine balls from a lacklustre Anya Shrubsole. Her opening spell offered hooping swing but far too much width, and she was not called upon again until the 60th over, by which time the 'roos had truly bolted.

England's other big concern centred on the fitness of their one in-form batsman, Tammy Beaumont. Though she had barely flinched at short leg after being cracked a savage blow on the left thumb by a full-blooded Healy pull, she had left the field by the close of play and was due to go for an X-ray. Her absence at the top of the order would be incalculable: in the ODIs, Beaumont's 114 from 115 balls in the second match at Leicester provided the team's one moment of batting dominance. Aside from her, only Nat Sciver has so much as passed fifty in three innings.

For a side that so desperately needed to set the agenda, it was a passive performance from England throughout the first day. With two fifties in the ODIs, Healy was in the mood to dominate from the outset, and her effortless gap-finding left England with few answers, in spite of the odd hint of dramatic turn, including Ecclestone's first delivery, which exploded past Healy's off stump in the 12th over.

But having over-stretched at midwicket in a futile attempt to intercept another flicked four from Healy, Ecclestone was left in tears after jarring her shoulder as she hit the turf, and having served up a leg-stump half-tracker that was pulled ruthlessly for four, she left the field mid-over, handing the senior spin duties to Gordon - one of two England Test debutants alongside Amy Jones.

Gordon settled quickly in the circumstances - though not before Healy had cashed in on a brace of nervy full-tosses to race to a 61-ball fifty, her first in Tests. And, having found her pace and length for the conditions, Gordon struck a vital blow in the final ten minutes before lunch, sliding one past Healy's back pad and into her stumps to pick up a notable maiden Test wicket in her sixth over.

Gordon's day could and should have got even better in her very next over. Sensing an opportunity to turn the screw at 95 for 2 with two batsmen playing for the interval, Knight posted herself in Lanning's eyeline at short cover, but then dropped a dolly of a checked drive, with Australia's most accomplished cricketer on 26.

It was a grim moment for the skipper, and though Lanning did occasionally get bogged down by the spinners, she didn't offer another sniff in pressing onto her half-century. On 57, however, Ecclestone - patched up in the dressing-room and restored to the attack - served up the ball of the day, a cunning slider that slipped under an attempted cut and into Lanning's off stump.

But Perry by this stage was deep into her innings and utterly serene. Her commitment to the front foot in defence, but ability to rock back deep into her crease to attack, offered England no quarter as they probed in vain for a weakness. Their best hope, in fact, came at the other end, where the left-handed Rachael Haynes initially found the footholes hard to combat, at least until she took the initiative with her own footwork, dancing down the track to Gordon and lofting her with the spin over wide long-on for four.

By the close, England had surrendered all pretence of the initiative, as Perry closed in on her second Test century in a fourth-wicket stand of 105. It's going to take something extraordinary to turn this game around, and England - on today's subdued evidence - don't look capable of producing it.

Zimbabwe have been suspended from the ICC with immediate effect. ICC funding to Zimbabwe Cricket has been frozen, and representative teams from Zimbabwe will not be allowed to participate in any ICC events while under suspension, making Zimbabwe's participation in the T20 World Cup Qualifier in October highly unlikely.

After several rounds of meetings in London this week, the ICC Board unanimously decided that Zimbabwe Cricket was in breach of Article 2.4 (c) and (d) of the ICC Constitution, and that the actions of the Sports and Recreation Commission (SRC) in suspending the board in June constituted government interference in Zimbabwe Cricket's affairs.

"We do not take the decision to suspend a Member lightly, but we must keep our sport free from political interference," ICC Chairman Shashank Manohar said. "What has happened in Zimbabwe is a serious breach of the ICC Constitution and we cannot allow it to continue unchecked."

ESPNcricinfo understands that a major part of the ICC's reasoning in blocking funds to ZC was that it was concerned the money might be diverted to the Zimbabwe government instead of being utilised for the development of cricket and the players.

Zimbabwe is in the midst of an economic crisis, with inflation figures increasing exponentially and price increases at a 10-year high as government coffers empty. According to an official who attended the meetings this week, since the ICC disburses funds in US dollars to member boards, it feared that the Zimbabwean government would seize the funds and hence the extreme step of barring ZC its funding had to be taken.

Zimbabwe's sanctioning marks the very first time a Full Member has been suspended by the ICC - although Sri Lanka were warned in 2015 by the then ICC chief executive David Richardson that they were at risk of immediate sanction for government interference in their administration. Various Associate Members are currently under suspension, including Nepal.

The ICC has directed that the ZC board originally elected in mid-June be reinstated to office within three months, and progress in this respect will be considered again at the next board meeting in October. "The ICC wants cricket to continue in Zimbabwe in accordance with the ICC Constitution," Manohar added.

At least one member of that board will not be taking up a position, however, as Ed Rainsford, the former Zimbabwe fast bowler, released a statement on Thursday through his lawyers indicating that he would decline to accept his nomination.

Representatives from both the SRC and Zimbabwe Cricket were heard by the ICC Board this week. Dave Ellman-Brown, the chairman of the SRC-appointed interim committee and a former Zimbabwe Cricket Union chief executive, was in attendance in London, and Tavengwa Mukuhlani took part in the board meeting, seemingly in his official capacity.

Mukuhlani, who has played various administrative roles in Zimbabwean cricket at provincial and national level since 2004, had been re-elected as board chairman in those June elections. But that the elections took place at all marked the start of ZC's conflict with the SRC - officially, at least.

Since then, Zimbabwean cricket has been in lockdown - and meltdown. Mukuhlani, acting managing director Givemore Makoni, and the entire board were suspended by the SRC and ZC's offices were literally locked, with a police detail dispatched to guard the property, "to ensure that no assets or other documents, especially of a financial nature, left the premises," according to SRC chairman Gerald Mlotshwa.

The ICC immediately froze Zimbabwe's funding upon the suspension of the board in June, and as a result Zimbabwe's women were unable to take part in a scheduled tour of Ireland. The men's team, already in the middle of their tour of Netherlands and Ireland, completed their trip and have since returned to Zimbabwe.

A member of the touring squad confirmed that players had not been paid match fees or salaries for the tour, and that "everything" has been frozen. ESPNcricinfo understands that the ICC will leave the question of player welfare to ZC while they are under suspension.

New Zealand's crushing disappointment after the World Cup final against England on Sunday was mitigated by the knowledge that they had played a huge part in one of the most thrilling cricket matches of all time, according to Martin Guptill, the opening batsman whose ill-fortune came to epitomise his side's cruel luck.

Not only was Guptill the man left sprawling for his crease in the Super Over, as Jos Buttler fielded the shy from midwicket that sealed the final in England's favour, he was also the man whose own throw from the deep - in England's final over of the original run-chase - inadvertently turned the course of the match on its head.

After gathering Ben Stokes' clip to midwicket with nine runs needed from three balls, Guptill's return to the keeper deflected off Stokes' bat and away to the third man boundary for four overthrows, making a total of six runs for the incident. Stokes had already smashed the third ball of the over for another six, and managed to eke out two more singles from the final two balls of Trent Boult's over to tie the scores.

"Up until the third ball we were right in the box seat," Guptill told Sky Sports ahead of his debut for Worcestershire Rapids in the Vitality Blast. "And then it wasn't to be, but that's just the way cricket goes, as players. It was one hell of a final."

Guptill admitted that "the thought crosses your mind" that New Zealand were simply fated to miss out, but he had no doubt about the moment that changed the game.

"I guess it was the throw that I threw in from the boundary and hit the back of Stokes' bat, and trickled off for four," he said. "You know when that sort of thing happens, from a throw from the boundary, it tends not to go your way."

Chasing 16 runs to win the Super Over, Guptill was left needing two from the final ball of the match, but this time Jason Roy's shy from midwicket was accurate enough to leave him well short as Buttler confirmed England's first World Cup in 44 barren years.

"I didn't really know where the ball was, I just put the head down and just started running," Guptill said. "It was a good throw and I dived from about halfway, and just come up a little bit short."

New Zealand received huge credit for the manner in which they accepted their defeat, in spite of having scored the same number of runs across the match, and Guptill said that the team had been quick to recognise quite what a massive part of sporting history they had played a part in.

"Yeah, I think so," he said. "You know, the support that we had from back home and even around here, and what you see on social media, everyone just loved the game, whether they were cricket watchers or not. Everyone was all over the game and they loved it and it was just a shame for us about the result.

"We actually had quite a good party," he added. "I mean, obviously it was quite a sombre mood for a while but then we realised we were part of one of the greatest games in cricket history, so we got over it fairly quickly. We had a good time together, because we're not going to be together as a group like that for a while yet."

Guptill's World Cup had been a luckless affair for much of the campaign. Despite making a half-century to seal a ten-wicket win over Sri Lanka in New Zealand's opening match, he didn't pass 35 in his remaining 10 innings.

But a change of scene could be just the tonic, as he links up with Worcestershire, the defending T20 Blast champions.

"You need a bit of luck in the game as a batsman sometimes," he said. "And T20 can be the place to find that luck. So who knows, hopefully tonight I can find a little bit and hopefully score a few runs.

"It's a young team and I think there's a lot of excitement around it," he added of his Worcestershire team-mates. "The guys just have fun playing together. I think that's a big part of cricket and something that we pride ourselves on as New Zealanders and the Black Caps. We just go out and have some fun with our mates."

ENGLEWOOD, Colo. -- As Denver Broncos quarterback Joe Flacco finished his first training camp practice with his new team Thursday, he made it clear he sees his 12th season in the league as a fresh start, a second chance and a potential "take that" season all in one.

It was the first time Flacco entered an NFL training camp as anything other than the starting quarterback for the Baltimore Ravens. The 34-year-old veteran, however, has big plans after a pre-draft trade led him to join the Broncos.

Has the change rejuvenated him?

"It's tough to say that without almost putting yourself down for the last couple years of your career," Flacco said. "There is an energy about coming here and an excitement that I feel being with this new team and getting another chance of being a starting quarterback. I don't think you can ever take that for granted. ... I'm definitely excited about it."

Broncos president of football operations/general manager John Elway has consistently said he likes to acquire veteran players with chips on their shoulders -- as he has shown with Peyton Manning, DeMarcus Ware and Aqib Talib in previous seasons. Elway, who sent a fourth-round pick to the Ravens in the trade, believes that Flacco can be another potential success story.

"Any time you get traded midway in your career or two-thirds of the way through your career, you've got something to prove," Elway said Wednesday.

Flacco was replaced by Lamar Jackson after suffering a hip injury in November and didn't get the starting job back after he returned.

"Yeah, there's no doubt [I've got something to prove]," Flacco said. "Listen, I think I've got a lot left in the tank. And I feel like I can do a lot more than I've shown in my 11-year career. I'm excited about that."

Also excited is receiver Emmanuel Sanders, who has come up with a new nickname for the veteran quarterback.

"Flacco's a baller," Sanders said Thursday. "I think we're going to be OK. I like the way he spins it. ... I call him, 'Pretty Boy' Flacco. That's his name. He's just smooth."

Although the Broncos used a second-round draft pick on quarterback Drew Lock, coach Vic Fangio and Elway have each said that Flacco is the unquestioned starter. Flacco took all of the work with the first-team during the first on-field work session of training camp Thursday.

Flacco said his family has settled into the Denver area and joked his daughter has already decked herself out in plenty of Broncos gear. He also joked when asked about a conversation with Elway and Lock during practice.

"I grew up watching John Elway," Flacco said. "And while we're kind of colleagues now on the field, there's still that little bit of kid in you -- man, John Elway's standing right next to you. So you try to act as normal as possible and shoot the breeze. ... I think it's a really cool opportunity.

"Listen, I know John's the man around here. Hopefully there's room for a couple more people."

PORTRUSH, Northern Ireland -- Former Open champion David Duval made a 14 at one hole on his way to a score of 91 that also saw him make a triple-bogey and a quadruple-bogey during the first round at Royal Portrush.

Included in the 14 was a 2-stroke penalty for playing the wrong ball and two other penalties for a lost ball. "Just done something I've never done as a professional ... " said Duval, who noted he had shot 85 twice before. "It was a long day, a rough day.

"A very unique, awful situation."

Duval originally had been credited with a 13 on the seventh hole and a score of 90, but the score was adjusted to 91 after a review by the R&A.

The winner of 13 PGA Tour events, Duval never won after capturing his only major at the 2001 Open played at Royal Lytham. For a time, he was ranked No. 1 in the world.

Duval, 47, long ago stopped playing tournament golf full time, but, as a past champion, he is exempt through age 60, and he felt good about his game before arriving in Northern Ireland. He played in a Korn Ferry Tour event last week in Colorado and had played four other PGA Tour events this year, although he missed the cut in three and withdrew from the other.

And after two early birdies, Duval was feeling pretty good. But he made an 8 at the fifth. And then came the problems at No. 7. Duval hit two tee shots that were poor enough to cause him to hit provisional shots. When the first balls were not found, he was lying 5. At that point, Duval hit what turned out to be a ball that was not his. That's a 2-shot penalty, and it meant going back to the tee again.

But that occurred only after Duval hit several more shots with the wrong ball -- shots that then didn't count.

"I get up to the front of the green, I discover it was the wrong No. 2 Titleist," he said. "I am at fault, I didn't check it myself close enough. It happened to me once before -- a marshal is standing right next to the ball. ... It's just my mistake."

After hitting what was his eighth shot, Duval needed six more shots to get down for a 14 -- one of five players to make a 12 or worse at The Open in the past 20 years.

Duval shot 49 for the first nine holes and then had a triple-bogey 7 at the 17th, shooting 42 on the back for his score of 91. The last time a player had three triples or worse in the same round at The Open was in 2003 -- when Duval shot a first-round 83 at Royal St. George's.

"It's fairly unsettling, obviously," he said. "I came in here with some fairly high hopes. I had some good practice, and I played in the Korn Ferry last week in Colorado and my scores were good, I drove the ball like I used to drive the ball and everything was there."

Duval cited some injury woes that have not helped, including tendinitis in his left arm, but said it wasn't bad enough to withdraw during the round.

"As a professional, if you play, you post your score," Duval said. "Is there some hint of embarrassment to it? I don't know, but I teed off and what I shot at the end of the day, put it on the board."

PORTRUSH, Northern Ireland -- Tiger Woods did not try to mask the physical issues that plagued him during the first round of The Open at Royal Portrush on Thursday, giving a grim assessment of a situation that is appearing to be more the norm these days than at any time since he returned to competitive golf last year.

Woods shot 78, his highest opening score in 21 Opens and the worst since a third-round 81 in 2002 at Muirfield. The latter, in part, was the result of a horrific weather situation that blew away the field. It was also tied for his third-worst round in any major, the 81 at Muirfield and an 80 at the 2015 U.S. Open his two highest scores.

While the weather was far from ideal on Thursday, there were still 42 players under par, with J.B. Holmes leading following a 66.

"I'm just not moving as well as I'd like,'' said Woods, who had spinal fusion surgery in April of 2017. "And unfortunately, you've got to be able to move, and especially under these conditions, shape the golf ball. And I didn't do it. I didn't shape the golf ball at all. Everything was left to right. And wasn't hitting it very solidly.''

When asked how disconcerting that was, Woods said: "Just the way it is. Father Time and some procedures I've had over the time. Just the way it's going to be. As I said, one of the reasons why I'm playing less tournaments this year is that I can hopefully prolong my career, and be out here for a little bit longer.''

Woods, 43, is playing just his 10th tournament of 2019, the highlight his stirring victory at the Masters, his 15th major title and 81st PGA Tour victory.

But this is just his fourth tournament since the Masters, and he's twice taken month-long breaks before competing again. He missed the cut at the PGA Championship and appears on his way to playing just 36 holes here as well. Woods has now played just 11 competitive rounds since the Masters.

Whether he plays next week's WGC-FedEx St. Jude Invitational has yet to be decided, according to Woods' agent, Mark Steinberg -- although that commitment is due Friday.

Judging by his movements Thursday, next week could be a long shot, with the FedEx Cup playoffs providing three straight weeks of tournaments in August.

Woods joked that he's much more sore when he is at home playing soccer or other games with his kids.

"But playing at this elite level is a completely different deal,'' he said. "You've got to be spot on. These guys are too good, there are too many guys that are playing well and I'm just not one of them.''

A poor warm-up preceded an opening tee shot in the rough for Woods, who seemingly makes a habit of getting off to poor starts. He made a great par at the first after finding a greenside bunker, but saw his round unravel with a three-putt bogey at the relatively short par-4 fifth, followed by a double bogey at the par-3 sixth and then another bogey at the par-5 seventh. After another bogey at the ninth, Woods shot 41 over the first nine holes.

His first and only birdie didn't come until the 15th hole, and Woods raised his arms in mock celebration. He ended with a bogey at the 18th. For the day, Woods hit just 8 of 14 fairways and 10 of 18 greens. He took 32 putts.

Woods could probably use some warm weather -- he struggled in cool conditions at Bethpage and Pebble Beach and it is again chilly here in the United Kingdom. Even so, he said, getting into the proper condition to play high-level golf is getting more difficult. He said "I'll be there'' for his 5:09 a.m. (10:09 a.m. local) tee time on Friday.

"I'm not 24 anymore,'' he said. "Life changes, life moves on. And I can't devote, as I've told you many times, I can't devote the hours to practice like I used to. Standing on the range, hitting balls for four or five hours, go play 36, come back, run 4 or 5 miles and then go to the gym. Those days are gone.

"I have to be realistic about my expectations and hopefully peaking at the right time. I peaked at Augusta well. And hopefully I can peak a few more times this year.''

Woods said he was on his way to get treatment from a physical trainer, standard before and after every round he plays. Aside from that?

"That's about all I can do,'' he said. "And hopefully the body responds. That's just the nature of the procedure that I had. I'm going to have days like this, and got to fight through it. And I fought through it. Unfortunately I did not post a very good score.''