Real Madrid sends UEFA evidence of alleged racist insult against Vini… — and more

MADRID — Real Madrid has sent UEFA “all available evidence” of the alleged racist insult against Vinícius Júnior in the Champions League match against Benfica.

“Our club has actively collaborated with the investigation opened by UEFA following the unacceptable episodes of racism experienced during that match,” the club said on Thursday without elaborating on the evidence.

UEFA appointed a special investigator on Wednesday to gather evidence about what happened in Lisbon in Madrid’s 1-0 win over Benfica in the first leg of the knockout round of the Champions League.

Vinícius accused Benfica player Gianluca Prestianni of calling him “monkey” after the Brazilian scored the only goal. Prestianni was among the Benfica players upset with Vinícius after the forward celebrated by the Benfica corner flag.

Prestianni covered his mouth with his shirt when he allegedly spoke to the Brazilian player and denied racially abusing Vinícius, who is Black and has been subjected to repeated racist insults in Spain.

“Real Madrid appreciates the unanimous support, backing, and affection that our player Vinicius Jr. has received from all areas of the global football community,” the club said. “Real Madrid will continue working, in collaboration with all institutions, to eradicate racism, violence, and hate in sports and society.”

Benfica said Prestianni was the victim of a “defamation campaign” and welcomed the investigation opened by UEFA on Wednesday, saying it “fully supports and believes the version presented” by Prestianni.

FIFA President Gianni Infantino said on Wednesday he was “shocked and saddened to see the incident of alleged racism” and praised the referee for activating the anti-racism protocol during the match, which was halted for nearly 10 minutes at the Stadium of Light.

What should we expect when Ronda Rousey and Gina Carano bring MMA to Netflix in May? How is Paramount feeling about the UFC partnership after Sean Strickland’s latest rant? And is the solution for heavyweights as simple as not asking them to fight three full rounds?

All that and more in this week’s mailbag. To ask a question of your own, hit up @BenFowlkesMMA on X or @Ben_Fowlkes on Threads.

@ewillcock: In Carano vs Rousey, I expect people will tune in, not to see who wins, but to see what happens.

I think I'm one of those people, and I'm excited at the potential for an exciting under card. Is there anything else to see here?

I expect there will be a lot of people who tune in based on two main factors: 1) They already have a Netflix subscription, and 2) They have at least heard of Ronda Rousey and/or Gina Carano. That’s enough right there. The fact that we might see something weird or memorable or just big and loud and dumb? That’s icing on the cake.

I don’t expect this to be all that competitive of a fight. I don’t think it would have been competitive even if they were both still in their respective primes. Rousey is the better fighter, the better athlete, and the far superior finisher.

She’s also probably a lot closer to something resembling fighting shape. Rousey herself suggested as much when she said one of the reasons she wanted to fight Carano was because she’d seen a recent interview in which Carano appeared to have gained a lot of weight. This fight, Rousey said, might give her a goal to work toward and a reason to get herself back in shape. (Side note: If any of you ever decide to help me solely because you see me and think I look really bad, feel free to keep that part to yourself.)

As for the undercard, I think we’ll probably see some familiar names long past their expiration dates as top fighters. There are at least a few fun fights that could be made from the available pool. But other than that? The UFC has most of the relevant talent locked up, and PFL has the rest. Who else would you even get other than known old-timers or totally unknown youngsters?

@Beastin364: Sean Strickland is back at it. Do you think Paramount regrets getting into business with the UFC when they see stuff or like that or did they know this ws part of the deal

They had to know. Right? I don’t see how any major company does any deal with the UFC and there’s not at least one conversation about the UFC’s, shall we say, permissive policies on fighter speech. It doesn’t take a crystal ball to know that, sooner or later, your communications department is going to be asked for a comment on the latest nonsense some UFC fighter uttered into a microphone on purpose. It also doesn’t take a fortune teller to guess that the fighter most likely to be the source of this specific variety of headache is Sean Strickland.

Am I the only one who sees this as a desperate grasp for relevance by him? This is his gimmick, and it has mostly stopped working. If he wants to keep getting attention for it, he has to keep ratcheting it up. Casual racism isn’t bringing the likes and the views anymore? Toss a few slurs in there. Take some shots at women while you’re at it. Maybe demeaning half the world’s population will result in another hit of attention.

At this point, it’s like he’s a kid jumping up and down and shouting for us to please, please look at him. Meanwhile, he’s a +220 underdog at BetMGM in a fight with one of the division’s rising contenders. This is a man on the brink. He wants to stay in the headlines and, with mixed results inside the cage lately, he only knows one reliable way to do it.

@KneebarNewsMMA: We shouldn’t expect heavyweights and bantamweights to have equal cardio. Why not reduce the cage time for heavyweight fights, perhaps to three 3-minute rounds?

I say we go the other direction. Everyone knows that the best heavyweight fights are the ones that end quickly and violently, usually in the first round. So why not see what we can do to discourage any of the big guys from even thinking about a second or third round?

I say bring back the 10-minute first round, but only for heavyweights. Let them know that they can either go out there and try to get it done quick or else become completely exhausted before they even get a chance to see the stool. You know these guys don’t want to fight for 10 minutes. They’ll see that and be motivated to take some chances and get out of there early. If somehow we get a Round 2? Then I’m fully in support of giving the referee permission to end any heavyweight fight at any time and declare it a draw if he concludes that no one needs to see these guys lean on each other any longer.

@VoiceofGarcia: Would you say the pressure on Dana and Paramount is added more to make the "best" White House card, thanks to MVP's announcement of Rousey vs Carano?

If they weren’t already feeling that pressure, they should have been. This White House event has been talked about to death already, and we’re still four months away, so it really has to deliver in order to feel like anything other than a letdown. The fact that Rousey and Carano will fight a month prior might turn the screws a little bit, but I’d hope Dana White and the UFC have enough awareness to see they’ve created a monster here already, and monstrous expectations will come with it.

@SLedkaditis: An undeserved Interim title fight, a rematch no one wanted and a BMF fight.

What's the UFC's title landscape going into the White House event?

The good news about having so few titles up for grabs in the months before this June event is that it ought to leave a lot to choose from.

I think a lightweight title fight between Ilia Topuria and Justin Gaethje is an easy choice. Heavyweight (unless it’s an interim belt) is probably off the table, just based on how Tom Aspinall’s recovery is going. At light heavyweight, Alex Pereira would be a great choice to lend some star power. At middleweight, I don’t know if it would be a great look to have a Chechen warlord’s favorite fighter defending his title at the White House right now.

The other big one I think we could reasonably hope for is Kayla Harrison vs. Amanda Nunes. It would be a tight turnaround after neck surgery for Harrison, but I think she’s motivated to get back in time to fight on this card.

@OnAirMafia: Part 1 - with the talk late last year about Eddie Hearn maybe getting into MMA with Turki and his recent collab with MVP in the Joshua/Paul fight...what are the odds about them all hooking up in this possible MVP MMA venture to try to challenge Dana & UFC?

There’s no serious chance for anyone to challenge the UFC in a real way. Not right now. It has almost all the top fighters under contract. It’s constantly funneling developing talent through the Contender Series and onto the main roster (at budget prices). The brand name is the sport in the mind of the public. There’s just no current way to create a new MMA competitor and keep it going in any way that would threaten the UFC at all.

What there might be room for is a hybrid fight promotion, something with boxing and MMA — plus maybe even kickboxing and bare-knuckle — all on the same fight card. That comes with challenges of its own, but at least it would offer some flexibility. It might also be just novel and weird enough to sustain our attention.

@ihab23: Why are we pretending UFC White House is a celebration of America when it’s really a birthday party for our dear leader? They blatantly changed the date from July 4 to Trump’s birthday.

Are we pretending that? I think we all know what this is going to be. The UFC has gone all-in for Trump and been rewarded for it. It’s definitely driven some fans away, but I also doubt the UFC would have gotten $1.1 billion from Paramount if it hadn’t positioned itself this way. There’s simply no way this broadcast doesn’t shower attention and praise on Trump at every opportunity. If he’s not awarded some kind of honorary gold belt at some point, I’ll be shocked. Some fans will probably love that and others will hold their noses through it, but we should all be prepared for it.

@LCombatsports: Am I wrong to think what could happen if the revival act passes is TKO spends money getting top or up and coming boxers, athletes & fans gravitate to Zuffa Boxing, the industry centralizes around them, & jobs are lost because companies arent interested in boxing unless it's TKO?

That’s looking way down the road. TKO is pretty far from anything resembling a boxing takeover right now. Its goal for now seems to be a weekly fight-night type of offering, populated mostly by boxers who are still far from the elite level. I can see that being profitable for TKO, but it’s nowhere close to being able to put on the big boxing events just yet. Which isn’t to say that couldn’t change. It just won’t change quickly.

Chelsea's FA Cup fifth-round tie at Championship side Wrexham will be televised live on BBC One on Saturday, 7 March (17:45 GMT kick-off).

The all-Premier League fixture between Wolverhampton Wanderers and Liverpool at Molineux will be shown on BBC One on Friday, 6 March (20:00 GMT).

Both matches will also be live on iPlayer and the BBC Sport website and app.

Wrexham will be hoping to cause another upset against Chelsea, having knocked out Premier League opponents Nottingham Forest in the third round.

There are eight fifth-round ties to be played across four days from 6-9 March.

FA Cup fifth-round TV games

Friday, 6 March

Wolverhampton Wanderers v Liverpool (20:00) - BBC One, iPlayer, TNT Sports 1 and discovery+

Saturday, 7 March

Mansfield Town v Arsenal (12:15) - TNT Sports 1 and discovery+

Wrexham v Chelsea (17:45) - BBC One, iPlayer, TNT Sports 2 and discovery+

Newcastle United v Manchester City (20:00) - TNT Sports 1 and discovery+

Sunday, 8 March

Fulham v Southampton (12:00) - TNT Sports 2 and discovery+

Port Vale or Bristol City v Sunderland (13:30) - TNT Sports 1 and discovery+

Leeds United v Norwich City (16:30) - TNT Sports 1 and discovery+

Monday, 9 March

West Ham United v Brentford (19:30) - TNT Sports 1 and discovery+

Scotland head coach Gregor Townsend has been speaking to the media after naming his team to face Wales on Saturday.

There are five changes from the team that beat England, as British and Irish Lions duo Blair Kinghorn and Duhan van der Merwe return.

Here are the main points from Townsend's news conference:

• Townsend was impressed with Kinghorn's performance for Toulouse at the weekend and insists he's "recovered quickly" while Van der Merwe has "trained really well".
• As a result, the Scotland staff expect the Edinburgh winger "to play his best rugby" and are keen to "make sure he's got opportunities to run" because that's when they feel he plays his best rugby.
• Townsend stresses there will be "a freshness around both of them" as well as "a huge determination to play well".
• On the challenge of Wales, the Scotland boss expects their opponents "will be highly motivated" and for them to play with "a lot of passion".
• Townsend knows it will be a noisy atmosphere at the Principality Stadium and is preparing for the challenge of Wales playing their best rugby.
• He's hoping his side can "deal with Wales' set piece threats" and wants his bench players to make an impact after again opting for a five-three split.
• After a week training in Spain, Townsend is urging his side to "play with a lot of energy", while saying Vitamin D is "good for the soul".
• After the victory over England, Townsend says they have to back it up and believes his players are "really keen to go again".
• On the suggestion Scotland will be heading to Wales as favourites, Townsend says: "I'm sure last week a lot of people thought England were clear favourites" and says predictions are irrelevant - "it's what you do in those 80 minutes."
• On coming up against former Scotland defence coach Steve Tandy, Townsend says "we think very fondly of Steve, he's been a big influence on our players" and expects to catch up over a beer after the game, regardless of the result.