Fernando Llorente’s deadline day arrival at Tottenham Hotspur has shunted Vincent Janssen out of the north London outfit’s Champions League squad.
Janssen, 23, endured a difficult debut season with Spurs, scoring just twice in 33 appearances in the Premier League, Europa League and Champions League.
Now Llorente, a £12-million signing from Swansea City, will likely represent Mauricio Pochettino’s plan B up front behind crowd favourite Harry Kane.
Another notable absentee is Erik Lamela, who has been blighted with injuries over the past year. The Argentinian last appeared for Tottenham as a substitute in a 2-1 League Cup loss in Liverpool in October 2016, and recent accounts optimistically predict a September return for the midfielder.
Teams competing in the Champions League can make three changes to their squad after the group stages.
FRISCO, Texas — Dallas Cowboys running back Ezekiel Elliott is eligible to play in Sunday’s season opener against the New York Giants even though an arbitrator upheld Elliott’s six-game suspension handed down by commissioner Roger Goodell.
In a temporary restraining order hearing in U.S. District Court in Sherman, Texas, on Tuesday, NFL attorneys acknowledged that, because of the timing of Harold Henderson’s decision to uphold Elliott’s suspension for violating the personal conduct policy, Elliott will be able to play in Week 1 against the Giants.
The NFL issued a statement on Twitter explaining Elliott being cleared to play Sunday.
“In the absence of a ruling from Mr. Henderson at the outset of the hearing, the judge indicated his desire to have the appropriate time to consider all legal issues before making a ruling,” the NFL explained. “To that end, the judge asked counsel whether it was prepared to allow Mr. Elliott’s suspension, if upheld, to begin after week one allowing him time to make that ruling. In deference to the judge, NFL counsel agreed that Mr. Elliott would be permitted to play this weekend regardless of the timing of the decision. When the decision was issued, the judge advised that in light of the league’s agreement, he would allow additional filings and make his decision by Friday.”
Elliott’s availability for Week 2 at the Denver Broncos and beyond is in doubt. Judge Amos Mazzant said he will make a decision on Elliott’s temporary restraining order by Friday at 6 p.m. ET.
While the Cowboys back will be allowed to play Week 1, he may have to serve a six-game ban afterward including a Week 8 game against Washington.
If the TRO is not granted and Elliott does not take the case further in the legal system, then the first game Elliott would be eligible to play would be Nov. 5 against the Kansas City Chiefs.
Elliott’s attorneys said they intend to take the running back’s case to the federal level if necessary.
“Mr. Elliott is looking forward to having his day in federal court where the playing field will be level and the NFL will have to answer for its unfair and unjust practices,” Elliott’s attorneys said in a statement.
A spokesman for the Cowboys said the team has no comment on Tuesday’s decision.
That Elliott will be available Sunday could be viewed as a minor victory for the running back and the Cowboys. While the Cowboys express support for Elliott’s potential replacements, Darren McFadden, Alfred Morris and Rod Smith, none is as good as Elliott, who led the NFL in rushing with 1,631 yards last year.
The Cowboys were 3.5-point favorites over the Giants at the majority of Las Vegas sportsbooks, prior to Elliott’s being cleared to play in Week 1. The line ticked up to Dallas -4 after the news was announced.
Ezekiel Elliott is eligible to play in Sunday’s season opener, despite his six-game ban being upheld. Sean M. Haffey/Getty Images
Elliott took part in Tuesday’s meetings and walk-through at the Cowboys’ practice facility, The Star, in Frisco, Texas, before heading to Paul Brown District Court, roughly 50 minutes away, in time for the hearing. He is expected to be at the Cowboys’ full-pads practice on Wednesday.
On Aug. 11 the NFL announced a six-game suspension for violating the personal conduct policy, citing “persuasive” evidence Elliott committed physical abuse against Tiffany Thompson, a former girlfriend, at least three times in July 2016.
Despite Elliott’s ability to play Sunday, his attorneys issued a statement decrying Henderson’s decision.
“We are extremely disappointed with Mr. Henderson’s inability to navigate through league politics, and follow the evidence and, most importantly, his [conscience],” Elliott’s attorneys said in a statement.
The statement also contends that Elliott is the “victim of a conspiracy orchestrated by the National Football League and its officers to keep exonerating evidence from the decision-makers, including the advisors and Roger Goodell.”
Elliott had his appeal heard last week in New York with three days of testimony lasting 25 hours from Elliott and multiple experts and witnesses, although Thompson was not allowed to be called. It was revealed during the hearing that the league’s lead investigator, Kia Wright Roberts, was not at the meeting in which Goodell and the four advisors reached the conclusion Elliott needed to be suspended. Roberts was the only NFL employee to interview Thompson, doing so six times, and she recommended Elliott not be disciplined.
In the conclusion of his decision, Henderson explained that as arbitrator it was his job to evaluate the fairness of the NFL’s process in which it penalized Elliott, not whether or not the punishment was fitting.
“The review is to determine whether the player was afforded adequate notice of his alleged violation, the right to representation, opportunity to present evidence, and a decision which is fair and consistent,” Henderson wrote. “In a case involving violation of a policy, fair and consistent means whether the process and result were in compliance with the terms of that policy. This one is, in every respect.”
Philippe Coutinho’s dream move to Barcelona might not have panned out this summer, but the Brazilian maestro won’t be in a Diego Costa-esque exile for the season, as Liverpool’s No. 10 was named to Jurgen Klopp’s squad for the 2017-18 Champions League campaign.
Right full-back Nathaniel Clyne was not named among Klopp’s group stage options, however, perhaps indicating a more serious development surrounding the back problem he had been dealing with through pre-season. Clyne played just 45 minutes of pre-season football for Liverpool and has been absent since picking up an injury against Tranmere Rovers.
Fellow Englishman Adam Lallana did make the team despite battling a similar mid-to-long term injury. He’s missed the start of the 2017-18 Premier League season with a thigh injury and will likely be out for another couple of months.
Newcomer Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain made his way into the final selection with no problems, as did the rest of Liverpool’s new recruits in Andy Robertson, Dominic Solanke and star winger Mohamed Salah.
However, Danny Ings and Lazar Markovic were both left out of the team.
If Klopp wants to make any changes, he’ll need to wait until January, when clubs can register three new non-cup tied players.
When the Seattle Seahawks pulled off a surprise trade for tight end Jimmy Graham in March of 2015, general manager John Schneider said the reasoning behind the move was his belief that there are “no finish lines” to building a championship-caliber team.
At the time, the Seahawks were coming off back-to-back Super Bowl appearances and had come within a yard of repeating as champions. They could have stood pat, but Schneider believed that as good as his team already was, acquiring a weapon like Graham would make it even better, even at the cost of a first-round pick plus starting center Max Unger.
The same roster philosophy led the Seahawks to make their latest blockbuster move, a trade for defensive tackle Sheldon Richardson in exchange for a package that includes Seattle’s second-round pick in 2018.
That’s not to say Richardson is entirely a luxury addition. The Seahawks could use a difference-maker at defensive tackle with top pick Malik McDowell potentially unavailable for his entire rookie season, if not longer, following an ATV accident. But Seattle’s defense already featured seven Pro Bowlers, including two on their defensive line in addition to Frank Clark, who’s coming off a 10-sack season. This was not a move they had to make, but Schneider made it anyway.
The same was true with Percy Harvin in 2013, when Seattle already had Doug Baldwin, Golden Tate and Sidney Rice in its receiver corps plus a Pro Bowl kick returner in Leon Washington. Seattle gave up its first-round pick and signed Harvin to what at the time was the richest contract in franchise history. He couldn’t fit into the Seahawks’ offense nor their locker room and was dumped 19 months later.
When the Seahawks traded for Graham the following offseason, it showed that the Harvin flop didn’t leave Schneider at all gun-shy when it comes to making bold moves.
Schneider and the Seahawks’ front office take great pride in how aggressively they pursue potential personnel acquisitions, even if they never materialize.
“That’s kind of how we got guys like Ahtyba Rubin here, Cliff Avril, Michael Bennett,” Schneider told 710 ESPN Seattle in 2016. “That’s how we acquired those guys a little bit later on, just by being aggressive in terms of staying in deals. Now, we walk away from, shoot, I would say like 70 percent of them, maybe 80 percent.”
The Richardson trade was one of those moves they stuck with until the end.
The Seahawks’ defense would have still been among the NFL’s best without him. But as Schneider has shown, he doesn’t believe in leaving well enough alone.
