YOUR degree is just a piece of paper, your education is seen in your behaviour. That piece of advice is Joeli Varo’s food for thought for the younger generation. Hailing from Narayawo Village in the province of Namosi, Mr Varo’s journey from humble beginnings to becoming a respected academic and professional in land management is nothing short of inspirational. Growing up in Nakavu Village, Mr Varo was raised in a family of hardworking individuals. His mother was a dedicated teacher and his father was a truck driver with the then Public Works Department. They instilled in him the values of discipline and perseverance. The third of five siblings, he experienced the balance of both the challenges and privileges that come with being part of a large family. “We usually did farming back then,” Mr Varo said. “That’s where I developed my interest in land management.” Mr Varo attended Nakavu Village School from Class 1 to 8 then moved to Vashist Muni College in Navua where he completed his Form 3 and 4. “Back then, playing rugby was something that I wanted to see myself in 10 years. “When I was in Form 3, I wanted to go to a school where rugby was fully developed and the pathway for that had already been established. “So, I attended Suva Grammar School to complete Form 5 and 6.” However, as things would turn out, fate had other plans for the 34-year-old. While at SGS in Form 5 and 6, one of his teachers, a history instructor, took him under her wing. Her guidance helped Mr Varo realise that his future lay in education, not sports. He furthered his education at the University of the South Pacific. “The transition from secondary to tertiary was a bit challenging for me because my parents had retired. I had to be resilient. So, I had to go the extra mile in order to achieve access to education, like moving from Navua to Suva.” Part of the process involved going to the market to sell cassava for bus fares. “So, I had to really plan and manage my time. I had to ensure I kept up with the challenging environments that I’d gone through.” At USP, Mr Varo pursued a double major in land management and geography, with a minor in Geospatial Information Science (GIS). The hard work paid off when he completed his diploma in Land Management and Geography within two years, followed by a bachelor’s degree. After graduation, Mr Varo took on an internship at the Ministry of Lands. After three months , he received an email from his professor about a land scholarship opportunity to study in Trinidad. He applied and was accepted. This experience broadened his horizons and gave him a deeper understanding of land management on an international scale. Upon returning to Fiji, Mr Varo worked as a lands officer at the Ministry of Lands and Resources. He then moved on to the i-Taukei Land Trust Board as an estates officer. His career took another turn when he moved to Papua New Guinea’s University of Technology to pursue a doctorate in algematics. His thirst for knowledge led him back to Fiji, where he took up a position as a lecturer at the Fiji National University, teaching urban and regional planning as well as civil engineering. “I was at FNU for three years and until I moved to USP as a lecturer. It’s been a year now. “That’s where I am today. I want to be a professor, that is my long term goal, but I have another 10 years at least to work out my professorship.” As head of discipline for land management and development at USP, Mr Varo is focused on building the next generation of experts in the field. His advice to the younger generation? Respect is the key – it opens the doors of success. For Mr Varo, it’s not about what you acquire, but how you treat others that will ultimately open hearts and lead to success.Houston Astros welcome 1B Christian Walker to team; say negotiations with Bregman stalledIndiana’s next governor has added a layer of management with his incoming cabinet, with just two of the eight members serving as agency heads in addition to their secretarial duties. Other positions in the cabinet include the adjutant general of the Indiana National Guard, the superintendent of the Indiana State Police and the lieutenant governor. All eight will oversee several agencies and report directly to Gov.-elect Mike Braun. In contrast, Gov. Eric Holcomb had two dozen members in his cabinet, including direct reports from agency heads. “So much of the inefficiency in government is when it sprawls and you don’t have any real good management structure to it,” Braun said at an Indianapolis steakhouse on Friday. He likened it to adopting a new technology with a steep up-front cost. “Sometimes you might be spending a little more on the structure of something — and I don’t view it as this being the case — because I can see how savings are going to immediately flow from it,” Braun said. “... The goal is going to be, as I’ve said many times, to show how you can do more with less. Government always wants to get more done; they want more to do it. “That’s not the real world. It doesn’t work that way and that’s not called productivity,” Braun continued. Cabinet members would be “entrepreneurial and accessible,” though Braun didn’t clarify if each would be able to hire their own staff — which could add more government positions. He said each would have “a lot of latitude.” At the event, Braun assembled nearly every cabinet member — Jennifer-Ruth Green, the incoming public safety secretary, was still on a military assignment — and called the government positions “the most exciting team we’ve had in state government for a long, long time.” “We’ve reorganized the executive side to make it streamlined so it’s going to emphasize transparency, results (and) accountability,” Braun told reporters. He recapped his one term in Congress, which culminated in a farewell speech last week, continuing his criticism of the federal government. “Here you’re going to see, I think, what government’s supposed to be about,” he said. He also repeated his company’s insurance “fix” to cap premiums in a high-deductible plan for his employees. Health care, he said, would be one of the hardest challenges to address, acknowledging a tight budget in the upcoming session. He also vowed to collaborate with the state legislature “in a way that’s probably never been done before” and continue to visit all 92 counties regularly. Braun’s incoming cabinet includes: This and other Indiana Capital Chronicle articles are available at indianacapitalchronicle.com
Alameda, CA (Prism) The push for clemency is a way to hold the U.S. accountable for military intervention in Southeast Asia as well as the criminalization of resettled refugees, advocates say Advocates from nine different organizations across the U.S. launched a joint campaign this week demanding President Joe Biden pardon Vietnamese, Cambodian, and Laotian refugees from the Vietnam War at risk of being immediately deported by the incoming Trump administration. The bid seeks to benefit some 15,000 refugees with a final order of removal from the U.S. due to decades-old criminal convictions. These refugees -- who fled from violence, genocide, mass carpet bombings, and persecution as a consequence of the U.S. military intervention in Southeast Asia in the 1960s and 1970s -- were resettled into heavily disinvested communities with limited access to resources and support. That led many to criminal convictions and incarceration. The push for clemency is a way to hold the U.S. political establishment, and particularly Biden, accountable not only for the U.S. military intervention but also for the following criminalization of resettled Southeast Asian refugees, said Van Sam, community defense program manager at VietLead, a nonprofit serving the Southeast Asian communities in Philadelphia and South Jersey. As a senator, Biden voted in favor of the Indochina Migration and Refugee Assistance Act of 1975, which allowed the largest-ever refugee resettlement in U.S. history. He also sponsored the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, which preceded the era of mass incarceration and criminalization of racialized individuals in the U.S. "So we are asking Biden: Can you take responsibility for the fact that our people are now being separated from our families once again?" Sam said. The Southeast Asian Refugee Relief and Responsibility (SEARR) Campaign demands Biden grant clemency to Southeast Asians with federal-level convictions. That would vacate their final orders of removal, said Socheatta Meng, the executive director at Mekong NYC, a social justice organization advocating for the Southeast Asian communities in New York. About 1.19 million noncitizens have "final orders of removal," which are decisions issued by an immigration judge that the individual did not or could not appeal. Still, many noncitizens with a final order of removal can remain in the country if they are provided "deferred action," a form of executive clemency that depends on the discretion of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Many Southeast Asian refugees are now U.S. citizens, as they can obtain permanent residency (a green card) and then apply for citizenship after five years. However, not every refugee knew or had the resources or legal help to apply for residency and later for citizenship, said Kevin Lam, the co-executive director at the Asian American Resource Workshop. "And lots of folks just never naturalized or got their citizenship because of language barriers and lack of access to resources," he said. So, despite years of living in the U.S. as a refugee or a permanent resident, any noncitizen can still be deported. That is the reason why "it's really urgent that President Biden take action," Meng said, "as a cycle of violence, displacement, and family separation threatens to be very real for our community." Democratic Congresswomen Judy Chu, Pramila Jayapal, Zoe Lofgren, and Ayanna Pressley last year introduced a bill that would end deportations of Southeast Asian refugees and establish a pathway back to the U.S. for the more than 2,000 already deported to Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. The bill fizzled out in the Republican-dominated House of Representatives. Now, advocates argue that Biden should show the same level of compassion as he showed for his son, Hunter Biden, who faced sentencing for two criminal cases. On Dec. 1, Biden issued a "full and unconditional pardon" to clear any offense off the younger Biden. Unlike Hunter Biden, Southeast Asian refugees have already served sentences, so removing them from the only country they have known as adults to another they no longer remember would be harsh double punishment, advocates say. Take the case of Lan Le, a 53-year-old single mother who resettled in the U.S. at 8 years old and now has nine children and four grandchildren. In a hostile environment, with both her parents working, Le became like a mother to her younger siblings. "It was so, so hard for us to adjust," she told Prism. "We didn't speak the language and didn't know anything." As a teenager living in Dorchester, a heavily policed Boston community with disinvested schools and little to no mental health resources at the time, Le got entangled with the criminal justice system and was incarcerated from 1997 to 1999. As a community organizer, Le has helped other refugees across Greater Boston to access social services through the Asian American Resource Workshop (AARW). Now, facing the risk of deportation, Le is asking for a pardon that would release her from a life in limbo, constantly fearing detention. As refugees with a final order of removal, Le explained, "they only give us one-year work permits." The permits, which cost around $500, can take six months or more to be issued. So by the time it arrives, she said, refugees need to find a job where they effectively use the permit for one or two months. "Living like this is just not fair," she said. The SEARR campaign concurs with other efforts asking Biden to shield some of the most vulnerable immigrants from deportation, such as extending the Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for people from countries in crisis around the world and protecting Deferred Action Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients by expediting renewals and facilitating H-1B visas. The requests reflect the sense of urgency within immigrant communities as President-elect Trump is scheduled to take office on Jan. 20. As Trump has vowed to carry out the "largest deportation operation in American history," his appointed "border czar," Tom Homan, has stated the administration's intent to first deport people with final orders of removal. Trump did it during his first term when his administration deported some 1.5 million people. Southeast Asian nationals were heavily targeted. In the first two years of Trump's first term, the removals of Cambodians increased by 279%, while Vietnamese removals rose by 58%. The deportation of Vietnamese violated a memorandum of understanding agreed to in 2008 by President George W. Bush to exempt from deportation those who entered the country before July 1995, when the U.S. and Vietnam reestablished diplomatic relations. "We have seen cases of folks still being targeted, regardless of what the agreement has said," Lam said. Although at a slower pace, the removal of Southeast Asian refugees continued during the Biden administration, revealing the profound legacy of violence against the Southeast Asian communities, Lam said. Deportations negate the historical responsibility of the U.S. to Vietnam, where more than 3 million people, mostly civilians, were killed during the war. Laos was turned into the most heavily bombed country in history. In Cambodia, U.S. planes dropped more than 2.7 million tons of bombs, contributing to the rise of the Khmer Rouge regime, which in four years killed more than 1.7 million civilians. For many of the refugees fleeing these horrors, said Kham Moua, national deputy director at the Southeast Asia Resource Action Center, "the pardon requests are really the last avenue for relief." Ultimately, Biden would also be responsible for the Southeast Asian refugees deported by the Trump administration. As a senator, Biden supported the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRIRA) of 1996, which radically expanded the crimes that made an immigrant eligible for deportation, including a host of nonviolent crimes, such as possession of any amount of an illicit drug or acts of "moral turpitude" such as theft, fraud, and dishonesty. Today, even a legal resident (green card holder) could be deported based on a decades-old conviction. Consider the case of Pheng Seng, whose family escaped the Khmer Rouge genocide in Cambodia and resettled in the U.S. when he was four months old. "The government just dropped us off into a community with overcrowded schools, hatred, and racism, where I was constantly bullied," Seng said in an interview with Prism. At 22 years old, with mental health problems and a substance use disorder, Seng got entangled in the criminal justice system. "I fell into the school-to-prison-to-deportation pipeline," he said. Now, 44-year-old Seng is an entrepreneur who launched a printing business with partners in Philadelphia, where he has lived for more than 30 years. He is asking for "a second chance" for him and for thousands of Southeast Asian refugees like him. "I'm trying to help a whole bunch of folks who are scared and traumatized," Seng said. "That's why I'm speaking up." This story is provided as a service of the Institute for Nonprofit News’ On the Ground news wire. The Institute for Nonprofit News (INN) is a network of more than 475 independent, nonprofit newsrooms serving communities throughout the US, Canada, and globally. On the Ground is a service of INN, which aggregates the best of its members’ elections and political content, and provides it free for republication. Read more about INN here: https://inn.org/ . Please coordinate with lara@prismreports.org should you want to publish photos for this piece. This content cannot be modified, apart from rewriting the headline. To view the original version, visit: http://prismreports.org/2024/12/12/advocates-ask-biden-to-pardon-refugees-from-the-vietnam-war/
De'Vondre Campbell won't be part of the 49ers after his refusal to enter a game, Kyle Shanahan saysA $750 million educational bond to fund new facilities at Mt. San Antonio College just garnered enough votes to exceed the threshold for passage, the community college announced in a statement Friday, Nov. 22. LIVE ELECTION RESULTS: See a chart of the latest vote counts Measure V needed 55% of the vote to pass and as of the Nov. 21 update, yes on Measure V had received 55.6% or 140,409 votes, according to the L.A. County Registrar of Voters. “This success is a direct result of voters who understand the vital role Mt. SAC plays in our region,” Mt. SAC Community College District Board President Manuel Baca said in a statement. “We are deeply grateful for their continued support.” The funds from the bond will enable Mt. SAC to complete construction of its Technology and Health building, which will house 10 departments and 26 programs. According to the school, once complete it will be the largest building on any college campus in California. Measure V will also support the construction of facilities for the School of Continuing Education, a new library and address infrastructure needs. The measure will cost property owners within the school’s district $15 per $100,000 of assessed property value. A Citizens’ Oversight Committee will be created to oversee the use of funds, according to Mt. Sac.
CHICAGO — With a wave of her bangled brown fingertips to the melody of flutes and chimes, artist, theologian and academic Tricia Hersey enchanted a crowd into a dreamlike state of rest at Semicolon Books on North Michigan Avenue. “The systems can’t have you,” Hersey said into the microphone, reading mantras while leading the crowd in a group daydreaming exercise on a recent Tuesday night. The South Side native tackles many of society’s ills — racism, patriarchy, aggressive capitalism and ableism — through an undervalued yet impactful action: rest. Hersey, the founder of a movement called the Nap Ministry, dubs herself the Nap Bishop and spreads her message to over half a million followers on her Instagram account, @thenapministry . Her first book, “Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto,” became a New York Times bestseller in 2022, but Hersey has been talking about rest online and through her art for nearly a decade. Hersey, who has degrees in public health and divinity, originated the “rest as resistance” and “rest as reparations” frameworks after experimenting with rest as an exhausted graduate student in seminary. Once she started napping, she felt happier and her grades improved. But she also felt more connected to her ancestors; her work was informed by the cultural trauma of slavery that she was studying as an archivist. Hersey described the transformation as “life-changing.” The Nap Ministry began as performance art in 2017, with a small installation where 40 people joined Hersey in a collective nap. Since then, her message has morphed into multiple mediums and forms. Hersey, who now lives in Atlanta, has hosted over 100 collective naps, given lectures and facilitated meditations across the country. She’s even led a rest ritual in the bedroom of Jane Addams , and encourages her followers to dial in at her “Rest Hotline.” At Semicolon, some of those followers and newcomers came out to see Hersey in discussion with journalist Natalie Moore on Hersey’s latest book, “We Will Rest! The Art of Escape,” released this month, and to learn what it means to take a moment to rest in community. Moore recalled a time when she was trying to get ahead of chores on a weeknight. “I was like, ‘If I do this, then I’ll have less to do tomorrow.’ But then I was really tired,” Moore said. “I thought, ‘What would my Nap Bishop say? She would say go lay down.’ Tricia is in my head a lot.” At the event, Al Kelly, 33, of Rogers Park, said some of those seated in the crowd of mostly Black women woke up in tears — possibly because, for the first time, someone permitted them to rest. “It was so emotional and allowed me to think creatively about things that I want to work on and achieve,” Kelly said. Shortly after the program, Juliette Viassy, 33, a program manager who lives in the South Loop and is new to Hersey’s work, said this was her first time meditating after never being able to do it on her own. Therapist Lyndsei Howze, 33, of Printers Row, who was also seated at the book talk, said she recommends Hersey’s work “to everybody who will listen” — from her clients to her own friends. “A lot of mental health conditions come from lack of rest,” she said. “They come from exhaustion.” Before discovering Hersey’s work this spring, Howze said she and her friends sporadically napped together in one friend’s apartment after an exhausting workweek. “It felt so good just to rest in community,” she said. On Hersey’s book tour, she is leading exercises like this across the country. “I think we need to collectively do this,” Hersey explained. “We need to learn again how to daydream because we’ve been told not to do it. I don’t think most people even have a daydreaming practice.” Daydreaming, Hersey said, allows people to imagine a new world. Hersey tells her followers that yes, you can rest, even when your agenda is packed, even between caregiving, commuting, jobs, bills, emails and other daily demands. And you don’t have to do it alone. There is a community of escape artists, she said of the people who opt out of grind and hustle culture, waiting to embrace you. The book is part pocket prayer book, part instruction manual, with art and handmade typography by San Francisco-based artist George McCalman inspired by 19th-century abolitionist pamphlets, urging readers to reclaim their divine right to rest. Hersey directs her readers like an operative with instructions for a classified mission. “Let grind culture know you are not playing around,” she wrote in her book. “This is not a game or time to shrink. Your thriving depends on the art of escape.” The reluctance to rest can be rooted in capitalist culture presenting rest as a reward for productivity instead of a physical and mental necessity. Hersey deconstructs this idea of grind culture, which she says is rooted in the combined effects of white supremacy, patriarchy and capitalism that “look at the body as not human.” American culture encourages grind culture, Hersey said, but slowing down and building a ritual of rest can offset its toxicity. The author eschews the ballooning billion-dollar self-care industry that encourages people to “save enough money and time off from work to fly away to an expensive retreat,” she wrote. Instead, she says rest can happen anywhere you have a place to be comfortable: in nature, on a yoga mat, in the car between shifts, on a cozy couch after work. Resting isn’t just napping either. She praises long showers, sipping warm tea, playing music, praying or numerous other relaxing activities that slow down the body. “We’re in a crisis mode of deep sleep deprivation, deep lack of self-worth, (and) mental health,” said Hersey. According to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data from 2022 , in Illinois about 37% of adults aren’t getting the rest they need at night. If ignored, the effects of sleep deprivation can have bigger implications later, Hersey said. In October, she lectured at a sleep conference at Gustavus Adolphus College in Minnesota, where her humanities work was featured alongside research from the world’s top neuroscientists. Jennifer Mundt, a Northwestern clinician and professor of sleep medicine, psychiatry and behavioral sciences, praises Hersey for bringing the issue of sleep and rest to the public. In a Tribune op-ed last year, Mundt argued that our culture focuses too heavily on sleep as something that must be earned rather than a vital aspect of health and that linking sleep to productivity is harmful and stigmatizing. “Linking sleep and productivity is harmful because it overshadows the bevy of other reasons to prioritize sleep as an essential component of health,” Mundt wrote. “It also stigmatizes groups that are affected by sleep disparities and certain chronic sleep disorders.” In a 30-year longitudinal study released in the spring by the New York University School of Social Work, people who worked long hours and late shifts reported the lowest sleep quality and lowest physical and mental functions, and the highest likelihood of reporting poor health and depression at age 50. The study also showed that Black men and women with limited education “were more likely than others to shoulder the harmful links between nonstandard work schedules and sleep and health, worsening their probability of maintaining and nurturing their health as they approach middle adulthood.” The CDC links sleeping fewer than seven hours a day to an increased risk of obesity, diabetes, hypertension, heart disease and more. Although the Nap Ministry movement is new for her followers, Hersey’s written about her family’s practice of prioritizing rest, which informs her work. Her dad was a community organizer, a yardmaster for the Union Pacific Railroad Co. and an assistant pastor. Before long hours of work, he would dedicate hours each day to self-care. Hersey also grew up observing her grandma meditate for 30 minutes daily. Through rest, Hersey said she honors her ancestors who were enslaved and confronts generational trauma. When “Rest Is Resistance” was released in 2022, Americans were navigating a pandemic and conversations on glaring racial disparities. “We Will Rest!” comes on the heels of a historic presidential election where Black women fundraised for Vice President Kamala Harris and registered voters in a dizzying three-month campaign. Following Harris’ defeat, many of those women are finding self-care and preservation even more important. “There are a lot of Black women announcing how exhausted they are,” Moore said. “This could be their entry point to get to know (Hersey’s) work, which is bigger than whatever political wind is blowing right now.” Hersey said Chicagoans can meet kindred spirits in her environment of rest. Haji Healing Salon, a wellness center, and the social justice-focused Free Street Theater are sites where Hersey honed her craft and found community. In the fall, the theater put on “Rest/Reposo,” a performance featuring a community naptime outdoors in McKinley Park and in its Back of the Yards space. Haji is also an apothecary and hosts community healing activities, sound meditations and yoga classes. “It is in Bronzeville; it’s a beautiful space owned by my friend Aya,” Hersey said, explaining how her community has helped her build the Nap Ministry. “When I first started the Nap Ministry, before I was even understanding what it was, she was like, come do your work here.” “We Will Rest!” is a collection of poems, drawings and short passages. In contrast to her first book, Hersey said she leaned more into her artistic background; the art process alone took 18 months to complete. After a tough year for many, she considers it medicine for a “sick and exhausted” world. “It’s its own sacred document,” Hersey said. “It’s something that, if you have it in your library and you have it with you, you may feel more human.” lazu@chicagotribune.com49ers QB Brock Purdy, DE Nick Bosa out, Brandon Allen to start at Green BayAuthoritative Release of the 2024 Top 10 Rankings in the Construction Machinery Industry: Unveiling the Most Influential Products and Companies
Paris Saint-Germain are at increasing risk of missing out on the Champions League knockout stages after losing with ten men away to Bayern Munich . It was a night for forget for Ousmane Dembele who was sent off for two yellow cards and also extended his record of most shots in the Champions League this season without scoring. Advertisement Russia goalkeeper Matvey Safonov was caught out by the corner from which Kim Min-jae scored the opening goal and while he pulled off a great save from Jamal Musiala in the second-half to keep the score at 1-0, PSG never found a way to get level. The result leaves PSG in 26th spot and Bayern 11th after five rounds, with the top eight qualifying automatically, the next 16 entering a play-off and the final eight eliminated. Here The Athletic ’s Oliver Kay, Sebastian Stafford Bloor and Anantaajith Raghuraman break down the key talking points. Are PSG really going to be eliminated? Could Paris Saint-Germain miss out on the Champions League knockout stage altogether? The new format offers margin for error, but the French champions are in big trouble, having lost three and won just one of their first five games in the league phase. PSG had only a 3 per cent chance of finishing in the top eight before the game and defeat in Munich left them 26th in the 36-team standings, just ahead of Shakhtar Donetsk, Sparta Prague and Girona , and desperately needing something from their final three games: away to RB Salzburg on December 10 and then they play Manchester City (home) and Stuttgart (away) in December in January. In a format where eight teams progress automatically to the knock-out stage and another 16 progress to a play-off round, it seemed almost inconceivable that one of Europe’s big guns could finish in the bottom 12, but PSG are in genuine danger. There were elements of the second-half performance that might have encouraged coach Luis Enrique, but their lack of goals in this competition (three in five games) is a real concern. Oliver Kay Is Kimmich Bayern’s captain in waiting? This was a timely performance from Joshua Kimmich , who was at the root of almost everything Bayern did well. Timely, because Kimmich’s contract is due to expire in the summer and he and the club are still trying to reach an agreement over an extension. This week, Max Eberl, the club’s board member for sport, described the situation: “I think we are very, very open with him,” Eberl told Sport Bild. Advertisement “We’ve told him that we want to extend his contract. We are telling him that he should become captain when Manuel Neuer is no longer on the pitch. And we tell him that he should be the face of our club. We’ve made that clear to him and we stand behind it.” No wonder, because Kimmich was everything Bayern needed him to be this evening. One of the criticisms of him is that he does not do enough with the ball when he plays in midfield. That he is a neat passer, but not a true orchestrator — and there is merit to that argument sometimes. But Kimmich was particularly dynamic with the ball against PSG, starting moves but thereafter providing the stability in his own half to allow them to develop safely. His role under Kompany has certainly broadened. Playing back in midfield naturally extends his influence, but he seems so often to be both the start point for moves and also the out-ball for teammates who are caught deep in their own half and put under pressure. A captain’s performance, even if he’s not wearing the armband yet. Sebastian Stafford-Bloor Was Dembele unlucky or bad or both? Ousmane Dembele’s individual performance was emblematic of a team who have potential but aren’t doing things right. With Alphonso Davies pushing forward and even inverting at times for Bayern, Dembele received multiple opportunities to bear down on goal down PSG’s right. His first involvement came eight minutes in after a Bayern error seemed to send him through, but he dawdled on the ball and Leon Goretzka slid in to block his effort. Dembele got his and PSG’s first shot on target in the 20th minute after another Bayern giveaway, but his effort from the edge of the box was comfortably pouched by Manuel Neuer. Another break followed 12 minutes later, with Fabian Ruiz ’s reverse pass finding Dembele, who wrestled with Kim before firing a left-footed shot from an acute angle that Neuer palmed away. Advertisement Frustrating, but PSG simply needed to hang on until the break. Then came the sequence that defined the game. As both teams set up for a Bayern corner, Dembele repeatedly debated with referee Istvan Kovacs on the legitimacy of the set-piece being awarded, getting himself booked. The initial corner was cleared out for another, which PSG goalkeeper Matvei Safonov flapped at to allow Kim to score in the 38th minute. PSG looked refreshed after the break, with their pressing limiting Bayern to unsuccessful counterattacks. Dembele was involved in their bid for an equalizer, sending a couple of teasing crosses into the box as well. However, that positive start was disrupted by Dembele receiving a second yellow card in the 56th minute after sliding into win the ball off Davies. Replays showed that the Frenchman did get his boot on the ball, but with VAR unable to review second yellow cards, Dembele was dismissed, leaving PSG to play over half an hour with 10 men with their Champions League campaign on the line. The dismissal will be disappointing, but this was another missed opportunity for Dembele, who holds the envious record of recording the most shots without a goal in this season’s Champions League (21). Anantaajith Raghuraman Why doesn’t Luis Enrique pick a centre-forward? “We need 20 clear chances to score,” Enrique lamented after his team’s 2-1 defeat by Atletico Madrid three weeks ago, which makes it all the stranger that he continues to operate without a specialist centre-forward. Goncalo Ramos is not yet match-fit after an ankle injury, but the continued exclusion of Randal Kolo Muani is mystifying, with Enrique preferring to field Ousmane Dembele and Bradley Barcola as wide forwards and leave the central area vacant for long periods of the first half. It wasn’t a horses-for-courses selection. Kolo Muani has started more games for France this season (five) than for his club (two). He has not started a game for PSG since Enrique substituted him at half-time during a a 1-1 draw with Nice. Advertisement After Dembele was sent off for a second bookable offence, it was Ramos who was summoned from the bench to replace Barcola with 19 minutes remaining. That didn’t work either. There is logic in going without a specialist centre-forward, but it requires an element of control in midfield or, failing that, a direct, incisive edge in attack. On this occasion, PSG had none of the above. Oliver Kay What was the Al-Khelaifi banner displayed by Bayern fans? Bayern’s ultras came prepared for the occasion — the specific game and the broader conflict. In the first half, they unveiled a banner aimed directly at Nasser Al-Khelaifi, the PSG president. “Football C’est moi? F*** off plutocratic Al-Khelaifi!” On a separate banner, hoisted a few rows behind: “Minister, club owner, TV rights holder, UEFA ExCo member and ECA chairman all in one!” Within that franglaise, the inference by the ultras is that Al-Khelaifi holds too much power in the game. Or that he holds too much authority within organisations that, in a few cases, theoretically overlap with one another. It’s a hard charge to refute. Al-Khelaifi is the president of the BeIN media group, a Champions League broadcaster. He is also, as the banner makes references to, a force within both UEFA’s executive committee and the European Club Association — European football’s policy maker and its organisation of member clubs respectively. Paris Saint-Germain have not responded to a request for comment on the banners from The Athletic . And, as is UEFA protocol, the governing body will wait for reports from the match before considering any action. Sebastian Stafford-Bloor What did Luis Enrique say? We will bring you this after he has spoken at the post-match press conference. What did Vincent Kompany say? We will bring you this after he has spoken at the post-match press conference. What next for PSG? Saturday, November 30: Nantes (H), Ligue 1, 8pm UK, 3pm ET What next for Bayern? Saturday, November 30: Borussia Dortmund (A), Bundesliga , 5.30pm UK, 12.30pm ET Recommended reading (Top photo: Alexander Hassenstein/Getty Images)
Sam Darnold sensed the backside pressure as soon as he dropped back with Minnesota trailing by four points late in the fourth quarter in Seattle, so he moved into a safe space in the pocket and did precisely what the Vikings would prefer him to do with the game on the line. He threw the ball down the field to Justin Jefferson. The perfectly placed throw near the sideline beat double coverage for a 39-yard touchdown that put the Vikings back in front with 3:51 remaining in a 27-24 victory over the Seahawks on Sunday. “It was a great call,” said Jefferson, who had 10 receptions for 144 yards and two scores, all season highs. “I’m not going to say too much about that play, but something went on where me and Sam were on the same page, and he found me and we went up.” The Vikings were understandably coy about the context around the go-ahead touchdown , when Darnold made a difficult on-the-run pass just over cornerback Tariq Woolen that Jefferson deftly twisted to catch next to his backside hip so he could shield the ball from late-breaking safety Julian Love. Darnold saw Love's shoulders initially shaded inside just enough to believe he couldn't retreat fast enough to prevent Jefferson from getting the ball. Jefferson also applied some improvisation to his route that Darnold clearly and properly read during the play. “I want those guys to have some freedom in those moments,” coach Kevin O'Connell said. “We do a lot of things with Justin and Sam, seeing the coverage and then with some route opportunities to get to at the line of scrimmage, and I think those guys have just gotten so comfortable with that stuff.” Darnold's long-delayed breakout performance under O'Connell has been one of the stories of the NFL this season, one that wouldn't have unfolded as neatly for the third overall pick in the 2018 draft without such synergy between him and his superstar wide receiver. If the Vikings (13-2) win their last two games, they will not only be NFC North champions for the second time in three years but also get the No. 1 seed and the lone first-round bye in the NFC for the playoffs. “Every single game we’re finding different ways to overcome adversity, overcome the different stuff defenses have thrown towards us," Jefferson said. “Sam has done a great job being a leader.” What's working The pass rush was strong, with Andrew Van Ginkel recording two sacks and pressure leading to both interceptions of Seahawks quarterback Geno Smith. The Vikings were credited with eight hits on Smith. What needs help The Vikings converted only three of 12 third downs, their second-worst rate of the season. Stock up Theo Jackson, who saw significant playing time at safety with Harrison Smith out, had the game-sealing interception with 49 seconds left. Stock down Tight end Josh Oliver has played 47% of the snaps the last two games, his two lowest usage rates of the season. He dropped the only pass he was thrown on Sunday. Injury report The defense ought to get a big boost this week with the expected return of the 13-year veteran Smith from his first absence in two years when he was sidelined at Seattle with a foot injury. Linebacker Ivan Pace, who has missed four games on injured reserve with a hamstring strain, is also on track to be back with his return to practice. Backup defensive lineman Jalen Redmond, who didn't play against the Seahawks because of a concussion, has made progress through the protocol, O'Connell said. Backup cornerback Fabian Moreau, who was inactive at Seattle with a hip injury, will continue to be evaluated throughout the week. Key number 13.6% — That's the third-down conversion allowance rate for the Vikings over the last two games, with Chicago and Seattle combining to go just 3 for 22. The Vikings rank second in the NFL in third-down defense at 33.7% for the season and also rank second on fourth down at 36.7%. Up next The Vikings host Green Bay on Sunday, with the kickoff moved to the late afternoon showcase spot on Fox. If Minnesota loses to the Packers, the Lions will clinch the NFC North and the Vikings would open the playoffs on the road as the No. 5 seed at best. Even if the Lions were to lose at San Francisco on Monday night, the Vikings would need to win at Detroit on Jan. 5 to take the division title. AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/NFLMystery drone sightings continue in New Jersey and across the US. Here's what we know
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