Beatriz Haddad Maia claimed back-to-back WTA Tour titles after Zhang Shuai retired hurt in the Birmingham Classic final on Sunday.

Haddad Maia enjoyed a fine day, beating second seed and two-time major champion Simona Halep 6-3 2-6 6-4 in a rearranged semi-final (postponed from Saturday due to rain).

Zhang followed that up by battling past Halep's Romanian compatriot Sorana Cirstea 4-6 6-1 7-6 (7-5), setting up a second career match with Haddad Maia.

The Brazilian struggled in the opening stages, with Zhang racing into the lead before squandering an opportunity to go 3-0 up.

Haddad Maia soon recovered to level at 3-3 before Zhang was forced to retire with an apparent neck injury, with the Chinese player 5-4 down in the first set.

That handed the world number 32 her second straight title after success at the Nottingham Open last week, with Ons Jabeur and Iga Swiatek the only others to record multiple WTA Tour triumphs this year.

Haddad Maia also became the first Brazilian lift the trophy in the tournament's 40-year history, surpassing the previous best result by a player from Brazil when Gisele Miro made the second round in 1989.

Fabio Quartararo declared he is "riding better than ever" after a tyre choice gamble paid off at the German Grand Prix on Sunday.

Track temperatures exceeded 50 degrees at the Sachsenring, where Francesco Bagnaia started on pole, with reigning MotoGP world champion Quartararo one of just two riders to opt for the medium rear tyre.

The Frenchman's decision was rewarded as he overtook Bagnaia on Turn 1, with Quartararo leading for all 30 laps and winning the race by almost five seconds to extend his lead in the championship to 34 points.

Bagnaia crashed out on lap four, losing the rear end of his GP22 for his fourth abandonment of the season, and last year's runner-up now sits 91 points behind Quartararo.

While Bagnaia was left to rue his mistake, Quartararo admitted he was nervous about his tyre decision.

"I feel tired. I was sick all weekend and during the race I was coughing a bit," Quartararo told reporters.

"I have no words. We took a choice on the rear tyre, the medium, that was really risky and in the race we were lucky because it dropped much more than expected.

"But I'm super happy. A really, really special victory, it was a little bit like Barcelona.

"On Friday I was not so great, yesterday was much better and this morning, with the medium tyre I felt it was the correct choice.

"In the race the conditions were totally different and from the beginning I was scared because I was using the tyre a little bit more than expected to ride fast.

"The last five, six laps were a total disaster from the rear. But the feeling on the front was super good."

Yamaha's Quartararo picked up his third win of 2022, adding to victories at the Portuguese Grand Prix and Catalan Grand Prix, and the 23-year-old feels he is in the form of his life.

"Of course, I'm feeling better than ever every time I race," the defending world champion added.

"I'm learning and I feel like every time I find something. The focus here was to make 30 laps in front and being consistent was something difficult.

"Barcelona helped me a lot because I had a similar situation, but of course I'm feeling confident and I feel I'm riding better than ever."

Ons Jabeur won the Berlin Open to seal her third career title following Belinda Bencic's retirement in the second set.

The win sees Jabeur rise to a career-high of number three in the world as the Tunisian – who was winning  6-3 2-1 when Bencic succumbed to an ankle injury – capitalised on her top seed position for the tournament.

With Jabeur on serve to clinch the first set, Bencic rolled her ankle and required treatment in a three-minute medical timeout – with Jabeur swiftly nosing herself ahead on the restart with an ace.

Olympic gold medallist Bencic pushed to continue but came to the net to retire when trailing 2-1 in the second set, taking Jabeur's tally of wins in 2022 to 30, a total that is only bettered by world number one Iga Swiatek.

Victory marked Jabeur's second title of 2022, with the 27-year-old having previously won the Madrid Open.

Jabeur had plenty of support from the crowd throughout the tournament, and said: "I cannot forget how amazing the crowd is, Tunisians are amazing, thank you for coming. I hope I can come back next year, it's been great to come back to Berlin."

Bencic paid tribute to her opponent following the game, saying: "You deserve this title, I really don't want to take this moment away from you because I think you played incredible tennis.

"This is the best tennis of your life, so I hope you continue. You gave me a really hard time, maybe it was one serve too much for me. This is your moment so I want you to enjoy it and focus on your title."

Jabeur continues her Wimbledon preparations at Eastbourne next week, competing in both the singles and doubles event – she will play alongside Serena Williams – while Bencic will be hoping to recover in time to feature in the season's third grand slam.

Daniil Medvedev lost a second final in two weeks as he fell to a straight-sets defeat to Hubert Hurkacz at the Halle Open on Sunday.

The world number one struggled to get going and repeatedly took his anger out on coach Gilles Cervara, who stormed out of his seat early in the second set.

Top seed Medvedev had already lost the first set 6-1 by that point and only fared slightly better in the second, which ended 6-4 in Hurkacz's favour.

Hurkacz has now won five ATP Tour titles, with this his first on grass, while Medvedev remains stuck on 13 having lost all three finals he has competed in this season.

The most recent of those losses came at the hands of world number 106 Tim van Rijthoven last week, but Medvedev had not dropped a set en route to Sunday's clash in Halle.

Indeed, Medvedev was 14-2 on grass since a first-round exit at Halle last year, yet Hurkacz broke the Russian's first two service games and eased into a 5-0 lead.

Having successfully served out the opener, Hurkacz – who beat the same opponent in this year's Miami Masters – again broke Medvedev in the first game of the second set.

Medvedev took aim at his coach at that point, with Cervara then spotted leaving the stands and failing to return for the remaining nine games, which went the way of the serve.

After easily navigating his way past Medvedev in a match lasting just over an hour, fifth seed Hurkacz becomes the seventh male player in the Open Era to win his first five career finals.

Matteo Berrettini ramped up his Wimbledon preparations by securing his seventh ATP Tour title and fourth on grass as he won again at the Queen's Club Championships.

The Italian returned from injury in emphatic fashion at the Stuttgart Open, defeating Andy Murray in the final, before heading to Queen's ahead of the start of the third major of the year.

Berrettini had little trouble negotiating his way through to Sunday's showpiece, dropping just one set throughout the tournament to set up a meeting with Filip Krajinovic.

And despite having to battle in the first set, Berrettini triumphed 7-5 6-4 to retain the title he won last year.

The 26-year-old had an early break cancelled out by Krajinovic but got a crucial second break to take the first set.

A tentative opening followed in the second set, yet Berrettini's patience paid off when he broke in the fifth game and he was able to serve out the victory.

That signified Berrettini's ninth straight win, all on grass, after a three-month injury lay-off.

Berrettini is the first player in the Open Era to win titles in each of his first two appearances at Queen's, and is the eighth repeat champion at the tournament – the other seven players to have achieved that feat are all former world number ones.

"I arrived to Stuttgart, and I wasn't feeling great, I wasn't hitting the ball the way I want it that way I used to do, and I was like 'guys I think it's going be tough' and then it went pretty well," he said after the win," Berrettini said.

"I mean I guess I'm Italian, I'm always complaining!"

Berrettini has also advanced to the final in all four of his past grass-court events, with his only defeat coming against Novak Djokovic at Wimbledon last year.

The world number 10 will now look to go one better this time around at The All England Club.

Zizou Bergs earned a wildcard for Wimbledon and a grand slam main draw debut by beating Jack Sock in the Ilkley Trophy final on Sunday.

Named after Zinedine Zidane – the France, Juventus and Real Madrid football great who goes by the nickname 'Zizou' – Belgian Bergs has established his sporting career in tennis.

Bergs, 23, is ranked a lowly 207th by the ATP and had to come through qualifying to play in the Ilkley event, a Challenger Tour tournament in Yorkshire.

Former world number eight Sock stood in his way in the final, but Bergs secured a 7-6 (9-7) 2-6 7-6 (8-6) victory over the American.

His father Koen Bergs wrote on Twitter: "Yesssssss. The tournament director announced during the ceremony the official reward of the WC for @Wimbledon main draw. History is made."

His triumphant son added on Instagram: "WIMBLEDON MAIN DRAW WILDCARD!! Whuuuutttt"

Bergs completes the list of men's singles wildcards, featuring alongside five British players plus Dutchman Tim van Rijthoven and Swiss three-time grand slam winner Stan Wawrinka.

Wimbledon begins on June 27 at the All England Club in south-west London.

Peter Sagan has seen his Tour de France preparations take a hit after testing positive for COVID-19 less than two weeks before the start of the race.

Seven-time Tour de France green jersey winner Sagan was forced to abandon the Tour de Suisse on Saturday due to a third positive coronavirus test in 18 months.

The Slovakian, who holds the record for the most points classification victories in the Tour de France (seven), took to Twitter to announce he had contracted the virus on Sunday.

"Yesterday, Saturday, after the finish of stage seven of the Tour de Suisse, I was given a COVID-19 test by the Team TotalEnergies doctor," he wrote.

"Unfortunately, it came out positive. I have no symptoms, and I feel well but I have to abandon the race. I thank you for your support and I will keep you posted."

Sagan becomes the latest name in a growing list of riders to contract the virus, with INEOS Grenadiers' Tom Pidcock and Bora-Hansgrohe's Aleksandr Vlasov also testing positive for COVID-19.

Vlasov was leading the Tour de Suisse at the time of his withdrawal, while Mikkel Bjerg – team-mate of two-time Tour de France winner Tadej Pogacar – withdrew from the Tour of Slovenia due to coronavirus.

Sagan will hope to recover in time for the start of the Tour de France in Copenhagen on July 1, having ended a 13-month winless drought with his sprint victory at stage three in Grenchen earlier this week.

Fabio Quartararo extended his MotoGP championship lead with victory at the German Grand Prix, where Francesco Bagnaia suffered yet more disappointment by crashing out.

Bagnaia had won twice in his past four races and set a scorching pace to claim pole at Sachsenring, but he was overtaken by Quartararo on Turn 1 and lasted three more laps.

In an attempt to reclaim first place from reigning world champion Quartararo, Bagnaia lost the rear end of his GP22 when coming through Turn 1 on lap four and left the track.

Bagnaia was unhurt physically, but his furious reaction said it all, with last year's runner-up now 91 points behind Quartararo and surely out of title contention for another year.

It was the fourth abandonment of the season for the Ducati rider, which is two more failures than he suffered throughout last year's 18-race campaign.

Adding to his victory at the Catalan Grand Prix last time out, Quartararo had no trouble in retaining his lead in Germany to move 34 points in front of Aleix Espargaro in the championship.

Monster Energy Yamaha's Quartararo is the first MotoGP rider other than Marc Marquez to win on this track since 2012, with the Spaniard missing this race due to injury.

Pramac Racing's Johann Zarco stayed safe in second place, 5.3 seconds behind the race winner, while Jack Miller did brilliantly to pip Espargaro to a place on the podium.

Luca Marini and Zarco's team-mate Jorge Martin completed the top six, with the latter returning to action after a period out following hand surgery.

Elsewhere, Maverick Vinales was forced to retire with 13 laps to go due to his rear ride-height device jamming. Joan Mir and Pol Espargaro were also among those not to finish.

TOP 10

1. Fabio Quartararo (Monster Energy Yamaha)
2. Johann Zarco (Pramac Racing) +4.939s
3. Jack Miller (Ducati) +8.372s
4. Aleix Espargaro (Aprilia) +9.113s
5. Luca Marini (Mooney VR46) +11.679s
6. Jorge Martin (Pramac Racing) +13.164s
7. Brad Binder (Red Bull KTM) +15.405s
8. Fabio Di Giannantonio (Gresini) +15.851s
9. Miguel Oliveira (Red Bull KTM) +19.740s
10. Enea Bastianini (Gresini) +21.611s

CHAMPIONSHIP STANDINGS

Riders
1. Fabio Quartararo (Monster Energy Yamaha) 172
2. Aleix Espargaro (Aprilia) 138
3. Johann Zarco (Pramac Racing) 111
4. Enea Bastianini (Gresini) 100
5. Brad Binder (Red Bull KTM) 82

Teams
1. Monster Energy Yamaha 197
2. Aprilia Racing 184
3. Pramac Racing 172
4. Ducati 162
5. Red Bull KTM 146

Former Manchester City defender Aleksandar Kolarov has announced his retirement after leaving Inter.

Kolarov's contract at San Siro officially expires at the end of June, bringing an end to his two-season stay with the Italian giants.

The 36-year-old made just 15 appearances for Inter in all competitions, seven of those being starts, after joining from Serie A rivals Roma in September 2020.

He previously enjoyed a spell with Lazio in the Italian top flight prior to joining City in 2010 for a seven-year stint.

The 94-cap Serbia international won two Premier League titles, an FA Cup and two EFL Cups with City.

In a statement released to ANSA on Sunday announcing his retirement, left-back Kolarov said: "I always knew that sooner or later this moment will come.

"Although I am sorry that I am closing one chapter of my life, I am grateful that I managed to achieve what has always been my dream.

"I thank all the people who followed me in this first part of my career."

"First of all, to every team-mate in the clubs in which I played as well as in the football team of Serbia, my homeland, which I have always represented with great pride. 

"I thank the clubs, presidents, managers, coaches, technical staff, doctors, economists, physios and all those who helped in my career, and worked hard from the background."

Kolarov, who started his career with Serbian sides Cukaricki and OFK Beograd, intends to remain in football by taking up a new role.

"I am coming to the end of this phase in my life, feeling great satisfaction with what I have achieved," he said.

"Now I am already focused on my 'other' life in the world of football. I will soon start training as a sporting director and scout at the national football centre of the Italian Football Federation in Coverciano."

Matt Fitzpatrick heads into the final round of the U.S. Open with a share of the lead and the confidence of a previous win in Brookline.

The 27-year-old, who recorded the best major result of his career last time out with a tie for fifth at the US PGA Championship, shot a 68 on Saturday to join Will Zalatoris on four under for the tournament.

Saturday's third round was a tricky one for most of the rest of the field, with only nine players now under par.

But Fitzpatrick knows exactly how to succeed at this course, having won the U.S. Amateur in Massachusetts in 2013.

He could now follow in the footsteps of the great Jack Nicklaus, who repeated his U.S. Amateur triumph at Pebble Beach in 1961 by winning the U.S. Open at the same course 11 years later.

"I certainly think it gives me an edge over the others," Fitzpatrick said, looking forward to Sunday's action. "I genuinely do believe that.

"It's a real, obviously positive moment in my career. It kind of kick-started me.

"To come back here and play so well again, it just gives me growing confidence round by round."

But Fitzpatrick knows he will not have it easy, with his experience of a tough final day at the US PGA – which he entered in second place – fresh in his mind.

"I think up until Southern Hills, I didn't really appreciate how hard it is actually to win a major," he said. "I've not challenged really up until then.

"I think, myself included, people on the outside maybe think it's easier than it is.

"You just have to look at Tiger [Woods]. He knocked off so many in such a quick span. That's why I think people think, 'oh, it's a piece of cake; it's like a regular Tour event'. But it's not.

"It brings a lot more to the mental aspect of the game than other regular events, and for me, I think it's been a big change from US PGA to come here to a golf course I know so well, and it's given me extra confidence."

Fitzpatrick might not get a better chance to land his first major win, and he accepts: "Would my career be incomplete if I didn't have one? Sure, yeah.

"I would be disappointed if I didn't, yeah. I genuinely would be disappointed if I didn't.

"I feel like certainly now these last two majors, I feel so much more comfortable out here. My game has changed for the better. I've given myself more chances.

"I definitely feel like I have much more of a chance now to win a major than I ever have done in my career, obviously."

Zinedine Zidane says he still has the "flame" to continue his managerial career, despite a year out of the game after his departure from Real Madrid last year.

The Frenchman departed Santiago Bernabeu for a second time at the end of the 2020-21 season, having guided the club to a hat-trick of Champions League triumphs during his first term in charge and won 11 trophies in all during his time there.

Zidane has since been linked with a number of jobs, including in his home country where he was touted as the frontrunner to succeed Mauricio Pochettino at Paris Saint-Germain, as well as Didier Deschamps' possible successor as France head coach beyond Qatar 2022.

With Nice boss Christoph Galtier now in the driving seat to take the reins at Parc des Princes, Zidane's time in the wilderness looks set to continue.

But the former World Cup winner, who turns 50 this month, hopes to return to the dugout, while admitting he remains satisfied without having to leap straight into any job that becomes available.

"I want to continue," he told Telefoot. "I still have this flame. Football is my passion.

"But I am [almost] 50 years old and fulfilled. I am happy, and that's the most important thing."

Zidane also addressed his infamous World Cup final headbutt on Marco Materazzi at Germany 2006, which saw him sent off for France as they went on to lose to Italy on penalties.

"I'm not proud of what I've done, but it's part of my journey," he reflected. "Even in a person's life, not everything is done perfectly."

Liverpool have confirmed the signing of Aberdeen right-back Calvin Ramsay, with the Scotland youth international heading to Anfield on a long-term deal.

Jurgen Klopp's side have brought in the teenage defender as their latest recruit of the transfer window, following the arrivals of Fabio Carvalho and Darwin Nunez.

Ramsay, 18, arrives fresh from being named the 2021-22 Scottish Football Writers’ Association’s Young Player of the Year after a string of superb performances in the Scottish Premiership this season.

"I'm just buzzing, and it's a dream come true really to be here," the defender told the club's official website.

"It was a dream come true to play for Aberdeen, and now to be at one of the biggest, if not the biggest club in the world, it’s a massive achievement, and I’m looking forward to trying to show the fans what I've got.

"Hopefully I can come in in pre-season, show everyone at the club, the staff, players what I've got, and then we’ll see what happens from there."

Richard Arnold sought to explain Manchester United's plans as he met supporters who intended to protest outside his house on Saturday.

Arnold, who was named United's chief executive in February, was filmed discussing a number of topics relating to the club with fans in a pub. The videos were posted to Twitter.

Those present had been planning a protest, but Arnold instead went to meet them and bought drinks, United confirmed.

A club spokesperson told Sky Sports News: "Richard Arnold heard that a group of fans had gathered in a pub near his house.

"He went to meet them, bought them all a drink, listened to their views and explained what the club is doing to deliver success on the pitch, improve the stadium and strengthen engagement with fans."

The video footage appeared to show Arnold being quizzed on a wide range of topics, including United's pursuit of Frenkie de Jong.

He said the club had "burned through cash", but "the money the manager and director of football want is there".

Erik ten Hag, De Jong's former Ajax coach, is now the man in charge, having replaced Ralf Rangnick at the end of a season Arnold would seemingly rather forget.

"It was a nightmare," the CEO told fans. "I was hating every game."