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Mbappe on target as PSG win without Messi and Neymar

AFP

Kylian Mbappe and Angel di Maria were both among the scorers as a Paris Saint-Germain side missing both Lionel Messi and Neymar won 4-2 away at Brest on Friday to make it three wins out of three this season in Ligue 1.

Ander Herrera and Idrissa Gana Gueye also found the net as PSG moved ominously on to nine points from a possible nine and clear at the top of the fledgling French table with a second consecutive 4-2 victory.

The full house of 15,000 in Brittany were denied the chance to see Messi make his PSG debut after the Argentine was left out of the squad as he continues to build up his fitness.

Neymar, who like Messi returned to training late after going all the way to the final of the Copa America last month, was also left out but PSG once again showed that they have little trouble finding the net and winning without the two superstars.

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However, once again their defending left a lot to be desired and will have given coach Mauricio Pochettino food for thought with a number of players still waiting on the sidelines.

“I prefer to win, but if I could choose a result I would prefer to win without conceding a goal,” Pochettino said.

“We have lots of star names but we need to build a team, that is the challenge.

“It won’t be easy because we need to find a balance among all the talented players we have. It will take time.”

– Donnarumma on the bench –

Italy’s Euro 2020 goalkeeping hero Gianluigi Donnarumma appeared in the squad for the first time since arriving from AC Milan but was left on the bench as Keylor Navas started in goal.

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Donnarumma’s fellow European champion, Marco Verratti, did play for the first time this season in midfield but skipper Marquinhos was still missing.

Mbappe has dominated headlines in Paris as speculation surrounds the future of the World Cup winner, who is out of contract at the end of the campaign and is wanted by Real Madrid.

However he set up a total of four goals in the opening league wins against Troyes and Strasbourg, and once again Mbappe played a central role in the rudimentary surroundings of the Stade Francis-Le Ble.

PSG went ahead midway through the first half when Mbappe’s clipped cross was cleared out to the edge of the area where Herrera met the ball on the volley and the Spaniard’s shot found the bottom corner.

Mbappe made it 2-0 in the 36th minute, arriving to head in his first goal of the season after Georginio Wijnaldum’s shot had been blocked.

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Brest got one back just before the break when Franck Honorat finished first-time after a fine back-heel lay-off by Romain Faivre.

Nevertheless Gueye appeared to put the game to bed when he made it 3-1 in the 73rd minute with a piledriver from 35 metres which Brest’s Dutch international goalkeeper Marco Bizot could only help on its way.

Yet Brest pulled another one back five minutes from time through Steve Mounie and PSG were actually in danger of conceding an equaliser until the 90th minute when Di Maria broke downfield and played a one-two with Achraf Hakimi before scoring with a delightful lob.

Di Maria had come on for Mbappe late on for his first appearance of the campaign and his goal was reminiscent of his winner for Argentina in the Copa America final against Brazil last month.

Saturday in Ligue 1 sees Monaco host Lens in between the two legs of their Champions League play-off against Shakhtar Donetsk, before defending champions Lille visit Saint-Etienne.

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FBI Most Wanted Fugitive Arrested in Mexico and Deported to U.S.

Authorities in Mexico announced Thursday that Samuel Ramírez Jr., a U.S. citizen accused of murdering two women and listed among the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted Fugitives, was arrested in the northern state of Sinaloa.

Ramírez Jr., 33, was detained Tuesday in Culiacán just 1 hour and 13 minutes after being added to the Federal Bureau of Investigation Ten Most Wanted list, the agency said in a statement.

The suspect, who was born in California, has already been deported to the U.S. state of Washington, where he faces charges related to the fatal shooting of two women at a bar in Federal Way in May 2023.

A court issued an arrest warrant for Ramírez in November last year, and the FBI initially offered a $25,000 reward for information leading to his capture, later increasing the amount to up to $1 million.

“To protect individuals’ privacy and ensure continued cooperation from the public, the FBI does not confirm the identity of those who provide information,” the agency said in its statement.

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UN experts warn Nicaragua runs vast transnational network to monitor exiled dissidents

Nicaragua maintains an “extensive” transnational network to monitor and intimidate opposition figures living in exile, affecting “hundreds of thousands” of people, the United Nations Group of Human Rights Experts on Nicaragua warned on Tuesday.

In a statement, the experts said their report “details an extensive transnational architecture of surveillance and intelligence used to monitor, intimidate and attack the hundreds of thousands of Nicaraguans living abroad.”

The report, which will be presented on March 16 to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, states that the structure maintained by the government of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo includes the army, the police, migration authorities and diplomatic missions.

According to the statement, “the government has arbitrarily stripped 452 Nicaraguans of their nationality, left thousands more exiled in a situation of de facto statelessness, and prevented many from returning to Nicaragua.”

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Trump: ‘We Think It’s True’ Amid Claims Iran’s Supreme Leader Was Killed

U.S. President Donald Trump said on Saturday that he believes multiple reports claiming the death of Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, during the U.S. and Israeli offensive against the Islamic Republic are likely true, though he stopped short of confirming the news.

“We have a feeling that the information is correct,” he said, according to NBC News. “I don’t want to say anything definitive until I see it, but we think that’s the case. And many of their leaders have disappeared,” he added.

Earlier, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said there were “many indications” that Khamenei had died in an attack on his residential compound.