BALLSTON SPA, N.Y. — Anyone who races has to enjoy it.

Otherwise the never-ending work and time spent going down the highway wouldn’t be worth it. Two drivers who especially appreciate racing with the Ollie’s Bargain Outlet All Star Circuit of Champions are Dale Blaney and Paul McMahan.

“I hurt my thumb at work in the fab shop last year and was out for three months,” Blaney explained  “I couldn’t race so I lost my ride and only showed 10 or 11 races for the whole season. I’d usually run 70 or more, so it was a big change. I’m not sure we’ll get to 70 this year with all the rainouts, but we’re trying.”

Last year was the first season in memory that Blaney hadn’t run a complete schedule.

“I guess I probably needed the time off,” Blaney said. “My longtime owner, mechanic and friend, George Fisher, passed away at the end of the 2016 season and it was tough going to races without him. 2017 was not much fun because it just wasn’t the same. It was probably a blessing to sit out last year after I got hurt. I ended up helping my brother, Dave, a little bit and got my desire to race back.

“It was like losing your wife. Friends of mine have had their wife die and it took them two or three years to recover. I felt like them.”

Blaney is driving for Sam McGhee Motorsports this season and had three victories through July 24.

“ It’s only their second year of racing,” Blaney explained. “Ryan Smith ran it last year and they learned from him. They’re still learning but they’re getting to be pretty good at it, and I see the potential for them to get a lot better.

“It took a couple of months for me to get back in the groove, plus we had to figure each other out between rainouts. Now we’ve found a routine and it’s a lot easier. When you don’t race much, you have to put yourself in racing situations and hone your skills again. A good driver never forgets how to race but it takes a little while to be sharp again.”

Now that he’s comfortable, competitive and winning races again, it seems like Blaney may be back for the long haul.

“I hope so,” said the 55-year-old Blaney. “My eyes are still good and my reaction time hasn’t changed.  Someday they’ll start going the other way but as long as I’m still competitive, still winning, I’m going to keep going. I’m like my brother, Dave. He’s still a really good driver but now he gets his enjoyment from building his own cars and trying new things. When he hits on something, he’s as fast as ever. I guess both of us just appreciate having the chance to keep racing at the upper levels of the sport.”

McMahan, 48, is another advocate of the ASCoC schedule, which lets top drivers compete without having to follow the far-flung World of Outlaws trail.

“I really enjoy this deal,” said McMahan. “I love being home in Hendersonville, Tenn., with my wife, sleeping in my own bed and having a real job. I work for QuickCar Racing Products as a production assistant and life is good.

“I was out there with the World of Outlaws so long that it wasn’t fun anymore,” he added. “There’s politics in racing everywhere, but there you had to deal with it every day. I’ve raced for a living since 1997 and spent 20 years with the Outlaws. I was fortunate to be able to do it that long.

“The All Star schedule is just enough to keep my ambition going. We don’t go if we don’t want to and sometimes we take a weekend off. After all these years, it’s great to do nothing, absolutely nothing. My wife and I go to the lake, we hang out, we have a nice dinner, all the things you miss when you’re on the road all the time.”

McMahan’s days as an outlaw have come and gone.

“No way. I wouldn’t go back,” he said. “I have no desire to run with the Outlaws again except for the Florida shows. I still love to race but I’m not doing it full time anymore. Owners want to buy a car off the shelf and go out and beat Schatz. That’s not going to happen. Nobody has more time together than Donny’s team.

“That’s why Brad Sweet is so good now,” McMahan added. “He’s been with Kasey Kahne a long time and has a good crew to go with some good cars. You reap the benefits seven or eight years later but most owners won’t wait that long. My owner now, Tom Buch, is pretty easy going, so life is good.”

ALCANIZ, Spain – Marc Marquez easily topped the speed charts on the opening day of MotoGP action Friday at Motorland Aragón.

Marquez was more than a second clear of his closest rivals aboard his Repsol Honda bike, topping the practice charts with a fast lap of 1:46.869. Yamaha’s Maverick Vinales was second fastest, 1.145 seconds slower than Marquez.

“Today we started very well and actually we ended quite well too,” Marquez said. “In the morning we did our time attack, I felt good and with the potential weather tomorrow I thought it was best. It was a quite good lap. In the afternoon we worked a lot with used tires and unfortunately had a small crash but we learned a lot from it. Aside from this little fall everything went well and I think there’s still some more time to find.”

Marquez’s fast lap came in the first practice, but it wasn’t all roses in the second practice. Marquez crashed his Honda in turn eight, but escaped uninjured and was able to continue.

Despite being more than a second off the pace set by Marquez in the first practice, Yamaha riders swept the top-three positions in the second practice.

Vinales’ lap left him second fastest overall, followed by fellow Yamaha riders Valentino Rossi and Fabio Quartararo. Red Bull KTM’s Pol Espargaro was fifth fastest overall, 1.5 seconds behind Marquez.

MARINA BAY, Singapore – Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton set the fastest time on the opening day of Formula One practice at the Marina Bay Street Circuit on Friday.

Hamilton edged Red Bull’s Max Verstappen for the fastest lap of the day in the second practice, circling the 3.146-mile, 23-turn circuit in 1:38.773. Verstappen’s fastest lap was .184 seconds off the pace set by Hamilton.

“It’s always a shock to the system when you first get in the car here in Singapore because it’s very bumpy, it’s a long lap and it’s so hot out there – it’s like a sauna in the car,” Hamilton said. “But it’s been a solid first day, we got through our run plan and continued to improve the car, so I’m really happy with it. I felt much better in the car today than I have for a while, so I hope I can keep that feeling over the weekend. They re-did a few bits of tarmac on the circuit and I managed to get the tires working well. If you can get into a groove and into a rhythm here, it’s such a beautiful lap, so I’ve really been enjoying it. But nothing’s ever perfect and we definitely have some areas that we can still improve on. We’ve got off to a good start, but the Red Bulls looked very quick and we still have to put it all together tomorrow, which is not going to be easy.”

Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel was third fastest overall, followed by the Mercedes of Valtteri Bottas and the Red Bull of Alexander Albon.

The only major incident on Friday saw Bottas run his Mercedes into a barrier at turn 19. The Mercedes team was able to repair his car and get him back on track for the second practice.

Albon also ran into trouble during the second practice, nosing his car into a tire barrier. The Red Bull entry suffered minor damage to the front wing.

Charles Leclerc, the winner of the last two Formula One events, had an up-and-down day. He retired early from the first practice with a gearbox issue, but rebounded to set the sixth fastest time overall in practice two.

Former New York Rangers and Tampa Bay Lightning defenseman Dan Girardi has announced his retirement from the NHL after 13 seasons.

Girardi appeared in 927 games, finishing with 56 goals, 264 points and a plus-78 rating. He also played in 143 playoff games, four Eastern Conference finals and one Stanley Cup Final over 11 seasons with the Rangers and two with the Lightning.

G,

Thank you for 11 years of giving us your all.
Thank you for being one of us. #NYR pic.twitter.com/74EBkG6CnG

— New York Rangers (@NYRangers) September 20, 2019

The 35-year-old defenseman entered the league with New York as an undrafted free agent in 2006 and appeared in 788 regular-season games with the Rangers, helping them reach the playoffs 10 times. He signed with Tampa Bay as a free agent in 2017 and had 10 goals and 24 assists the past two seasons.

In addition to ranking 30th all time in playoff games played by a defenseman, Girardi blocked more shots -- 1,954, nearly 1,700 of them with the Rangers -- than any other player since the NHL began keeping the statistic for the 2005-06 season.

The Rangers announced Friday that they have agreed to terms with free-agent defenseman Tony DeAngelo, who had four goals and 26 assists for New York last season.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Hockey season is about to begin, but there has never been more uncertainty in the women's game.

It's a paradox. Girls hockey is among the fastest-growing sports in America. Programs are also sprouting up in places like Kuwait, while China is launching a program ahead of the 2022 Olympics in Beijing. In 2018, the IIHF shared that there are now nearly 200,000 women playing hockey across the world -- up from 170,000 (a 17.6 percent increase) in 2010. Team USA's thrilling gold-medal shootout win over rival Canada in the 2018 Olympics was part of significant momentum at the elite level. In January, Kendall Coyne Schofield became the first woman to participate in the NHL All-Star skills competition (and dazzled). She and four other top stars subsequently signed partnerships with Adidas and have been featured in a variety of brand and product campaigns.

But when it comes to professional women's hockey, the sport is at a crossroads. Despite growth last season, the Canadian Women's Hockey League made the stunning decision to fold in May citing an "economically unsustainable business model." That left the rival National Women's Hockey League as the only remaining professional league in North America. While the NWHL also reported record attendance and viewership last season (its fourth), Coyne Schofield and many other top stars decided not to play in that league -- or any pro league -- this fall.

They joined a newly created Professional Women's Hockey Players Association to achieve their goal of a unified sustainable league. The snag? One league already exists -- the NWHL, which is set to kick off its regular season on Oct. 5. If that leaves you with more questions, don't worry. We've got answers. Here's a rundown of what the women's hockey landscape looks like at this moment.

What is the PWHPA?

It's not a labor union, but rather an advocacy organization. There are 173 dues-paying members including some of the sport's top stars like Team USA's Coyne Schofield, Hilary Knight, Brianna Decker, Canada's Shannon Szabados and Marie-Philip Poulin and Finland's Noora Raty. Each player is part of one of the eight chapter regions: Boston, Buffalo, Calgary, Markham (Ontario), Minnesota, Montreal, Toronto, the tri-state area of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut.

"It was obviously devastating when the CWHL folded," said Sarah Nurse, who played for the Toronto Furies last season. "But it was the kick in the butt we needed to push for what we truly want and what we truly deserve. It was very easy for a lot of the girls to be happy in the spots that we were in and not push for more. We didn't want to take a lateral step, we wanted a step forward."

Added Alyssa Gagliardi, who played for the Boston Pride of the NWHL last season: "We didn't want to just jump into the only option, because it was the only option. We wanted to make sure we were thinking long term about the future of the sport. I was grateful to have the NWHL opportunity, but looking forward, I want to be part of a professional league where I can make a livable wage, have health insurance, full-time staff, all of those aspects."

PWHPA members say they don't expect the millions that NHL players make, but they do want to be able to have hockey as their primary vocation. The NWHL last year had a team salary cap of $100,000 (they increased it to $150,000 this season). Gagliardi said that last season with the Boston Pride, all but three of her teammates also had full-time jobs.

"It's not just the pay equity and pay gap -- that will come, and we know that's something that is not going to come overnight," Nurse said. "But it's the professionalism that we're looking for. Simple things like getting our laundry done, ice time before 9:30 at night, being able to travel on the road with a full staff. Last season we often traveled without our athletic therapist and medical team, we were often sharing medical staff with other teams. Our coaching staff didn't have access to video resources, they didn't have their own locker rooms. Our equipment manager couldn't give us laces or hockey tape. We had to go buy them ourselves."

Said Gagliardi: "We joke, but it's kind of sad -- the resources we got in college are what you wish you had when you graduated. Those are the resources no league to date has been able to provide consistently. We're not asking for millions by any means, just something to live off of. Plus those resources. Think where the game could be if, in the last four years [since I graduated college], I could train full time and play hockey. And if there was an entire league that could do that. How good could this game be?"

Who leads the PWHPA?

The PWHPA is currently led by Jayna Hefford, a Hockey Hall of Famer who most recently served as interim commissioner of the CWHL when it folded. "What these players are doing is courageous," Hefford said. "It's a selfless act. They're sacrificing what they could do right now -- play in a league, because that's the easy thing to do, and make some money. And in turn, they're choosing to change the conversation. They're united in this quest to find something that's sustainable for the sport and sustainable for the next generation."

The PWHPA is advised by a team of lawyers from Ballard Spahr, the same firm that represented the U.S. women's hockey team in their wage dispute with USA Hockey ahead of the 2017 world championship. Billie Jean King and Illana Kloss are also advisors; Hefford says Kloss is especially involved on a day-to-day basis. They've secured several sponsorships, such as with Budweiser and Dunkin Donuts (which also partners with the NWHL). Hefford said the PWHPA will be releasing even more sponsorship news in the next couple weeks. Adidas, meanwhile, partnered with the PWHPA to create jerseys and provide the athletes with training gear.

So if they're not playing in a league, what will players in the PWHPA be doing this season?

The PWHPA arranged for training opportunities and ice time in each of the eight chapter regions. They're also scheduling intra-squad games and scrimmages against local college, club and even boys youth teams. But the big event is the Dream Gap Tour, which kicks off Saturday in Toronto. Consider it a barnstorming tour where the players will be showcasing the game in exhibitions, plus doing community engagement events and clinics, specifically trying to reach young girls.

They also have dates scheduled in New Hampshire (Oct. 4-6) and Chicago (Oct. 18-20). Hefford says there will be at least six showcase events this year. The games will all be streamed on the PWHPA's website.

So that brings us to the NWHL. What's going on with that?

Business as usual. "We're not going anywhere," commissioner Dani Rylan told ESPN earlier this month. "It's definitely disappointing, to say the least, when the people that you built a business for, or a platform for, feel that destroying that business is the best way forward."

Anya Battaglino is a former NWHL player who now is director of the NWHL players' association. The NWHLPA was in the middle of negotiations with the NWHL for standard player agreements for the 2019-20 season when the CWHL folded. The women's hockey community has always been fragmented -- two leagues dispersed the top talent across two countries and had vastly different business plans with the CWHL being a nonprofit. Now was finally an opportunity for everyone to stand united. Battaglino and the NWHL were riding high after viewership for the 2018-19 season was at an all-time high; the all-star game in Nashville drew 6,200, the largest crowd for a pro women's hockey game in the United States, and several teams routinely sold out their arenas for home games.

She was hoping players from the displaced CWHL would see the foundation they built, and the business plan that was in place, and realize that they had something they could grow together. "It basically sparked this need internally to create one league we had been trying to work on for so long," Battaglino said. "I understand the battle cry of 'we want more,' but we had an avenue here that was working. The idea of taking a gap year without a clear business plan just didn't make sense to me."

However, many players decided against it. "I think there's so much passion behind not joining the NWHL, there was an inability for a lot of people to hear what was actually happening," Battaglino said.

The NWHL carried on. During their negotiations, Battaglino said Rylan was more transparent and inclusive than she had ever been before. The players fixed some verbiage in the previous contracts they didn't like. For the first time, it was the players writing the contracts and the NWHL executive office making edits to it -- not the other way around. One thing Battaglino would like to clear up is claims that the NWHL doesn't offer insurance. "The players are full employees and get workers comp," Battaglino said. "Anything that has to do with hockey, they are covered medically for."

The NWHL initially explored expanding to Canada when the CWHL folded but decided to stick with their five American teams for now. There were some initial challenges once the PWHPA formed. The Pegula family -- which also owns the NFL Buffalo Bills and NHL Sabres -- severed its ties with the league and relinquished control of the Buffalo Beauts. The New Jersey Devils also dissolved their marketing partnership with the Metropolitan Riveters.

Rylan -- the NWHL's founder -- was determined to keep her league afloat and made several improvements to lure players in. They increased the regular-season schedule from 16 to 24 games and restructured the schedule for multiple games clustered on weekends rather than multiple weekends of travel.

Rylan said player salaries are up 26 percent over last season. Some players are making as much as $13,000 this season -- which is for six months of work.

Rylan didn't offer specifics but said she also increased per diem rates (they were $20 last season, which is far below the federal recognized rate of $51).

Additionally, for the first time, players are receiving a 50 percent split of revenue from all league-level sponsorship and media deals. That includes the league's three-year streaming partnership with Twitch, which was announced this month.

"Brands want to be part of a feel-good story," Battaglino said. "There's nothing more satisfying for brands to know that 50 percent of the dollars they're putting in is going directly to players."

The NWHL has retained some of their big sponsorship deals, such as with Dunkin Donuts, and added several others, including Chipwich, this season.

Also, this month a team of investors, led by Miles Arnone, purchased the Boston Pride, making it the only privately owned team in the league. Arnone said he plans to hire a full-time team president as well as "improve sponsorships, run more substantial ticket sale drives, and focus on merchandise sales and outreach to the community."

The NWHL still sets the league salary cap, but Arnone said that if the team can "grow commercially" it will "advance the state of economics as it pertains to the players. Then we can afford to pay the players better."

So who is playing in the NWHL this season, and what do they have to say about all of this?

The NWHL is filling out its rosters. To date, there are about 90 player signings across the five teams -- though they did have to dip into a bigger pool considering how many players chose to sit out. However, there are many returning players and, as Rylan points out, a few players who flipped from their initial commitment from the PWHPA to the NWHL.

Allie Thunstrom detailed her decision to re-sign with the Minnesota Whitecaps: "It was a really difficult decision. I've been in women's hockey for a long time, and I just felt like after last year, we had so much momentum. That's what we need to grow that fan base, so eventually ticket sales are able to support living wages. Right now, we are selling out crowds, but it's a 1,400-seat arena. Eventually, it would be great to sell out Xcel Energy Center, or another NHL arena. And to do that, you need fans and you need momentum. I just felt like everything was on the up and up, and the last thing I wanted to do was not have a product on the ice for people to see and for people to continue to support."

Is there a rift between the boycotting players and the NWHL players?

Not publicly, at least. "Everyone's situation is different," said Gagliardi. "I have friends who are playing in the NWHL -- they're still good friends. We respect everyone's decision. Ultimately I saw this as an opportunity to be a voice for change for the future. We've all had to have an internal conversation with ourselves. And if my hockey career is done, and I never get to play a professional hockey game again, I'm OK with it -- knowing the next generation might be able to do it for a living."

Said Thunstrom: "I respect all of those girls' decisions just as I think they respect all of our decisions for playing next year. Honestly, they're hitting a lot of different markets [with the Dream Gap Tour] that we're not hitting in the NWHL, so it might turn out to be a really great thing for everybody."

If the boycotting players want a different option, does that mean they want the NHL to get involved and run a pro women's hockey league?

Perhaps. But they're not waiting around for the NHL, either. Hefford said the NHL has the "infrastructure and resources that would be an integral piece to a successful women's professional league."

Consider, if NHL teams each had a sister team, the women's players could utilize the same trainers, medical staff, video coaches -- not to mention ice time and equipment.

"If you look at what history tells us, it's that startup women's leagues are very successful when they're connected to an existing league," PWHPA member Meghan Duggan told ESPN in May. "That's true throughout Europe, in women's soccer, the WNBA, and the NWSL with their support from U.S. Soccer. That's part of what we're looking for."

Duggan said that while "certainly the NHL makes a lot of sense," the women want a partner that will see the players' value and share their long-term vision. "[The goal] is simply to work toward one viable league in North America," Duggan said. "And we'll consider any proposal that addresses that."

So what does the NHL have to say?

The NHL has long held the stance that it doesn't want to get involved with women's hockey as long as professional opportunities exist. In other words, they don't want to come in as "big brother" and save the day.

"We're supportive and we're watching," NHL commissioner Gary Bettman told ESPN this month. "We don't want to do anything that would undermine an existing league. If Dani Rylan and her partners are able to make a success out of it, that's great. I also understand there's another group that's gone about elevating the profile of women playing hockey, and we think that's great too. I think both sets of approaches need to sort out exactly what's working for them. This is not a 60-minute game that's going to come to a conclusion immediately. This is going to evolve."

Hefford said the NHL has been "very much the same behind the scenes as they are publicly."

"I believe the NHL is not making any decisions as long as the current state stays as it is," Hefford said. "So in that time, we'll continue to provide what we can for these athletes."

While the league itself has not announced anything formal, the NHLPA has partnered with the PWHPA as a "premiere partner for their Dream Gap Tour.

"The success of women's hockey is integral to the growth of the sport. NHL players are proud to continue with their support of the women's game by sponsoring the PWHPA," said Don Fehr, NHLPA executive director. "We look forward to seeing these talented hockey players on the ice as they demonstrate their skill and passion for the game throughout the PWHPA's Dream Gap Tour."

Why is all of this happening now?

The CWHL folding was the impetus for a movement, but this is also part of a larger story of gender equality.

"Women's sports has put this on the front page," Hefford said. "Bianca Andreescu just won the US Open, and that highlighted the fact that tennis is one of the few, if not the only sport, where women are paid equitably to men. You saw the U.S. women's soccer team and their fight recently. It's empowering. I think it's a topic on the mind to people. Combine that with the type of athletes we have [in hockey] on a united front. It's the biggest names in the game, and they're standing up and speaking for what they believe in."

ESPN's Greg Wyshynski contributed to this report.

VIRGINIA WATER, England – As his fellow professionals marveled at Danny Willett’s start at the BMW PGA Championship, the Englishman had to admit that his play through two rounds at the European Tour’s flagship event was “out of the blue.”

For Willett, whose career was derailed after winning the 2016 Masters by injury and poor play, the return to Europe after his first full season on the PGA Tour is shaping up to be a welcome homecoming, thanks to a front-nine 29 that propelled him into a share of the lead at Wentworth at 11 under par.

“One of those days, really. We hit a lot of good shots. Holed some nice kind of mid-range putts and I think with the wind picking up it's probably better that you don't expect that coming in,” said Willett, who is tied for the lead with Jon Rahm after a second-round 65.

Willett relocated with his family to the United States this year and focused almost exclusively on the PGA Tour until the FedExCup Playoffs concluded last month. His attention is now squarely on the European Tour where he has a busy schedule planned the with starts at next week's Dunhill Links Championship, the Italian Open and, if he qualifies, the DP World Tour Championship, where he is the defending champion.

Former world No. 1 Stacy Lewis will likely miss the rest of this season recuperating from the injury that led to her withdrawal from the Solheim Cup last week.

Upon returning home to Houston, Lewis was more definitively diagnosed with a rib cage injury, according to her management team. The injury is expected to require up to eight weeks of rest and rehabilitation.

“Given the nature of my injury, I will likely not return until the start of next year,” Lewis said in a statement. “The time off will give me the chance to get healthy and stronger, and to spend time with my family.”

Lewis, 34, was named one of Juli Inkster’s two captain’s picks for the U.S. Solheim Cup, but she began feeling pain in her lower back at the Cambia Portland Classic, her last start before going to Scotland for the biennial international team event. She alerted Inkster before traveling overseas that her back might be an issue there. Three days before the competition began, Lewis withdrew, with alternate Ally McDonald taking her place on the roster.

Lewis stepped away from the LPGA late in the summer of 2018 to prepare for the birth of her first child, Chesnee, who was born last October. Lewis has been adjusting to life on tour as a new mom. She’s 52^nd on the LPGA money list with three top-10 finishes this season.

VIRGINIA WATER, England – Like most top players, Jon Rahm needed to decompress following the end of the PGA Tour season and this week’s BMW PGA Championship is his first start since last month’s Tour Championship.

But if the Spaniard was rusty after his three-week break he hasn’t looked the part through two rounds at Wentworth. Rahm opened with rounds of 66-67 that left the Spaniard tied for the lead with Danny Willett at 11 under.

“No matter how much time off I have or I don't, it's always great to get off to a start like this,” he said. “After 36 holes it's important to have a chance, especially on a course that I've never seen before and a tournament this important.”

Rahm hadn’t been able to play the European Tour’s flagship event because of scheduling conflicts when it was held in May, but this year’s move to September allowed him to add the event to his schedule for the first time.

Although Rahm got off to an interesting start on Friday, with two bogeys and four birdies through his first six holes, he said the normal learning curve on a new course has been straightforward.

“There's a few lines off the tee you need to learn. After that, it's right in front of you,” he said. “That's the great thing about this golf course, it's not overly complicated. It's right in front of you.”

It will happen at some point this season, possibly as early as November. Chelsea will play a game with seven homegrown players in their starting XI. Thus far, we've seen four: Andreas Christensen and Fikayo Tomori at the back, Mason Mount in midfield, Tammy Abraham up front. With Mount doubtful for Sunday's clash with Liverpool, we'll probably see three but that is sure to change when Ruben Loftus-Cheek, Reece James and Callum Hudson-Odoi become available. (Loftus-Cheek is out until November, but the latter two have resumed training.)

Clubs so heavily reliant on Academy products aren't exactly new. We all remember Pep Guardiola's first Barcelona side, the one that further burnished the legend of their La Masia academy: Lionel Messi, Xavi, Andres Iniesta, Sergio Busquets, Carles Puyol, Gerard Pique, Pedro, Victor Valdes, etc. Plus, of course, Manchester United's Class of '92, with Ryan Giggs, David Beckham, Nicky Butt, Paul Scholes and the Nevilles. All were Academy products, except there's a difference when it comes to Chelsea, one that makes this group potentially unprecedented, at least among bigger clubs in bigger leagues.

Apart from Christensen, who joined the club at 16, the other six all were in the Chelsea system from before the age of 10. That's a hefty distinction.

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In many cases, when clubs boast about the players they "produce," you should take it with a grain of salt. It's one thing to take a kid at 8 and nurture him all the way into the first team. It's an entirely different matter to cherry-pick talented 16-year-olds from other clubs, put them into your Academy for a year or two and then claim them as your own. One is a full-service, K-12 educational institution; the other is finishing school.

This isn't to say that one is necessarily more virtuous than the other, just that the skill-sets involved are rather different. Guessing that an 8-year old might have the necessary athleticism, personality and coordination to become a professional footballer, and then giving him high-quality coaching and guidance for a decade is one thing. Acquiring, say, Paul Pogba and Raheem Sterling at 16, after they had played international football for their respective countries at the youth level, is quite another.

Chelsea are a prime example of this because over the years, they've done plenty of both. In fact, the reason they were hit by a transfer ban in the first place is linked to irregularities in signing youth players from other countries. (That ban, of course, has had a silver lining. While Frank Lampard insists the likes of Mount would be playing regardless this season, there's little question that the inability to bring in players has created opportunities that weren't there before.)

Except for certain specific situations, FIFA regulations stipulate that players under the age of 16 can't move internationally. And because you can't sign a binding contract until you're 16 in most countries, raiding other clubs (especially abroad) for talent in the "magical window" just after a player turns 16 became a way of life. It still required scouting and contacts and fees (sometimes straight up, sometimes in the form of tribunal compensation) and there was often fierce competition, but almost everybody did it and Chelsea seemed to do it better than most. While they arguably never quite hit the jackpot in terms of acquiring a superstar who would then play many years in their first team, over the past five seasons along they netted in excess of $60m in transfer fees and loan fees from the likes of Nathan Ake, Gael Kakuta, Tomas Kalas and Lucas Piazon.

Yet even as they were doing that on an international level, they were pushing their ground game hard in their backyard: the sprawling London metropolitan area. At one point, Tomori, James, Loftus-Cheek, Hudson-Odoi, Abraham and Mount were all aged 12 or younger and all in Chelsea's system. And it wasn't just them. So too were Eddie Nketiah, an England Under-21 international, and Declan Rice, who has five England caps.

Nketiah and Rice were both released by Chelsea: the former is now at Leeds United, on loan from Arsenal, the latter is at West Ham. They're evidence of how easy it is for clubs to get things wrong in deciding which youngsters to back and which to let go.

Where do players come from: Europe's talent hotspots

Chelsea have 10 development centers that cover Under-7s and Under-8s. About 160 kids enter the system, usually by invitation. Each year they are whittled down and kids from elsewhere are invited to try out. It continues until they join the Academy at age 9 and, from there, there is the annual risk of being released until you sign a professional contract.

If it sounds rather dog-eat-dog, that's because it is. There is a ton of competition for players to get into the system and there is an equal moment between clubs to attract players. Because while London may offer a huge catchment area of talent, Chelsea have to compete with the likes of Arsenal, Tottenham, West Ham, Queens Park Rangers and more for that same gifted kid.

Clearly though, Chelsea are doing it right at youth level. They've won the FA Youth Cup seven times in the past 10 seasons and the UEFA Youth League (aka the Champions League for kids) twice. The challenge has been ascending into the first team and that lack of pathway is something for which Chelsea has long been criticized in the past. It's something the club have taken on the chin while pointing out that very few of the Academy graduates who they sold on would likely have had a major impact on the first team. (In that sense, they have a point. It's not as if the Premier League is filled with Chelsea youth alums who have come back to haunt them. Most had the tools to be very good professionals, but not regulars at Chelsea.)

No more. The combination of the transfer ban and the return of Frank Lampard as manager (with Jody Morris -- himself a Chelsea Academy product and former youth coach -- as his assistant) has opened the door to throwing the youngsters in at the deep end. It's working on many levels, not least the fact that it has bought the club time with fans and media.

The trickiest part is deciding whether it was a statistical quirk that so many gifted footballers gravitated to Chelsea before they learned their multiplication tables at some point between 2004 and 2008. And, of course, the classic nature vs. nurture debate: was it Chelsea that made them what they are or would they have reached this level regardless? (Yes, obviously the answer is a bit of both, but the challenge is determining to what degree each contributed.)

Either way, the transfer ban is proving to have a massive silver lining for the club. And for that they can thank the work done over the past decade, both in assembling this group and in developing them from childhood through adolescence into adulthood.

When Waqar Younis twice served as the Pakistan head coach in the past - 2010 to 2011 and 2014 to 2016 - Misbah-ul-Haq was the Test captain on both occasions. Three-and-a-half years since his last stint with the team, Waqar has returned to the support staff set-up as the bowling coach and Misbah is now the head coach.

Waqar will, as a result, work under Misbah after the PCB overhauled the support staff that was led by Mickey Arthur until the World Cup. Waqar and Misbah have shared a cordial relationship and the former fast bowler brings with him loads of coaching experience. This will be his fifth term in the Pakistan support staff, having served twice as the head coach, as the bowling coach in 2006-07, and the bowling and fielding coach briefly in 2009-10.

His two stints as head coach had not ended on a good note earlier as he resigned both times before the end of his tenure. In 2011 he stepped down amid differences with then limited-overs captain Shahid Afridi and in 2016 he quit after a dispute with the PCB's management following that year's T20 World Cup.

Will working under Misbah be a "demotion" of sorts for Waqar? He doesn't think so.

"As far as thinking like it's a demotion, it's only a myth that you go up or down," Waqar said. "Our goal is how to make Pakistan a better team. For me the exciting thing is to try and help some of the promising youngsters who are in the pipeline, and some more who will come in the near future too.

"You come directly under a head coach as it's his domain and you work according to his mindset. The others are helping hands like the fielding coach and bowling coach. We will try to help Misbah as much as possible and move forward.

"In three years lots of things have changed," Waqar said when asked what made him come back. "The format has changed in domestic cricket, new people have come, there are new coaches, new thinking has come. I am not here to make controversies, I will try to make the Pakistan bowling attack a good one."

Waqar clarified that he wasn't "mentally ready" to apply for the post of head coach again and he knew that Misbah was the main contender for the job. Waqar applied for the bowling coach position and he was the main candidate after another shortlisted applicant, Mohammad Akram, withdrew at the last minute.

"I decided that I wasn't mentally ready to get back into the set-up [as head coach] so I applied for bowling coach," Waqar said. "I think I have a very good chemistry with Misbah, I've got a very good understanding with him and it will help in the future. The PCB has given Misbah an opportunity and it's our responsibility to support and back him because he's a very honest man and passionate about the game.

"My role is very simple and well-defined. I had done both the roles as a head coach and a bowling coach so I have an idea. The best thing is that I know about Misbah's mindset because whatever coaching I had done was with Misbah as the captain."

Their first assignment together will be two limited-overs series against Sri Lanka starting September 27 in Karachi with three ODIs followed by as many T20Is in Lahore next month. Currently, Waqar and Misbah are holding a training camp at the Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore where Waqar is working with young fast bowlers.

"The emphasis of the camp is on training and fitness, we are always focusing on fitness with our bowlers," Waqar said. "We have bowlers in the pipeline like Mohammad Hasnain and Nasim Shah and in the next few months they will come on the scene.

"The best thing is Sri Lanka is coming, it's a plus for Pakistan, and other teams should also come. Our short-term goal is that we should win matches early on and build the confidence."