Cricket has come a long way since Paul Farbrace, looking to make his way in the game, took a job picking celery as a way to make ends meet.

Farbrace was obliged to work as a postman, customs officer and teacher, too. When he signed for Kent in 1986, he was paid £2,300 a season - contracts only lasted for six months in those days - and, 10 years later, at Middlesex, was earning £11,000. If you're thinking that might have been a decent amount at the time think again: inflation calculators suggest the Kent wage was worth, in today's terms, just under £6,000. The Middlesex wage was worth around £18,000.

Coincidentally, £18,000 is the amount guaranteed to young players on the new 'rookie contract' deal. After a significant amount of lobbying by the Professional Cricketers' Association (PCA), the players' union, the figure was written into the new County Partnership Agreement (CPA) between the first-class counties and the ECB. It means no full-time professional aged over 21 can be paid less than £27,500 while those aged between 18-21 will be paid a minimum of £18,000. They will automatically move to the higher figure if they play the requisite amount of first-class or T20 games.

Trialists, meanwhile, will be paid a daily rate (whether they play or not) and will automatically become full-time professionals after a certain number of days. The county salary collar - the minimum amount counties can pay players - will rise from £750,000 a year in 2019 to £1.5m a year by 2024. The salary cap is rising to £2.5m.

The point of this? Research conducted over recent seasons found that some professionals were earning under the minimum wage. As little as £4,000 for the entire season in a couple of cases. Some counties - not many, to be fair - were exploiting the desperation of young people to pursue a career in the game, by employing them on terms which should be deemed unacceptable in modern sport. From now on, every contract will have to be filed with the PCA to ensure it meets its criteria.

There could be a downside to this. It could be that counties are reluctant to take a chance on players for fear it will incur too great a cost. But there are, for now at least, still 18 first-class counties - which should ensure a decent amount of opportunity for talented players - and the hope is that smaller but better paid staff will result in a less exploitative experience with more playing opportunities. After many months' deliberation, it seems most counties have either signed their CPA deals or are about to do so.

Farbrace - a last-minute replacement for an unwell Ashley Giles - is among those invited to Edgbaston on Tuesday to address the latest batch of county recruits on the now regular 'rookie camp' which precedes every season. Saqib Mahmood and Rory Burns also share their experiences. Ten years ago, Burns was one of the attendees at the first rookie camp.

In those 10 years, 300 young people - there are two women and 50 men at Edgbaston for this version - have been through the process. 16 of them - men and women - have gone on to represent England at senior international level. A far higher proportion have dropped out of the game altogether.

A common phrase on the day is that there has "never been a better time to be a professional cricketer". It's largely true, too. With higher salaries and the proliferation of T20 leagues, today's players will never find themselves needing to pick celery to keep the wolf from the door. "We played cricket," Farbrace tells the young players. "But you lot are professionals."

But the modern game has also thrown up new dangers. Among them are match-fixing, gambling (particularly on-line gambling), drugs - recreational and performance-enhancing - and the challenges presented by social media. Alarmingly, Ian Thomas, the PCA's director of development and welfare, reports that the organisation helped 85 members with mental health issues in 2019. Forty of them (mostly, but not entirely, men) were current players. That means that just under 10 percent of professional cricketers in England and Wales are receiving help with mental health issues.

"The pressures of life are different now," Thomas says. "And people are more willing to come forward. Marcus Trescothick made a huge contribution in taking the stigma away from mental health and we need to keep encouraging people to come forward. But it's a tough challenge for our charity - the Professional Cricketers' Trust - because the cost of treatment is not cheap."

Making the transition once a playing career ends remains the biggest challenge of all. Players lose not just their livelihood, but much of their sense of purpose and identity. Gone is the salary and the support network of the dressing room. Giles believes every player he knows has struggled in the aftermath. Some never fully recover and move on.

So as part of these rookie contracts, players are obliged to undergo further personal development. This can take the form of education or vocational training and work placements. The hope is this will ensure the number of former players falling on hard times - and there are some horrific stories of poverty out there - are minimised. The PCA's funding has been increased by around 23 percent and that money has gone almost entirely on employing three more personal development managers (there are six at present) to help players plan their next steps.

Over the course of the day, the young players are given presentations about social media, corruption, the law and gambling; the last given by Patrick Foster, who enjoyed a brief first-class career before developing a gambling addiction that had appalling consequences. In the coming weeks, they will also be obliged to take on-line tutorials about drugs, corruption and the issue of sexual consent. Every professional player registered in England was obliged to sit through such a session in 2019.

In recent years Chris Lewis and Mervyn Westfield - jailed for their parts in drug trafficking and match-fixing respectively - have provided cautionary tales for young players. In time, Thomas agrees, Alex Hepburn, currently serving a five-year sentence for rape, may have a role to play in providing similar testimony.

Will any of this help England win more games? Probably not. But that's not really the point. It's more about learning from the past and helping today's young players avoid the mistakes made by their predecessors. It's about a duty of care towards young people making their way in a sport in which, even if they excel, they will probably be forced to leave in their mid-30s.

"We've saved a lot of lives," Thomas says as he reflects on the PCA's contribution. And he's no doubt right. There's not only never been a better time to play the game, there's probably never been a better time to leave it, either.

The BCCI's decision to introduce limited DRS in the semi-finals and final of the Ranji Trophy 2019-20 has been welcomed by the players, with Saurashtra captain Jaydev Unadkat agreeing that the technology would help in restricting the "howlers" in the crunch games.

It is the first time that DRS is going be in use in India's domestic circuit, but there will be no HawkEye, Snickometer or UltraEdge. The tools that will be used are a virtual pitch map (for lbw decisions) and slow-motion cameras, with each team getting four reviews per innings.

"It will be beneficial for sure because there won't be the umpiring howlers that sometimes happen," Unadkat told ESPNcricinfo.

However, the Saurashtra seamer wasn't entirely certain how the limited version of the DRS would work and was waiting to hear more about it from the match officials before the semi-final against Gujarat later this week in Rajkot. "But it is not the DRS used in the international cricket. So I am slightly doubtful that even this [limited DRS] can go wrong. I am just afraid what if this doesn't prove to be worthy enough for the decisions to be accurate. Having said that, it is still a beneficial first step."

Unadkat also pointed out that umpiring standards in domestic cricket have been improving. "The umpiring quality has sure-shot improved," he said. "The BCCI has been ranking the umpires and the best umpires are standing in the top groups. This year I felt the best umpires were standing in the Elite Group matches."

Unadkat pointed out that the on-field decision-making was not below par even last season. According to him, the controversial decisions during the quarter-final between Karnataka and Saurashtra had "hyped" the issue and put umpires in a bad light. "It wasn't that it was really, really poor last year. Just because of the couple of incidents, and because it happened against a team like Karnataka and it got hyped it so much, that is why the umpiring got highlighted.

"So the umpiring standards were not horrible last year. It was improving even then and has been the case even this season."

Bengal captain Abhimanyu Easwaran also backed the decision. "I think it's a very good thing to have DRS in domestic cricket as well, especially in knockout games, and semi-finals and final, even though there's not that much technology," Easwaran said as his team got ready to face Karnataka in the other semi-final at Eden Gardens. "The umpires can make errors at times. A human can make an error, but to rectify it, you have the technology and that will probably change the game for a team and that can probably be a deciding thing at a crucial point of the game.

"So I think it's really good to have it, and hopefully, it can help players get crucial runs or crucial wickets and change the game for their teams."

Abhimanyu, like most of his team-mates and a lot of others in the domestic circuit, has never played in a match that has had DRS in operation. The Karnataka camp will have KL Rahul and Manish Pandey, at the very least, who will be familiar with the system through their time in international cricket. But Abhimanyu was confident that the lack of experience wouldn't be too much of a barrier to overcome.

"It's a new thing, but I think guys have seen enough cricket on television, so we know a bit of how it works," he said. "In the pre-match meeting with the umpires and the referee, there is going to be an explanation about how it works and what are the technologies available and things like that. So we'll have a fair idea of it the day before the game.

"And obviously, we'll talk about it to our teams as well, so they have a fair idea of how it's working. We've been also given papers to read how it works, and the guys have seen on TV, how to take a review, and things like that."

TEMPE, Ariz. -- We should all take a moment, before salivating at the promise of the inimitable Shohei Ohtani, to commend general manager Billy Eppler for his restraint. Think about it. The Los Angeles Angels carry hopes of contention into this season, as evidenced by the $245 million addition of Anthony Rendon. But they understand, like the rest of us, that they're at least one front-line starting pitcher away from becoming a serious threat. If you watched Ohtani pitch as a rookie in 2018, you quickly realized he had that type of potential. And yet Eppler -- whose contract is entering its final season, and who might remain GM only if the Angels reach the playoffs -- is playing it slow, even though Ohtani wants to go fast.

"There's what we want," Eppler said, "and there's what we can do."

As part of their introductory presentation to first-time minor leaguers, the Angels narrow a player's career down to two different types of pain -- the pain of discipline and the pain of disappointment. The pain of discipline involves the daily sacrifices made to achieve a greater goal, such as getting proper sleep, eating right and staying hydrated. The penalty for not enduring that pain, the Angels preach, is the pain of disappointment -- of not reaching goals, of not making it to the big leagues, of not maximizing potential. Eppler attempts to apply this mantra to himself, while handling the most unique baseball player in a century.

"It's practice what you preach," said Eppler, approaching his fifth season as the Angels' GM. "We have to have the pain of discipline here. Because if we don't have the pain of discipline, we'll have the pain of disappointment -- and that's not having Shohei able. We want him able, as much as possible."

From the start of April to the end of May 2018, a 23-year-old Shohei Ohtani, having spent his entire life in Japan, proved that he was capable of flourishing in a two-way role not seen since the days of Babe Ruth. On the mound, he posted a 3.18 ERA and struck out 57 batters in 45⅓ innings, boasting a fastball that often reached triple digits and a splitter that looked impossible to hit. In the batter's box, he managed a .955 OPS and 14 extra-base hits in 112 plate appearances, displaying easy power and surprising speed.

But then, a week into June, Ohtani's UCL gave out, robbing the sport of its greatest spectacle. Ohtani wound up winning the American League Rookie of the Year Award and put up 137 wRC+ from 2018 to 2019, a mark topped by only 16 players with at least 750 plate appearances during that span. But half of his skill set went mostly idle. Now, after undergoing Tommy John surgery, then recovering from knee soreness that halted the late stages of his throwing program, Ohtani is ready to resume doing what was long considered impossible at baseball's highest level -- with clear limitations.

Ohtani will not begin the season in the rotation, partly because a minor knee operation forced him to finish his throwing program late last year and partly because the Angels prefer to limit his innings on the front end. A new rule that designates two-way players allows someone like Ohtani to remain on his rehab program as a pitcher without having to go on the injured list, thus allowing him to contribute as a DH in the meantime. The Angels will take advantage of that through April.

When Ohtani does return -- roughly six weeks into the start of the season -- he will pitch once a week, not every five games, which means the Angels will technically field a six-man rotation. Initially, at least, he will not be in the lineup the day before or the day after his starts. Hitting on the day of his start, an idea floated by new manager Joe Maddon, will not occur unless the Angels are playing in a National League park.

Even with all those parameters in place, Ohtani will be on track for about 20 starts as a pitcher and at least 100 games as designated hitter.

It's enough for him to make a major impact both on the mound and at the plate.

"I'm really looking forward to it," Ohtani, speaking through an interpreter, said of returning to a two-way role. "I came over here to do this and I wasn't able to do it last year, so I'm excited to try to get it back on track."

Maddon believed long ago that it was only a matter of time before someone like Ohtani came along. He tried molding a two-way player himself while coaching in the Angels' minor league system in the early 1990s. The team had a left-handed pitcher named Deshawn Warren who was also skilled with the bat and could run like a deer. Maddon had Warren do the 60-yard dash with the position players one spring and watched him beat everybody. He thought Warren could occasionally DH, perhaps even play a little center field when needed.

Maddon made his pitch to Danny O'Brien, the Angels' GM at the time, but the idea was squashed in an era when position players hardly even changed positions. The sport was not ready for something that seemed so unconventional. Still, Maddon considered two-way players an inevitability. He sat with Ohtani when the Chicago Cubs tried to recruit him three offseasons ago and noticed a young man who had the commitment to match the talent. Over the past two years, as Ohtani seemed to breeze through major league competition, Maddon tried his best to watch him. He noticed "a tension-free, effortless kind of athlete."

"Those are the guys you're always looking for because normally that skill set continues to get better," Maddon said. "It normally does. And it takes a long time for it to regress."

Ohtani, now 25, got his first driver's license over the offseason, but still hasn't driven by himself and has hardly even considered venturing onto the highway.

Driving was hardly necessary for him in Japan. Players must live in dormitories during their first four years in Nippon Professional Baseball, after which they are free to find their own place. Ohtani chose to stay in his dorm for his fifth and final year in the NPB because it was closer to the facility and it allowed him to narrow his focus. Eppler learned this during the recruiting process and considered it a testament to Ohtani's commitment to baseball.

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In 2018, Ohtani's talent and commitment quickly became obvious to those in the Angels' clubhouse. By 2019, after growing more comfortable with the culture and language, Ohtani began to reveal himself as a prankster with sharp comedic timing. Some teammates found him hilarious.

In the meantime, though, Eppler believes Ohtani's competitiveness has been underappreciated.

It showed in the battery of conditioning tests Angels players go through so that the training staff can determine a baseline for their fatigue levels. Most of the players get competitive with the tests, but Ohtani took it to a different level. He performed poorly the first year, largely because a lot of the drills were foreign to him. By the second year, he was finishing within the top 10% in practically every category. Eppler was stunned. He learned that Ohtani researched the proper techniques for the drills on YouTube and practiced until he mastered them.

"He got really good at all of them -- all the med balls, the jumps, everything," Eppler said. "It stood out."

Eppler made a serious run at free agent Gerrit Cole this past offseason, but watched him sign a nine-year, $324 million contract with the New York Yankees. Cole was born and raised in Orange County, but he grew up a Yankees fan and made it clear that his goal was to give himself the best chance at winning the World Series. Many, including Angels owner Arte Moreno, considered the pairing a fait accompli.

"You knew, no matter what I bid, we were gonna get outbid," Moreno said.

The Angels pivoted to Rendon, then failed to acquire Corey Kluber and basically bypassed the second layer of the free-agent market for starting pitchers, instead trading for Dylan Bundy and signing Julio Teheran -- two durable-yet-uninspiring arms who will join the rotation alongside Andrew Heaney and Griffin Canning. The Angels have maintained the payroll flexibility and prospect capital to add a top-of-the-rotation starter before the July 31 trade deadline, but true aces are rare and often unavailable.

Ohtani, the Angels' cleanup hitter, remains their best candidate.

"I'm excited about Ohtani and really excited he feels great," Moreno said. "They're letting him throw and hit and run. He's wide open. That's like getting a free agent."

Nick Kyrgios accused the Mexican Open crowd of "disrespect" after he was booed off court following his first-round retirement against Ugo Humbert.

Kyrgios, 24, was only on court for 32 minutes before retiring with a wrist injury after losing the first set 6-3.

It was his first appearance since last month's Australian Open because of wrist and shoulder injuries.

"I'm not healthy. I tried to come here, I tried to play," said Kyrgios, who later swore during the news conference.

Kyrgios, who was defending champion in Acapulco, was 4-1 down when he called a medical timeout so he could receive treatment on his wrist.

He managed to continue and twice hold his serve, but after Frenchman Humbert saw out the set Kyrgios signalled that he was unable to continue.

Once the crowd realised Kyrgios was retiring, he was booed.

"I've been doing media for the tournament, been helping out," added Kyrgios. "I tried to give the fans a little bit of tennis. And their disrespect?"

Kyrgios had not played since his fourth-round defeat by Rafael Nadal in Melbourne, where he had received praise for his improved on-court behaviour as well as his response to the Australian bushfires.

The Australian said he had "made progress as a human" after having been placed on a six-month probationary period and given a suspended 16-week ban in September for "aggravated behaviour" on court.

Javier "Chicharito" Hernandez is enjoying the advantages of living in Los Angeles as he gets set for the new Major League Soccer season.

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The Mexican forward, who will play in the 25th season of MLS with LA Galaxy, attended the Staples Center for the LA Lakers' clash with New Orleans Pelicans.

And he had the opportunity to chat with his idol LeBron James ...

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Dream come true

A post shared by Javier "Chicharito" Hernández (@ch14_) on Feb 25, 2020 at 7:22pm PST

"Dream come true," Hernandez wrote on Instagram with a picture of his meeting with the Lakers star.

The MLS season starts this weekend and Chicharito's Galaxy will begin on Saturday with a visit to Houston Dynamo.

Hernandez, who did not find the net in LA Galaxy's preseason, was also recently invited to the Staples Center to drop the puck prior to the beginning of the NHL game between LA Kings and Florida Panthers.

James upstaged new NBA hope Zion Williamson on Tuesday, scoring 40 points in the Lakers' 118-109 win over the Pelicans.

Virat Kohli's match aggregate of 21 runs in the Wellington Test against New Zealand, which went the way of the home team by 10 wickets, has allowed Steven Smith to reclaim the top spot in the Test rankings for batsmen, the Australian getting to No. 1 for the eighth time in his career.

The top spot has changed hands between Smith and Kohli for the longest time, with only Kane Williamson occupying the position for a brief eight-day period in December 2015, and the New Zealand captain has returned to No. 3 on the table by jumping past Marnus Labuschagne after scoring 89 in his only innings at Basin Reserve.

Among the Indian batsmen who were part of the action in Wellington, Ajinkya Rahane's 46 and 29 have taken him up by a spot to No. 8 and Mayank Agarwal has gone up to No. 10 following scores of 34 and 58, but Cheteshwar Pujara has slipped two spots to ninth after identical scores of 11 in the two innings. From the New Zealand side, Ross Taylor, who was playing his 100th Test, has gone up three spots to No. 13 after scoring 44 the only time he got to bat.

Over to the bowlers, and there were big gains for Tim Southee and Trent Boult, who picked up nine and wickets in the match, respectively. Southee has moved up eight positions to sixth, his best since being No. 5 in June 2014, while Boult has moved up four spots to joint-13th with Pakistan's Mohammad Abbas. Neil Wagner, who missed the first Test against India because of the birth of his first child, remains the top-ranked New Zealand bowler at No. 2 behind Pat Cummins.

The Bangladesh v Zimbabwe Test in Dhaka, meanwhile, was a great one for the home side, which won by an innings and 106 runs.

Their stars were Mushfiqur Rahim and Mominul Haque with the bat and Nayeem Hasan and Abu Jayed with the ball, and they too gained in the rankings. Mushfiqur's unbeaten 203 lifted him five places to No. 20, while Haque's 132 helped him go up to No. 39, a rise of five spots. Hasan's nine wickets for the match took him up 29 places to 38th, while Jayed, who picked up four wickets in the Zimbabwe first innings, got to No. 46, up by 11.

Craig Ervine, the stand-in captain in Sean Williams' absence, played his part for Zimbabwe with 107 and 43, the best for his team in either innings, and moved up 15 places to 40th place.

The ECB have announced the appointment of David Court as player identification lead, filling the vacancy left by Mo Bobat's promotion to the role of performance director in October.

Court, who will work closely with Bobat and with Ed Smith's selection panel, has spent the last four years at the FA as performance education lead, having previously worked for the ECB as a regional performance manager and for Surrey in various roles.

"I'm looking forward to continuing the excellent work done in player identification in recent years and supporting England's short, medium and long-term selection needs," Court said. "The prospect of leading the scouting team is exciting, as is working closely with the counties who work hard to develop players."

"I'm absolutely delighted to have somebody of David's calibre joining us as player identification lead," Bobat said. "It's great to be able to bring him back to the ECB for what is a crucial role within our men's pathway and I have no doubt that David's experiences within football over the last few years will add huge value to us as an organisation.

"We've made significant progress in how we identify players across every level of our international pathway and we're ambitious about firmly establishing ourselves as world-leading in this area. A key responsibility will be to work closely with our counties and through the new County Partnership Agreement (CPA), enhance the rigour of player identification structures and systems across the county game.

"David's knowledge of both cricket and talent identification, alongside his experience of leading talent identification and technical director programmes for the FA, make him the ideal candidate to help us realise those ambitions."

FONTANA, Calif. – In a dogfight to the finish line, Ashton Crowder beat Garrett Lowe in a battle of teenagers to become a two-time eNASCAR Coca-Cola iRacing Series winner on Tuesday night.

Crowder, 17, fought tooth and nail with Lowe, 18, down the home stretch in the second race of the season. The pair exchanged the top spot four times in the final five laps of the 100-lap, 200-mile event, with Crowder’s decisive move coming on lap 98 of 100.

The Charlotte, N.C., resident took command by holding true to the outside lane when it mattered most. His momentum off the higher groove propelled him past Lowe’s Wood Brothers Gaming Ford Mustang, and then Crowder eked out a car length more at the finish.

Though Lowe held the race lead on the 96th rotation, Crowder’s determination paid off two laps later, shortly after the pair exchanged the top spot twice in one circuit on lap 97.

Tuesday night’s thriller marked Crowder’s second series victory, as well as his second in the last six races dating back to 2019.

“That was pretty cool,” Crowder said after celebrating with a frontstretch burnout. “I told Garrett over the drivers’ radio with like 10 (laps) to go not to go then, to wait until five to go … because I didn’t want us to get caught by Bobby (Zalenski). Thankfully that didn’t happen.”

Crowder was outside the top 10 when the race’s first of two cautions waved past the halfway point, and he didn’t take the lead for the first time all night until lap 79.

But once out in front, Crowder commanded the field when it counted, pacing 16 of the final 22 laps en route to his first triumph at the virtual Auto Club Speedway.

The teenager noted afterward it was a huge show of growth from his entire team which culminated in a big victory for Burton Kligerman eSports, the team co-owned by NASCAR on NBC broadcast personalities Jeff Burton and Parker Kligerman.

“Everyone that builds these race cars has stepped up, because we weren’t all that good last year,” he added. “We got a win (at Darlington Raceway), but it was mostly off of strategy. The cars overall were lacking at that point. We spent a lot of time in the winter testing our butts off and it’s showing, I feel. We got out front and we had a lot of speed all night.

“It was a tad bit loose at times, but overall, I think we held on really well considering where we restarted toward the end,” Crowder noted. “I think Garrett may have fallen back a bit more than I did, but it was a huge group effort tonight. I’m so happy to get the win here.”

Lowe came up one spot short of securing a second-career victory in his own right, but was quick to note the fun he had in battling Crowder in the closing stages of the race.

“We had a fantastic car all night; I can’t thank everyone at Wood Brothers Racing enough,” said Lowe. “We couldn’t quite get there at the end. I think I may have pushed him away more than I was able to stay close to him in the draft. I think we’ve got plenty to look forward to for the rest of the season, though; I feel like we showed plenty tonight and we’ll be able to carry this momentum forward as we get into the heavy part of the season.”

The official margin between the two teenagers at the finish line was .128 seconds.

Bobby Zalenski tried to run down Crowder and Lowe in the final 10 laps, but could not get to the front pair and settled for a third-place finish.

Zalenski and Jake Nichols, who finished fourth after parlaying a one-stop pit strategy into a charge from 33rd on the grid, both led 13 laps but weren’t in the picture for the win in the end.

Chris Overland crossed the line fifth to give Wood Brothers Racing a pair of cars inside the top five, followed by John Gorlinsky, Casey Kirwan, Jimmy Mullis, Blake Reynolds and Jarl Teien.

Four-time series champion Ray Alfalla led 13 laps in his own right during his attempt at the one-stop pit strategy, but his hopes were squelched by an ill-timed caution past halfway.

Alfalla was scored 11th, while polesitter Keegan Leahy finished 22nd after heavy contact with Santiago Tirres in turn three during the second half of the event.

The night’s second caution flag at lap 58, when Michael Guariglia slapped the outside wall off turn four and came down into Logan Clampitt, collected seven cars in all – including two-time Fontana eNASCAR winner Ryan Luza, who ended up 36th, two laps down.

Defending champion Zack Novak was also eliminated in the melee, credited with 40th.

The eNASCAR Coca-Cola iRacing Series season continues March 17 at the virtual Homestead-Miami (Fla.) Speedway, where Novak won last fall to secure the title.

The finish:

Ashton Crowder, Garrett Lowe, Bobby Zalenski, Jake Nichols, Chris Overland, John Gorlinsky, Casey Kirwan, Jimmy Mullis, Blake Reynolds, Jarl Teien, Ray Alfalla, Matt Bussa, Brad Davies, Phillip Diaz, Jeremy Allen, Caine Cook, Alex McCollum, Bob Bryant, Santiago Tirres, Nick Ottinger, Brandon Kettelle, Keegan Leahy, Nathan Lyon, Justin Bolton, Corey Vincent, Graham Bowlin, Kollin Keister, Steve Sheehan, Eric J. Smith, Michael Conti, Dylan Duval, Chris Shearburn, Michael Guest, Malik Ray, Christian Challiner, Ryan Luza, Brian Schoenburg, Logan Clampitt, Michael Guariglia, Zack Novak.

Lead Changes: 30 among 13 drivers

Lap Leaders: Keegan Leahy 1-2, Ryan Luza 3-10, Bobby Zalenski 11, Logan Clampitt 12-14, Chris Shearburn 15, Logan Clampitt 16-18, Chris Shearburn 19, Logan Clampitt 20-22, Chris Shearburn 23-24, Logan Clampitt 25-26, Casey Kirwan 27, Logan Clampitt 28, Keegan Leahy 29-34, Nick Ottinger 35, Ray Alfalla 36-48, Jake Nichols 49, Nathan Lyon 50, Keegan Leahy 51-55, John Gorlinsky 56-57, Jake Nichols 58-66, Bobby Zalenski 67-69, Jake Nichols 70-71, Bobby Zalenski 72, Jake Nichols 73, Bobby Zalenski 74-78, Ashton Crowder 79-81, Casey Kirwan 82, Bobby Zalenski 83-85, Ashton Crowder 86-95, Garrett Lowe 96-97, Ashton Crowder 98-100.

Laps Led: Ashton Crowder 16, Keegan Leahy 13, Bobby Zalenski 13, Ray Alfalla 13, Jake Nichols 13, Logan Clampitt 12, Ryan Luza 8, Chris Shearburn 4, Casey Kirwan 2, John Gorlinsky 2, Garrett Lowe 2, Nick Ottinger 1, Nathan Lyon 1.

Caution Flags: Twice for six laps

Margin of Victory: .128 seconds

Average Speed: 44.556 seconds (161.594 mph)

Just imagine that despite the prospect of a two-year ban from European competition from the start of next season, Manchester City are able to blank out all of the noise and win the Champions League for the first time at the end of this campaign.

On the one hand, it would be the ultimate achievement and crowning glory of Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed al Nahyan's transformation of the club. As City chairman Khaldoon al Mubarak told ESPN in an exclusive interview in August 2018: "We should win it [Champions League] in the next 10 years, and obviously, sooner rather than later."

But if UEFA's ban sticks and City spend the next two years unable to compete for European club football's biggest prize, then Champions League glory in May in Istanbul could prove to be a poisoned chalice rather than the Holy Grail. All of a sudden, the likes of Raheem Sterling, Kevin De Bruyne, Aymeric Laporte and the rest of City's superstars -- not to mention manager Pep Guardiola -- would have scaled the highest mountain at the club, only to find that the next two years will offer nothing more challenging than a domestic scene they have already conquered more than once.

City find themselves in a catch-22 situation. If they win the Champions League, there is nothing else for their array of stars to achieve at the club, and such glory could trigger an exodus sparked by ambition and harsh financial realities.

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As Guardiola's team prepare to face Real Madrid on Wednesday in Spain in the first leg of their round-of-16 Champions League tie, the City hierarchy are battling to overturn the ban imposed by UEFA earlier this month, after the club was found to have committed "serious breaches" of club licensing and financial fair play regulations. Ferran Soriano, City's chief executive, has claimed that the charges against the club are "simply not true," and an appeal has been lodged with the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).

It is a fight that will rumble on for some time off the pitch, and it is one City cannot afford to lose. But, paradoxically, winning the Champions League this season -- in the club's ninth attempt -- threatens to bring everything crashing down in the dressing room if CAS upholds the UEFA ban.

There are two strands to the battle facing City in the event of a failure to overturn the ban. Even if City are able to have it reduced to one season on appeal, they will still have to find a way of keeping their squad together.

First of all, they must deal with the financial implications of missing out on the funds that come with participating in the Champions League. Despite being eliminated at the quarterfinal stage by Tottenham last season, City still banked €93.24 million (£77.98m) in Champions League prize money. If they were to win this season's competition, they would expect to earn a similar figure to the €111.1m (£99.92m) taken home by Liverpool following their success in winning their sixth European Cup in June.

Missing out on close to £80m-per-season for the next two years, plus the loss of gate money that would come with staging no European fixtures, would leave a major hole in City's finances, and it is not one that could be filled by donations from the pockets of Sheikh Mansour. If City are forced to operate with an £80m shortfall for each of the next two seasons, they will struggle to fund an annual wage bill that stood at £315.3m in their 2018-19 financial report.

Although they have sensibly tied their key players to long-term contracts -- Sterling (2023), De Bruyne (2023), Laporte (2025), Bernardo Silva (2025) -- the flip side of having them secured for so long is that the club have to be able to pay their wages. Being without at least £160m over the next two years will place a strain on City, just as it would hurt any club.

Secondly, even if City can ride the financial storm for two years without Champions League money, the players might not be so keen to miss out on the biggest games in the most glamorous competition.

Sterling's flirtation with Real last week, in an interview with Spanish newspaper AS, was probably a sign of things to come. The England forward insisted that he is "really happy" at City but was quick to add that Real are a "fantastic club." Maybe Sterling was just being polite, playing to his audience, but timing is everything, and with a cloud hanging over City right now, it left the impression of a player keeping his options open.

But why shouldn't Sterling, or any of his teammates, play that game? City have been fantastic for Sterling, De Bruyne, Sergio Aguero, David Silva and many others in recent years. They have given them a platform to win big and earn big, and if they help City win the Champions League this season, it will be mission accomplished in every sense.

That is when the problems will start: When a player has nothing left to achieve and the biggest challenges are taken away from him, it is inevitable that he will look for something more appealing.

City might end up winning the Champions League this season, and it might prove to be more trouble than it is worth.