South Zone completed a hat-trick of BCL titles after beating East Zone by 105 runs in the final in Chittagong. The win came shortly after tea on the fourth day when they bowled out East Zone for 248 runs, with Shafiul Islam and Mahedi Hasan picking up three wickets each.

South Zone had dominated most of the game after posting 486 batting first. Farhad Reza struck his sixth first-class century after fifties from Fazle Mahmud, Anamul Haque and Shamsur Rahman.

East Zone were bowled out for 273 in their reply, with veteran left-arm spinner Abdur Razzak picking up 7 for 102, his 41st haul of five wickets or more. South Zone were then bowled out for 140 in their second innings, but despite the best efforts of Hasan Mahmud and Abu Hider who took four wickets each, the 354-run fourth innings target was too much against a formidable South Zone attack.

Only Mahmudul Hasan batted out more than two hours for his 81, otherwise they capitulated in 68.4 overs. South Zone have now won the tournament five times, underlining the region's strength in producing quality players as well as banking on a group of experienced cricketers.

WHEN GIFS OF the "Tiny Hands" guy from Burger King started showing up on his phone before the NFL combine, Brandon Allen began to wonder if the pre-draft process had finally gotten just a little bit, well, out of hand. After a rough start as the quarterback at Arkansas, where fans egged and torched his truck (not at once, mind you, but in separate instances), Allen emerged as an NFL prospect after throwing for 30 touchdowns and leading the SEC in passer rating (166.5) as a senior in 2015. An invite to the Senior Bowl followed, and shortly after landing in Mobile, Alabama, Allen strolled into a room full of NFL team reps who unceremoniously ordered him to hold up his throwing hand.

Completely unaware and somewhat amused that hand size was even a thing, Allen halfheartedly offered up his hand without so much as straightening his digits. After all, he had lost a fumble a grand total of five times in four years at Arkansas, and he had thrown for 406 yards and seven TDs (and no picks) against Mississippi State in 30-degree temps. Still, a scout stepped forward with a tape measure, stretched it between Allen's pinkie and thumb and barked out "Eight and a half!" over his shoulder to audible gasps.

Before he even knew what was happening, Allen had been swept up into the annual spring revival of the QB Hand-Size Myth. The latest victim? LSU's Joe Burrow, who made headlines on the first day of the 2020 combine when his hand measured a minuscule 9 inches flat -- a quarter-inch smaller than Patrick Mahomes' mitts. The theory behind all of this, that a college quarterback's hand size correlates to his eventual fumble rate and overall performance on Sundays, has become one of the most prevalent metrics in NFL scouting. There are, however, just a few tiny theoretical stumbling blocks with this edict. For starters, it's based on a physiologically flawed principle and is, according to decades of data, utterly meaningless as a predictor of NFL performance.

Other than that, it's perfect.

And so word spread quickly in 2016 about Allen's phalangeal deformity, and the next time he checked his phone, his college buddies had filled it with the David Spade-like character from the viral Burger King ads who is terrified his doll-sized hands can't grasp a Whopper. "It was all so silly, but it was a huge ordeal for a while," says Allen, who started three games for the 2019 Denver Broncos. "I'm getting Burger King commercials on my phone, and they're actually wasting time on air on national sports shows talking about my hands, and I was like, 'OK, this is getting ridiculous.'"

But it was the NFL draft and quarterbacks, so the ridiculousness was just getting started.

After the 2016 Senior Bowl, Allen began preparing for the combine at the XPE Sports training facility in Boca Raton, Florida. When the program's masseuse overheard him lamenting his tiny mitts, and with signing bonuses hanging in the balance, Allen began receiving deep tissue massages to relax and elongate the connective tissue in his right hand. A month later, when he showed up in Indianapolis, Allen's hand had magically grown to 8⅞ inches (the same as Tony Romo's once measured), and the spotlight had shifted to Jared Goff, the eventual No. 1 pick, who just barely broke 9 inches. "It matters because we play in a division where all of a sudden there's rain, there's snow and it's different," then-Cleveland Browns coach Hue Jackson said at the time, echoing the hand-size myth's oft-repeated origin story. "Guys that have big hands can grip the ball better in those environmental situations, and so we'll look for a guy that fits what we're looking for in a quarterback. Is hand size important? Yes it is."

To which Goff just scoffed: "I just heard about that yesterday. I've been told I have pretty big hands my whole life. I never had a problem with that, and I don't expect it to be a problem at all."

It wasn't.

Two years later, Goff had led the Rams to the Super Bowl and Jackson was looking for work.

At the time, Allen's miracle-working hand masseuse was the talk of nearly every dinner table at St. Elmo Steak House, the popular combine hangout. In Indy, Allen's Instagram account was flooded with queries from terrified tiny-handed QBs across the country afraid to patronize Burger King and begging to learn his secret. But he says now it was all blown out of proportion, that he received only a few "treatments" and that the biggest difference was that the combine hand measurement had been done with a ruler taped to a desktop, which allowed him to lean all of his body weight onto his palm and stretch his hand for a proper measurement.

Listen: ESPN senior writer David Fleming discusses the hand-size myth on the ESPN Daily podcast.

Allen never broke the 9-inch mark, but he was nevertheless selected by Jacksonville in the sixth round. He spent 2017 and '18 with the Rams and in 2019 went 1-2 as a starter in Denver, filling in for Joe Flacco. He has yet to fumble as a pro -- or find a better summation of the hand-size myth's silliness than John Elway's take from 2016.

"As a player, you never look at hand size," the Broncos' general manager and Hall of Fame quarterback said. "As a GM, you always do."

THE NOTION THAT hand size correlates to strength and virility is as old as man himself, and almost as dumb. Although widely debunked, the "size matters" theory was popularized in the NFL thanks in part to Hall of Fame QB Brett Favre. Trying to quantify why a second-round washout in Atlanta became a three-time MVP in Green Bay, some Packers personnel were convinced that Favre thrived inside the icy confines of Lambeau Field because of his abnormally large 10⅜-inch hands. Others, including once-renowned offensive mind Chip Kelly, even said hand size was more important than a QB's height. "It never made sense to me," Allen says. "I kept asking: Where do the facts come from to back up this theory on big hands? Because it seemed more like an old-time measurement that doesn't mean anything anymore, like something that didn't have any factual basis behind it but people still went with anyway."

As is human nature, while ignoring the numerous big-handed busts, scouts instead began to lock in on Drew Brees, Russell Wilson, Peyton Manning and other great quarterbacks with large hands who, in turn, selectively proved their theory. And then, without bothering to study the physiology of the grip or the abundant and readily available player performance data, the NFL scouting community (and, yes, the media) mixed common sense and an urban legend from Green Bay into QB canon: The Bigger the Hands, the Better. Period. End of discussion. All along, though, it was never more than what psychologists call an "illusory correlation." It's a logical, assumptive shortcut the human brain creates to form an overriding belief by conflating certain bits of anecdotal evidence. Every summer, for instance, we stay out of the ocean after news reports about shark attacks while ignoring the fact that millions of people swam safely in those exact waters.

While no one is arguing that a strong grip isn't important for quarterbacks, there is no biological or kinetic proof that hand size correlates in any way to hand strength. Even with hands the size of catcher's mitts, Favre still fumbled at an alarming rate (166 times, more than any QB in NFL history and good for 0.55 per game), far greater than that of his replacement, Aaron Rodgers (0.43), whose hands are a quarter-inch smaller. While you can't blame Packers scouts for trying (or wanting to claim some credit, or deeper understanding), you just can't quantify gamers like Favre with a single measurement, or a thousand. As frustrating as it is for the people charged with evaluating them, the greats are always more about art than science. Although, just to complete the ouroboros and confuse the issue, when asked about his ability to hold on to the ball, Rodgers held up his hands and smirked: "Size matters."

Rodgers was kidding, but to most scouts, hand size remains no laughing matter. And so every spring in the buildup to the NFL draft, quarterback prospects get dealt the same bad hand. The draft class after Allen and Goff featured a future NFL and Super Bowl MVP quarterback whose 9¼-inch hands inspired this actual headline: "Will Patrick Mahomes' Small Hands Tank His NFL Draft Stock?" Last year it was Kyler Murray's turn. The Heisman Trophy winner and eventual No. 1 pick had the smallest hands (9½ inches) of any passer taken in the first round but the lowest fumble rate (0.31) and highest QBR (55.7) of any rookie quarterback. The silly season has continued with the 2020 draft class. Burrow got things started when his hands sent Twitter into a meme frenzy on Monday. In Mobile, Jordan Love, from Utah State, was a sideshow for half a day after word spread about his 10⅝-inch measurement, the biggest set of hands anyone had seen since, well, Paxton Lynch or Cody Kessler. Love's draft stock has since risen. And long before he declared for the 2020 draft, when Tua Tagovailoa measured 10⅛ at this junior pro day at Alabama, ESPN's Kirk Herbstreit went so far as to say that number was "more significant than his actual arm strength."

Considering retirement after I was informed the football will be slipping out of my tiny hands. Please keep me in your thoughts.

— Joey Burrow (@Joe_Burrow10) February 24, 2020

That new theory on biomechanics is sure to interest the Cincinnati Bengals, who are almost certainly going to select a quarterback with the No. 1 overall pick. But when Bengals coach Zac Taylor, who played quarterback at Nebraska, was asked about the role hand size would play in the team's selection, he reacted in a telling manner and one similar to the way nearly everyone else inside the NFL reacted when hand size was brought up: a helpless shrug followed by an embarrassed, apologetic laugh as if word had leaked that teams were using palm readers and psychics.

"Look, plenty of guys have had great seasons, great careers and Super Bowl seasons, and people would say they have small hands," Taylor says. "I have small hands, so I'm a little bit sensitive to it. I'm about a 9 flat, which is generally last when it comes to starting quarterbacks in the league." Here, Taylor holds out his hands in mock disgust and jokes, "It's probably why I'm not a starting quarterback in the NFL right now. You can look at this both ways: There are some great quarterbacks in the league that have 10½-inch hands, and there are some great quarterbacks who have 9s, just like myself, that are playing deep in the playoffs. There are always exceptions to everything."

Behind Taylor, on a wall inside the Mobile Convention Center, was a giant banner of Senior Bowl icon Baker Mayfield. One season after Hue Jackson's bold combine proclamation about the significance of large QB hands on cold-weather franchises, the Browns used the No. 1 overall pick in 2018 on -- wait for it -- the QB with the smallest hands in the draft. Since then, of course, Mayfield (9¼) has had the lowest fumble rate (0.41) and the second-highest QBR (51.8) of the five QBs taken in the first round that year. "Yes, we're overthinking it with hand size, which is what we tend to do in the NFL," says Jim Nagy, the executive director of the Senior Bowl and an ESPN analyst who won four Super Bowl rings as an NFL scout. "It's insane the amount of work and minutiae in scouting now, and hand-size measurements is just a microcosm of that."

AS A BIOMETRIC, QB hand size is fundamentally flawed on every level.

For starters, it's hard to take the statistic too seriously when there isn't a single universally accepted method for how to measure hand size. And so, as was the case with Allen, the data can vary wildly between the Senior Bowl, the combine and pro day workouts on campus. And while the size of an NFL football is close to universal -- 11 inches tip to tip and 22 inches around at the center -- where and how quarterbacks grip the ball isn't. "Every single quarterback grabs the ball just a little bit differently," Mahomes says. "It's hard to describe what makes a grip feel right because it's a mix of everything, starting with the shape of the football, and not every football is exactly the same. There are ones that are more ovalish, ones that are more rigid, ones where the laces are big or tight to the ball."

That's why Lamar Jackson puts his 9½-inch hand higher up on the laces with his pointer finger practically on the cone of the ball, while Troy Aikman threw with his hand closer to the middle of the ball and his palm over the laces. "My hands aren't the biggest," Mayfield explains, "so I [put my] ring finger on the end and my pinkie four down on the laces." All three of these quarterbacks place their hands on different areas of the ball. And if grip quality is determined by the percentage of the ball's circumference a passer can cover with his hand, unless all quarterbacks are forced to hold the ball in the same spot, it's impossible to accurately compare Grip Size A directly to Grip Size B.

Next, there's the pinkie problem. While the pinkie is an integral part of the scouting measurement, it has virtually no physiological significance in grip strength. (The NBA ignores the little finger altogether, measuring hand "height" from the wrist to the tip of the middle finger.) Last year, when ESPN surveyed nearly every starting quarterback in the NFL about their grips, players were asked which digit was the least important to throwing mechanics, and the universal response was the pinkie. It's so vestigial that Mahomes, the Super Bowl MVP, revealed he often does drills where he leaves the pinkie entirely off the ball in order to work on his wrist and the four fingers that actually matter.

"The pinkie is useless," says David Dellanave, who owns Movement Minneapolis, where he specializes in training and coaching grip strength, a niche branch of weightlifting. "So to that point it's doubly stupid to use this measurement because the pinkie is useless when it comes to gripping something."

When he wants to gauge someone's hand strength, Dellanave doesn't get out a tape measure. Instead, he uses several diagnostic tests and tools, including a $30 grip dynamometer, a squeezable clipboard-sized tool that instantly measures grip strength digitally within one-hundredth of a pound. This year, the Senior Bowl teamed up with Zebra Technologies and placed GPS tracking chips in the ball and in shoulder pads in order to precisely track player speed and ball movement. In the occasionally archaic world of scouting, this is a major step forward. But for the time being, when it comes to the most important and expensive hands in the game, they're sticking with the good old-fashioned tape measure. "That's gotta be so simple -- hand the kid a device, let him squeeze it, done," Nagy says. "The NFL and scouting in general is kind of antiquated in their methods, and hand size is a good example of that. We're making strides with technology, but for whatever reason, we just haven't gotten there with the grip yet."

These disqualifying issues with the QB hand-size measurement, however, are minor compared to the metric's central, catastrophic flaw. In the NFL, the purpose of measuring the length between a QB's pinkie and thumb is the belief that there is a relationship between this distance and a passer's hand strength, fumble rate and overall performance.

It's logical, reasonable even, to think that these two data points might be related. When you want to grab and hold something, bigger is probably better. You don't reach for tweezers when you need to pick up a cinder block. But there's zero proof that the distance between the pinkie and thumb is related in any way to the strength of the grip. "Size alone doesn't really mean anything when it comes to grip strength," Dellanave says. "I don't think there is any correlation between hand size and hand strength. You would think teams would have a ton of data and insight into this, but then again, I've seen some pretty dumb stuff in professional sports training, so I don't know."

When Taylor, the Bengals coach, was asked why NFL teams continue to measure hand size instead of what they're really after -- hand strength -- a lightbulb seemed to flicker for a split second before his eyes glazed over as if he had been asked about nuclear physics. "I don't know," he shrugged. "That's a little beyond me."

Using hand size to predict a quarterback's strength (and success) is a little like measuring a kicker's shoe size to predict field goal range and accuracy. Which means for the last few decades, the NFL, a $15 billion business with virtually unlimited time and resources, has been drafting the most critical position in the game based, in part, on a measurement that doesn't actually measure anything.

The data resoundingly confirms that there is no actual correlation between hand size, fumbles and passing efficiency. Since 2014, there have been several studies that analyzed data from hundreds of NFL quarterbacks and each one concluded the same thing: The hand-size myth is laughable. As USA Today put it: "Hand size has nothing to do with a quarterback's ability to hold on to the football [even in cold weather]. ... Just to drive that point home, the correlation coefficient between the number of letters in the quarterback's name and their fumble rate is six times stronger than hand size." ESPN Stats & Information's own analysis went back through the past 10 draft classes and found that the group of QBs with the smallest hands fumbled at nearly the same rate as QBs with large hands, and, what's more, small-handed QBs had a slightly higher QBR than passers with medium-sized hands.

More than anything, what the data shows is that by the time a quarterback has reached the level of the NFL draft, the selection process has made whatever variation is left in hand size pointless. By the combine, the range of hand sizes of potential quarterbacks is so preposterously narrow that to back the hand-size myth, you'd have to believe that the difference between a perfect passing hand and an unacceptable one is found in a variance half the width of your phone.

If that's too theoretical, just focus on Mahomes and his supposedly disqualifying 9¼-inch hands and the way he is able to pump-fake, draw the ball back, palm it and scramble with it in the open field like an NBA point guard on grass. "Scouting is checks and balances, so if there's a concern with hand size, it's just one more thing you have to go back to the tape and double-check," Nagy says. "You're not running back into the draft room yelling, 'This guy's got 9-inch hands! Don't take him!' I don't think that's happening. But absolutely, I think we should all maybe take a breath on hand size."

AS OVERWHELMING AS the data is, it's simply no match for human nature. The best -- and perhaps only -- use for QB hand size might be as a window into the pervasive, stubbornly old-fashioned groupthink of the NFL. This is a league where inside the bunker mentality of the draft-day war room, consensus is often valued far more than critical thinking. It's a league slow to innovate, where old habits die hard, where coaches who dare to run the ball on fourth-and-1 (when the conversion rate is near 65%) are still considered mavericks and loose cannons. And it's an environment in which the theory that bigger hands are better is considered to be true simply because scouts have always believed it to be true.

To move on from the QB hand-size measurement, then, or to even just trade it for a grip dynamometer, would first require some of the biggest egos in sports to admit they've been wrong for decades. There's a better chance we'll see the Lions and Browns in the next Super Bowl. "I'm afraid you just opened Pandora's box," says Linda Elder, an educational psychologist and president of the Foundation for Critical Thinking. "This just shows how entrenched the human mind is in holding on to beliefs it already has."

Elder says that when a long-held belief is questioned, our brains react by overemphasizing evidence that supports the original theory. And it just so happens that three of the most respected and influential scouting departments -- Green Bay, Seattle and New England -- all have compelling, and oft-repeated, anecdotal confirmation of the hand-size myth. And there's a good chance those stories will keep it alive, no matter how much proof is offered to the contrary. "This is where the groupthink factor comes in, the power in numbers," Elder says. "You're gonna hear a lot of: 'I know what they're telling us over here with all this data and all this lousy evidence, but everyone in this room, we all know the facts. And the fact is, the best quarterbacks all have the biggest hands.'"

Besides the Favre legend in Green Bay, before the 2012 draft, the Seahawks were concerned with Russell Wilson's height (5-foot-11) until they discovered he had a high release and the hands (10¼) of someone who, proportionately, should have been 7-foot-4. In 2003, the Patriots drafted Texas Tech QB Kliff Kingsbury, the current Cardinals head coach, in the sixth round despite his 8½-inch hands. As if reliving a nightmare, Patriots staffers from that time still recall how badly Kingsbury struggled to hold on to the ball, especially as the season went on and the weather got worse. A year later, after a season that also included a stint on injured reserve, Bill Belichick cut Kingsbury, and he bounced around professional football until starting his coaching career in 2008.

Since then, Kingsbury, who developed Mahomes in college and drafted Murray in Arizona, seems to be trying to destroy the QB hand-size myth all by himself. Kingsbury, however, declined an interview request. Which is exactly what a former Patriots scout predicted would happen. "Kliff doesn't want it out there that he's got small hands," the scout said, laughing, "because of the way people equate small hands to something else."

INSIDE THE MOBILE Convention Center, an hour or so after the official weigh-in for the 2020 Senior Bowl, QB hand measurements begin circulating on Twitter. Suddenly, there is a larger than expected crowd around Utah State's Jordan Love, whose massive hands have turned him into something of a unicorn among the draft-guru underground. Laughing as he recalls the moment, Love explains to the captivated crowd that a scout used a tape measure and that his official size was, yes, 10⅝ inches (though he measured in at 10½ at the combine on Monday). "It's just part of being a quarterback," Love says, shrugging. "Height, weight, hand size."

Nearby, Michigan quarterback Shea Patterson isn't quite as forthcoming with the hand he was dealt. The look on his face is proof of how endlessly frustrating the hand-size myth can be for players on the doorstep of their dreams. After all, you can work out to get stronger and faster. You can study to improve your knowledge of the game. But you're pretty much stuck with the hands you were born with. Patterson says he thought he did everything right. He got his hands massaged. He worked tirelessly on his actual grip strength. But when he is asked about his rumored 9¼ Burger King measurement, all Patterson can do is deflect the question with humor. First, he blames his parents, naturally. Then he claims amnesia. Finally, he says with a smirk that he can't be 100 percent sure of the measurement, "but I think I was a 12 or a 13."

The more Love tries to downplay his hand size, the more the starstruck draft devotees in the crowd push back and escalate his indoctrination, insisting, out loud, just how big that number is, just how important that number is and just how unlikely it is that Love will ever fumble as a pro even during an ice storm or a flash flood. "Some people are born with small hands, some people are born with big hands. I'm not really sure what it means," Love insists. "But did I stretch my hand for the measurement? Oh yeah, definitely, I'm trying to make my hands as big as possible."

A few hours later, Love and the rest of the North squad take the field at Ladd-Peebles Stadium for practice, with representatives from every NFL team watching from the aluminum stands. With the wind picking up and temperatures dropping into the low 40s, after all the buzz about Love's giant mitts, it's a perfect opportunity for one more field test of the QB hand-size theory.

After warming up and breaking into groups for individual work, the offense and defense meet up at the 30 to take some live 11-on-11 snaps. Sporting a red No. 5 jersey and his white and blue U-State helmet, Love strolls confidently to the line of scrimmage while rubbing his hands together. He checks the safety depth and IDs the Mike linebacker. Then he places those can't-miss, once-in-a-generation 10⅝-inch hands under center.

And promptly fumbles the snap.

Dallas Mavericks guard Jalen Brunson sat out Monday's game and will miss at least the next four games with a right shoulder sprain, coach Rick Carlisle said.

Brunson, who suffered the injury during Saturday's loss to Atlanta, will travel on the team's upcoming four-game road trip while rehabbing.

"He will travel and begin rehabbing and we'll see where we are then," Carlisle said. "We've got J.J. [Barea], who is always ready. He'll be in the middle of it. He's a great luxury to have sitting there."

Brunson is averaging 8.2 points, 2.4 rebounds and 3.3 assists in 17.9 minutes per game in 57 appearances this season.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Top 10 players Daniil Medvedev and Stefanos Tsitsipas have confirmed they will play at Queen's in June.

Spain's defending champion Feliciano Lopez will return, while organisers hope Britain's Andy Murray will recover from a pelvic injury in time to play.

Former world number one Murray, a five-time champion, has not played since November's Davis Cup finals.

"Daniil and Stefanos have shown they can beat anyone in the world," said tournament director Stephen Farrow.

"Feliciano's win last year was incredibly emotional and uplifting, and Andy is our greatest champion."

Three-time Grand Slam champion Murray was forced to pull out of January's Australian Open because of the pelvic injury.

The 32-year-old said last month he was not putting a time frame on his recovery as "bone bruising" is taking longer to heal than expected.

"We know Andy is still working his way back to fitness, but we also know that he wants to play, so fingers crossed that he will be able to," added Farrow.

Russia's Medvedev, 24, is currently fifth in world rankings after reaching the fourth round in Melbourne, while Greek 21-year-old Tsitsipas, who won the Open 13 tournament in Marseille earlier in February, is sixth.

The main grass court event will run from 15 to 21 June and be live on the BBC.

On Friday, Gloucester fly-half Danny Cipriani released an emotional video tribute to his ex-girlfriend Caroline Flack on social media.

The 32-year-old spoke about his own mental health issues after former Love Island host Flack, 40, was found dead at her home in London having taken her own life.

On BBC Radio 5 Live's Rugby Union Weekly podcast, Harlequins scrum-half Danny Care, Sale wing Chris Ashton and ex-England wing Ugo Monye praised Cipriani for his bravery and opened up about their own experiences with social media and mental wellbeing.

'Personal attacks' on the day Monye's wife had a miscarriage

For Monye, the main issue is that people do not know what is going on in players' lives when they attack them on social media.

It is a situation the 36-year-old, who says he has had more abuse since starting work in the media than he used to get as a player, has personal experience of.

About four years ago, when his wife Lucy was seven weeks pregnant he was preparing to commentate on a Saracens game when he got a phone call from his sister-in-law.

"I had a feeling something was bad," he says. "I answered the phone and Lucy had just started bleeding, she'd just started having a miscarriage.

"In that moment, I was devastated. I tried to block it out because I tried to get on and do a job. I commentated on the game, did my best to get through it.

"I went home to be with her. She was in bits. I was trying to be as positive as I could. I picked up my phone and some mentions I got that day were a personal attack on me.

"I thought it was unnecessary and they didn't have a clue what was going on in my life then. The game I had just commentated on was so irrelevant. What makes them think they know me that they have the right to at me and call me whatever over a game?

"You don't know me, you don't know what's happened in my life. No-one in commentary knew that because there was no reason to share it but there is a reason to share it now."

Monye says the experience brought him "greater perspective" that "there is zero need for anyone to ever get personal".

And he believes the policies of social media platforms "absolutely have to change" to avoid other people going through something similar.

"The governance of social media is so poor now, you can be faceless and cowardly, say whatever you want and there is zero retribution," he adds.

"We want players to be accessible, but don't abuse that privilege to go out and abuse people.

"The world was a far simpler and kinder place without social media. It is only a small percentage of people that ruin it for everyone.

"Unfortunately on social media those people's voices are much louder than the ones who are really kind."

'They say, 'I hope you die''

Ashton says he struggles "to go anywhere near social media" now, comparing his feelings to a phobia, after having bad experiences with it in the past.

Around 2012, the year the 32-year-old moved from Northampton to Saracens, Ashton admits the amount of abuse left him "in a bad way".

"I took so much abuse," he explains. "Really bad stuff that if you flagged it up now people would go wild about it. Back then anyone could say what they wanted.

"They say, 'I hope you die' or 'I'm going to fill you in when I see you' or things about family. You're just there to be attacked.

"Once I've read it it's in me so it would affect me. I've got a phobia of it."

'Awful comments on pictures of my family'

For Care, who is now involved in a mental health scheme for young players, a lot of abuse is related to "indiscretions" committed earlier in his rugby career.

In a three-month period starting at the end of 2011, the Quins back was arrested three times for drink-related offences.

"You put your hand up and apologise for it but people don't forget those times you made a mistake," he adds.

"For whatever good you can do on or off the pitch, there are still people who are only going to remember the bad stuff.

"To this day, I put up a nice picture of my family and someone will feel the need to comment on Instagram with something awful."

The 33-year-old says such abuse used to have a greater impact on him, but now he deletes any negative comments and blocks the person who sent them.

"If you want to go looking for bad stuff about yourself you're going to find it," he says.

"When I was younger I read it and it affected me a lot more because I cared too much about what people thought about me. Being older and wiser, I know the people whose opinion I care about. But we're not all the same.

"Every athlete or person in the limelight deals with it differently. Some people struggle with it a lot more but that is the way I deal with it."

If you, or someone you know, have been affected by mental health issues, help and support is available at bbc.co.uk/actionline

Ospreys have named former London Irish director of rugby Toby Booth as the new head coach on a three-year deal, starting in the summer of 2020.

The 50-year-old joined Harlequins as assistant coach in November 2019 after seven years as Bath's first-team coach.

"When the opportunity was presented to join such an iconic Welsh team it made it an extremely attractive proposition," said Booth.

Booth spent eight years with London Irish, four as director of rugby.

Between 2008 and 2012, he guided the Irish exiles to Premiership and Challenge Cup finals and three successive Heineken Cup qualifications.

"The Ospreys is a side full of rich talent and international experience, it is an ambitious group and has good potential to improve," he added.

A region of talent

"Having developed players throughout my career, I look forward to adding value to this squad of players and developing their performances on the pitch.

"This rich rugby region has always produced young talent. The ability to help players reach their potential was a contributing factor in wanting this role.

"A team that has high numbers of home-grown talent is exciting for coaches and supporters. It helps achieve greater levels of consistency in effort as they are emotionally connected to the team."

Ospreys had been seeking a long-term replacement for Allen Clarke, who left in December 2019.

In January 2020, Ospreys appointed ex-Wales coach Mike Ruddock as their new performance director until the end of the 2019-20 season, with part of his role to appoint a new coaching staff.

Ruddock initially joined as a consultant in December 2019 after Clarke was no longer in charge of first-team affairs at the region, while backs coach Matt Sherratt leaves at the end of the season to join Worcester.

Sherratt and forwards coach Carl Hogg have been in charge of first-team affairs since Clarke's departure.

Ruddock's recommendation

"Toby is a vastly experienced coach who has proven himself over many years in the English Premiership with London Irish, Bath and Harlequins," said Ruddock.

"He is an excellent communicator and an innovative coach. His track record of developing a high performance rugby programme impressed the interview panel and the senior players that met with him during the recruitment process.

"There were a number of outstanding candidates on our short list however Toby's ability to outline his impressive coaching philosophy and his rugby specific knowledge marked him out as a stand out coach.

"The Ospreys board would like to thank the WRU for their involvement and support for our recruitment process and we look forward to Toby taking charge next season."

Ospreys have won only two out of 18 matches this season and are bottom of Pro14 Conference A and suffered six defeats in the Heineken Champions Cup pool stage.

For the latest Welsh rugby union news follow @BBCScrumV on Twitter.

Six Scots have been included in the initial 24-strong GB Women's Sevens squad for Tokyo 2020 after none made the final cut for the Rio 2016 squad.

Chloe Rollie, Helen Nelson, Megan Gaffney, Rhona Lloyd, Hannah Smith and Lisa Thomson, who are also part of Scotland's 15-a-side team for the Six Nations, all make the cut.

England's Emily Scarratt, who led Great Britain to a fourth place in Rio, is absent as she focuses on 15-a-side, but Abbie Brown, Heather Fisher and Amy Wilson Hardy all return.

Three Welsh women - Keira Bevan, Hannah Jones and Jasmine Joyce - are also included.

Joyce was the only non-English player in the final 13 for Rio four years ago.

A 13-player squad for this year's Olympics will be named in July.

"I have been able to spend a decent amount of time with the English players and staff in their environment.

"With them being the one full-time squad competing on the World Series, this has been invaluable for me to get to know them better," said head coach Scott Forrest, who also coaches Scotland's women.

"I obviously know the Scotland Sevens team very well and I have had some good conversations with Ollie Philips as well, since his appointment as Wales Women's Sevens coach."

The squad will go through three training camps, with the first taking place in Edinburgh this week before others in Wales and England in April.

Should they make the final squad, Scotland's women will face a short turnaround before a qualifying tournament for women's Rugby World Cup in September.

Great Britain's women's sevens training squad

Holly Aitchison (England)

Keira Bevan (Wales)

Abbie Brown (England)

Abi Burton (England)

Heather Fisher (England)

Deborah Fleming (England)

Megan Gaffney (Scotland)

Sydney Gregson (England)

Hannah Jones (Wales)

Meg Jones (England)

Jasmine Joyce (Wales)

Ellie Kildunne (England)

Rhona Lloyd (Scotland)

Alex Matthews (England)

Helen Nelson (Scotland)

Jodie Ounsley (England)

Celia Quansah (England)

Chloe Rollie (Scotland)

Helena Rowland (England)

Hannah Smith (Scotland)

Lisa Thomson (Scotland)

Emma Uren (England)

Beth Wilcock (England)

Amy Wilson Hardy (England)

PETALUMA, Calif. – The Racers Group is set to launch the SRO GT4 America season with a strong lineup of dedicated drivers and a returning sponsor.

The three 2019 Porsche GT4 Clubsport MRs will compete in two classes: Sprint and SprintX. Spencer Pumpelly, Dr. Jim Rappaport, Derek DeBoer, Jason Alexandridis and Craig Lyons, who joins the lineup for the first time since 2017, will all drive for the team this year.

Pumpelly will be racing No. 66 TRG/Lasalle Solutions Porsche Cayman GT4 Clubsport, and in SprintX, Pumpelly will drive No. 23 TRG/Stor-it/Mobettah Classic Cars Porsche Cayman GT4 Clubsport with co-driver Lyons.

DeBoer will be driving No. 17 TRG/FASTLIFE.TV/Silver State Consulting/Sierra Pacific Spine Institute/Rebounderz/BRM Porsche Cayman GT4 Clubsport with co-drivers Rappaport and Alexandridis.

“It is fantastic to have a powerful three-car team heading into our first big event at Circuit of the Americas in Austin and to be running with five such incredibly passionate and talented drivers for the full season,” said TRG Founder and CEO Kevin Buckler. “We are gunning for three championships, Sprint Pro, SprintX Pro-Am & SprintX Am.

“Derek and Jim are going to make a solid duo in their second season racing together in the Pirelli GT4 America SprintX races and will be sharing the No. 17 car throughout the season with Jason Alexandridis, whom we are excited to partner with Derek again this year for a handful of Pirelli GT4 America SprintX races. They are all terrific drivers, and we are all friends, which makes it even more awesome.

“The return of Spencer Pumpelly to the TRG team for this year’s championship run will be exciting. Spencer raced with TRG for many years, starting in 2006, and having him back behind the wheel of our TRG/LaSalle Porsche is going to be fantastic. We have such a strong history of several big wins together, including Daytona, so we know this is going to be an exciting year on the track. We are definitely running for a championship and hope to make Porsche proud.”

In addition, LaSalle Solutions will be back on board as the team’s primary sponsor for the sixth-straight year.

“Over a half decade LaSalle Solutions and TRG formed a marketing partnership leveraging the racing program and Winery,” Steven Robb, President Solutions Group at LaSalle Solutions. “As with everything we do our expectations were high, but I would not have imagined how successful the program has worked out for us. LaSalle has not only stood on the podium, competed for championships and brought a unique experience to our customers, prospects and partners, but we have also been featured in the NY Times and numerous forms of media. The icing on the cake was to be associated with an Amazon Prime show FastLife.TV and have customers and partners comment after binge watching the racing reality TV show.”

Gigi Becali, the flamboyant owner of Bucharest football club FCSB, formerly known as Steaua Bucharest, thinks he knows what is to blame for his team's recent poor run in the Romanian league: too much sex.

The 1986 European Cup winners, Romania's most successful club with 26 league titles, have failed to win their last three games, and Becali said after FCSB's 1-1 home draw against lowly Chindia Targoviste: "My players are making love with their girlfriends too often, that's why they aren't playing football so well lately."

The result left them fourth in the table, eight points behind leaders CFR Cluj.

Becali, who made his fortune in real estate after the fall of communism in 1989 and served as a member of the European Parliament, praised CFR Cluj coach Dan Petrescu, a former Chelsea and Southampton right-back, for restoring discipline at the club.

"Look at Dan Petrescu," Becali said. "CFR players have sex only once a week. They meet with women only once a week."

CFR officials could not be reached for comment.

"If [FCSB striker] Florinel Coman would have rested too ... but he is doing other things," Becali added.

BCB president Nazmul Hassan has told Mushfiqur Rahim that he was contract-bound to travel to Pakistan for the one-off ODI and second Test in Karachi - the last leg of a three-part tour - in April, saying that players must "think about the country, and not about themselves".

"We are expecting that he would go," Hassan said at a press conference in Mirpur on Tuesday afternoon. "Not only him, but every contracted player should go. Players have to think about the country, and not just themselves. This is what I personally feel.

"The country comes before everything else. Everyone should keep it in mind. We will remind them that the contracted players must play as they are told, when selected. It never occurred to me that one has to tell them this, too."

Mushfiqur had refused to travel with the rest of the team for the first two legs, saying in January that his family was worried about his safety, but might not have a say in the matter anymore.

It's a bit of a change of stance on the part of Hassan, who had said before the tour that players could choose whether to travel to Pakistan or not and that the board would respect the players' decision.

"Let me say it simply: we also had fears about security, but now that we have played, and even someone from his family has played [brother-in-law Mahmudullah], will the family only cry about him but not when something happens to Riyad," Hassan said. "He should hear about Pakistan from Riyad or his other team-mates.

"But look, I will not force anyone to go to Pakistan, so he should definitely go if he has spoken to the others."

The ODI is scheduled for April 3, with the Test beginning on April 5. Pakistan had won the first Test, in Rawalpindi, by an innings and 44 runs.