TOULOUSE, FRANCE - JUNE 12: Spain players warm up during a training session ahead of their UEFA Euro 2016 Group D match at the Stadium Municipal on June 11, 2016 in Toulouse, France. (Photo by David Ramos/Getty Images)
Its only been a handful of days that the 2016 UEFA Euros have been going on and the action in the group stage has already been off the chain. With great plays, surprising outcomes, and enormous individual performances, the Euros have been cant-miss television to this point. That will certainly be the case in the second match of Group D on Monday with Spain vs Czech Republic kicking off the day.
Spain is obviously a team that doesnt need much of an introduction at all. Despite their odd showings over the past couple of years that started with a disappointing 2014 World Cup, the Spanish are always poised to make a run and the 2016 Euros are no exception to that with the likes of Sergio Ramos, David De Gea, and of course many others. That being said, this Czech team has plenty of talent that has played at the highest level in European club competition and they could be a sleeper in the 2016 Euros to make real serious noise in this tournament.
This Group D matchup in the Euros between Spain and Czech Republic will be broadcast on ESPN with live streaming on WatchESPN, which can be accessed online or through the ESPN app using a cable or satellite subscription to login.
Details for Mondays game are below:
Date:Monday, June 13Start Time:9 a.m. ETLocation:Toulouse, FranceStadium:Stadium de ToulouseTV Info:ESPNLive Stream:WatchESPN
For all your coverage of the 2016 Euros, stay up to date with the FanSided Soccer hub and follow the @FanSidedSoccer on Twitter.
Hours after 49 people were killed in a nightclub shooting in Orlando Sunday, people started lining up to give blood.
Lines quickly got so long at one Orlando blood bank, OneBlood, asked people to make appointments, instead. "The blood center is at full capacity and is asking donors to help over the next several days to help replenish the blood supply," the organization said in a statement.
Tatiana Osorio, of Orlando, cries while giving blood at the OneBlood blood center, June 13. Osorio lost three friends in the shooting. David Goldman / AP
"Thousands of people packed our donor centers and blood drives eager to donate and help replenish the blood supply. Your immediate response to help patients in need was unprecedented and remarkable," it added.
"We have experienced a huge outpouring of support. Local blood banks have over 600 units of blood on hand, which is more than usual as a result of all the donations," said Orlando Health, an area not-for-profit medical network.
But almost as quickly, social media became overwhelmed with outrage. The club that was attacked was a favorite among gay men, but there are some restrictions on blood donations by sexually active men who have s*x with men.
"Shocking: Gay & bisexual blood donations STILL restricted after #Orlando massacre," OUT Magazine tweeted.
"There"s an urgent need for blood donors in Orlando. Gay men still can"t donate," tweeted Jared Polis, a Democratic congressman who"s gay.
It"s a basic tenet of public health and emergency responders when there"s a crisis to give people something to do. Giving blood is almost always No. 1 on the list, because blood shortages are frequent even when there isn"t a crisis, and blood donations help people beyond any immediate crisis.
So many in the LGBT (Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender) community felt especially offended that they were excluded from helping their own.
The Food and Drug Administration restrictions don"t quite amount to a ban on gay men. They"re meant to keep the human immune deficiency virus that causes AIDS out of the blood supply. So the FDA asks blood banks to exclude men who have had s*x with another man in the past year from donating blood -- a guideline softened last year after years of protest.
Before there was screening for HIV in blood donations, thousands of people caught HIV that way. By the end of 2001, more than 14,000 people became infected with HIV through blood transfusions, many of them children.
Related: As Promised, FDA to Lift Gay Blood Donation Ban
Experts estimate that the risk of being infected with HIV if you get a contaminated blood transfusion is 90 percent. And a single blood donation can go into the arms of three different people, the American Red Cross says.
"HIV antibodies may take a few weeks to develop after infection with the virus."
Tests for HIV don"t catch very early infections.
"HIV antibodies may take a few weeks to develop after infection with the virus. If you were recently infected, you might have a negative test result, yet be able to infect the recipient of your donation," the American Red Cross says.
There was a high-profile case in 2010. A Missouri man donated blood twice in 2008, and told the blood center he"d never had s*x with another man. At his second donation attempt, he tested positive for HIV. Blood he donated the first time went to a kidney transplant patient, who also become infected with HIV.
Investigators determined he"d lied about having s*x with other men and that he likely had become infected soon after his first donation.
Dozens of people wait to donate blood at the OneBlood Blood Donation Center in support to the victims of a mass shooting at Pulse nightclub, in Orlando, Florida, USA, 12 June. Cristobal Herrera / EPA
Other people at high risk of HIV or other bloodborne diseases are also excluded from giving blood, including s*x workers, injecting drug users, people with recent tattoos and, most recently, people at risk of Zika virus infection. People who lived in Britain since the 1980s are asked not to donate, because of the risk of a human version of mad cow disease, called Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, that more than 170 people caught from eating British beef.
Gay and bisexual men, especially in the South, have a disproportionate burden of HIV infections. A recent report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that urban southern gay men have a 30 percent HIV infection rate. African-American men who have s*x with men have a 50 percent lifetime risk of HIV.
It"s in part because people fail to get tested, the CDC says, and in part because these communities are not always informed about the risks, and thus not aware of the importance of using condoms and other safe s*x practices.
"Today"s tragedy illustrates that it"s the blood already on the shelves that helps during an emergency."
FDA"s policy isn"t universally accepted by experts. Dr. Paul Volberding, director of the AIDS Research Institute at the University of California San Francisco, says a one-year exclusion is far too long because newer tests can show if someone is infected within a few days.
However, OneBlood says its donations get to recipients within three days. It hasn"t even been able to adopt the FDA"s latest guidance, and still asks all men who have ever had s*x with another man to hold off on donating.
The CDC and FDA say the restrictions have helped keep the blood supply alomost free of HIV.
The CDC estimated the risk for HIV infection through blood transfusion is now about one in 1.5 million.
Only about 10 percent of Americans eligible to donate blood do so in any given year, but high-profile attacks and disasters often cause people to turn out.
The Red Cross said it expected large crowds at four blood drives to be held in the Washington, D.C. area Monday. Red Cross blood drives were scheduled across the country Monday and Tuesday. And the organization has a website to help people find blood drives.
"Today"s tragedy illustrates that it"s the blood already on the shelves that helps during an emergency," the Red Cross said
R.I.P PS4 Neo, Xbox Scorpio Most Powerful Console Ever. Microsoft E3 Impressions
Who would have expected, three years ago, that the biggest news from Microsofts 2016 E3 event would be not just a new console, but two new consoles. The Xbox One S and Project Scorpio were the standouts of an E3 event that underscored Microsofts new direction a purposeful shift from the focus on entertainment and media to video games. Microsoft is treating the Xbox brand like Amazons Kindle ecosystem, envisioning a future in which Xbox games can be played on a console, a computer, a mobile device, or whatever else comes next.
Microsofts vision for the future of games is so big, that its almost easy to overlook the actual games being produced in the present. The company provided closer looks at a number of announced titles Recore, Halo Wars 2, and Gears of War 4 and officially announcing a slate of sequels State of Decay 2 and Forza Horizon 3.
It was a lengthy, game-filled presentation. So, weve collected the seven most important announcements.
Microsoft will launch two new consoles in the next two years: Xbox One S and Project Scorpio
Microsoft has fired the first shot in a new sort of console war. Sony is expected to announce an updated, more powerful PlayStation 4 at a later date, but this morning, Microsoft revealed its own plan. Or should we say plans?
The Xbox One S will be available this August, and is a traditional improvement upon a game console midway through its lifecycle: thinner and smaller, with a larger hard drive, a slick paint job, and a handful of small internal improvements. In fall 2017, though, Microsoft will release something different. Dubbed Project Scorpio, the new console will be able to run games at 4k resolution and power virtual reality experiences. But unlike a fully new console, Project Scorpio will be the beginning of Microsofts initiative to extend the lifecycle of a console or at least its games indefinitely. In this theoretical future, Microsoft will release new and better hardware with greater frequency, but old Xbox One games will work on the new hardware, too.
Xbox Play Anywhere wants you to play anywhere
The majority of upcoming games developed or published by Microsoft will be playable on Xbox One and Windows 10; so if you buy a downloadable game on Xbox One,youll be able to play it on PC. You can start on your Windows desktop, and finish on your living room Xbox One. Recore, Forza Horizon 4, and Halo Wars 2 will be some of the first titles to make use of the functionality.
Xbox president Phil Spencer compares the ubiquity to Netflix. The grand ambition is, one day, Microsoft games will be available wherever wed like them: on a computer, phone, television, VR headset, or whatever nascent technology will appear this decade.
Xbox Live gets "clubs"
"Clubs" are persistent groups of Xbox Live friends that exist both on and off Xbox One. Rather than form a new party each game session, a club is essentially a voice and text chatroom that can be entered and exited at will. The text chat isnt limited to the console, it will be accessible on PC and the Xbox Live mobile app, too.
Forza Horizon 3 and Gears of War 4 appeal to the fans
For Gears of War 4, Microsoft hired the franchise"s longtime producer, Rod Fergusson, to run the revamped Vancouver studio, The Coalition. The result of that decision is a Gears of War game that looks very much at place within the franchise, more so than the 2013 spinoff Gears of War: Judgement.
Forza Horizon 3 also looks like an ambitious, colorful sequel to a series that"s quietly become one of the best experiences on Xbox One.
Halo Wars 2 beta is playable todayHalo Wars 2 won"t be released until February 2017, but Microsoft announced the beta begins today. This is part of a new trend in which publishers give fans something to try immediately as they wait for the promises of E3 to become realities over the coming months or years.
Donald Trump"s official CNN interview as presumptive nominee (Part 1) Robert Hall was one of four people kidnapped by the group last September in the southern Philippines. His likely execution follows that of fellow Canadian hostage John Ridsdel on April 25 when the militants did not received the requested ransom.
"It is with deep sadness that I have reason to believe that a Canadian citizen, Robert Hall, held hostage in the Philippines since September 21, 2015, has been killed by his captors," Trudeau said in a statement, adding that officials were working to officially confirm the death.
"The vicious and brutal actions of the hostage-takers have led to a needless death. Canada holds the terrorist group who took him hostage fully responsible for this cold-blooded and senseless murder," he said.
The militant group originally asked for 300 million Philippine pesos ($6.5 million) in ransom per hostage to be paid by April 25.
The two Canadian men -- along with Hall"s Filipina partner, Marites Flor, and Norwegian national Kjartan Sekkingstad -- were taken in a raid on the Oceanview Resort on Samal Island, which lies off the coast of the southern island of Mindanao.
Hall, Ridsdel and Flor were visiting the resort"s marina on their yacht, while Sekkingstad was the manager of the property.
The apparent execution comes after Abu Sayyaf released a "final" video of the three hostages pleading with Filipino President-elect Rodrigo Duterte and their embassies for assistance.
The video showed Flor wearing a headscarf, Hall and Sekkingstad addressing Duterte in a local dialect, according to jihadist monitoring group SITE Intelligence.
The hostage situation is seen as a test of Duterte"s pledge to crack down on militant activity.
Even though he has not yet been inaugurated, Duterte apologized to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau over Ridsdel"s execution, vowing to crack down on militancy in his country.
"You can rest assured that when the time comes, we will be able to apprehend the criminals and exact justice," he promised Trudeau.
Some members of Abu Sayyaf pledged allegiance to ISIS in 2014, though the connection between the groups remain tenuous.
In the video, however, the male hostages were pictured wearing orange T-shirts, mirroring ISIS videos in which hostages are forced to wear orange jumpsuits in a grim reference to prisoners at Guantanamo, the U.S." controversial military prison in Cuba.
Trudeau said that today "marks yet another difficult day for Canada and for Canadians as we grieve as a nation for the loss of both John Ridsdel, who was killed on April 25, and Robert Hall."
"With the tragic loss of two Canadians, I want to reiterate that terrorist hostage-takings only fuel more violence and instability. Canada will not give into their fear-mongering tactics and despicable attitude toward the suffering of others," Trudeau said.
"On behalf of the Government of Canada and all Canadians, I would like to express my heartfelt condolences to the family and friends of Mr. Hall. They have suffered a terrible loss, and this is a devastating moment for them."
CNN"s Kathy Qiano reported from Jakarta, CNN"s Zahara Ullah reported from Hong Kong and journalist Angela Dewan wrote from London.
Pittsburgh Penguins vs San Jose Sharks. 2016 NHL Playoffs. SCF. Game 6. 06.12.2016. (HD) On the San Jose Sharks
Craig Custance of ESPN: Looking at what Sharks GM Doug Wilson should focus on this offseason.
1. Sign Brent Burns to a long-term contract Burns is eligible for a contract extension after July 1st. Dustin Byfugliens five-year, $7.6 million per season deal should be the starting point for Burns. Tomas Hertl also needs a new contract and will get a nice raise.
2. Trade Patrick Marleau Marleaus early season trade request was limited and included the Kings, Ducks and Rangers. Marleau carries a $6.7 million cap hit and its probably time to move on. The Sharks would likely have to retain some salary.
3. Fill out their depth they need to add depth to their bottom six and their third pairing was exposed at times. James Reimer might be looking for a starting job elsewhere, but would be a good fit as their backup if he wants to return.
On the Pittsburgh Penguins
Craig Custance of ESPN: Looking at what Penguins GM Jim Rutherford should focus on this offseason.
1. Trade Marc-Andre Fleury If there is going to be an expansion draft, the Penguins are not going to be able to keep both Fleury and Matt Murray. Fleury carries a $5.75 million cap hit for three more years, so it makes sense to move his contract and use the money elsewhere. He could be a fit for the Flames or Hurricanes. The Hurricanes have the draft picks and cap space to take on Fleury.
2. New deals for defensemen Justin Schultz requires a $3.9 million qualifying offer, but the Penguins could sign him to a mulit-year deal at a lower cap hit. The 32-year old Ben Lovejoy deserves to come back, but they cant give him too much term.
3. Extend Matt Murrays contract Murray has a year left at $620,000 and Rutherford should look to extend him like Ducks GM Bob Murray did with John Gibson.
The hearing may be the final chapter of his widely watched trial over the fatal 2013 Valentine"s Day shooting. Pistorius faces up to 15 years in prison.
Lawyers for the double-amputee sprinter, nicknamed "Blade Runner" for his prosthetic legs, argued that Pistorius was too mentally unwell to serve more jail time.
The only witness called Monday was Jonathan Scholtz, a clinical psychologist, who repeatedly described the athlete as "a broken" man." He explained Pistorius was not able to testify in his own defense due to anxiety and depression following his dramatic fall from grace.
In 2012, Pistorius became the first amputee to compete in the Olympics. But this glory was short lived as he fatally shot Steenkamp through a bathroom door at their Pretoria home, saying he had mistaken her for an intruder.
Scholtz said in his testimony that Pistorius was still on medication for post-traumatic stress disorder and depression. If Pistorius were a regular patient, he would recommend hospitalization, Scholtz said.
But state prosecutor Gerrie Nel questioned why Pistorius had agreed to a television interview in 10 days" time if he was so mentally unfit. He also questioned the psychologist"s claim that Pistorius truly felt remorse, saying that the athlete likely just felt sorry for himself.
A court had initially convicted Pistorius of culpable homicide, but the Supreme Court in December overturned the conviction and handed him the more serious verdict of murder. Pistorius appeared shaken throughout the trial, looking gaunt and dazed and throwing his head into his hands at times.
Scholtz said that Pistorius "takes some comfort" in the knowledge that Steenkamp is with G*d, and that the athlete, a known gun collector, had sold all his weapons and had sworn off firearms.
Pistorius arrived in the Pretoria court in a dark suit and tie flanked by a large police escort. His relatives sat on one side of the courtroom while the family of Steenkamp sat on the other.
There was some debate about the victim"s mother, June Steenkamp, and her statement that she had forgiven Pistorius. Scholz and prosecutor Gerrie Nel agreed that she had done that for her own sake, not for the man who killed her daughter.
Pistorius will learn his fate by Friday.
Here"s what else you need to know:
But hasn"t he been sentenced already?
Yes, after a nearly 50-day trial stretched over seven months, Pistorius was convicted of culpable homicide (much like manslaughter) in September 2014. Judge Thokozile Masipa ruled the sprinter had acted negligently when he shot Steenkamp four times through a locked bathroom door, but that he didn"t do it intentionally. The Supreme Court of Appeal later changed that conviction to murder.
Why did they change the verdict?
The appeals court ruled that the identity of whoever was behind the bathroom door was irrelevant. Pistorius should have foreseen that his action would kill that person, but he went ahead anyway. The key legal principle is known as dolus eventualis.
Is he in prison?
No, Pistorius is at his uncle"s mansion under house arrest. Pistorius spent about a year in a private cell in the hospital wing of a maximum-security prison. He should have gotten out after 10 months, or a sixth of his sentence, but a South African minister intervened. Pistorius could be going straight back to the cell after the sentencing hearing.
What to look out for at this sentencing
It will be the first time the public gets a good look at Pistorius since the first sentencing hearing. The defense has tried to paint a picture of a "broken man" and will likely focus on the media coverage and public treatment of Pistorius as one of their arguments. On the prosecution side, we may see a family member or close friend of Steenkamp brought as a witness to offer emotional testimony.
What sort of time will Pistorius do?
The sentence for murder in South Africa is 15 years, but the defense will argue the judge has some discretion to reduce the jail time and include time already served. Nel, the prosecutor, is unlikely to go for the lower end of the sentencing spectrum. Trial judge Masipa will be handing down the sentence.
CNN"s David McKenzie reported from Pretoria. Journalist Angela Dewan wrote from London
