#progress! the tally has dropped from 19 to 16

[televinita]

Update: it's been 9 days but there's enough change for this (mostly because I'm losing track of how damn many books I've started) so BOOM.

CURRENTLY READING / LISTENING

1. A Study in Drowning - Ava Reid: 40% in; there are aspects that annoy me and it's longer than my usual quick reads so I'm taking breaks in between bits, but overall enjoying myself.

2. A Wizard’s Guide to Defensive Baking - T. Kingfisher: 40% in on ebook and I just got the audiobook, so woohoo!! Having a good time. I freaking love the sentient gingerbread man, he reminds me of the one in Shrek (the only good thing about Shrek) but silent

3. Graveyard Shift - M.L. Rio: 54% in via ebook -- I forgot I had a backdoor "cheat" and was able to get on the shorter Overdrive list in the county next door -- and god this is weird, why is it sci-fi horror, but there are some interesting turns of phrase and I am STUBBORN so I will finish. Not least because I only have 75 pages left.

4. Scrappy Little Nobody - Anna Kendrick: a random audiobook pick from my back-burner TBR, because I was DESPERATE last night (literally about 16 hours before Kingfisher's title popped up). 30% in; I'll progress further when my other audio(s) run(s) out.

AVAILABLE NOW

5. Legends & Lattes - Travis Baldree: still a possibility

6. Passenger Princess - Morgan Elizabeth: still a possibility

7. In The Shadow of Lakecrest - Elizabeth Blackwell: still a possibility

8. Final Girls and/or The Last Time I Lied - Riley Sager: now at the bottom of my interest list but keeping just in case

9. The Book of Cold Cases and/or Murder Road - Simone St. James: same, though the odds of reading one of these are a bit better

10. What Does It Feel Like? - Sophie Kinsella: well look what got here surprisingly fast! Picked up today; I will be starting and maybe finishing it in the next 2 days; guys, even calling this a "novella" is a stretch; this is closer to a long short story. Exactly 120 pages + author note, visibly at least 1.25 line spacing, and a smaller-than-average-sized book.

11. The Woman in Black - Susan Hill: I completely forgot to mention that after rewatching the movie, I wanted to try reading this, and the weather now is frankly perfect. Picked this up today. It's 2nd highest priority in this category, though will be kicked down when books from the next one start showing up.

COMING SOON

12. Before We Were Us - Denise Hunter: in cataloging!

13. Beyond Ivy Walls - Rachel Fordham: estimated wait for audio (only option because it's far too long to tolerate an ebook) now ~4 weeks hmmm

14. Games Untold - Jennifer Lynn Barnes: releasing on November 12th! It's long too so I'm kind of nervous about whether I should freeze my hold and wait for 2nd round of checkouts (pushes me out 3-4 weeks), so I can get through all the new releases above first, or if I can realistically get to it in the next 4 weeks -- max. wait time before I pick it up + 3 weeks + if I need to be a dick and keep it a couple days late I will, since I'm sick of being well behaved about that while everyone else takes advatage.

COMING EVENTUALLY!

15. The Wren in the Holly Library - K.A. Linde: the sprayed-edge version is beautiful and I have not learned any hesitancy yet about trying fantasy (romantasy?) if the cover is pretty and bookish enough. Although one glance at the reviews has me lowering my expectations to "3-star time with a 40% chance of DNF."

16. 26 Ways To Come Home For the Holidays - Jennifer Joy: I refuse to pick this up for at least another week but I still can't wait!

Reading Triage

I'm in a bit of a reading slump at the moment (a word which here means: I have only finished 4 books in 2 weeks), so what better way to fix it than by chucking back all my library books, picking out a brand-new set and/or placing holds, and then talking out the options!

CURRENTLY READING / LISTENING

1. A Study in Drowning - Ava Reid: this was all the rage last fall and I shrugged it off as "fantasy, not my thing," but fantasy IS kind of turning out to be my thing this year. So when I saw the new special edition w/ stenciled edges (featuring shelves of old books) in a Goodreads giveaway, I immediately investigated it further and oh, we're starting in dark academia, in an architectural college?? There's a house design contest?? Well that sounds great! So I'm giving it a go; got about 40 pages in last night.

2. The Spellshop - Sarah Beth Durst: this is my 2nd time around with it, because I wanted to hear the audiobook version. About 90 minutes left, and I better hop-to because it's due in 2 days.

3. One Of Our Own - Lucinda Berry: this is a just-under-4-hours audio exclusive thriller (is thriller the right word, it seems like a pretty domestic mystery), and I am literally only here because it's dual narration and the main narrator is A.J. Cook. The plot looks bland and unpleasant and after only 8% in I can all but guarantee it would be a 2-star in print, but I might give it 3 because listening to her voice is a treat.

AVAILABLE NOW

4. Legends & Lattes - Travis Baldree: attempt #2 to salvage the cozy coffee shop vibes out of an otherwise uninteresting story, now that the temps are finally about to drop down into at least the 50s, and if it doesn't work this time I quit forever because I have better fantasy places to be (but I really do wanna savor the romanticizing of coffee + baked goods).

5. Strongheart, Wonder Dog of the Silver Screen - Candace Fleming: I didn't buy it, but I am now more motivated than ever to read this. It's actually much shorter than I thought, being about 50% illustration, and I want to dive right in. Might even do so as soon as I post this, tbh.

6. Passenger Princess - Morgan Elizabeth: I feel honor-bound by winning it to read enough to offer a review. Honestly, the first chapter was quite fun, so if I just go in with determination to skip straight over the porn and judge the rest of the story on its own merit, I might enjoy it. (I will of course be judging more harshly for its Goodreads rating)

7. In The Shadow of Lakecrest - Elizabeth Blackwell: a 1920s Rebecca-esque novel that I own and have been meaning to read for 2 years now. I got so close to cracking it open this time...and I still might, but more likely the other books on this list will take priority.

8. Final Girls and/or The Last Time I Lied - Riley Sager: the references in Middle of the Night finally got me interested in these 2 I skipped the first time around, but it's still just...so hard to convince myself to try them, even when I crave a guaranteed good thriller. There's a reason I skipped over them the first time around, and that reason is they just look and sound generic as hell.

9. The Book of Cold Cases and/or Murder Road - Simone St. James: I spent literally the entire month of October a) not reading any ghost stories for lack of good options and being sad about it, and b) forgetting about this author literally every time I went to the library until the 28th. But now they're here! So...maybe! (more than likely pushed off til next year though. I don't feel particularly excited when I look at them, even though the first book at least has been on my TBR since its release)

10. The Widow of Rose House - Diana Biller: almost forgot one of the few remaining from my last round! A random checkout because it looks like an unusual sort of historical romance with like seven different appealing elements; lemme just copy the summary:

It's 1875, and Alva Webster has perfected her stiff upper lip after three years of being pilloried in the presses of two continents over fleeing her abusive husband. Now his sudden death allows her to return to New York to make a fresh start, restoring Liefdehuis, a dilapidated Hyde Park mansion, and hopefully her reputation at the same time. However, fresh starts aren't as easy as they seem, as Alva discovers when stories of a haunting at Liefdehuis begin to reach her. But Alva doesn't believe in ghosts. So when the eccentric and brilliant professor Samuel Moore appears and informs her that he can get to the bottom of the mystery that surrounds Liefdehuis, she turns him down flat. She doesn't need any more complications in her life--especially not a handsome, convention-flouting, scandal-raising one like Sam. Unfortunately, though Alva is loath to admit it, Sam, a pioneer in electric lighting and a member of the nationally-adored Moore family of scientists, is the only one who can help. Together, the two delve into the tragic secrets wreathing Alva's new home while Sam attempts to unlock Alva's history--and her heart

COMING SOON

11. Tracker's Canyon - Pam Withers: a YA novel about a teen using his outdoor/trailing skills to find his dad and evade people who may want to harm his dad (or him). It's been on my Goodreads TBR for 5+ years, picked when I was scrolling through looking for I.L.L. options. Looks fun and also relatively short, under 200 pages. Should be here in a week or two at the most.

12. A Wizard's Guide to Defensive Baking - T. Kingfisher: library doesn't have a physical copy so waiting on the e-book, estimated 3 weeks. I haven't read her before but I kept seeing this on BookTube and its title and cover looked so fun and cute. Probably a 3-star time but I still want in.

13. Piranesi - Susanna Clarke: this was on my original fall TBR at the beginning of September, and I've been slowly making my way towards it. No promises I'll read it this year, but if I don't get too distracted by the new shinies, the fact that this is much shorter than I thought has made me more willing to listen to its many rave reviews. Currently on a waitlist; "my" copy is due back on Halloween but I of course have zero faith in the people of this county at this point, so I'm going to bet more realistically on the second week of November (next copy is due back 11/9).

14. Before We Were Us - Denise Hunter: romance about an engaged woman who develops amnesia, not only forgetting her (relatively new) relationship but still viewing her middle-of-nowhere job at his family resort as a pit stop and ready to get the hell outta dodge; he must convince her to fall in love with him again. I WILL be going full Chuck/Sarah with this. Currently on-order at the library and I am first in line.

15. Beyond Ivy Walls - Rachel Fordham: This whole summary just sounds Immediately Great and like the kind of historical (1903) romance I love; wish I had access to a physical copy but waiting on the audiobook instead, estimated time 3 weeks. Love 2 have everything come crashing in at once!

All of Monticello believes Otis Taylor has been away fostering his musical genius. But the truth is that his father exiled him long ago, rejecting Otis's appearance and the scars that came with it. . . . At twenty-three years old, Sadie West left her family farm and found employment at the Hoag feather duster factory. Desperate to save money and help her family make ends meet, she trespasses and finds shelter in an abandoned building--and is thrown in the path of the town's mysterious bachelor. Otis's wounds are deep, but as Sadie's friendship with him grows, she begins to fall for the man beneath the mask

COMING EVENTUALLY!

16. Graveyard Shift - M.L. Rio: the reviews are so middling and I am also sure it will be a 3-star at best, but damn it, I got excited about this one months ago and now I HAVE TO KNOW (this is why knowing about new releases sucks! don't do it!). Waiting on an ebook copy because the library doesn't have a physical one. It is an absurdly long wait for such a short book (14 weeks?! i am PRAYING for a physical copy to be ordered soon).

17. Games Untold - Jennifer Lynn Barnes: on the other hand I am first in line when this releases in a couple weeks. Beyond excited for a collection of short stories and novellas aka BONUS SCENES for The Inheritance Games. (sometimes knowing about new releases doesn't suck)

18. 26 Ways To Come Home For the Holidays - Jennifer Joy: a "Thanksgiving to Christmas" novella romance about a department store in the 1940s. I have been excitedly waiting for it to be seasonally appropriate (for maximal impact) since spring. I still gotta give it 3 or 4 weeks though.

19. What Does It Feel Like? - Sophie Kinsella: 12th in line for 8 copies, at the library that doesn't show due dates so I'm guessing this may not arrive until December, at which point I might roll it over to the new year. Still, if it comes sooner, interested in this novella mirroring her real-life health crisis.

[littleharpethcrossfit]

Saturday, August 1.....Apollo 13..... “McGee”.....Get Vertical.

Dark clouds scuttled overhead all morning.  Once again, the rain held off until we were through playing.... and then the rain came down seriously hard.

The Admiral Armando consented to lead our mobility/flexibility again.  He seemed tired today.  I suspected a Saturday morning hangover,  but he claimed that he had already done a long bike ride before coming here.  

Warmup WOD:     “Apollo 13″     A fun little game that we have done many times in the past.  Partnered, one runs with any Med-Ball while the other does Sumo Deadlift High Pulls with any kettlebell.  After a 60-70 yd jog, the partners switch roles, keeping a running tally of the SDLHPs for their score.  As a bonus, a whistle was blown every minute and everyone got to drop and do 3 BURPEEs.  This for 6 minutes.

Lee/Armando=214     Scott/Chase & Jeff M/Luke=176    Zac/Tom=164     Angel/Shannon G=142     Aiden/Nathan=138     Rodney/Dyer=127      Bethany/Linda=128     Leigh Ann/Sue=118     Manny/Lew=???     Others failed to post.

The Hero WOD “McGee”.        He was killed in Iraq on 5/13/2009. 

A 30 Minute AMRAP.      

5 Deadlifts     ( 265/185 E )     ( 225/135 )

9 Box Jumps     (24/20)

13 Push-Ups

With the potential of being a 30 minute high rep KILLER WOD, everyone was encouraged to share the reps, be safe, work hard, and have fun.  

Scored by rounds and fractions. 

Did all the reps but scaled LIGHT:

Miss Linda=22 2/3     Sue=19     Coach=15 1/3

Elite Weight.  Shared reps:

Aiden/Nathan=9 each

RXed Weight:

Armando=14      Angel=11  1/3

Scaled weight, shared reps somehow:

Rodney/Dyer=25 total     Tom=16    Luke=15 1/3     Lee=14 1/2     Scotty/=14 1/3     Shannon G=14     Leigh Ann=13     Mason=12     Zac/Chase=12 each      Manny (and others) did it but didn’t post.

  Lew abruptly left after Patti called and reported a log-jam in a commode at home.  This is not the first time that that particular excuse has been used to exit a workout.

Cool-Down:   Get Vertical for 90 seconds total.  Coach Manny, our resident gymnastic Master, led a brief seminar showing the progressions to HEAD- STANDS.    Many participated, although a few mistook HAND-STANDS and jumped-the-gun on the seminar.  

Notes:

Jeff M is an Infectious Disease MD at a local hospital.  I thought he would be a good source for suggestions in regards to how to be safe about the VIRUS at the gym.  As we already know,  elderly people, hospital workers, obese, diabetics, and de-conditioned people, are at increased risk.  Please note that eliminates most of us, including me.

Seriously, being outside and having many sunlit hours between workouts allows the virus to expire, which is a big safety factor.  Also, we have hand sanitizing stuff located in several spots.  There are masks available if you want, but so far no one wants to workout wearing a mask. 

On a brighter note, although we don’t recommend drinking Lysol or bleach, we have it from a reputable source that consuming beer, wine, or bourbon immediately after a workout is nearly as good as a dose of Hydroxychloroquine, especially in the doses that we use.

The highlight of the day was watching Doctor Manny spot Mrs Emerson in the FROG progression to headstand.  Manny knows those subtle coaching cues that are so very helpful to success.  We could all learn a lot watching Manny.

Many thanks to Shannon G for making Armando take our Barn trash to the dump.  We greatly appreciate that.

Tomorrow  at 1 PM.   If you feel ill, feverish, dry cough, stay the hell away from the BARN.            

[jobsearchtips02]

USGDP Fell 9.5 Percent

Here’s what you need to know:

Economic output fell at its fastest pace on record last spring as the coronavirus pandemic forced businesses across the United States to close their doors and kept millions of Americans shut in their homes for weeks.

Gross domestic product — the broadest measure of goods and services produced — fell 9.5 percent in the second quarter of the year, the Commerce Department said Thursday. On an annualized basis, the standard way of reporting quarterly economic data, G.D.P. fell at a rate of 32.9 percent.

G.D.P. shrank $1.8 trillion in the 2nd quarter.

Gross domestic product, adjusted for

inflation and seasonality, at annual rates

G.D.P. shrank $1.8 trillion in the second quarter.

Gross domestic product, adjusted for inflation and seasonality, at annual rates

The collapse was unprecedented in its speed and breathtaking in its severity. The only possible comparisons in modern American history came during the Great Depression and the demobilization after World War II, both of which occurred before the advent of modern economic statistics.

Unlike past recessions, this one was a result of a conscious decision to suspend economic activity to slow the spread of the virus. Congress pumped trillions of dollars into the economy to sustain households and businesses, limit long-term damage and allow for a rapid rebound.

The plan worked at first. In recent weeks, however, cases have surged in much of the country. Data from public and private sources indicate a pullback in economic activity, reflecting consumer unease and renewed shutdowns.

“In another world, a sharp drop in activity would have been just a good, necessary blip while we addressed the virus,” said Heather Boushey, president of the Washington Center for Equitable Growth, a progressive think tank. “From where we sit in July, we know that this wasn’t just a short-term blip.”

Waiting for help with an unemployment insurance claim at an event in Tulsa, Okla., last week.Credit…Joseph Rushmore for The New York Times

The number of Americans filing new claims for state unemployment benefits totaled 1.43 million last week, the Labor Department reported Thursday.

It was the 19th straight week that the tally exceeded one million, an unheard-of figure before the coronavirus pandemic. And it was the second weekly increase in a row after nearly four months of declines, a sign of how the rebound in cases has undercut the economy’s nascent recovery. Claims for the previous week totaled 1.42 million.

New claims for Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, the government’s program aimed at covering freelancers, the self-employed and other workers not covered by traditional unemployment benefits, totaled 830,000, down from 975,000 the week before. Those numbers, unlike the figures for state claims, are not seasonally adjusted.

Initial weekly unemployment claims,

both regular and those under the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program

Initial weekly unemployment claims, both regular and those under the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program

“We’re still in a desperate situation,” said Diane Swonk, chief economist at the accounting firm Grant Thornton in Chicago. Noting that weekly claims were in the 200,000 range before the pandemic brought widespread shutdowns in March, she added, “This is unique in terms of the speed and magnitude of the job losses.”

What’s more, fears are growing that after rebounding strongly in May and June, the economy has run out of steam, with many states reversing the reopening of businesses.

“Everyone wants to keep putting on rose-colored glasses, but it’s blinding us to the reality of the situation and what we have to deal with,” Ms. Swonk said.

At the same time, the $600 supplemental weekly unemployment payment from the federal government is ending, a potentially crippling financial blow to millions. Republicans have proposed replacing the supplement with a $200 weekly payment, while Democrats want to extend it in full. “We’re nowhere close to a deal,” Mark Meadows, the White House chief of staff, said Wednesday.

The Frankfurt stock market. About 7 million people in Germany are on government-subsidized paid furloughs, and not all will get their jobs back.Credit…Reuters

The German economy shrank 10.1 percent from April through June compared to the previous quarter, the biggest decline since the government starting keeping the data in 1970.

But the figure, which covers the peak period of pandemic lockdowns, may already be old news. Surveys of business managers indicate that Europe’s largest economy is rebounding quickly, though it will probably be months or years before growth returns to normal, and the risk of further setbacks is high.

The German labor market stabilized in July, according to data published Thursday by the nation’s labor office. The number of unemployed people fell by 18,000 after rising sharply from April through June. But joblessness could rise later in the year if many businesses founder, and workers who are now on furlough become unemployed.

Germany is in a better position than other European Union countries like Italy or Spain, in part because the government was effective in containing the spread. At the same time, new infections of the coronavirus are rising again as Germans return from holidays abroad, and there is fear of a second wave.

The pandemic has left deep scars on the German economy even if the pain is less severe than in many other countries, including the United States.

About 7 million people in Germany are on government-subsidized paid furloughs, and not all will get their jobs back. Companies like the automaker Daimler and Deutsche Bank are cutting their workforces permanently in response to changes in their industries that go beyond the pandemic.

Midsize companies like Ziehl-Abegg, which has 4,300 employees worldwide, are driving growth by rehiring workers and expanding.Credit…Felix Schmitt for The New York Times

While other business managers responded to the pandemic by cutting staff and postponing investment, Peter Fenkl doubled down. This month Mr. Fenkl broke ground on a major addition to a factory he oversees in southern Germany that produces high-performance fans.

Mr. Fenkl is chief executive of Ziehl-Abegg, a maker of ventilation systems for hospitals, factories and large buildings. The company’s investment of 16 million euros, or $19 million, in additional floor space helps explain why the German economy is showing signs of bouncing back with surprising pep. In a nation not known for producing sunny optimists, German business leaders are upbeat about their prospects.

“If we wait to invest until the market recovers, that’s too late,” Mr. Fenkl said in an interview. “We want to be prepared.”

Surveys show that managers’ expectations for future sales are almost back to pre-virus levels, despite a steep slump in German economic output from April through June when lockdowns were in force. That optimism translates directly into growth, emboldening companies to rehire furloughed workers and invest in expansion.

Much of that growth is driven by specialized, midsize companies like Ziehl-Abegg, which has 4,300 employees worldwide.

Ziehl-Abegg, based in the town of Künzelsau about 60 miles north of Stuttgart, has not been immune to the economic impact of the virus. Sales have stagnated this year, and employees in departments like marketing or servicing have been furloughed.

But Mr. Fenkl said that the Chinese market has already recovered and that some Ziehl-Abegg departments are working overtime to fill demand for products such as fans for big data centers.

Consumer spending is the bedrock of the U.S. economy, but shopping hotbeds like 34th Street in Manhattan have suffered during the pandemic.Credit…Hiroko Masuike/The New York Times

Consumer spending, the bedrock of the U.S. economy, plunged 10.1 percent in the second quarter, the Commerce Department reported Thursday. It was by far the biggest drop on record. But the decline wasn’t across the board — and the details help paint a picture of life in a pandemic.

Spending on services fell 13.3 percent, led by a near-total collapse in spending on restaurant meals and recreation, the department’s report on quarterly economic output noted. Health care spending fell sharply, too, as patients canceled elective procedures and delayed routine care.

Spending on goods was a different story. Overall goods expenditures fell a modest 3 percent, and some quarantine-friendly categories actually had increases. Spending on recreational vehicles and related goods rose nearly 9 percent as consumers sought ways to travel without getting on airplanes.

Other parts of the economy showed large contractions. Business investment, residential construction and trade — both imports and exports — all fell by double-digit percentages. One exception: Spending by the federal government rose 4.1 percent as Congress moved to prevent deeper economic damage. (That figure reflects only a small fraction of the government stimulus efforts, much of which are considered “transfer payments” that aren’t counted in gross domestic product.)

Volunteers at a food bank in Davis, Calif., last week. “The path forward for the economy is extraordinarily uncertain,” the Fed chair said Wednesday.Credit…Max Whittaker for The New York Times

Stocks slid on Thursday as economic reports from the United States and Germany showed the toll of the coronavirus outbreak on growth and investors absorbed a flood of earnings reports.

The S&P 500 fell more than 1 percent, while shares in Europe were down by more than 2 percent.

Oil prices were also sharply lower, as were shares of energy companies. ConocoPhillips was among the worst performing stocks in the S&P 500 after the company said its earnings plunged by more than analysts had expected.

The U.S. economy shrank by 9.5 percent in the second quarter, while Germany’s economy shrank by 10.1 percent. On an annualized basis, the standard way of reporting quarterly economic data, U.S. gross domestic product fell at a rate of 32.9 percent, which is the sharpest drop on record.

Data released at the same time showed that 1.43 million Americans filed new state unemployment claims, the second week in which that number has risen and a figure that highlights the persistence of the economic downturn.

The grim data came a day after Jerome H. Powell, the Fed chair, told reporters that the “pace of recovery looks like it has slowed,” pointing to debit and credit card spending and hiring trends. He added, “The path forward for the economy is extraordinarily uncertain and will depend in large part on our success in keeping the virus in check.”

Stock investors are also considering a number of earnings reports from companies in the U.S. and Europe. The largest technology companies, including Apple, Facebook, Alphabet and Amazon, which often set the direction of the broad market because of their sheer size, are scheduled to update their results after the end of trading Thursday.

The Commerce Department revises annual economic data to incorporate new sources and apply updated methods.Credit…Al Drago/The New York Times

In addition to issuing second-quarter figures, the Commerce Department on Thursday revised data for economic growth over the previous five years. The updates were mostly minor, especially in the context of this year’s huge declines. But they did restore some bragging rights to President Trump — while also giving new ones to his predecessor.

The government now says that U.S. gross domestic product grew 3 percent in 2018, up from the previously reported 2.9 percent. The difference isn’t significant economically, but it might matter politically: the president and his advisers repeatedly promised annual growth of at least 3 percent. (Mr. Trump has at other times promised growth of 4 percent or more.)

When the Commerce Department released its initial 2018 estimate, in February 2019, it looked as if Mr. Trump had met his goal: The report showed growth of 3.1 percent. But that talking point was wiped away when the figure was revised downward a few months later. Now, it has been pushed back up.

Mr. Trump may be less happy about another revision, however. The government now says that G.D.P. grew 3.1 percent in 2015, up from 2.9 percent before the update. Mr. Trump has in the past criticized his predecessor, Barack Obama, for never hitting 3 percent for a full year.

The revisions are part of an annual process to incorporate new data sources and apply updated methods. This year’s changes didn’t alter the overall picture: Growth has hovered around 2 percent a year, with any accelerations proving short-lived.

The 2018 boomlet was no exception. Growth slowed to 2.2 percent in 2019 (revised from 2.3 percent), and has plunged into negative territory this year because of the pandemic.

A new home in Washingtonville, N.Y., beyond New York City’s northern suburbs. Unusually low interest rates have bolstered the real estate market. Credit…John Minchillo/Associated Press

The overall economy may be looking shaky, but one exception is the housing market. The National Association of Realtors’ Pending Home Sales Index jumped 16.6 percent in June, hitting its highest level since 2006.

The Federal Reserve’s decision to cut interest rates to near zero has provided support, with many home buyers taking advantage of exceptionally low borrowing costs.

Housing starts have also bounced back, rising 17 percent last month, according to the Commerce Department. Sales of new homes rose 13.8 percent in June and 19.4 percent in May. Demand for new homes should help revive construction jobs.

“Home sales continue to see a bounce reflecting low mortgage rates as well as stronger demand as more and more people work from home and opt for larger spaces,” said Rubeela Farooqi, chief U.S. economist at the research firm High Frequency Economics.

In addition, Ms. Farooqi said, a desire to move from densely populated urban areas to the suburbs and beyond is driving sales.

“I don’t know how long this lasts, but I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s momentum for the next month or two,” Ms. Farooqi said.

With the $600 federal supplement ending, Louise Francis will have to get by on $247 a week in state benefits.Credit…L. Kasimu Harris for The New York Times

This was the year that Louise Francis was finally going to make $20 an hour. Instead, she is out of work and worrying about how she will pay her bills.

Ms. Francis, 59, has worked as a banquet cook at the Sheraton Hotel in New Orleans for nearly two decades. She earned $19.37 an hour, and was on track to get a raise in August. But when the hotel shut down last spring, Ms. Francis was furloughed, and she hasn’t worked since.

It took three months of effort to get her first unemployment check, and she relied on her adult daughters for help in the meantime. But when she began receiving the money, a $600 weekly federal supplement to regular state benefits allowed her to find some stability.

“With the $600, you could see your way a little bit,” Ms. Francis said. “You could feel a little more comfortable. You could pay three or four bills and not feel so far behind.”

With the supplement at an end and no congressional consensus on replacing it, Ms. Francis isn’t sure what she will do. Her age, combined with her diabetes and high blood pressure, put her at high risk of severe illness if she contracts the coronavirus, which makes her reluctant to take any job that puts her into face-to-face contact with the public, especially with cases surging in Louisiana.

Ms. Francis’s husband is retired, leaving her as the family’s breadwinner, and she will have to get by on $247 a week in state benefits.

“If they take that $600 from us, how am I supposed to be able to continue paying my bills?” she said. “You still have to eat, to pay insurance. If they take it away, they’re going to push us back into poverty.”

Russian River Brewing Company has rebounded only partly. Revenues are back more or less to normal levels, but profits are still down, and one of its brew pubs has had to close again.Credit…Felix Uribe for The New York Times

To understand the roller coaster ride of the coronavirus economy, look at the experience of Russian River Brewing Company in Sonoma County, Calif.

Before the pandemic, half the company’s revenue came from retail sales: food and drink at its two brew pubs, tours and tastings at the brewery itself, in-person purchases of bottled beer. When California ordered restaurants to shut down in mid-March, all of that revenue disappeared.

“We were panicking for 48 hours,” said Natalie Cilurzo, who owns Russian River with her husband, Vinnie.

But after the panic passed, determination set in. They furloughed about 140 of their roughly 200 employees and cut the hours of many of the rest. They stopped kegging beer and started putting everything into bottles that they could sell in grocery stores. They began selling online.

“We just felt like we were in start-up mode all over again,” Ms. Cilurzo said.

It worked. With restaurants shut down, grocery store sales surged, and online ordering proved to be a hit. A loan through the Paycheck Protection Program helped cover employee salaries and other expenses. And in early June, Russian River was allowed to reopen its brew pubs.

Still, it has only been a partial rebound. Revenues are back more or less to normal levels, but profits are still down because margins are lower for grocery-store sales. The company has brought back most of its furloughed workers, but it has permanently laid off 20 percent of its staff.

One of its locations had to close again when California reimposed restrictions on indoor dining. The other location has outdoor seating, but that won’t work once the weather cools off.

“We’re open, we’re closed, we’re open, we’re closed — we’re kind of in this yo-yo here in California,” Ms. Cilurzo said.

Sales increased across many of Procter & Gamble’s divisions. The company produces Charmin toilet paper, Pampers diapers, Tide detergent and Vick’s cough medicine.Credit…John Locher/Associated Press

The consumer goods giant Procter & Gamble reported strong demand for products like dishwashing detergent, disinfectants and cough suppressants, causing revenue to rise 4 percent to $17.7 billion in its fourth quarter, while net income rose to $2.8 billion from a loss of $5.2 billion a year earlier.

Sales increased throughout the company — which produces Charmin toilet paper, Pampers diapers, Tide detergent and Vick’s cough medicine — with the exception of its grooming division. A “pandemic-related reduction in shaving frequency,” caused Gillette sales to drop, according to the company, whose earnings call included discussion of the rising popularity of mullets and “coronabeards.” The skincare brand SK-II, a staple at airport retailers, took a hit as the crisis disrupted customers’ travel plans.

Procter & Gamble, one of the largest advertisers in the world, increased spending on marketing 2.7 percent in its fourth quarter, which ended June 30. But other earnings reports on Thursday showed a wait-and-see attitude toward advertising spending:

The beverage company Molson Coors said it is “preserving the biggest firepower in our marketing budgets so they can be ramped up in the back half of the year when we expect they will be most effective” following “significant reductions in spend” in the most recent quarter.

Mastercard’s advertising and marketing spending sank nearly 59 percent in the quarter, to $93 million.

JCDecaux, an outdoor advertising company that manages ads on billboards, benches, buses and more, said revenue tumbled nearly 65 percent in the quarter amid a “temporary historic drop in urban and transport audiences.”

A Total service station in Bordeaux, France. The oil company is reducing the value of its assets, including tar sands properties in Canada.Credit…Regis Duvignau/Reuters

Royal Dutch Shell and Total, two of Europe’s largest oil companies, reported sharply lower quarterly profits on Thursday, after widespread lockdowns designed to tackle the pandemic slammed demand for oil and gas.

Despite the difficult conditions, the companies are still investing in their operations, by shifting into wind and solar and other clean-energy businesses in response to pressures from investors and European governments to lower greenhouse gas emissions. Total, for instance, has almost doubled its capacity to generate electricity via renewable means over the last year.

The trading of crude oil and products saved Shell from a loss on the metric called adjusted earnings that is most widely followed by analysts. Shell, based in The Hague, earned $638 million, an 82 percent fall from a year earlier. It took advantage of the volatile market conditions to earn $1.5 billion in trading, almost 30 times what it made a year earlier.

Total, based in Paris, was also squeezed by market conditions and reported adjusted net income of just $126 million, a 96 percent fall from a year earlier.

With both the pandemic and climate change concerns raising questions about future earnings, companies are reviewing assets like oil fields and refineries to see if their values need to be marked down. This exercise led Shell to take a $16.8 billion writedown and report an $18.1 billion net loss. Total is taking $8 billion in writedowns, mostly on Canadian tar sands properties whose reserves may wind up “stranded” or never produced.

Comcast, the largest cable operator in the U.S., reported on Thursday $23.7 billion in revenue and $7.9 billion in adjusted profit for the second quarter, beating expectations. Peacock, its new streaming product, attracted 10 million sign-ups in its first three months. The company added 323,000 more broadband customers, but it lost 477,000 pay TV subscribers.

Yum Brands reported on Thursday that its same-store sales in the second quarter fell about 15 percent from a year ago (not 12 percent as was earlier reported here). The company, which runs the Pizza Hut, KFC and Taco Bell fast food chains, said nearly all of its restaurants around the world are at least partially open and sales in June had leveled off. Same-store sales in June were nearly unchanged from a year ago.

Dunkin’ Brands said it expects to close about 800 U.S. locations of its Dunkin’ chain in 2020, or about 8 percent of its total footprint. The company, which also owns Baskin-Robbins, said on Thursday that its revenue declined 20 percent in the three months through June, from a year ago.

Strong sales in China helped Huawei edge out Samsung to become the world’s biggest smartphone vendor in the second quarter, according to the research firm Canalys — a milestone for the embattled Chinese tech giant.

French carmaker Renault posted a record net loss Thursday of 7.3 billion euros, or $8.58 billion, in the first half of the year, as layoffs mounted at its global operations. The bulk of Renault’s losses came from Nissan, Renault’s partner in a global automaking alliance.

Volkswagen said on Thursday it fell into the red during the first six months of 2020 after sales plunged 23 percent compared to a year earlier. But the world’s largest carmaker said vehicle sales, which were down by more than half in May, have begun to recover.

Airbus reported a big loss for the first half and vowed to conserve cash; AstraZeneca reported a 26 percent rise in earnings for its first half as sales of new drugs beat forecasts; Credit Suisse beat expectations, thanks to a surge in trading revenue; trading also aided Shell, which reported a smaller-than-expected loss, and Total, which disclosed a surprise profit; and Nestlé announced an 18 percent rise in first-half profit but warned of slowing growth for the rest of the year.

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from Job Search Tips https://jobsearchtips.net/usgdp-fell-9-5-percent/

[virginiaprelawland]

Law School Professor Wins Million-Dollar Defamation Suit

By Kayla Blevins, Liberty University, Class of 2020

June 11, 2020

Francesco Parisi isa professor at the University of Minnesota Law School and was accused of rape, harassment, and stalking by an ex-girlfriend, Morgan Wright. The couple dated for a few months and then separated. After separation, the woman said that 54-year-old Parisi started drinking and progressively became“crazier and crazier.” (1) According to Wright, Parisi scared her by telling her he had sexual encounters with female law students, a fourteen-year-old girl, and her friends. (2)Wright claimed Parisi then became angry with her and barred her from leaving his residence and beat her so badly she had a seizure. As she was becoming conscious, she claimed that he was in the process of raping her. (3) When the attack was over, she went to the hospital with broken teeth and required an operation to repair her colon. (4)

Afterward, Wright filed for a restraining order against Parisi. The restraining order described Parisi preventing her from leaving his home but failed to mention the rape incident. Because she left out the rape accusation, the court dismissed the order for protection.Wright provided the court Parisi's texts to her, in which Parisi pleads for her to drop the order because he was afraid of extradition(because he is an Italian immigrant) and job loss.

Afterward, Wright filed for (and won) another restraining order because she said Parisi sent people to her home late in the night to threaten her. (5) Also, he sent threatening messages to her and tried to kill her by attempting to commit vehicular manslaughter.  (6) Wright said she was jogging when Parisi saw her and came dangerously close to running her down. Because she was frightened, she ran into an elevator in a nearby building and had another seizure caused by the ordeal.

However, this restraining order was also dismissed. The problem? There was no evidence that any of these accusations were true, and Wright’s claims of abuse were refuted in court. (7) This seems to be a fatal attraction case.

The police and court records say that Wright and Parisi were in a serious relationship to such an extent that they purchased a condo together. (8) But the relationship quickly ended and Parisi sued to cancel the purchase of the condo. On the same day Parisi sued to cancel the property agreement, Wright filed for a restraining order, accusing Parisi of blocking her from leaving his residence.(9) In addition to the restraining order, she countersued Parisi over his trying to cancel the property agreement. (10) However, she never mentioned anywhere that he raped her. Wright filed two additional complaints about the property and claims Parisi abused her, but still never mentions rape until the Minnesota Court of Appeals ruled in Parisi's favor in the property dispute. (11) Then Wright reported to the police that Parisi’s sexual assault was so brutal, she needed colon surgery and repair work for her teeth. (12)

Investigators never collected Wright’s dental or medical records until after Parisi was already charged. (13) Medical records revealed that Wright did have an operation on her colon, but the operation occurred almost two years after she claimed she was raped. (14) Also, Wright went to a doctor because she complained of a migraine, but she never mentioned anything about having teeth problems or complained of injuries resulting from rape. (15)

Parisi filed a defamation suit and won a settlement of $1.2 million, the largest in Minnesota history. (16) John Braun, Parisi’s attorney, said “[Parisi] is pleased that the court system has finally unmasked Morgan Wright and recognized her for the liar that she is. … It’s been ruinous to his reputation and his health to have to constantly be battling Wright, with whom Parisi was involved in a relationship.” (17)

When a plaintiff sues for defamation, he or she must prove these elements:

1.     The plaintiff’s reputation was harmed or intended to be harmed.

2.     The statement is reasonably interpreted by at least one person as referring to the plaintiff.

3.     At least one interpretation of the statement could reasonably be considered as defamatory.

4.     The statement is false.

5.     The statement is seen or heard by someone other than the plaintiff (publication).

6.     A defendant acts with actual malice. (18)

When these elements are satisfied, the plaintiff can recover by being awarded damages. Damages can either be punitive, non-pucuniary, or pecuniary. (19) Non-pucuniary and pecuniary damages are awarded for nonmonetary losses like enduring humiliation, loss of friendship, or an illness. (20)Punitive damages are monetary damages that are awarded to punish a defendant who either intentionally or recklessly injured the plaintiff. (21) Punitive damages can be recovered in matters of public interest if the plaintiff can prove the defendant acted with actual malice and in matters of private concern when negligence is shown. (22). Actual malice is proving the defendant knew he or she made a false statement but nevertheless had a reckless disregard for the truth. (23)Reckless disregard for the truth means the evidence shows the defendant “entertained serious doubts” regarding the truth of his or her statements. (24)

Under common law, presumed damages were allowed in libel cases which promoted the plaintiffs to recover even when they were not able to demonstrate they suffered actual harm because one does suffer (to an extent) when someone makes a defamatory, slanderous statement against them. (25) However,modernSupreme Court rulings require the plaintiff to demonstrate the defendant acted with reckless disregard of the truth if he or she desired to recover presumed damages. (26) If the plaintiff wants to demonstratethe defendant’s negligence, then the plaintiff yields the ability to recover any presumed damages. (27) There is an exception - if there is no issue of a public interest at hand, then the courts can award the plaintiff damages even if the plaintiff can onlyprove the defendant’s negligence. (28)

It is lawful for plaintiffs who believe they need to clear their name to go to court, even when there has been no monetary loss to tally. Such a plaintiff is therefore willing to accept only minimal damages because the real goal is to clear his name.

However, the judge in Parisi’s case ruled that $800,000 goes towards his personal economic losses, and $325,000 goes to cover his emotional, punitive, and reputational damages. (29) The DA dropped all charges against Parisi in 2017 because the authorities were not able to find any evidence of the rape allegations. (30)

Judge Moreno said, “[Wright’s] plethora of allegations against Parisi lack credibility, [and her] accusations were false, made with malice. [She] injured Parisi as a direct result of her untruthful narrative crusade.” (31) However, no charges will be made against Wright for filing a false police report. (32)

________________________________________________________________

(1)  Stahl, Brandon. “U Law School prof charged with sex assault, stalking,” StarTribune. Feb. 22, 2017. June 7, 2020. https://www.startribune.com/u-law-school-prof-charged-with-sex-assault-stalking/414401613/.

(2)  Ibid.

(3)  Ibid.

(4)  Ibid.

(5)  Ibid.

(6)  Ibid.

(7)  Ibid.

(8)  Walsh, Paul. “University of Minnesota law professor falsely accused of rape wins $1.2 million defamation judgment,” StarTribune. May 21, 2020. June 7, 2020. https://www.startribune.com/u-law-professor-falsely-accused-of-rape-wins-1-2-million-defamation-judgment/570666022/.

(9)  Ibid.

(10)                   Ibid.

(11)                   Ibid.

(12)                   Ibid.

(13)                   Ibid.

(14)                   Ibid.

(15)                   Ibid.

(16)                   Ibid.

(17)                   Ibid.

(18)                   Edwards, Stanley, J. (2016). Tort Law. Cengage Learning, p. 354.

(19)                   Ibid., p. 364.

(20)                   Ibid.

(21)                   Goldman, Thomas, F. (2014). The Paralegal Professional. Pearson, p. 491.

(22)                   Edwards, Stanley, J. (2016). Tort Law. Cengage Learning, p. 380.

(23)                   Ibid.

(24)                   Ibid.

(25)                   Ibid., p. 364.

(26)                   Ibid.

(27)                   Ibid.

(28)                   Ibid.

(29)                   Walsh, Paul. “University of Minnesota law professor falsely accused of rape wins $1.2 million defamation judgment,” StarTribune. May 21, 2020. June 7, 2020. https://www.startribune.com/u-law-professor-falsely-accused-of-rape-wins-1-2-million-defamation-judgment/570666022/.

(30)                   Ibid.

(31)                   Ibid.

(32)                   Ibid.

[theliberaltony]

via Politics – FiveThirtyEight

Former Vice President Joe Biden has gotten a lot of good news over the past few days. A huge, almost 30-point win in South Carolina. A series of impressive endorsements. Other candidates in the moderate lane — namely, former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg and Sen. Amy Klobuchar, who were among those endorsers — dropping out.

But one thing we haven’t had a lot of since South Carolina was hard data. That changed late last night with a flurry of new polls — we now have at least two polls conducted since South Carolina in every single Super Tuesday state. So by the time we froze the FiveThirtyEight forecast at 9:30 a.m. on Tuesday morning,1 the Super Tuesday picture was a lot clearer — and overall, things look good for Biden.

Biden is now about twice as likely as Sanders to win a delegate plurality, according to our primary model, which gives him a 65 percent chance of doing so compared with a 34 percent chance for Sanders. This represents the culmination of a trend that has been underway in the model for about a week; it started to shift toward Biden once polls showed the potential for him to win big in South Carolina — and it anticipated a polling bounce in the Super Tuesday states if he did win big there. Still, even after South Carolina, Biden’s plurality chances had risen only to 32 percent, compared with 64 percent for Sanders. That means the polling bounce from the events of the past few days has been bigger than the model anticipated.

To be clear, however, there is still a lot of uncertainty. We’ve been talking about delegate pluralities, which obscures the fact that the most likely outcome in the model is still that no one wins a majority of pledged delegates. And we should note that the lack of a majority does not necessarily imply a contested convention. For instance, if Biden enters the convention with 46 percent of delegates and former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg with 10 percent, they could strike a deal where Bloomberg delegates vote for Biden on the first ballot.

Still, in the overnight polling, the numbers for Bloomberg — and to a slightly lesser extent, Sen. Elizabeth Warren — held up better than you might have expected. The model has Bloomberg projected to finish with at least 15 percent of the vote in most states, which is the threshold required to receive delegates allocated at the state and district levels — and it has Warren projected to do so in most states outside of the South. While to our eye, the model’s numbers look a little optimistic for Bloomberg, the whole point of a model is to rely on objective data. And that says Bloomberg could still accumulate plenty of delegates, even though he isn’t a favorite in any state. Keep in mind that both Bloomberg and Warren also benefit from Buttigieg and Klobuchar dropping out — it’s easier to get 15 percent in a four-way race than a six-way one.2

Overall, the model has “no majority” happening 61 percent of the time, a Biden majority 31 percent of the time and a Sanders majority 8 percent of the time. Anyone else winning a majority would require a minor miracle.

In delegate terms, Biden is projected to finish about 375 delegates ahead of Sanders in the average simulation — but keep in mind that the average obscures a huge amount of variation. Still, this provides for a helpful benchmark. Bloomberg is projected to finish with an average of 555 delegates, and Warren with 283 delegates — so their combined delegate tally projects to be more than twice as large as the projected margin separating Biden and Sanders. That’s why the model tends to land on “no majority” outcomes. If Bloomberg, Warren and other candidates are keeping 15 or 20 percent of the overall pledged delegate haul for themselves, then either Sanders or Biden needs to beat the other one by quite a bit to get an overall majority.

Below are our final forecasts for the 15 states and territories that will finish voting today. As you can see, Biden is favored to win in the seven Southern states, although he is anywhere from a very slight front-runner in Texas to a solid favorite in Virginia. And Sanders is favored in the seven remaining states across the Northeast, Midwest and West; his lead is most tenuous in Massachusetts and safest in Vermont. The model isn’t really sure what’s going to happen in American Samoa, where it gives Biden, Sanders and Bloomberg all decent chances.

Biden is favored in the South, Sanders in the North and West

Percent chance each top Democratic presidential candidate has of winning each Super Tuesday contest, according to the FiveThirtyEight primary forecast as of 9:30 a.m. Eastern on March 3

Contest Biden Bloomberg Sanders Warren California 22% 1% 76% 0% Texas 55 2 43 0 North Carolina 95 0 4 0 Virginia 98 0 2 0 Massachusetts 20 4 51 25 Minnesota 19 2 53 2 Colorado 20 6 69 5 Tennessee 68 5 25 1 Alabama 92 3 5 0 Oklahoma 78 2 18 2 Arkansas 69 17 12 1 Utah 28 11 59 3 Maine 23 7 68 3 Vermont 0 0 100 0 American Samoa 36 20 36 8

That regional divide in who wins what states has been clear for a while, but to repeat, the real prize of Super Tuesday is pledged delegates to the Democratic National Convention. And our forecast now says that Biden (484) will get more delegates, on average, out of Super Tuesday than Sanders (463) will. That’s a big shift from as recently as Sunday, when we were forecasting Sanders to get an average of 540 delegates on Super Tuesday and Biden to get an average of 395.

Biden and Sanders are neck and neck in delegates

Average number of pledged delegates each top Democratic presidential candidate is forecasted to receive from Super Tuesday contests, according to the FiveThirtyEight primary forecast as of 9:30 a.m. Eastern on March 3

Contest Biden Bloomberg Sanders Warren California 133 63 164 55 Texas 84 43 81 21 North Carolina 54 17 31 7 Virginia 52 14 26 7 Massachusetts 23 15 29 24 Minnesota 20 9 26 9 Colorado 18 13 24 11 Tennessee 26 12 20 6 Alabama 28 9 11 4 Oklahoma 16 5 11 5 Arkansas 12 8 7 3 Utah 8 7 10 4 Maine 7 5 9 3 Vermont 2 1 12 2 American Samoa 2 1 2 1 Total 484 222 463 162

Why this sudden turn in Biden’s favor? As we said, it’s mostly about the polling showing an even bigger bounce for Biden than the model expected. On Monday night and Tuesday morning, we got our first glimpse of polls in which a significant number of interviews were conducted after Buttigieg’s and Klobuchar’s withdrawals from the race, and several were startlingly good for Biden. For instance, we got four polls3 in rapid succession of Virginia, a state that had looked like a tossup before South Carolina — and all four gave Biden a lead of at least 14 points. He is now virtually certain to win the state as a result. In the same way, North Carolina is now firmly in Biden’s camp with the release of three new polls4 that gave Biden an average lead of 16 points in the Tar Heel State.

Biden had already been gaining ground in our California polling average, but new Swayable and Data for Progress polls caused Biden to improve further in our forecast for the state. Although Sanders still has a lead there and is the likely winner, Biden has cut his projected margin to the single digits — and both Bloomberg and Warren project to get at least 15 percent of the vote in California, meaning they’ll get delegates of their own and prevent Sanders from running up the score. On the flip side, if Sanders overperforms in California and keeps Warren and Bloomberg from getting 15 percent there, he has some upside relative to our projections.

Granted, other new polls showed less dramatic movement. Swayable and Data for Progress released polls of Texas confirming what our forecast already thought: that Sanders and Biden are neck and neck in the Lone Star State, in what is probably the most interesting contest of the evening. Other polls featured results that looked a little flukish, like Bloomberg leading in Maine and Utah, per two Swayable polls. (This still hurt Sanders’s chances, though, especially in Utah, which was previously expected to be an easy win for him.) But few new polls (outside those of his home state of Vermont) were unambiguously good for Sanders.

We should keep in mind that none of these new polls are traditional, live-caller telephone polls; there just wouldn’t have been enough time to conduct many of them anyway after South Carolina. So that increases the uncertainty — although our model accounts for a lot of uncertainty. For example, in California, we think Sanders could get anywhere from 26 to 39 percent of the vote, while Biden could get anywhere from 21 percent to 32 percent. And those are merely 80 percent confidence intervals; vote shares will fall outside of those ranges 20 percent of the time.

But Biden sure seems to have a lot of upside in today’s contests, especially when you consider that even the polls above aren’t even pricing in the full impact of the last 72 hours. Most of them still included Buttigieg and Klobuchar as options, even though some respondents answered them knowing that they had dropped out. Perhaps Biden’s rally in Texas last night and endorsement from former Texas Rep. Beto O’Rourke could help him there; that’s also too recent to be reflected in any of the polling.

On the other hand, millions of early votes have already been cast by mail-in states like California and Colorado, where Sanders has been (and remains) strong. When watching the results tonight, you should be careful; early ballots are counted first in some states (though not all) and they may not match election-night returns. Early voters can also skew older than younger ones, which can be a disadvantage for candidates such as Sanders who rely on young voters.

And in terms of delegates, it’s possible for either Biden or Sanders to walk away from Super Tuesday with a big lead. Our model thinks Biden could get as many as 639 delegates or as few as 341, and Sanders could get as few as 325 or as many as 608. We’ll only know after all today’s votes have been counted — which, thanks to those mail-in ballots in the West, could take several days.

[ticket4futball]

Liverpool Premier League records: Is Klopp's side could still do in a stunning season?

It gazes a substance of when, not if, Liverpool boost the Premier League cup, and they might become record-breakers beside the way.

With a 22-point top over their nearby competitors, Jurgen Klopp's side is previously enjoying the best term in the history of any club from Europe's top-five associations in terms of points gained. Football fans from around the world can purchase Premier League Football Tickets online to enjoy its stunning performances.

I keep telling everyone to really savor this, the record that we have kept so far, I do not think it is going to come along again so quickly, Chairman Tom Werner thought after their best recent win, a 4-0 beating of Southampton previous weekend, and their 16th three-point pull in a row.

There are plenty of reasons for Werner to enjoy the moment, Liverpool are still in the Champions League and FA Cup, as well as remaining on course for the first unbeaten Premier League season since Arsenal's invincible in 2004, but that's far from the only record they could be rewritten by the end of the campaign.

The records Liverpool are chasing down

A longest consecutive run of wins: 18 Manchester City, 2017/18

When could Liverpool break it? Watford (A), February 29

A perfect half-season between draws with Everton and Crystal Palace set Manchester City on their way to a record-breaking points tally back in 2017/18, more on that later, but Liverpool has that total in their sights now with a run of wins stretching back to late October.

Victories, at Norwich, at home to West Ham and then at Watford, a trio they beat by a combined 8-1 scoreline in the reverse fixtures, will break Manchester City's record.

Longest unbeaten run: 49 Arsenal, 2002/03-2004/05

When could Liverpool break it? Aston Villa (H), April 11

When Arsenal racked up 49 games unbeaten, it was questioned whether there would ever be a team to surpass Arsene Wenger's Invincible.

There have been impressive unbeaten runs since then, Chelsea was beaten only once in the season that magnificent run came to an end, and Manchester City lost only twice en route to the title in 2017/18.

But Liverpool has not tasted defeat since their ultimately costly 2-1 reverse at the Etihad last January and the Reds will become the first team to go 50 Premier League competitions undefeated if they can get somewhat from each of their next eight league competitions.

The 50th game is set to be their home clash with Aston Villa on April 11, but pending FA Cup progression could also be a way to Brighton a week later.

Most wins: 32 Manchester City, 2017/18 and 2018/19

When could Liverpool break it? Brighton (A), April 18

Manchester City ripped up the record books when Pep Guardiola lifted his first Premier League title in 2018, with the kind of dominating season the league had never seen before.

Despite City winning all, but six games across the entire campaign, and repeating that feat last season, Liverpool are well on-course to not only beat Manchester City's record haul but potentially better it.

If they keep up their stunning run of victories, which would include beating both City and Everton away, they could break Guardiola's wins record at Brighton in mid-April and potentially end up with a mammoth 37 victories by the end of the season.

They can static give to drop points in four competitions before the conclusion of the season and overhaul Manchester City.

Most points: 100 Manchester City, 2017/18

When could Liverpool break it? Burnley (H), April 25

Gabriel Jesus' last-minute winner for Manchester City at Southampton on the last day of the season in 2017/18 did not mean much in a title race that was long-since over but Guardiola's celebrations on the touchline at St Mary's told their own story about how significant reaching the target of a three-figure points tally was for the manager.

City was only two points away from matching that last season, but Liverpool can afford to drop 11 points between now and the end of the campaign and still beat that incredible figure.

But to place that into setting with reverence to their present form, it is occupied them since January 3, 2019, to droplet their last 11 points.

At present, Liverpool could smash past 100 points against Burnley on April 25, and could even afford one draw up until that point to still break the record.

Most away victories in a term: 16 Manchester City, 2017/18

When could Liverpool break it? Arsenal (A), May 2

Winning all-but two away games in a Premier League season sounds like a fantasy to most, after all, even the highest-points winners in the division's history, Manchester City's 2017/18 team, dropped points on three of their road trips.

Football fans can get Liverpool Football Tickets through our trusted online ticketing marketplace. Ticket4football.com is the most reliable source to book Manchester United Tickets.

[gadgetsrevv]

Norway vs. Spain: Euro 2020 Qualifying Odds, Live Stream, TV Info | Bleacher Report

Soccrates Images/Getty Images

Spain are yet to drop a point in qualifying for UEFA Euro 2020 and could secure their place at the tournament finals if they defeat Norway on Saturday and other results go in their favour.

Robert Moreno’s side have won each of their six matches in Group F and boast a seven-point lead at the top of the pool. Norway are two points outside the top two and in far greater need of a result if they’re to qualify automatically.

Spain are guaranteed one of those spots if they win on Saturday and either second-place Sweden lose at Malta or third-place Romania drop points in their visit to the Faroe Islands.

Norway lost 2-1 when they opened their Group F campaign against Spain in Valencia in March, but coach Lars Lagerback will hope for a better display considering that’s their only loss in 10 games.

          Date: Saturday, October 12

Time: 2:45 p.m. ET/7:45 p.m. BST

Venue: Ullevaal Stadium, Oslo, Norway

Live Stream: Sky Go (UK), ESPN+ (U.S.), fuboTV (U.S.)

TV Info: Sky Sports Football (UK)

      Odds

Norway: 117-20

Draw: 33-10

Spain: 1-2

Via Caesars.

         Preview

Spain have run rampant in Group F, and they are one of only four teams to have won all of their matches.

Norway have only lost one more than Spain in qualifying, despite the gulf between their points tallies. Lagerback’s side have lost just once in six Group F outings, but home draws against Sweden and Romania have limited their scope in terms of finishing in the top two.

Joaquin Maroto of AS reported midfielders Fabian Ruiz and Dani Ceballos were each doubtful for Saturday’s showdown due to knocks. However, it speaks volumes of Spain’s strength in depth that any number of talented options are on standby, including Thiago Alcantara, Pablo Sarabia, Santi Cazorla and Saul Niguez.

Norway are far more affected by the absence of Red Bull Salzburg phenomenon Erling Haaland. The Scandinavians might have hoped their 19-year-old wonderkid could replicate his recent exploits against Genk in the UEFA Champions League, via BT Sport (U.S. and UK viewers only, respectively):

Bleacher Report Live @brlive

@brfootball Erling Haaland went OFF on Matchday 1.

Here’s every goal from his hat trick

https://t.co/XqmD1XKne3

Haaland followed up that hat-trick performance on his Champions League debut by scoring a dramatic equaliser against Liverpool when his side recently lost 4-3 at Anfield, per Statman Dave:

Statman Dave @StatmanDave

Erling Haaland in the Champions League:

4 shots 4 goals

Unreal.

https://t.co/kjFM1um76v

Much is at stake, and Moreno could hand international debuts to defenders Sergio Reguilon or Pau Torres, while striker Gerard Moreno is also in contention to make his senior Spain bow.

Barcelona prodigy Ansu Fati was another uncapped asset in contention following a string of breakout performances, but Moreno recently said the 16-year-old wasn’t available, per The Spanish Football Podcast:

The Spanish Football Podcast @tsf_podcast

Robert Moreno confirms he WAS considering 16-year-old Ansu Fati for the Spain squad.

“Everything around him is exceptional. I want to help his progress… he has been injured, there’s a bureaucratic issue too. We want to help as much as we can so he can continue to grow”

Three points for the hosts could inject some life into the race for Group F qualification, even if Spain look destined to win the pool.

Bournemouth striker Joshua King will seek to supplement Norway’s attacking threat against a Spain side that’s conceded two goals in the last five games and are chasing an eighth successive victory.

Source link . More news

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[anfieldcentral]

Talking Points | West Ham United 0 - 4 Liverpool FC

London? Completed It Mate |

The Reds have officially gone unbeaten in London all season. The Reds have played 6 games in the capital since August - against Arsenal, Spurs, Chelsea, Crystal Palace, Watford, West Ham - and come away with 16 points out of 18 on offer and with a goal difference of +9. London hasn’t exactly been a happy hunting ground for the Reds in recent years and this tally is a remarkable improvement on last season when the Reds took just 10 points from the same 6 venues and a lesser goal difference of -2. Not only have the Reds been able to match the big boys of England’s capital this season but they’ve not hidden away when visiting the more physical mid-table boys either, something that will undoubtedly please Jurgen Klopp when he looks back on this campaign.

A Magical Masterclass from Philippe Coutinho |

What an assist. What a goal. What a second goal. What a fucking player. The little Brazilian has been on another level in recent weeks and 6 goals/2 assists in his last 8 games has seen him really step up to the plate since Sadio Mane’s injury against Everton. The little Brazilian was deployed in a deeper, central role against the Hammers after Klopp’s assertions that he could be a success story in this role and boy did he back up his managers talk. An inch perfect through ball that split open West Ham’s defence for Sturridge to put Liverpool 1-0 up in the first half was just the beginning as Coutinho opted to take the game by the scruff of the neck. 19 goal involvements in the League this season puts him ahead of Mane and Firmino as Liverpool’s most dangerous player and the scary part is - he’s only going to get better.

Tactical Switch Up Proves Shift In Klopp’s Management |

There’s been a real shift in Jurgen Klopp’s management over the last month or so and I have to say, I like it. The German has put aside his philosophies for the most part and recognised that he just needs his side to get the job done. The press has still been there but was used far more sparingly against West Ham as the Reds picked and chose their moments effectively. Against the Hammers though, Klopp opted to change his system from this season’s tried and tested 4-3-3 to a 4-4-2 diamond with Origi and Sturridge partnered up top. The strike force has done well whenever they’ve played together since Klopp arrived at Liverpool and this was no different. The system granted both men the opportunity to drop deep, push wide and move across the West Ham backline while also freeing up room for the likes of Philippe Coutinho, Adam Lallana and Gini Wijnaldum to make late runs from deep into the West Ham box. Perhaps this is something Klopp should consider ahead of next week’s crunch clash against Middlesborough, especially if Roberto Firmino doesn’t recover in time.

Impressive Away Day Stats |

Liverpool’s recent away day form guide reads - WWWWD. In fact, the Reds have only lost 4 times away from home all season, a remarkable improvement on their away form of recent campaigns. Their immediate form though has been the most impressive run of all. 5 games under the kosh. 13 points from 15. 9 goals scored. 2 goals conceded with 3 clean sheets. The Reds ability to knuckle down and just get the job done away from the home support of Anfield has been vital in their final push for Champions League football and has gone a long way to proving that there is a new steeliness about this squad that has been missing in previous years. If anything is going to be taken as a sign of progress under Jurgen Klopp this season, this is a solid contender.

Annnnnnnnnd Breathe. |

While Arsenal and City both won on Saturday, Liverpool’s 4 goals and 3 points move them to 73 points with a 33 goal difference. This means that should Arsenal win their game in hand against Sunderland midweek - if they don’t everyone on the planet will be shocked - they will still remain one point behind the Reds with Everton to play on the final day. Spurs defeat of Manchester United after Liverpool’s result has also freed up some - albeit minimal - breathing room, with Mourinho’s men now numerically unable to finish in one of the Champions League spots. While it’s going to be another nervy 90 minutes on Sunday, we can at least breathe easy for the rest of this week knowing that we’re in the pole position. C’mon you Redmen, let’s finish where we belong. In the Champions League spots!

[brajeshupadhyay]

Coronavirus Updates: Delhi reports 11 deaths today, lowest in over a month; 1,076 test positive in past 24 hrs

23:40 (IST)

Coronavirus Outbreak in West Bengal Latest Updates

2,816 new COVID-19 cases in West Bengal today

2,816 new COVID19 cases, 2,078 discharged and 61 deaths reported in West Bengal today. Total number of cases in the state is now at 83,800, including 58,962 discharged, 22,992 active cases and 1,846 deaths, the state health department said.

22:46 (IST)

Coronavirus Outbreak in Delhi Latest Updates

Delhi committee suggests early recognition, transfer of patients to ICU to cut COVID-19 fatality

Four death monitoring committees constituted by Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal to analyse the high mortality rate in ten COVID-19 hospitals on Wednesday submitted reports suggesting measures like early recognition and transfer of patients to ICU, and use of plasma at the initial stage.

In a statement, the government said that the chief minister, who held a meeting with representatives of these committees set up on July 31, said that all steps should be taken to bring deaths to zero in the city.

— PTI

21:42 (IST)

Coronavirus Outbreak in Delhi Latest Updates

Delhi reports lowest death count in over a month

Delhi reported 1,076 COVID-19 cases and 11 deaths on Wednesday, the lowest daily fatality count in more than a month, authorities said, adding the city's caseload has surpassed 1.4 lakh and death toll has risen to 4,044.

The active cases tally on Wednesday rose to 10,072, from 9,897 on Tuesday. The daily cases count had dipped to 674 and 12 deaths were recorded on Tuesday. As per Wednesday bulletin, the positive rate stood at 6.4 percent while the recovery rate was nearly 90 percent.

— PTI

20:29 (IST)

Coronavirus Outbreak in Gujarat Latest Updates

Gujarat reports 2,557 new cases, 23 deaths; tally rise to 66,777

According to the state health department, Gujarat's COVID-19 tally reached 66,777 with 1,073 patients testing positive on Wednesday while 23 patients died from the virus, taking the overall toll to 2,557, PTI reported.

Of the total cases, Ahmedabad reported 161 infections takings its overall tally to 27,283. 

Five people died in the city on Wednesday taking the toll from the virus to 1,617, the state health department bulletin added.

20:16 (IST)

Coronavirus Outbreak in Maharashtra Latest Updates

Over 10,000 new COVID-19 cases reported in Maharashtra

The state of Maharashtra reported 10,309 new coronavirus cases today while 334 people succumbed to COVID-19.  Total number of cases in the state is now at 4,68,265, including 1,45,961 active cases, 3,05,521 recovered & 16,476 deaths, the state's health department said. 

20:10 (IST)

Coronavirus Outbreak in Jammu and Kashmir Latest Updates

J&K records 559 new COVID-19 cases, tally rises to 22,955

 Jammu and Kashmir on Wednesday recorded 559 new coronavirus cases, taking the total number of infected people to 22,955, even as 9 COVID-19 patients died during the last 24 hours in the union territory, officials said. "Nine people, who were COVID-19 positive, have died over the past 24 hours in Jammu and Kashmir," the officials said.  

They said while one death took place in Jammu region, eight were reported from the Kashmir Valley. The coronavirus death toll in the union territory has now risen to 426 of which 395 are from the valley and 31 from Jammu region

19:46 (IST)

Coronavirus Outbreak in India Latest Updates

Passenger transport operator bodies say sector on verge of collapse, seek govt help

The Bus and Car Operators Confederation of India (BOCI) and the Delhi Contract Bus Association on Wednesday sought government intervention to "save" contract carriage and all-India tourist permit bus operators saying the sector is on the verge of a collapse due to the coronavirus pandemic. The two bodies said transporters in Delhi alone have suffered a financial loss of Rs 65,000 crore in the past two months and the business has no money to continue operations in the coming months.

    They demanded relief measures from the government, including waiver of road and passenger taxes for the next three quarters, deferment of tax payments and extension of vehicle insurance validity, among others, according to a joint statement. The passenger transport operators also sought deferment of EMI payments for the next 6-12 months and waiver of interest component for the deferred period; discount of 10-25 percent on toll taxes; and extension of validity of documents like fitness certificate, permits, driving licence and registrations, till March 2021.

19:36 (IST)

Coronavirus Outbreak in Uttar Pradesh Latest Updates

UP reports over 4,000 cases, 40 deaths in 24 hours

Uttar Pradesh reported 4,078 COVID-19 cases and 40 new fatalities on Wednesday, bringing the infection tally to over 1.04 lakh and death toll from the disease to 1,857. However, the state government said 4,154 cases were reported in the last 24 hours, taking the total number of infected people to 1,04,388. There are 41,973 active cases in the state while 60,558 people have been discharged from hospitals after recovering from the infection, the statement said.

19:18 (IST)

Coronavirus Outbreak in Kerala Latest Updates

Kerala reports 1,195 new cases in 24 hrs; tally crosses 29,000

Kerala reported 1,195 cases in the last 24 hours taking the overall tally across 29,000. The state's toll has reached 94. Of the positive cases, 971 were infected through contact and the source of infection of 79 people is not known, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said. Sixty six of those who tested positive have come from foreign countries and 125 from other states. Thirteen health workers are among those infected,he told reporters.

18:17 (IST)

Coronavirus Outbreak in Goa Latest Updates

Goa govt issues new guidelines for passengers arriving in state

The Goa government said that all passengers arriving in the state are "required to go for 14 days of home quarantine or they can opt for 14 days of paid institutional quarantine."

All passengers arriving in Goa are required to go for 14 days of home quarantine or they can opt for 14 days of paid institutional quarantine. #COVID19 pic.twitter.com/R7YR8OMj6T

— ANI (@ANI) August 5, 2020

17:50 (IST)

Coronavirus Outbreak in Assam Latest Updates

Tinsukia, Makum to be under total lockdown from today

The Assam government will enforce a "total" lockdown in areas under the Tinsukia and Makum Municipal boards from 6 pm on Wednesday till 6 pm on 12 August, reports said.

17:33 (IST)

Coronavirus Outbreak in Maharashtra Latest Updates

One new COVID-19 case reported in Dharavi

The BMC on Wednesday said that one new coronavirus case was reported in Mumbai's Dharavi area, taking the total number of cases to 2,589, including 77 active cases and 2,254 discharges.

17:00 (IST)

Coronavirus Outbreak in Karnataka Latest Updates

Karnataka govt inaugurates mobile COVID-19 testing lab

Karnataka medical education minister Dr K Sudhakar on Wednesday inaugurated the state's first Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR)-approved mobile COVID-19 testing labs.

Karnataka: State Medical Education Minister Dr K Sudhakar inaugurates state's first Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) approved mobile #COVID19 testing labs. pic.twitter.com/ITgEMMJTiV

— ANI (@ANI) August 5, 2020

16:35 (IST)

Coronavirus Outbreak in India Latest Updates

India's fatality rate drops to 2.09%, says Centre

The COVID-19 fatality rate has further dropped to 2.09 per cent, the Union health ministry said. The recoveries have surged to 12,82,215 and are more than twice the active cases of the coronavirus infection, it added.

Coordinated implementation of the strategy by the Union and state and Union Territories governments has also ensured that the COVID-19 case fatality rate has been low when compared to the global scenario. "It has been progressively falling and stands at 2.09 per cent as on date," the ministry said.

15:54 (IST)

Coronavirus Outbreak in Goa Latest Updates

In-charge of hospital in Goa's Margoa suspended for 'negligence'

The official in charge of a COVID-19 facility in Goa's Margoa was on Wednesday suspended for 'negligence', The Indian Express reported.

"The State Health department has transferred Dr Ira Almeida, who was heading the facility, after it was found that conditions at the hospital were not up to the mark. Almeida has been replaced by a senior doctor from the Goa Medical College, Dr Uday Kakodkar. Goa has reported around 7,000 cases of Covid-19 so far," the report said.

15:27 (IST)

Coronavirus in Andaman and Nicobar LATEST Updates

8-yr-old boy dies of COVID-19 in Andaman; 98 new cases reported

Andaman and Nicobar Islands reported the first death of a child due to COVID-19 as an eight-year-old boy succumbed to the infection on Wednesday, reports PTI.

The boy, who was a resident of Junglighat area of Port Blair, was suffering from diabetes. He died of COVID-19 at the G B Pant Hospital here, the official said, adding the fresh fatality has pushed the coronavirus death toll in the islands to 12.

15:16 (IST)

Coronavirus in Singapore LATEST Updates

Singapore reports 908 new cases today

Singapore on Wednesday reported 908 new coronavirus cases, the highest daily figure recorded since May, with the Ministry of Health (MOH) attributing the high number of infections to the ongoing clearance of dormitories housing foreign workers.

The new cases raised the total number of COVID-19 infections in the country to 54,254, the MOH said.

15:01 (IST)

Coronavirus in Puducherry LATEST Updates

Puducherry reports 286 new cases, 7 deaths

According to the Puducherry health department, 286 new COVID19 positive cases and 7 deaths were reported in the Union Territory. The total number of cases now at 4,432 including 1,721 active cases, 2,646 recovered cases and 65 deaths.

14:52 (IST)

Coronavirus in Karnataka LATEST Updates

Siddaramaiah's vitals are stable, says Bengaluru hospital

According to ANI reports, former Karnataka chief minister Siddaramaiah has no fever and his vital parameters are stable. "He has been started on appropriate treatment and is being closely monitored by our experts. His symptoms have improved since admission and is comfortable at present," Manipal Hospital told the news agency.

14:41 (IST)

Coronavirus in US LATEST Updates

Trump says America’s attitude towards China ‘changed greatly’ since COVID-19 hit US

America’s attitude towards China has “changed greatly” since the coronavirus pandemic hit the country, US President Donald Trump has said, asserting that the Chinese government should have stopped the deadly contagion in Wuhan.

Trump, who has in the past upped the ante against Beijing over its handling of the COVID-19 outbreak, told reporters at the White House on Tuesday that the coronavirus should not have hit the world.

14:17 (IST)

Coronavirus in India LATEST Updates

Singer SP Balasubrahmanyam tests postivie for COVID-19

Popular playback singer SP Balasubrahmanyam has tested positive for the coronavirus. Despite doctors advising home quarantine, the singer chose to admit himself to the hospital.

The singer shared his diagnosis in a Facebook videoearlier today. He said that he had tested positive a few days back but it was a mild case of the virus.

Read full report here

13:33 (IST)

Coronavirus in Tripura LATEST Updates

Tripura's COVID-19 caseload rises to 5,646; toll mounts to 30

Tripura's COVID-19 caseload increased to 5,646 on Wednesday with the detection of 125 fresh infections, while two more fatalities pushed its coronavirus toll to 30, reports PTI.

13:24 (IST)

Coronavirus in Maharashtra LATEST Updates

10,026 Maharashtra cops contract COVID-19, toll reaches 107

Over 10,000 Maharashtra Police personnel have so far tested positive for coronavirus and 107 of them have died due to the viral infection, reports PTI.

The police personnel who tested positive for the disease included 1,035 officers, he said. "So far, 10,026 personnel have tested positive for COVID-19. Of them, 107 personnel, including 10 officers, have died," the official said, adding that more than 50 percent of the casualties were reported from the Mumbai Police force.

13:14 (IST)

Coronavirus in Pakistan LATEST Updates

Pakistan's toll due to coronavirus crosses 6,000

Pakistan has reported 15 more deaths due to coronavirus in the last 24 hours, taking its death toll to 6,014 while the total number of infections in the country stands at 281,136, the health ministry said on Wednesday.

The Ministry of National Health Services said a total of 675 new cases of coronavirus were reported in the country. The total number of infected cases reached 281,136 after 675 new cases were detected while the death toll due to the infection has surged to 6,014, the ministry said in a statement.

13:00 (IST)

Coronavirus in Odisha LATEST Updates

Odisha's COVID-19 total crosses 39,000-mark

Odisha's COVID-19 caseload crossed the 39,000-mark with the detection of 1,337 fresh infections, while nine more fatalities pushed its coronavirus toll to 225 on Wednesday, reports PTI. The fresh infections reported in 28 districts took the state's tally to 39,018.

12:52 (IST)

Coronavirus in India LATEST Updates

Zydus Cadila to commence phase II clinical trials of COVID-19 vaccine from 6 Aug

Drug firm Zydus Cadila on Wednesday said the phase I clinical trial of its COVID-19 vaccine candidate, ZyCoV-D, has been completed and it will commence phase II clinical trials from 6 August.

"ZyCoV-D was found to be safe and well tolerated in the phase I clinical trial. The company will now commence phase II clinical trials from the 6th of August, 2020.

12:27 (IST)

Coronavirus in India LATEST Updates

Lupin Ltd launches COVID-19 drug Favipiravir in India

Drug major Lupin on Wednesday announced the launch of its Favipiravir drug under the brand name 'Covihalt' for the treatment patients with mild to moderate COVID-19 symptoms at Rs 49 per tablet in India.

Favipiravir has received authorisation from the Drug Controller General of India (DCGI) for emergency use, Lupin said in a regulatory filing.

12:16 (IST)

Coronavirus in India LATEST Updates

COVID vaccine likely by mid 2021: WHO scientist Soumya Swaminathan

Stating that a realistic timeline to start receiving first million doses of COVID vaccine is mid-2021, World Health Organization’s Chief Scientist Dr Soumya Swaminathan cautioned that it might take longer "as we did not understand the virus completely".

11:38 (IST)

Coronavirus in Rajasthan LATEST Updates

593 fresh COVID-19 cases in Rajasthan 

With 593 fresh COVID-19 infections in Rajasthan, the overall count in the state climbed to 47,272 on Wednesday, ANI reported. The COVID-19 toll has reached 742 after 10 more patients succumbed to the viral infection.

The state recorded 32,900 COVID-19 recoveries so far, according to the Rajasthan government.

11:23 (IST)

Coronavirus in Arunachal Pradesh LATEST Updates

Arunachal Pradesh reports 32 new coronavirus cases

Arunachal Pradesh on Wednesday reported 32 fresh COVID-19 infections including 13 security personnel, taking the northeastern state's overall count to 1,790, a senior health official said.

Of the 32 new cases, eight were reported from Lohit district, Lower Siang (7), East Siang (4), West Kameng and Capital Complex three each, Changlang, Tirap and Papumpare reported two cases each and one from East Kameng district, State Surveillance Officer Dr L Jampa said.

10:47 (IST)

Coronavirus in India LATEST Updates

India has nearly 5.8 lakh active COVID-19 cases

Of 18.55 lakh total confirmed COVID-19 cases, nearly 5.8 lakh patients are being treated for coronavirus in different parts of the country, as per the Union Health Ministry. 

10:45 (IST)

Coronavirus in Uttar Pradesh LATEST Updates

Uttar Pradesh cabinet minister tests COVID-19 positive

Uttar Pradesh cabinet minister Brajesh Pathak on Wednesday said he has tested positive for the novel coronavirus, and asked people who came in contact with him recently to get themselves tested as per norms.

"After symptoms of coronavirus, I got tested on advice of doctors. I have tested positive for COVID-19. Those who came in contact with me in past few days are requested to follow government guidelines and quarantine themselves and get themselves tested," said Pathak. 

10:40 (IST)

Coronavirus in Madhya Pradesh LATEST Updates

Shivraj Singh Chouhan discharged after recovering from COVID-19

Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivrah Singh Chouhan has been discharged from Bhopal's Chirayu Hospital on Wednesday after recovering from COVID-19, reported ANI.

Reports of him contracting the viral infection came on 25 July. The hospital advised him to quarantine himself at home and monitor his health for further seven days.

10:07 (IST)

Coronavirus in India LATEST Updates

India's COVID-19 recovery rate at 67.19%

Of the total 19,08,255 confirmed coronavirus cases, there are 5,86,244 active cases, according to the latest data by the health ministry. 

So far, 12,82,216 COVID-19 patients have been cured, taking India's recovery rate to 67.19 percent. 

09:58 (IST)

Coronavirus in India LATEST Updates

India's COVID-19 cases over 19 lakh 

India registered over 19 lakh COVID-19 infections on Wednesday after 52,509 more individuals tested positive for the novel coronavirus. With 857 more deaths in the past 24 hours, the COVID-19 toll climbed to 39,795, according to the health ministry.

09:33 (IST)

Coronavirus in India LATEST Updates

India's COVID-19 testing rate lower than other nations: WHO chief scientist 

Noting that lockdown was a temporary measure to contain the spread of coronavirus, a senior official of the World Health Organisation on Tuesday said India has a low testing rate when compared to some of the countries that are successfully trying to curb it.

"India as a whole, the testing rates are much lower compared to some of the countries, who have done well like Germany, Taiwan, South Korea, Japan. Even the United States is testing a huge number of people. So we need to have some benchmark and every public health department needs to have benchmarks on what is the rate of testing per lakh or per million, what is the test positivity rate," said Soumya Swaminathan, the Chief Scientist of WHO.

09:15 (IST)

Coronavirus in Odisha LATEST Updates

Naveen Patnaik calls for silent prayer in memory of COVID Warriors

In a bid to boost the morale of the thousands of people engaged in the fight against COVID-19 in the state, Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik urged people to observe a silent prayer on Wednesday and take an oath to follow guidelines to avoid infection.

"I will lead a silent prayer in the memory of COVID Warriors. I appeal to my 4.5 crore sisters and brothers of Odisha to join this silent prayer at 6 pm tomorrow (5 August)," Patnaik said. 

08:54 (IST)

Coronavirus in India LATEST Updates

India’s COVID-19 testing rate lower than other countries: WHO chief scientist

Noting that lockdown was a temporary measure to contain the spread of coronavirus, a senior official of the World Health Organisation on Tuesday said India has a low testing rate when compared to some of the countries that are successfully trying to curb it.

The Chief Scientist of WHO, Soumya Swaminathan, in an interactive session through video conference said,as of now about 28 vaccine candidates for COVID-19 are under clinical trial, of which five are entering Phase-II and over 150 candidates are in pre-clinical trials across the globe.

"India as a whole, the testing rates are much lower compared to some of the countries, who have done well like Germany, Taiwan, South Korea, Japan.

08:14 (IST)

Coronavirus LATEST Updates

Global toll rose to 6.9 lakh as US reports 1,302 new deaths 

The global toll rose to 6,99,134 on Wednesday with the United States adding 1,302 more fatalities to the tally, according to the Johns Hopkins University. The global coronavirus count crossed 1.84 crore. As many as 1.10 crore people have recovered.

08:11 (IST)

Coronavirus LATEST Updates

Novavax Covid-19 vaccine induces immune response in early study

Novavax Inc said on Tuesday its experimental Covid-19 vaccine produced high levels of antibodies against the novel coronavirus, according to initial data from a small, early-stage clinical trial, sending the company’s shares up 10%, reports Reuters.

The company said it could start a large pivotal Phase III trial as soon as late September, and on a conference call added that it could produce 1 billion to 2 billion doses of the vaccine in 2021.

08:09 (IST)

Coronavirus in Delhi LATEST Updates

Delhi’s active cases fall below 10,000-mark, toll at 4,033

The number of active cases in Delhi went below the 10,000-mark. The Capital’s coronavirus tally stood at 1,39,156, including 1,25,226 recoveries and 4,033 deaths.

Maharashtra’s case count rose to 4,57,956 after 7,760 new infections, and the toll went up by 300 to 16,142. Meanwhile, Tamil Nadu has 2,68,285 cases and the toll stood at 4,349.

08:01 (IST)

Coronavirus in Assam LATEST Updates

Assam reports highest spike in cases yesterday

Assam on Tuesday reported its highest single-day spike of 2,886 new COVID-19 cases, taking the state's tally to 48,161, Health Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said. Six more patients died in the state, following which the toll rose to 115.

📌Alert ~ 2886 COVID cases detected out of 5⃣9⃣0⃣6⃣4⃣ tests in last 24 hrs~ maximum in a day so far. Positivity Rate- 4.86% Kamrup (M)- 550, Kamrup (R)- 294, Nagaon- 213, D'garh- 201 ↗️Total cases 48161 ↗️Recovered 33428 ↗️Active cases 14615 ↗️Deaths 115 9:40 PM, Aug 04 pic.twitter.com/5mXtNS10XI

— Himanta Biswa Sarma (@himantabiswa) August 4, 2020

07:55 (IST)

Coronavirus in US LATEST Updates

'Too many are selfish': US nears 5 million virus cases

Fourth of July gatherings, graduation parties, no-mask weddings, crowded bars there are reasons the US has racked up more than 155,000 coronavirus deaths, by far the most of any country, and is fast approaching an off-the-charts 5 million confirmed infections, easily the highest in the world, reports AP.

Many Americans have resisted wearing masks and social distancing, calling such precautions an overreaction or an infringement on their liberty.

Public health experts say the problem has been compounded by confusing and inconsistent guidance from politicians and a patchwork quilt of approaches to containing the scourge by county, state and federal governments.

07:52 (IST)

Coronavirus in Maharashtra LATEST Updates

2,098 new COVID-19 cases reported in Pune yesterday

Pune district reported 2098 new coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours, taking its COVID-19 count to 94,978 on Tuesday, a health department official said. He said the death toll rose to 2,185 with 56 more patients succumbing to the infection during the same period in the western Maharashtra district, reports PTI.

07:52 (IST)

Coronavirus in Meghalaya LATEST Updates

Meghalaya reports highest single-day spike in cases yesterday

Meghalaya on Tuesday recorded the highest single-day recovery of 66 COVID-19 patients, Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma said. Fifteen more people also tested positive for coronavirus, increasing the state's tally to 917.

While 330 patients have recovered from the disease so far in the state, five have died due to the virus.

07:42 (IST)

Coronavirus in India LATEST Updates

Rapid Antigen tests comprise about 25-30% of total Covid-19 tests, says ICMR

Rapid antigen tests comprise nearly 25-30 per cent of the total daily tests conducted for the detection of COVID-19 in the country at present, ICMR Director General Balram Bhargava said on Tuesday.

A record 6,61,892 samples were tested for COVID-19 on Monday, taking the total number of tests conducted so far in the country to 2,08,64,750 and the Tests per Million (TPM) to 15,119.

Of the total 2.08 crore tests conducted so far, around 26.5 lakh are antigen tests, an ICMR official said.

Coronavirus LATEST Updates:  Delhi reported 1,076 COVID-19 cases and 11 deaths on Wednesday, the lowest daily fatality count in more than a month, authorities said, adding the city's caseload has surpassed 1.4 lakh and death toll has risen to 4,044.

The active cases tally on Wednesday rose to 10,072, from 9,897 on Tuesday. The daily cases count had dipped to 674 and 12 deaths were recorded on Tuesday.

The state of Maharashtra reported 10,309 new coronavirus cases today while 334 people succumbed to COVID-19. Total number of cases in the state is now at 4,68,265, including 1,45,961 active cases, 3,05,521 recovered & 16,476 deaths, the state's health department said.

While Mumbai reported 1,125 cases on Wednesday, the Pune Municipal Corporation reported a rise of 1,282 cases, taking the total number of cases to 65,136, a state bulletin said

Gujarat's COVID-19 tally reached 66,777 with 1,073 patients testing positive on Wednesday while 23 patients died from the virus, taking the overall toll to 2,557, a state health department bulletin said.

Of the total cases, Ahmedabad reported 161 infectiosns takings its overall tally to 27,283.

Five people died in the city on Wednesday taking the toll from the virus to 1,617, the bulletin added.

Uttar Pradesh reported 4,078 COVID-19 cases and 40 new fatalities on Wednesday, bringing the infection tally to over 1.04 lakh and death toll from the disease to 1,857.

Of the positive cases, 971 were infected through contact and the source of infection of 79 people is not known, Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said. Sixty six of those who tested positive have come from

Andaman and Nicobar Islands reported the first death of a child due to COVID-19 as an eight-year-old boy succumbed to the infection on Wednesday, reports PTI.

The boy, who was a resident of Junglighat area of Port Blair, was suffering from diabetes. He died of COVID-19 at the G B Pant Hospital here, the official said, adding the fresh fatality has pushed the coronavirus death toll in the islands to 12.

10,026 personnel have tested positive for COVID-19. Of them, 107 personnel, including 10 officers, have died, an official said, adding that more than 50% of the deaths were reported from the Mumbai Police.

Pharma major Lupin Limited today announced the launch of its Favipiravir in India under the brand name Covihalt for the treatment of mild to moderate COVID-19.

India registered over 19 lakh COVID-19 infections on Wednesday after 52,509 more individuals tested positive for the novel coronavirus.

The global toll rose to 6,99,134 on Wednesday with the United States adding 1,302 more fatalities to the tally, according to the Johns Hopkins University. The global count crossed 1.84 crores.

India's COVID-19 tally rose by over 50,000 for the sixth consecutive day on Tuesday, taking the total cases to 18,55,745. In the past 24 hours, 52,050 new cases were reported. Meanwhile, the recoveries crossed the 12-lakh mark, according to the Union Health Ministry's data.

The toll due to COVID-19 climbed to 38,938 with 803 new fatalities being reported in 24 hours, the data updated at 8 am showed.

A total of 12,30,509 people have recovered, while there are 5,86,298 active cases of coronavirus infection in the country presently.

The recovery rate among COVID-19 patients has risen to 66.31 percent, while the fatality rate has further dropped to 2.10 percent, the data stated.

The health ministry also said that the number of recovered patients is now double than the number of active cases.

According to the ICMR, a cumulative total of 2,08,64,750 samples have been tested up to 2 August with 6,61,892 samples being tested on Monday, the highest done in a day so far, scientist and media coordinator at ICMR, Dr Lokesh Sharma, said.

"A total of 1,05,32,074 tests for detection of coronavirus infection have been performed with per day average of 3,39,744 tests in July, the highest number of tests conducted in a month so far," Sharma said.

There are 917 labs in the government sector and 439 labs in the private sector for conducting COVID-19 tests.

Dharmenda Pradhan, Siddaramaiah tests COVID-19 positive

Union Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas, Dharmendra Pradhan informed that he has tested positive for COVID-19. Taking to Twitter, Pradhan said that he has been hospitalised as per doctor's advice and is in a healthy condition.

"I decided to get myself tested after noticing some symptoms of COVID-19 and my report came back positive. As per the doctor's advice, I have admitted myself in a hospital and I am in healthy condition," his tweet read.

Union Minister Amit Shah also tested positive for COVID-19 on Sunday.

Other politicians testing positive for COVID-19 include Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, Karnataka chief minister BS Yediyurappa.

Earlier on Tuesday, former Karnataka chief minister and Leader of Opposition in the state Assembly, Siddaramaiah said that he has tested positive for COVID-19 and admitted himself to a hospital.

"I have been tested positive for COVID-19 and also been admitted to the hospital on the advice of doctors as a precaution. I request all those who had come in contact with me to check out for symptoms and to quarantine themselves," Siddaramaiah tweeted.

Centre says 68% men, 32% women make up COVID-19 casualties

The Union Health Ministry said that of the people who died due to coronavirus in the country, 68 percent are men and 32 percent are women.

Union Health secretary Rajesh Bhushan gave mortality analysis for COVID-19 — gender and age-wise respectively.

"These are cumulative figures. If you see the mortality analysis i.e. the deaths caused by the coronavirus, you will find that 68 percent deaths are reported among male patients. And 32 percent of deaths are among female patients. This is broadly in line with the global scenario also, although the percentages may differ," he said.

"If you look at age-wise mortality analysis, 50 percent of deaths were reported in patients above 60 years and above; 37 percent deaths were seen in among patients with the age group of 45 to 60 years. This means that on one side — we have to save lives of our senior citizens, they should not go out unnecessary — and, on the other hand, we have to see that people between 45 to 60 years age group are also vulnerable too. Most importantly, those who are co-morbid should follow guidelines and everyone should wear mask, maintain distance and hand hygiene," Bhushan said.

According to the health ministry, about 11 percent mortality was seen in patients with 26 to 44 years of age. Only one percent fatality was observed in patients in the age group between 18 to 25 years and below 17 years of age.

Centre says 96% of 60,000 ventilators being procured are indigenous

In a briefing on the coronavirus situation in the country, the Union health ministry on Tuesday said that 96 percent of the 60,000 ventilators being procured by the government are indigenous and most of them have been sponsored by the PM-CARES fund.

Health Ministry secretary Rajesh Bhushan said 60,000 ventilators are being procured and 18,000 have already been supplied to states and union territories.

"Of the 60,000 ventilators, 50,000 are being funded by PM-CARES fund which comes to about Rs 2,000 crore in monetary terms," Bhushan said during the briefing.

He further said all the ventilators that are being procured under PM-CARES and those by the budgetary allocation of the Health Ministry have GPS chips embedded that can be tracked.

"The 'Make in India' (indigenous) ventilators have a share of more than 96 percent by volume and more than 90 percent by value," he said.

Delhi's LNJP records 'zero deaths' on two days in a week

The LNJP Hospital, the Delhi government's biggest COVID-19 treatment facility, did not report any death due to the disease on two days in a week, signalling improvement in the pandemic situation.

The 2,000-bed hospital's medical director Suresh Kumar said on Tuesday the number of people on ventilator at the facility has come down by nearly 25 percent, compared to the figure a month ago.

Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal tweeted on 28 July that LNJP Hospital had not reported any death on 27 July, a feat, doctors said, recorded for the first time in the last couple of months.

"After that day, on two more days, our hospital saw no death from COVID-19.... It is definitely a good sign for all of us who are fighting this situation," Kumar told PTI.

WHO chief scientist says India's COVID-19 testing rate is low

Noting that lockdown was a temporary measure to contain the spread of coronavirus, a senior official of the World Health Organisation on Tuesday said India has a low testing rate when compared to some of the countries that are successfully trying to curb it.

WHO chief scientist, Soumya Swaminathan, in an interactive session through video conference said, as of now about 28 vaccine candidates for COVID-19 are under clinical trial, of which five are entering Phase-II and over 150 candidates are in pre-clinical trials across the globe.

"(In) India as a whole, the testing rates are much lower compared to some of the countries, who have done well like Germany, Taiwan, South Korea, Japan. Even the United States is testing a huge number of people. So we need to have some benchmark and every public health department needs to have benchmarks on what is the rate of testing per lakh or per million, what is the test positivity rate," she said.

Without adequate number of tests, fighting the virus is like "fighting fire blindfolded," she pointed out. According to Swaminathan, the number of tests being conducted is not adequate if the COVID-19 test positivity rate is above five percent.

State-wise cases and deaths

Maharashtra continues to be the worst-affected state as it has a total of 1,47,324 active cases and 15,842 deaths. A total of 4,50,196 coronavirus cases have been recorded in the state up to Monday, according to Union Ministry of Health.

Tamil Nadu reported 5,063 COVID-19 cases, 6,501 discharged and 108 deaths on Tuesday. Total number of cases in the state is now at 2,68,285, including 2,08,784 discharged, 55,152 active cases and 4,349 deaths.

Delhi reported 674 COVID-19 cases, 972 recovered/discharged/migrated cases and 12 death. The total positive cases here rises to 1,39,156 including 1,25,226 recovered/discharged/migrated cases and 4033 deaths.

4,108 RTPCR/CBNAAT/TrueNat tests and 5,187 Rapid antigen tests conducted.

As many as 390 cases, 824 recovered and 10 deaths were reported in Jammu and Kashmir, taking the total number of cases in the Union Territory to 22,396, including 7,123 active cases, 14,856 recovered and 417 deaths.

Andhra Pradesh on Tuesday reported 9,747 new COVID-19 cases with 67 deaths. The state government said that the total count of cases has gone up to 1,76,333 with 79,104 are active cases, 95,625 recovered patients and 1,604 deaths due to the disease.

A total of 1,124 new COVID-19 cases and 13 deaths were reported from Rajasthan till 8.30 pm on Tuesday.

State Health Department said the count of cases in the state stands at 46,679 including 13,115 active cases and 732 deaths. A total of 32,832 persons have recovered from the viral infection in the state so far.

Gujarat reported 1,020 new COVID-19 cases and 25 deaths in the last 24 hours, informed the state health department on Tuesday.

"With this, state tally has risen to 65,704 including 14,811 active cases, 48,359 cured/discharges and 2,534 deaths," the State Health Department said.

With inputs from agencies

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[businessliveme]

Virus Update: U.S. Cases Climb 3.2%; Saudis Face ‘Painful’ Cuts

(Bloomberg) — U.S. cases of coronavirus rose 3.2%, which is higher than the one-week daily average. New York’s new deaths rose slightly while hospital admissions fell. The U.K. toll edged closer to Italy, which reported a jump that kept its fatalities the highest in Europe.

Governor Phil Murphy said reopening New Jersey will be driven by how much “knucklehead” behavior is apparent as limits are lifted. Saudi Arabia faces deep spending cuts, a top official said.

Spain’s runners, walkers and cyclists took to the streets for the first time in almost two months as the nation began to ease one of Europe’s tightest lockdowns.

Key Developments

Virus Tracker: global cases near 3.4 million; deaths 242,000

America’s retailers lure virus-weary shoppers to malls

Stir-crazy Italians ask, who can we visit now?

U.S. beef output is down more than shutdowns suggest

Covid exit strategy needs a worldwide vaccine

From Houston to New York, muni finances in tatters

Subscribe to a daily update on the virus from Bloomberg’s Prognosis team here. Click VRUS on the terminal for news and data on the coronavirus.

Saudi Minister Warns of ‘Painful’ Steps (4:30 p.m. NY)

Saudi Arabia will need to take “painful” measures and consider deep spending cuts to deal with the pandemic and a meltdown in global oil markets, Finance Minister Mohammed Al-Jadaan said on Saudi television station Al-Arabiya.

A week ago, Al-Jadaan told reporters the kingdom had survived similar, “maybe even worse,” crises and would pass through this one as it had others. On Saturday, he said government spending would need to be “cut deeply” and even some programs in Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s “Vision 2030” economic plan face cuts as implementation is delayed by steps to slow the outbreak.

Read the full story.

U.S. Cases Rose 3.2%, Above Week’s Average (4 p.m. NY)

U.S. cases increased 3.2% from the same time on Friday to 1.12 million, according to data collected by Johns Hopkins University and Bloomberg News. The national increase was above the average daily increase of 2.9% over the past week.

New York reported 4,663 new cases, for a total of 312,977 — about 9% of total reported cases around the world. Deaths rose slightly, by 299, to 18,909, the Department of Health reported.

New Jersey registered 2,912 new infections, bringing total cases to 123,717. Governor Phil Murphy reported 205 deaths, down from 311 reported Friday, to bring the total to 7,742.

Massachusetts had 1,952 new cases, boosting the total to 66,263, while deaths rose by 130, to 3,846, the Department of Public Health said.

Illinois reported 2,450 new cases, boosting the total to 58,505, and deaths increased by 105, to 2,559, the Department of Public Health reported.

Florida added 735 new cases, up 2.1%, to 35,463, while deaths rose by 50, or 3.5% to 1,364, the state health department said.

Texas reported 1,293 new cases, the biggest one-day rise, bringing the state’s total to 30,552, with 31 additional fatalities, for a cumulative tally of 847, the state health service said.

California Deaths Rise (4:05 p.m. NY)

California added 98 new deaths from the outbreak, bringing the total toll to 2,171. The state added 1,755 new cases, with a total of 52,197. Hospitalizations increased by 5. Governor Gavin Newsom said Friday he could be making announcements on the easing of the state’s stay-home orders within days, not weeks.

House, Senate Decline Offer for Tests (3:55 p.m. NY)

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi declined an offer from the Trump adminisrtation to use rapid coronavirus testing equipment for lawmakers until “these speedier technologies become more widely available.”

“Congress is grateful for the Administration’s generous offer,” the leaders said in a statement. “Congress wants to keep directing resources to the front-line facilities where they can do the most good the most quickly.”

Earlier, U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar tweeted that three Abbott point-of-care machines and 1,000 tests are being sent to Capitol Hill. President Donald Trump noted “tremendous” testing capacity for lawmakers and tweeted that that the House — which opted to remain out next week — also should return to work.

Read the full story.

N.J. Alert for ‘Knucklehead’ Behavior (2:50 p.m. NY)

New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy, who is reopening state parks, said the pace of returning to normal would be driven in part by how much “knucklehead” behavior emerges as restrictions are relaxed.

“If we hear reports of people not taking either their health or the health of — maybe even more importantly — the health of other park-goers seriously then we won’t hesitate to — and I don’t say this with any joy — to close them again,” Murphy said.

Murphy reported signs of progress. Some 5,713 Covid-19 patients are currently hospitalized in the state, a drop of 1,000 on the week. Those in intensive care and on ventilators are also down.

Read the full story.

French Deaths Fewest in Almost Six Weeks (2:10 p.m. NY)

France reported 166 new deaths, bringing the total number to 24,760 since March 1. The country reported 1,530 new cases in 24 hours, for a total of 201,667. The French health ministry also said hospitals in Southern France are under less pressure.

Ethiopia Offers Business Tax Break (1:30 p.m. NY)

Ethiopia offered tax relief to companies affected by the outbreak, including cancellation of interest and penalties on outstanding taxes due for 2015-2018, state television said.

In addition, underlying taxes due for the period can be paid in installments, the Ethiopian Broadcasting Corporation reported, citing Finance Minister Eyob Tekalign. The government will grant a one-month grace period on payment of value-added and turnover tax payments.

Cuomo Orders Police Enforcement (1:20 p.m. NY)

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo ordered police to enforce social distancing and made it clear that he would not immediately follow other states in reopening or easing restrictions.

“I disagree with people who say ‘open the economy’ even though you know there’s a public health risk,” Cuomo said at a briefing in Queens. “I’m not going to put dollars signs over human lives.”

Cuomo noted trends that continue to show that the outbreak in New York has receded significantly: new and ongoing hospitalizations continued to drop, as did admissions to intensive care units.

Italy’s Deaths Rise, Cases Stable (12:10 p.m. NY)

Italy’s daily death count rose and new cases remained stable as the nation prepares to gradually ease its two-month lockdown as of Monday.

Figures from civil protection authorities showed 1,900 new cases, compared with 1,965 a day earlier. There were 474 deaths, compared with 269 on Friday, bringing the total number of fatalities to 28,710. The daily tally includes 282 deaths from April that were only communicated at the end of the month, the Lombardy region said on its website. Without the addition of the Lombardy numbers, which include Milan, the daily toll would be the lowest in more than a month.

U.K. Deaths Rise to More Than 28,000 (11:06 a.m. NY)

The U.K. reported an additional 621 deaths on Saturday, bringing its total to 28,131, Communities Secretary Robert Jenrick said, adding that 76 million pounds ($95 million) will be made available for victims of domestic abuse.

Jenrick also outlined measures to prevent homeless people who have been housed during the crisis from returning to the streets.

Eurostar Passengers Must Cover Faces (10:45 a.m. NY)

Passengers on Eurostar trains between London and Paris and Brussels must cover their faces starting Monday, the rail operator said on its website. “Any type of mask is suitable as long as it effectively covers your nose and mouth,” Eurostar said. “If you don’t have a mask you may be refused travel on our services.”

Eurostar said the move is in line with guidelines announced by governments in France and Belgium, where fines may be imposed on passengers not wearing masks.

Portugal Hospitalizations Decline (9:36 a.m. NY)

Portugal reported 203 new confirmed coronavirus cases in a day, taking the total to 25,190, Health Minister Marta Temido said. The total number of deaths rose by 16 to 1,023. The number of hospitalized cases and of patients in intensive care units fell. Deaths so far indicate a fatality rate of 4.1%, while for those more than 70 years old it’s 14.5%, Temido said. Figures for confirmed cases from previous days are being revised to remove some duplicated cases, according to Temido.

France May Isolate Those Who Enter Country (9:05 a.m. NY)

The French government unveiled a proposal to put mandatory isolation for anyone who enters France and tests positive for Covid-19. Borders won’t reopen when France lifts its lockdown on May 11th, Interior Minister Christophe Castaner said. The government’s plan, which extends the emergency state until July 24 and gives extra power to the executive branch, will be discussed in parliament next week.

Ireland Guarantees Loans (7:54 a.m. NY)

Ireland’s government set up a program guaranteeing 2 billion euros ($2.2 billion) worth of loans for small and medium-sized companies, as it prepares to reopen the economy from May 18, Finance Minister Paschal Donohoe said Saturday. In addition, the state is preparing to provide 2 billion euros worth of capital to larger companies, as it tries to fully reopen the economy by mid-August.

Turkey Rolls Back Curbs on Medical Exports (6:46 a.m. NY)

Turkey lifted the bulk of medical exports restrictions following signs that the nation’s coronavirus outbreak is subsiding.

Turkish companies will no longer need official authorization for exports of machinery such as ventilators and related equipment, according to a trade ministry decree published on Saturday. Similar restrictions on shipments of disinfectants and related chemicals were also lifted.

Tehran Transit Mandates Face Masks (6 a.m. NY)

Wearing face masks became mandatory in Tehran’s subway and bus service from Saturday, state TV reported. The measure comes as Tehran’s thoroughfares became busy after authorities allowed the nationwide reopening of some businesses and shopping malls last month in a bid to cope with the impact of the pandemic on the country’s sanctions-hit economy.

Iran’s daily coronavirus infections fell to the lowest since March 9 as the country reported 802 new cases and 65 deaths overnight, bringing fatalities to 6,156 from a total of 96,448 infections.

Spain Allows Outdoor Exercise (5:30 p.m. HK)

Spain reported 276 deaths from coronavirus in the 24 hours through Saturday, taking total fatalities from the pandemic to 25,100, according to Health Ministry data. The number of new cases rose by 1,147 to 216,582.

On Saturday, Spaniards were allowed out of their homes to exercise for the first time in seven weeks. The government set time slots in which age groups are allowed onto the street for different activities, with exercise permitted in the early part of the morning. The next stage of the government’s plan to phase out of the lockdown will start May 4, when restaurants, stores, bars and hotels are allowed to open under certain strict rules in four islands.

The post Virus Update: U.S. Cases Climb 3.2%; Saudis Face ‘Painful’ Cuts appeared first on Businessliveme.com.

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[jodyedgarus]

Louisiana Tech Was The UConn Of The ’80s

The very first women’s NCAA basketball tournament was held in 1982, and Louisiana Tech took center stage. The Lady Techsters had already compiled a 109-9 record over the previous three seasons, winning the 1981 AIAW Championship (the precursor to the women’s tourney) with a perfect 34-0 record. Led by Wade Trophy winner1 Pam Kelly, the team put the finishing touches on another title in 1982 by defeating Cheyney and legendary coach C. Vivian Stringer in the final. It was the first of two NCAA championships Louisiana Tech would win in the 1980s and started a run of seven No. 1 seeds across nine NCAA tournaments.

Louisiana Tech was the UConn of the women’s NCAA tourney’s early era. But aside from a few more strong seasons in the 1990s, it’s been downhill since. The Lady Techsters haven’t made the NCAA field since 2011 — at 14-14 this season, they aren’t likely to end that drought soon — and they haven’t had an All-American since Tamicha Jackson in 2000.

Louisiana Tech isn’t alone among once-great programs whose talent pipelines have dried up. A number of teams that were the titans of the early NCAA tournament have struggled in recent decades. And in their place, a new ruling class of schools has emerged to become the defining programs of the modern age. In a championship as young as the women’s tournament, it’s been fascinating to watch the rise and fall of programs that, not very long ago, were in a very different place.

To visualize the progress of women’s programs in the absence of game-level data, such as our Elo ratings, we can use NCAA Tournament seeds as a proxy for team strength over time. This doesn’t explicitly factor in how a team performs in the tournament itself, but it does measure the general quality of a team’s entire season — plus, higher seeds tend to win more in the tournament anyway2. To measure this, we awarded “seed points” in proportion to a given seed number’s expected wins in the tournament, calibrated to a 100-point scale where the No. 1 seed gets 100 points, No. 2 gets 70 points, and so forth.3

A more basic scoring system might assign 16 points to a No. 1 seed, 15 to a No. 2, etc., all the way down to 1 point for a 16 seed. But that would understate the power of a high seed: Instead of being only twice as valuable as, say, a 9 seed, a No. 1 seed wins about seven times as many games during the average tournament.

Averaging those seed-based point totals over all the women’s tournaments held since 1982, here are the top overall programs of the entire NCAA tourney era.

Which women’s programs have been most successful during the NCAA tournament era?

Seed points* in NCAA tournaments held for women’s programs, by decade and overall since 1982

Seed Points Per Tournament, by decade School 1980s 1990s 2000s 2010s Overall 1 Tennessee 73.7 95.4 87.4 68.9 82.1 2 UConn 2.2 72.0 89.4 100.0 68.4 3 Stanford 15.7 83.3 51.1 77.4 58.5 4 Duke 2.7 23.3 89.4 55.3 44.5 5 Georgia 65.0 45.7 42.9 24.6 44.0 6 Louisiana Tech 92.6 60.1 27.1 1.5 44.0 7 Texas 76.4 29.8 35.0 35.1 42.6 8 Maryland 43.5 20.8 38.6 50.4 37.7 9 North Carolina 25.4 38.3 62.5 20.2 37.7 10 Notre Dame 0.0 10.9 35.9 93.4 35.4 11 Penn St. 31.0 48.7 32.3 19.6 33.4 12 Ohio St. 46.1 15.5 36.2 33.8 32.1 13 Purdue 4.2 50.1 47.4 17.5 31.5 14 Baylor 0.0 0.0 41.1 83.7 31.5 15 Virginia 40.8 58.4 19.3 4.9 31.0 16 Vanderbilt 11.1 46.9 48.5 10.5 30.8 17 LSU 25.2 16.8 60.0 17.4 30.5 18 Old Dominion 57.2 42.5 17.1 0.0 28.5 19 Iowa 30.1 43.1 11.2 20.0 26.0 20 NC State 41.3 26.6 19.5 12.9 24.6

*Seed points award a score on a 100-point scale; a No. 1 seed gets 100 points, while the rest descend in proportion to the seed’s expected wins during the tournament.

Source: NCAA

Some teams, such as Tennessee, have been relatively consistent throughout the NCAA era. Although the Lady Vols were at their best under coach Pat Summitt during the 1990s, ranking first among all programs in seed points per tournament, they were also the third-best program of the 2000s according to our metric, fourth-best of the 1980s and even fifth-best of the 2010s, though the past few years haven’t been as strong by Tennessee standards. (The Vols probably won’t be adding to their tally this season, either: Tennessee is currently 18-11 and ranks 63rd in the RPI ratings, making it a bubble team at best for this year’s bracket.)

Maryland and North Carolina have also been relatively good throughout the history of the women’s tournament. But more striking on the list above is how many programs followed the Louisiana Tech path — dominating the early days of the tourney, only to drop off the face of the Earth later. In addition to the Lady Techsters, three other programs — Long Beach State, Southern Cal and Old Dominion — have seen the biggest drop-off in seed points per tournament between the tournament’s first two decades and its two most recent.

At the other end of the spectrum, we have the programs that started slow and picked up steam into the present day. And as hard as it is to believe now, Connecticut wasn’t always the unstoppable force we see today. The Huskies didn’t make their first NCAA tournament appearance until 1989 and didn’t win a championship before 1995. Now it’s shocking news when UConn might not be a No. 1 seed, and it’s currently riding a streak of 11 straight Final Four berths. According to our metric, no team’s fortunes have improved more between the NCAA tourney’s early period in the 1980s and the current era than the Huskies’.

Other stunning out-of-nowhere success stories include current No. 1 Baylor, which made its first NCAA tournament in 2001(!); defending champion Notre Dame, which didn’t win an NCAA tournament game until 1996; and Duke, which — despite the success of its men’s team — failed to make much noise on the women’s side until the late 1990s/early 2000s. With the exception of the Blue Devils (who at 14-14 are unlikely to make the tournament), all of these programs have continued to be great this season. In fact, many more of today’s top teams — such as Louisville, Mississippi State and South Carolina — all emerged from humble results during the 1980s and ‘90s.

Most sports see early champions maintain some sort of strong presence into modern times, like the New York Yankees in baseball and Boston Celtics in basketball. So it’s surprising that this many of the most dominant teams of the early women’s tourney have vanished from the competitive landscape. It’s not impossible to imagine Louisiana Tech returning to its former glory someday, but for now the Lady Techsters’ success is a memory fading quickly into ancient history.

Sara Ziegler contributed research.

from News About Sports https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/louisiana-tech-was-the-uconn-of-the-80s/

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Copa del Rey 2018/19 Tactical Analysis: Girona vs Real Madrid

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Copa del Rey 2018/19 Tactical Analysis: Girona vs Real Madrid

Artwork by @chapulana

Taking a welcome break from La Liga duty, Real Madrid travelled to Girona looking to see out a comfortable 4-2 lead in the quarter-final second leg of the Copa del Rey. They did the job and returned to the Spanish capital with a 3-1 win.

Karim Benzema’s first-half brace gave his team a vital lead, though Girona pegged one back thanks to Pedro Porro before the break. Finally, Marcos Llorente notched his second Real Madrid goal, and his second in the last two games he has started, with an effort from long range to put the game to bed.

Here, our tactical analysis will use statistics to identify what key points Real Madrid can take from the game as they secured safe passage to the semi-finals of the Copa del Rey with a two-legged win over Girona.

It’s all about confidence

The results are finally coming for Santiago Solari and Real Madrid and it’s beginning to show. Confidence is bringing free-flowing football to the fore and it is for the benefit of all. After struggling to dominate possession against the likes of Villarreal and Real Betis, things have changed. This match against Girona was the fourth consecutive game in which Los Blancos had over 50% possession and completed more passes than their rivals, again making over 25% more passes than Girona over the 90 minutes.

Perhaps the most obvious case of all is in Benzema. The Frenchman notched his second brace in as many games with two fine finishes, with the first showing how his game has transformed this season. Starting deep and wide, he interlinked neatly with Dani Carvajal to burst into the box and add the finishing touch. Whereas in the past he would often play the first pass and then sit deep waiting for a rebound, he now has the belief to attack defences and exploit the spaces they are leaving for him.

As soon as he plays the pass, Benzema has spotted the space.

He then exploits it with aplomb.

We may only be halfway through the season, now entering the business end of the campaign with fixtures coming thick and fast, but already Benzema has managed 72 shots this season, beating his tally for the whole of last season of 71. Yet again his touches in the box and his progressive runs were more than double his season averages, and it is becoming more and more clear that he is adapting to become the main man in attack.

A way back for Marcelo?

Having been dropped for youngster Sergio Reguilon, Marcelo made a comeback to the starting XI and looked to stake his claim for a first La Liga start since the first game of 2019. However, Solari may have been left feeling shortchanged. On a positive note, the Brazilian was more defensively disciplined, often seeming to hold back rather than bomb forward and leave his defence exposed, but that was about all in terms of a value-adding contribution.

On the ball, he completed just 66% of his passes, his worst completion rate in any game since such data collection began back in 2015/16, showing just how careless he was. Too often he carried the ball to the final third, doing the simple things effectively, only to look for a spectacular final ball to make an impact. The problem was it never came off. Of his eight attempted long passes and crosses, not a single one reached its target.

Marcelo’s passing in the final third was particularly woeful.

Defensively, he lost the ball 17 times, his highest in one game since April 2018, and won only three of 14 defensive duels. Such figures are concerning, not only for Marcelo’s form but also his long-term future. By hitting such lows, some will begin to wonder whether this is a short-term blip, particularly as he seems to by trying desperately hard to avoid it.

Marco Asensio’s new role

Having been sidelined since the Club World Cup, Marco Asensio replaced man of the match Benzema to play a full 35 minutes in a new role as a centre forward. Rather than sticking to his usual right-hand side attacking role, he played in a more central role, often interchanging with Gareth Bale after he replaced Vinicius Junior.

His impact was limited, with just one touch in the box and one attempt on goal in over half an hour, but it may take some time for the Spaniard to get used to it. There were moments when his movement and pace off the ball looked to have dazzled the Girona backline. As has been the case all season though, they were far too fleeting.

Marco Asensio’s heat map shows how he struggled to settle.

Solari clearly believes in Asensio and is keen to make it work for him, but he seems not to know where he fits into his system. Given Vinicius’ explosive breakthrough, Asensio doesn’t have time and opportunities to waste.

Playing Girona at their own game

Against the likes of Alaves, Levante and Eibar, Real Madrid have come unstuck against teams playing direct, counter-attacking football. Perhaps expecting that Eusebio and Girona would look to take the same approach, Solari appeared to have instructed his team to do so themselves.

Real Madrid made six counter-attacks in total, almost double their season average, and impressively ended four of them with shots, compared to just three counter attacks across both of their past two games.

The long ball also offered an escape from Girona’s pressing.

That may well be linked to the side’s use of long passes, looking to get the ball over the top and allow the likes of Vinicius to spread play more quickly with his pace. In fact, both of the club’s last two fixtures registered higher numbers of long passes than in any game since November. There can be few complaints given the way it is setting up the likes of Benzema, allowing him to drift wide rather than forcing him to battle with tough-nut, physical and experienced central defenders.

Conclusion

Girona huffed and puffed but were facing an uphill battle from the off and it showed. Real Madrid grew into the game, thanks to a significant extent to Benzema’s display, and dominated. This was a chance for a number of men to stake their claim and some certainly did a lot more than others to show why they could be worth a shot in La Liga.

If you love tactical analysis, then you’ll love the digital magazines from totalfootballanalysis.com – a guaranteed 100+ pages of pure tactical analysis covering topics from the Premier League, Serie A, La Liga, Bundesliga and many, many more. Buy your copy of the January issue for just ₤4.99 here, or even better sign up for a ₤50 annual membership (12 monthly issues plus the annual review) right here.

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Lining Up: Guentzel on Fire; Barzal Producing – January 8

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Team

Line

Points

1

Calgary

Johnny Gaudreau – Sean Monahan – Elias Lindholm

29

2

Tampa Bay

Tyler Johnson – Brayden Point – Nikita Kucherov

22

3

Columbus

Artemi Panarin – Pierre-Luc Dubois – Cam Atkinson

20

4

Pittsburgh

Jake Guentzel – Sidney Crosby – Bryan Rust

19

5

Buffalo

Jeff Skinner – Jack Eichel – Jason Pominville

16

6

Islanders

Anthony Beauvillier – Mathew Barzal – Josh Bailey

14

7

Minnesota

Zach Parise – Charlie Coyle – Luke Kunin

14

8

Toronto

Andreas Johnsson – John Tavares – Mitchell Marner

13

9

Winnipeg

Nikolaj Ehlers – Mark Scheifele – Blake Wheeler

13

10

Colorado

Gabriel Landeskog – Nathan MacKinnon – Mikko Rantanen

12

11

Montreal

Tomas Tatar – Phillip Danault – Brendan Gallagher

12

12

New Jersery

Taylor Hall – Nico Hischier – Kyle Palmieri

12

13

Chicago

Dylan Strome – Artem Anisimov – Patrick Kane

11

14

Florida

Jonathan Huberdeau – Aleksander Barkov – Evgenii Dadonov

11

15

Ottawa

Brady Tkachuk – Colin White – Mark Stone

11

16

Vegas

Brandon Pirri – Paul Stastny – Alex Tuch

10

17

Dallas

Jamie Benn – Tyler Seguin – Alexander Radulov

9

18

Edmonton

Zack Kassian – Connor McDavid – Leon Draisaitl

9

19

San Jose

Timo Meier – Logan Couture – Lukas Radil

9

20

St. Louis

David Perron – Ryan O'Reilly – Alexander Steen

9

21

Boston

Brad Marchand – Patrice Bergeron – David Pastrnak

8

22

Los Angeles

Alex Iafallo – Anze Kopitar – Dustin Brown

8

23

Rangers

Chris Kreider – Mika Zibanejad – Jesper Fast

8

24

Washington

Jakub Vrana – Evgeny Kuznetsov – Tom Wilson

8

25

Nashville

Ryan Hartman – Ryan Johansen – Viktor Arvidsson

7

26

Anaheim

Ondrej Kase – Adam Henrique – Nick Ritchie

6

27

Arizona

Richard Panik – Derek Stepan – Clayton Keller

5

28

Carolina

Brock McGinn – Sebastian Aho – Teuvo Teravainen

5

29

Detroit

Tyler Bertuzzi – Frans Nielsen – Thomas Vanek

5

30

Vancouver

Nikolay Goldobin – Elias Pettersson – Brock Boeser

5

31

Philadelphia

Jakub Voracek – Sean Couturier – Wayne Simmonds

4

                                                                      In this week’s instalment, we take a look at a couple of hot lines. Using Dobber’s Line Production Tool, we compared even-strength point production around the league over the past 10 games. I compiled a list of the highest scoring line for each team at even strength. Here’s the list…

  Jake Guentzel – Sidney Crosby – Bryan Rust

To the surprise of absolutely no one, Sidney Crosby is a good hockey player who makes his teammates better. While coach Mike Sullivan likes to throw different wingers out with Sid the Kid every now and then, Bryan Rust and Jake Guentzel have been his line mates most frequently this year. Although this line has been particularly hot in the last ten games, they also lead the team in even-strength production on the season. In terms of their advanced stats, there’s really not too much to get excited about. The Guentzel-Crosby-Rust line controls about 51% of shots taken, 50% of scoring chances and 49% of high-danger opportunities. Although most of those numbers hover around average, they’ve managed to outscore their opponents 15-5 at even strength.

Considering how hot he was in his rookie season (2016-2017), Jake Guentzel disappointed many with his 48-point sophomore campaign (2017-2018).  This year, he’s on pace for 74 points! While he didn’t have the best start to 2018-2019, he has put up 26 points in his last 24 games. In those 26 games, he’s only been seeing about a minute on the power-play – which makes his numbers all the more impressive. With that being said, it’s hard to get too excited about Guentzel’s production for the rest of the season while his power-play time is limited. By no means am I saying he’s suddenly going to stop scoring, but I expect him to put up fewer points in the second half of the season than he did in the first. The 24-year-old is currently scoring on 17% of his shots, which seems a little bit high, but he’s also proven to be an efficient shooter so far in his young career.

Sidney Crosby play good hockey. Sidney Crosby score 19 point in last 12 game. Sidney Crosby on pace for 107-point season! Sidney Crosby capable of anything. Sidney Crosby play good hockey.

Bryan Rust holds fantasy value as long as he’s skating beside Sidney Crosby. Although his 19 points in 41 games don’t seem impressive, he recently had a seven-game hot streak in which he tallied 11 points (eight of which were goals). While his 14 minutes of ice-time (none of which are on the PP) don’t justify a spot on your roster, he certainly makes for a good streaming option amidst a scoring streak. In this last half of the season, I’m expecting about 20 points from him, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he put up 25.

    Anthony Beauvillier – Mathew Barzal – Josh Bailey

If you expected the Islanders to be this good after John Tavares’s departure, please raise your hand. You’ll notice everyone with their hand up also has their pants on fire, because they’re lying. In all seriousness, I’m really surprised the Isles weren’t more negatively affected by the loss of Tavares. Not only have coach Barry Trotz and his strong defensive system improved the team’s ability to keep pucks out of the net, but they’re actually scoring too! I’m not ashamed to admit I was one of the haters that doubted Mathew Barzal. Sure, I knew the ‘kid’ was extremely talented after his rookie campaign and was going to take the league by storm in the coming years. But in his sophomore season? A season in which he’d be drawing tougher matchups without JT to shelter his minutes? Yeah, I never would have guessed that halfway through the year Barzal would have 38 points in 40 games. What else do you need to know about Barzal? Well, his shooting percentage is sustainable, he’s seeing about a minute more of ice time than last season, and he’s shooting the puck more than last season. He’s already a superstar in this league and will continue to be one for many years.

Anthony Beauvillier isn’t quite where we expected him to be in terms of production, but I think his second half of the season will be better than his first. While he was averaging 13 minutes of ice-time in his first 18 games, he’s been averaging 16 minutes in his last 21 games. Hopefully this upward trend continues as the team makes a push for the playoffs. It’s interesting to see that he has just one power-play point halfway through the 2018-2019 campaign. Last year he had eight through a full season and was seeing less time on the PP. He should start getting more points with the man advantage, which will boost his production going forward. Beauvillier is also shooting the puck more than last year, which should lead to good things if he keeps it up. Remember, he’s just 21 years old and this is his third season in the NHL. Some young guns need more time to develop than others. Whatever the case, I’d keep an eye on his production going forward as he might make a sneaky addition down the stretch.

Josh Bailey tallied 71 points in 75 games last season, a feat not many thought he would replicate this year. While he may not be able to score at quite that pace, he has managed 31 points in 40 games and is on track for a 64-point campaign. That production drop might be a result of the Islanders’ struggles with the man advantage. Last year, they were capitalizing on about 23% of their power-play opportunities. This year, their success rate sits slightly above 16%. Bailey had 31 points on the PP in 2017-2018 and is on pace for just 20 this season. This may be one area where the miss John Tavares, but they definitely have the talent to be more successful on the power-play. Keep an eye on this as the season progresses.

The advanced stats seem to consider this line above average. They control about 52% of shots, 55% of scoring chances, and 52% of high-danger opportunities while they’re on the ice.

    from All About Sports https://dobberhockey.com/hockey-home/nhl-line-combinations/lining-up-guentzel-on-fire-barzal-producing-january-8/