Today's sports news: What you need to know

Latest - Kevin Durant led Team USA's victory over France in the men's basketball final in Tokyo on Saturday, avenging a first-round loss and claiming a 16th gold for the country in the sport.

Durant, who in these Games surpassed Carmelo Anthony as the United States' highest career scorer, led with 29 points in the 87-82 victory at the Saitama Super Arena.

The championship game attracted the biggest crowd yet to the arena north of Tokyo in these Games, with the bottom bowl of seats about half full of athletes, officials, media and volunteers in place of fans due to COVID-19 restrictions.

France earned their third Olympic silver medal in men's basketball. Slovenia, making their debut at the Games, will play Australia in the bronze medal match later on Saturday.

The U.S. men have historically been the team to beat, with 15 gold medals since 1936 going into these Games. This championship marks their fourth straight gold medal.

But this year's team proved to be vulnerable, dropping two-straight exhibition games in July and suffering a shock 83-76 defeat to France in the preliminary round of the Games, which was their first defeat on the Olympic stage since 2004.

- Reuters

West Ham signed New Zealand 'keeper

Football Ferns goalkeeper Anna Leat has signed her first professional contract.

The 20-year-old has joined English Women's Super League club West Ham.

Leat made her debut for the Football Ferns as a 15-year-old and was part of the New Zealand side that claimed bronze at the under-17 world cup in 2018.

She made her fourth appearance for the New Zealand senior team at the Tokyo Olympics, starting in the group game against world champions the USA.

"The whole experience of coming here has been pretty unreal and it's been something I've really been looking forward to for a long time now," Leat said.

"I've definitely been putting in the hard yards to get to this point so it's an awesome feeling to finally be here.

"I'm British on my dad's side and I've always wanted to live in England, the opportunity came up and it was perfect. I've been wanting to make the jump to a pro league and this is the best in the world so I'm delighted to be at West Ham."

Turbos kick off NPC season with rare win

The Manawatu Turbos have kicked off the NPC with a 39-21 win over Counties Manukau Steelers in Palmerston North.

New signing Brett Cameron was a standout for the Turbos, scoring 29 of the team's points, including a try and nine of 12 shots off the tee.

Poor discipline also proved costly for the Steelers, who were behind 23-9 at halftime.

Adding to Cameron's try were tries for Drew Wild and Ray Niuia.

The Manawatu Cyclones have secured a Farah Palmer Cup championship semifinal spot with a 67-12 win over Hawke's Bay Tui.

The home side were ahead 43-0 at halftime.

Kaia Walker-Waitoa, Lauren Balsillie and Layla Sae all scored two tries for the Cyclones with Jayme Nuku, Rangimaire Sturmey,Crystal Mayes, Elinor-Plum King and Janna Vaughan running in the rest in the 11 try rout.

Italy win first sprint relay gold

Filippo Tortu ran a breathtaking final leg as Italy added to an unprecedentedly rich Olympic harvest in athletics in Tokyo by pipping Britain by one-hundredth of a second for a shock 4x100 metre relay gold.

The race was one of the most open in years, missing the U.S. team that have dominated the event for decades but failed to make the final following a ragged run that saw them finish sixth in their semi-final.

The Azzurri took the opportunity with both hands, picking up their fifth gold from track and field at this year's Games after triumphs in the men's 100m and long jump and the double in 20 kilometres walk.

In the men's sprint relay it was their first gold medal and their first of any colour since they won bronze in 1948. Italy had also never won more than three Olympic gold medals in athletics before.

Fuelled by the three individual 100 metre medallists, Jamaica surged to an emphatic win in the women's 4x100m relay, posting a national record 41.02 seconds to finish well clear of the United States and Britain.

Elaine Thompson-Herah, who now has all three available sprint golds at Tokyo, Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce and Shericka Jackson delivered again, after Briana Williams had done her job on the opening leg.

It was Jamaica's first gold in the event since 2004, after back to back silvers behind the U.S. in London and Rio.

- Reuters

Olympic hockey players break rules to buy booze

Australian hockey players who sought to drown their sorrows in beer after losing the Olympic gold medal match also temporarily lost their freedom on Friday, after breaching Covid-19 rules by leaving the athletes' village to buy the booze.

Five members of the men's squad had been reprimanded and isolated in their rooms, Team Australia chief Ian Chesterman said, adding a further blemish to the team's reputation a few days after rugby sevens players and rowers from the same nation damaged rooms in the athletes village.

Chesterman said three of the players left the village to buy two cases of beer at 3am on Friday, hours after Australia lost the final to Belgium.

Under the state of emergency operating in Tokyo for the duration of the Games, athletes are restricted to the Olympic Village and competition venues.

Chesterman said the athletes who broke the rules reported themselves to team officials later on Friday and had all tested negative for Covid-19 and would be returning to Australia on Saturday.

- Reuters

Messi's wages too much for Barcelona

Barcelona was forced to let star player Lionel Messi leave the club because his high wages coupled with strict La Liga financial rules could have jeopardised its future, President Joan Laporta said.

Both the club, which has suffered steep losses recently, and 34-year-old Messi had wanted to sign a new contract. But the Argentine's deal would have taken salaries to 110 percent of the club's earnings, a financially risky move given the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, Laporta said.

"The club is above everything - even above the best player in the world,

"We reached agreement but couldn't formalise it, because of the club's economic situation, which means we can't register the player due to salary limits," he said.

Without Messi's wages, salaries would account for 95 percent of Barcelona's income, while ideally, they should not exceed 70 percent, "so there's still a lot of work to be done", Laporta said.

Messi had wanted to sign a new contract at Barcelona on reduced terms, reportedly 50 percent below his latest pay, but the club was unable to come up with an arrangement that also complied with the financial rules of Spain's La Liga competition.

- Reuters

Wrestling coach assaults Olympic referee

A Belarusian member of India's wrestling coaching staff is being sent home for assaulting a referee at the Tokyo Olympics, the Indian Olympic Association (IOA) said.

"Indian wrestling team's foreign assistant coach Mr Murad Gaidarov, who was involved in an uncalled (for) incident of assault on one of the match referees, is being withdrawn from the Tokyo Olympic Village immediately..." tweeted IOA secretary-general Rajeev Mehta.

The Belarusian, a former Olympic silver medallist, was flying back to India on a late flight, Mehta added.

The IOA official declined to share any details of the incident when contacted by Reuters.

Media reports in India said Gaidarov assaulted the official after Deepak Punia lost the 86kg freestyle bronze medal bout against San Marino's Myles Nazim Amine on Thursday.

Gaidarov was disqualified from the 2004 Olympics for exchanging blows with his opponent after losing his quarter-final bout.

- Reuters

India take the lead in rain effected Test

India rode half-centuries by KL Rahul and Ravindra Jadeja to claim a handy 95-run first innings lead against England on a rain-curtailed day three of the opening test.

The hosts were 25 for no loss, still 70 behind, in their second innings when play was abandoned for the day just five overs after the tea break.

Rory Burns will resume on 11 and Dom Sibley on five on the penultimate day of the weather-bedevilled contest.

Earlier, Rahul's patient 84 and Jadeja's fluent 56 helped India post 278 in reply to England's first innings total of 183.

For England, Ollie Robinson claimed a career-best 5-85, while James Anderson grabbed four wickets, overtaking Indian Anil Kumble to become the third-highest wicket-taker in test cricket.

The first match of the five-test also marks the beginning of a new World Test Championship cycle.

- Reuters

Bangladesh beat Australia for third time in T20

Bangladesh secured a series win against Australia for the first time in any format after their 10-run victory in the Twenty20 international in Dhaka gave them an unassailable 3-0 lead in the five-match series.

Mustafizur Rahman led an extraordinary performance from the hosts' bowling attack and conceded only nine runs in his four overs while Shoriful Islam (2-29) took the crucial wicket of Australia's top-scorer Mitchell Marsh (51) in the 18th over.

Earlier, Australian seamer Nathan Ellis bagged a hat-trick on debut, while Josh Hazlewood and Adam Zampa took two wickets each as the visitors restricted Bangladesh to 127-9, with captain Mohammad Mahmudullah (52) top-scoring for the hosts.

Bangladesh won the series opener by 23 runs, claiming their maiden T20 victory over Australia, and the second game by five wickets. The fourth match will be played on Sunday.

- Reuters