French cyclist Charles Coste, who won a gold medal in track cycling team pursuit at the 1948 London Olympics, died late last month at the age of 101.

He had been the world’s oldest living Olympic champion since January and was honoured at the Paris Olympics last year as a torchbearer.

French sport minister Marina Ferrari said in a post to X confirming his death: "It is with great sorrow that I learned of the death of Charles Coste, Olympic champion in London in 1948… At 101 years old, he leaves behind an immense sporting legacy."

5
The number of centuries Australian batter Marnus Labuschagne has scored in his last eight innings for Queensland. The 31-year-old’s most recent 100-run innings came on Monday when he scored 101 runs off 111 balls to help Queensland down New South Wales in a one-day match. Labuschagne was dropped from the Australian Test team for a series against the West Indies in July but now looks set to return for the Ashes against England later this month following his impressive run of form.

"There's going to be fallout over this, there's going to be some heads that will roll because I do not know how Eli Katoa was actually even allowed to take the field."
Former rugby league star Shaun Johnson, on his podcast The Play On Sport Show, about Sunday’s Pacific Championships match between New Zealand and Tonga, which saw Melbourne Storm star Eli Katoa endure three head knocks before eventually being taken off the field. Katoa suffered ‘seizure activity’ on the bench, and the Tongan international was taken to hospital to have fluid drained from his brain. He is now in a stable condition.

Every October, the town of Tualatin in Oregon hosts an event called the West Coast Giant Pumpkin Regatta. Competitors carve out enormous pumpkins, some weighing over 600 kilograms, and race them across a lake like kayaks. One long-time participant, a man named Gary Kristensen, even holds a Guinness World Record for the longest journey by pumpkin boat after he paddled 94 kilometres down the Columbia River earlier this year.

🏀 The Oklahoma City Thunder are the NBA’s last remaining unbeaten team after improving to 7-0 with a 137-106 win over the New Orleans Pelicans. The defending champions have dominated at both ends of the floor, leading the league in defensive rating despite injuries to Jalen Williams and Chet Holmgren. Reigning league and finals MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander scored 30 points to extend the Thunder’s perfect start, while the Chicago Bulls and San Antonio Spurs both saw their first losses of the season. It’s the second straight year the Thunder have opened 7-0, underlining why they remain early favourites to repeat as champions.

⚽ The A-League Men’s Melbourne City faces a crucial AFC Champions League Elite clash on Tuesday night against Japan’s Machida Zelvia, needing a positive result to stay in the hunt for the knockout stages. City reignited its campaign with a 2-1 comeback win over Buriram United last time out and is now unbeaten in four games across all competitions. Missing several key players, including captain Aziz Behich and Mathew Leckie, manager Aurelio Vidmar will again turn to his young stars, with 16-year-old Besian Kutleshi and striker Max Caputo among those set to feature in the tough away test in Tokyo.

⚽ After 10 games and a 2-0 victory over Burnley on Sunday, Arsenal sit atop the English Premier League table on 25 points. According to BBC Sport, in the history of the EPL, 14 of the 33 teams to lead after 10 rounds have gone on to win the title and Arsenal’s points total matches the average total (24.7) of eventual champions at this stage. That being said, each team plays 38 matches in a season, and Manchester City (19 points) and defending champions Liverpool (18) both loom as potential title threats. Next weekend will see two top-four clashes, with Arsenal playing Sunderland (4th) and City taking on Liverpool.

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The Melbourne Cup, Australia’s most prestigious horse race, was won by Australian horse Half Yours with Jamie Melham riding. 

Here’s what to know. 

Melham became the second female jockey to win the Melbourne Cup as she rode Half Yours to a victory by three lengths at Flemington. 

Melham’s win comes on the 10th anniversary of Michelle Payne’s 2015 victory with Prince of Penzance, when she became the first woman to ever win the race. 

Half Yours (with Melham riding) also won the Caulfield Cup last month. Half Yours is just the 13th horse to win both of the prestigious Cups, while Melham is the first female jockey to do so.

Irish horse Goodie Two Shoes, ridden by jockey Wayne Lordan, finished second. British horse Middle Earth, with jockey Ethan Brown, rounded out the top three. 

Melham told Channel Nine: "This is what we do it for. This is why we get up out of bed every morning at 4:00am and work our arses off. I've had an amazing year. Got married, had some really great days on the track, but nothing ever, ever compares to this feeling right now I'm feeling."

Payne greeted Melham after the race and said: “Welcome to the club.”

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While all the tennis grand slams on the 2025 calendar have been played, there is one final tournament for both the women and men before the year ends. 

Here’s what to know. 

The ATP Finals and WTA Finals are the season-ending championships for men’s and women’s tennis, featuring the top eight singles players and doubles teams from the world rankings. 

Often called the sport’s unofficial “fifth major,” these tournaments carry major prestige as they determine the best performers of the season. There is also significant prize money and ranking points up for grabs. The ATP Finals have been held in Turin, Italy, since 2021, while the WTA Finals rotate host cities, with this year’s event being held in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. 

Both the men’s and women’s tournaments follow the same format. The eight players (or teams for doubles) are split into two groups and then play a round robin. The top two teams in each group advance to the semi-final knockout stage, with the winners of the semis securing a place in the final. 

This year’s WTA Finals began on Saturday 1 November and will run through to the final on Saturday 8 November. 

In the ‘Serena Williams Group’, sixth seed Elena Rybakina is the first player through to the semi-final stage after winning her opening two matches against Poland’s Iga Świątek (2) and American Amanda Anisimova (4). The last player in that group, American Madison Keys (7) will not advance to the knockout stages after losing her first two matches. 

In the ‘Stefanie Graf Group’, Belarus’ Aryna Sabalenka (1) and the U.S’ Jessica Pegula (5) both recorded wins in their opening matches against Italy’s Jasmine Paolini (8) and the U.S’ Coco Gauff (3), respectively. The group will play their second matches tonight as Gauff takes on Paolini in a do-or-die match and Pegula faces Sabalenka in a bid to lock in a semi-final spot.

Gauff is the reigning champion, having won the 2024 edition, while Świątek is the only other past champion (2023) in the field. As the world number one, Sabalenka has the best shot at overall victory. 

The ATP Finals begin on 9 November and will run through to a singles final on 16 November. At this stage, only seven of the eight singles players have qualified. 

Two players, Italy’s Lorenzo Mussetti and Canada’s Felix Auger-Aliassime, are in the race to claim the final spot. Auger-Aliassime is currently eighth in the live rankings, but if Musetti wins the ATP Hellenic Championship in Athens this week, he will move ahead of the Canadian and qualify. 

Alex de Minaur (7) is the only Australian singles player in either tournament and has qualified for the finals for a second year running. Last year, the Demon struggled to make his mark at the event, losing all three of his group stage matches. The last Australian to win was Lleyton Hewitt in 2002. 

The other players to have qualified for this year’s tournament include reigning champion Jannik Sinner (2), Spain’s Carlos Alcaraz (1), Germany’s Alexander Zverev (3), seven-time winner Novak Djokovic (4), and the U.S. duo of Ben Shelton (5) and Taylor Fritz (6). 

You can watch the WTA and ATP Finals on beIN SPORTS.