A key departure from Manchester City is now confirmed as City will en…

Bernardo Silva will leave Manchester City at the end of this season. City assistant manager Pep Lijnders confirmed after Manchester City’s FA Cup quarter-final win over Liverpool that the City captain will depart the club once his contract expires at the end of this season. Bernardo has been ever-present in Pep Guardiola’s side since arriving at the club from AS Monaco in 2017. Next season, City will move on without one of their most important players, which will give Pep Guardiola’s side a new look for what lies ahead.

Pep Lijnders has confirmed that Bernardo Silva will leave Manchester City at the end of this season.

Speaking after Manchester City comfortably beat Liverpool in their FA Cup quarter-final tie 4-0 at the Etihad, City assistant Pep Lijnders confirmed that Bernardo Silva will leave the club at the end of this season. That news didn’t come as a surprise. However, it was the first official confirmation that Bernardo Silva will leave City imminently. Speaking on Bernardo Silva’s future, in quotes relayed by ESPN, Pep Lijnders said: “Every good story comes to an end. I hope he enjoys the last months — there are only six weeks — and has a good farewell. He deserves all that attention as well.“

Pep Lijnders further explained that there is no like-for-like replacement for Bernardo Silva. It will take a combined effort from a host of players to fill the void in Pep Guardiola’s squad when Bernardo Silva does depart. He explained: “You never replace a player with the same kind of player because they don’t exist. Bernardo Silva is unique. The way he controls games, the way he moves, the way he receives, the way he leads, the way he sees the solutions. All these things.”

“You never search for a replacement of one type of player. You search for what is needed to grow with the team and somebody who can fit in the first XI.”

“And then you hope, with our academy, with the young players we already bought that they can make that step as well in the midfield positions.”

There will be a new look to Pep Guardiola’s squad next season without Bernardo Silva in it.

It is sad to have it confirmed that Bernardo Silva will leave Manchester City at the end of this season, it is hard to picture a City side without the versatile and inspirational Portuguese international in it. Bernardo’s contribution to City has been immense, and he remains a key component of Pep Guardiola’s side. There is a strong argument to be made that while Bernardo Silva has aged, he is currently playing some of the best football of his career. But, much like Kevin De Bruyne’s departure at the end of last season, nothing lasts forever. It will be sad to see Bernardo play his last game for Manchester City. As a glittering City career ends, a new chapter at Manchester City will begin.

Bernardo Silva’s departure from Manchester City will allow other players, whether that’s a new signing, or players currently in the City squad, to step up. Responsibility will fall on new players to fill the void that Bernardo Silva’s departure will create. No player can replace Bernardo Silva’s role on the pitch. That is impossible. No other player can play so many roles so well and also has an intimate understanding of Pep Guardiola’s demands. Instead, someone, or multiple players, will have to step up. There will be a new look to this Manchester City side next season after a club legend departs.

Bernardo Silva will leave Manchester City at the end of this season. Pep Lijnders has confirmed the news that has felt inevitable for some time. Manchester City will have a new look next season without their current captain in their squad. How that looks next season is unknown, but it will be fascinating to watch unfold.

Red Sox Tumble To Worst Record In Baseball With Historically Bad Start originally appeared on NESN. Add NESN as a Preferred Source by clicking here.

A week and a half into the 2026 MLB season, the Boston Red Sox are not where they want to be.

They are not at the top of the standings, which is where they were aiming for. They are not even in the middle of the standings. Unfortunately, they are all the way at the bottom, and not just in the AL East.

The Red Sox tumbled to 2-7 with Sunday's 8-6 loss to the San Diego Padres at Fenway Park. Following wins by the Athletics and Colorado Rockies later in the day, that's officially the worst record in baseball. It's also tied for the worst nine-game start to a season in franchise history.

Boston's first home series of the season began on a high note with Friday's 5-2 win over the Padres, snapping the team's five-game losing streak. However, the Red Sox were unable to build on that performance over the weekend, dropping back-to-back games and losing their third straight series to start the year.

The Red Sox, at 2-7, have the worst record in Major League Baseball. They’re the only team that has yet to win 3 games. pic.twitter.com/AwmJQJxsIs

— Gordo (@BOSSportsGordo) April 6, 2026

Both defeats were close, by one run on Saturday and two runs on Sunday. Five of Boston's seven losses this season have been by two runs or less, a concerning trend that's carried over from last year.

It was a frustrating weekend for the Red Sox. On Saturday they didn't hit, scoring just two runs and going 0-for-5 with runners in scoring position. On Sunday, their pitching and defense let them down, blowing a 4-0 lead in the series finale.

Fortunately for Boston, nine games represent just 5.6 percent of the season -- equivalent to one game in an NFL season. Despite losing seven of their last eight games, the Red Sox are too talented to have MLB's worst record for long.

They need to start playing better, however, and that won't be easy with the Milwaukee Brewers coming to town on Monday. The Brewers are tied for the best record in baseball at 7-2, so things won't get any easier for Boston this week as it tries to start climbing out of the basement.

More MLB: Tom Caron's Football Analogy Might Ease Minds Of Panicking Red Sox Fans

In the final three games against the San Francisco Giants, the Mets allowed five total runs en route to three wins to culminate a 4-3 road trip. Even in their losses, New York allowed three runs or fewer in two of them and for the most part has gotten superior starting pitching two times through the rotation.

On Sunday, it was Kodai Senga's turn to deliver a quality outing and the right-hander handed in five scoreless innings before getting tagged for two runs in the sixth where only one ball was hit particularly hard.

Senga finished his outing by going 5.2 innings and allowing two earned runs on five hits, two walks and striking out seven on 88 pitches (55 strikes). Early on, he even struck out five in a row and looked great for a second straight start, this one on four days rest.

"It wasn’t perfect today, but good enough to make the game winnable," Senga said after the game through an interpreter.

It's the same kind of mentality that Senga used to have with himself when he was going good, often being hyper critical of things that he could improve on and fix for the next one.

Still, manager Carlos Mendoza was much more effusive of the right-hander's performance, saying "he pretty much dominated that lineup… Overall I think he was outstanding."

Senga is the latest of Mets starters to pitch well, following Clay Holmes' seven scoreless innings on Saturday and Nolan McLean's five hitless innings on Friday. As a unit, New York's starting rotation has a 3.13 ERA, eighth in MLB and third in the NL.

What's also encouraging? The Mets rank third in total innings pitched by their starters at 54.2 -- a year after their staff was routinely unable to go deep into games. As the season progresses and the temperature gets warmer and pitchers become more stretched out, hopefully that number continues to go up as well.

"I think it’s a really strong group," Senga said of the starting rotation. "As long as we stay healthy, stay out on the mound, we can be a stabilizing force for the team. That goes for everybody and myself. I don’t want to be the one lagging behind, I want to be up there with them."

Of course, after his incredible first half last season, Senga returned from a hamstring injury and had a dreadful end to the year. It became such a problem that New York sent him down to the minors to try and restore his stuff and his confidence.

The team even entertained trading the 33-year-old during the offseason but decided to keep the right-hander who then rewarded the Mets with a strong showing in spring training that has continued into the regular season.

It's obviously still very early into the season, but the signs are good for Senga and if he's able to keep it up he can certainly be a part of a Mets staff that has all the makings of a top rotation in baseball and be that stabilizing force that he was talking about.

Sunderland had just drifted aimlessly since dropping out of the top tier in May 1991. Reaching the cup final in 1992 provided a big distraction from just how bad things were, but we ended up with a manager in Malcolm Crosby that chairman Bob Murray just didn’t want.

Roker Park was falling to bits, there was nothing in the coffers to rebuild, that lot up the road were on the journey with Keegan and the Honey Monster and things looked bleak.

Despite his record as player-manager of Coventry City and the fact he was brought to the club by his predecessor, it says a lot that there was an initial excitement around the appointment of Terry Butcher. Although it may have been anticipation of him not appearing in the back four after he gave Julian Joachim a thirty-yard head start at Filbert Street and was still beaten to the ball.

If nothing else, Butcher was ambitious. I’m still not sure how he pulled it off, but Denis Smith had been given virtually nothing to spend in his time in the Roker hotseat, but the new man was handed the credit card in the summer of 1993 and was told to go nuts.

Alec Chamberlain arrived from Luton Town on a free transfer, which offered value for money given the age of first-choice keeper Tony Norman. Another arrival from Luton was striker Phil Gray who was wanted by a few clubs, which pushed the value up to around £750,000.

Butcher went up to his old stomping ground north of the border and took highly rated Derek Ferguson for around the same price from Glasgow Rangers. Defender Andy Melville signed in a swap deal plus cash from Oxford United that saw Anton Rogan move in the opposite direction, and highly-rated Ian Rodgerson signed from Birmingham City.

All this happened in one summer which hadn’t been seen at Roker for some time. There was even a thought that we might actually be headed for better things. But in the days leading up to the opening day of the season against Marco Gabbiadini’s Derby County at the Baseball Ground, all of the new signings were involved in a car accident.

We lost the game a few days later 5-0.

By late October we were 11th in Endsleigh League Division One, and considering we’d survived the drop on the last day of the season by goal difference the previous year, this was a decent start. Then we took on Ron Atkinson’s Aston Villa at Roker in the League Cup, having already knocked out Howard Wilkinson’s Leeds over two legs, but Mark Bosnich did his thing as we battered them in a 4-1 defeat.

We lost the next five successive league games which saw us drop to one place and one point above the drop zone and we were drifting once again towards relegation. Butcher was sacked and up stepped reserve team coach Mick Buxton, who had previously seen success at Huddersfield Town as manager.

The players immediately responded to a new voice and we won six of the next nine games, which provided the safety of mid-table. By the time Sunderland were due to travel to Mick McCarthy’s Millwall on this day in 1994, we were just six points off a play-off place.

Sunderland started brightly and should have been ahead when Martin Smith was sent through by Derek Ferguson, but saw his shot tipped wide by Kasey Keller. Around ten minutes before half-time Sunderland fell behind. Future Sunderland defender Kenny Cunningham sent over a cross that David Mitchell headed beyond Chamberlain.

Five minutes later the lead had doubled when Mitchell again won a header in the box, this time from a corner, and this time it needed a deflection to beat Chamberlain but the result was the same. Buxton changed things up at half-time and Don Goodman replaced Brian Atkinson and it was looking to be paying off when Andy Melville looped a header past Keller to halve the lead with around twenty minutes left on the clock.

All it needed was for us to get the ball back to the centre circle and get going quickly – which Goodman attempted to do but Keller wouldn’t let go of the ball. The Millwall keeper then elbowed Goodman in the face, and the Sunderland striker retaliated and punched him in the face. As is often the case, the referee only saw the final act and Goodman received a red card while Keller – yep, you guessed it – received no punishment.

A few minutes later Alex Rae came on as sub for Millwall on a bench that also had ex-Sunderland goalkeeper Tim Carter, but the game ended 2-1 to the home side in a result that probably extinguished any small hope we might have had to make the play-offs that year.

Wednesday 6th April, 1994

Division One

Millwall 2-1 Sunderland

[Mitchell 37’, 41’ – Melville 66’ (Goodman sent-off 66’)]

The New Den

Sunderland: Chamberlain, Kubicki, Bennett, Melville, Ord, Atkinson (Goodman), Ferguson, Ball, Smith (Armstrong), Gray, Russell

Millwall: Keller, Cunningham, Dawes, Roberts, Van Den Hauwe, Stevens, Hurlock, Allen, Kerr, Mitchell, Berry (Rae) Substitutes not used: Carter, Verveer

Attendance: 10,244

Jones claims Bryan Beltran chased his car for two blocks while revving the engine to intimidate him. He took to X to express pride in defending himself against the alleged intimidation. 'I am glad this happened to me and not one of the senior citizens in our community,' Jones wrote.