It was a glorious Sunday in Croke Park for all the Tipperary fans who saw their side trounce Kilkenny by 3-25 to 0-20. It was Tipperary 27th time lifting the Liam McCarthy Cup and Dublin city was awash with drunken Tipp fans celebrating their success (and probably Kilkenny fans drinking away their sorrows too)
VAR, as per usual, dominated the discussion in the football after Manchester City were once again denied a last minute winner after a VAR check. Gabriel Jesus thought he had given his side what would have been a richly deserved winner, only for VAR to step in to ruin his dream. David Silva’s corner hit the arm of Aymeric Laporte, deflecting the ball into the path of Jesus who smashed the ball beyond Hugo Lloris. The new rule recently brought in states that should a goal come as a result of the ball hitting the arm of the attacking team, regardless of intention or position of the hand, the goal must be dissallowed. In this sense, VAR was allowing enforcing the rules of the goal and the rule itself, not VAR, should be subject of the torrent of criticism. Man City probably should have had the match won long before the controversial moment, spurning numerous chances to score and conceding cheap goals to Erik Lamela and Lucas Moura.
Elsewhere, there was wins for Arsenal and Liverpool who overcame Burnley (2-1) and Southampton (2-1) respectively while Chelsea drew 1-1 at home to Leicester and Man Utd also drew 1-1 away to Wolves. There was also wins for Bournemouth away to Aston Villa (2-1), Everton at home to Watford (1-0) while newly promoted Norwich beat Newcastle 3-1, Sheffield Utd beat a rudderless Crystal Palace (1-0) and Brighton and West Ham played out a 1-1 draw.
In rugby, Wales beat England 13-6 in Cardiff. The result meant that Wales are now top of the Rugby World Rankings with New Zealand in second and Ireland in third.