Colombia reached the Women’s World Cup quarterfinals for the first time in the country’s history after a nervy 1-0 victory over Jamaica in Melbourne on Tuesday.

Catalina Usme brilliantly scored the winner and, in the process, became the first player at this tournament to break Jamaica’s stubborn defense.

The Colombians’ reward is a last eight tie against reigning European champion and world No.4 England in Sydney on Saturday, a match the South American team has the talent to win despite there being 21 places between the two sides in the world rankings.

Colombia and Jamaica’s unlikely journeys to the knockout stages will be a major reason why this tournament will be regarded as a success. After all, what is sporting romance if it isn’t the traditional powerhouses faltering and the underdogs thriving against the odds?

With these two teams having been accustomed to largely playing against countries expected to beat them in the group stages, both struggled to take the initiative in this tie and, consequently, there were few chances.

But in doing just enough to beat Jamaica, Colombia becomes the first South American country to reach the last eight since Brazil in 2011.

After the match, Colombia coach Nelson Abadía told FIFA: “I believe this moment is unique for Colombian women’s football history, for south America … Equally, this is the triumph of a human group that has worked hard to achieve consistency, to have a trade, character, personality … and today we played and won well.”

Jamaica had an opportunity to level the score late in the game, but Drew Spence headed inches wide. Colombia’s Leicy Santos then hit the post in the final few minutes as the match came to life in the latter stages with Jamaica going in search of an equalizer.

Impossible to ignore

Some of Jamaica’s players were in tears after the final whistle. But the country’s presence in the round-of-16 is particularly remarkable.

Not only did the Reggae Girlz progress from a group which contained favorites France and Brazil, but they did so having had to release a statement before the tournament expressing their “utmost disappointment” with the country’s soccer federation.

The team had missed several friendlies, the statement said, due to “extreme disorganization” and that they had “showed up repeatedly without receiving contractually agreed upon compensation.”

In a statement on its website, the JFF acknowledged that “things have not been done perfectly” but that it was “working assiduously to resolve” players’ concerns.

The question now is what will be the response to the team’s success, and that of other lesser-funded countries?

While about $49 million of the record $110 million World Cup prize money will go directly to individual players, the rest of the pot will be split between participating federations who will decide what share of this money to allocate to teams and players – if any at all.

Even though Jamaica’s participation in this tournament ended in Melbourne, the players have sparkled on the world stage and made themselves, you would hope, impossible to ignore.

Jamaica keeps Caicedo quiet

The match started as if it were to end in penalties. Jamaica relied on the defense that hadn’t conceded a goal in the group stages and, like France and Brazil before them, Colombia struggled to puncture a well-organized backline.

Having scored just once in the tournament prior to this tie, Jamaica’s coach Lorne Donaldson had challenged his team to find the net, but the team managed just two shots on target and didn’t enjoy enough possession to put sustained pressure on Colombia.

There were flashes from Linda Caicedo, Colombia’s talented 18-year-old, but the teenager was largely kept quiet in a match in which defense got the better of attack, other than for Usme’s moment of magic.

In the 51st minute, the Colombia captain delicately controlled Ana Guzman’s incredible pass and placed the ball beyond Jamaica’s Rebecca Spencer. Fittingly, it was the goal that would make history.

Jamaica nearly leveled soon after when Colombia’s Catalina Perez fumbled the ball on her goalline, but the South American side counterattacked quickly and troubled the Caribbean side once again only for Caicedo to be called offside.

The longer the game progressed, the more freedom Caicedo enjoyed on the left flank, but Jamaica defended the threat posted by the Real Madrid player who has lit up this tournament with her wonderful skill on the ball.

But Jamaica needed to also score and despite a late flourish, the team’s prosaic approach ultimately proved to be its downfall.

A Champions League match in Greece has been postponed after a fan died during a brawl with supporters of Croatian club Dinamo Zagreb, European soccer’s governing body UEFA said on Tuesday.

The police said they arrested 96 people including 87 Croats and five Greeks. One Austrian, one German, one Bosnian and one Albanian were also arrested, they said.

According to Greek state broadcaster ERT, the victim is a 22-year-old AEK supporter. Eight other people were injured in the brawl, including a minor with a stone wound to the head, per ERT.

The Greek state broadcaster reported that a group of 150-200 organized Dinamo fans entered Greece in several cars, despite a ban on the movement of fans from Croatia ahead of the game.

The incident happened in the Nea Filadelfeia neighborhood in the outskirts of Athens, home of the AEK Athens football club’s home stadium, where the Champions League qualifying match between AEK and Dinamo Zagreb had been due to take place on Tuesday.

However, UEFA said that the “conditions for the match” to go ahead “are not met” following consultation with local authorities, resulting in the game’s postponement.

“UEFA deplores in the strongest possible terms the appalling incidents that took place in Athens last night and resulted in the loss of a life,” European football’s governing body said in statement.

“While expressing our deepest sympathy to the family of the victim, to AEK Athens FC and its fans, we would like to reiterate that violence has no place in our sport and we expect that those responsible for this terrible act be arrested and consigned to justice in the shortest delay,” added UEFA.

The first-leg match will now be played on either Friday, August 18 or Saturday, August 19, with the originally scheduled second leg in the team’s Champions League qualification tie taking place next week in Zagreb as planned, with UEFA reiterating that no away fans would be permitted at either of the two games.

A massive storm system unleashed vicious winds and thunderstorms across the East Coast on Monday, killing at least two people and knocking out power to more than 1 million utility customers from Pennsylvania down to Georgia.

In the northwestern Alabama city of Florence, a 28-year-old man died after lightning struck him in a parking lot Monday, police said – a rarity in the US as only about 20 people on average are killed by lightning strikes annually, according to the National Weather Service.

In Anderson County, South Carolina, Evan Christopher Kinley, 15, was killed when a falling tree struck him during a severe storm, according to the county coroner’s office. The teen had just arrived at his grandparents’ home and got out of his car when the tree fell, the office said.

The storm system brought heavy rain, thunder and violent winds of up to 70 mph throughout parts of the coast from New York to Mississippi – and caused major travel disruptions in the skies. By Monday night, more than 400 reports of strong winds had been made across the region.

More than 8,000 flights within, into or out of the US were delayed Monday and more than 1,600 were canceled, according to data from FlightAware.com. The most affected airports included the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, New York’s LaGuardia Airport and the Reagan National Airport near Washington, DC, according to the website.

Nine simultaneous ground stops, which prevent flights from landing, were in effect at airports, including Hartsfield-Jackson, LaGuardia, Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey and Philadelphia International Airport.

Live updates: Damaging storms hit Eastern US

And as the sun went down, hundreds of thousands of Americans were without power, with the majority of outages recorded Monday night in North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Georgia and Maryland, according to PowerOutage.us.

In Georgia, crews were out as soon as the skies cleared Monday evening and worked to restore power, after uprooted trees and powerful winds, hail and rain downed power lines, according to utility company Georgia Power.

And parts of the country that were hammered with severe weather Monday may still not be out of the woods, as new threats could develop Tuesday.

A slight risk of severe thunderstorms – a Level 2 of 5 – exists Tuesday afternoon for parts of Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and Florida, as well as parts of Colorado, Nebraska and Kansas, the Storm Prediction Center says. An enhanced risk – a Level 3 of 5 – exists for a smaller portion of the latter three states.

Areas at risk on Tuesday will generally be south or west of where Monday’s damaging storms rages. While that is good news for residents cleaning up after Monday’s mess, it also means more than 5 million additional people are at risk for damaging winds and heavy rainfall on Tuesday.

Shiver, 36, of Thomasville, Georgia, is accused of unsuccessfully conspiring with the two Bahamas natives to kill her husband, Robert Shiver, on July 16 while on the Abaco Islands, months after the couple filed for divorce.

The bail conditions stipulate that she remain in the Bahamas and wear an ankle monitoring device until her next court appearance on October 5, Cargill said.

Lindsay Shiver and the two suspected co-conspirators have been in custody at the Bahamas Department of Correctional Services since their arrest last week.

Her alleged accomplices, Bethel, 28, and Newbold Jr., 29, face conspiracy to commit murder charges.

Attorneys represented the defendants in court during a Friday arraignment, according to court documents. They were not required to enter pleas and were remanded to the Bahamas corrections department until an October 5 hearing.

Lindsay and Robert Shiver both attended Auburn University and live in Thomasville, according to social media posts. Robert Shiver is an insurance executive and former Auburn University football player, court records and his company’s website show.

The husband filed for divorce a day before the wife did

Robert Shiver had filed for divorce April 5, and his wife did the same the next day, according to a complaint at the Thomas County, Georgia, Clerk of Courts website.

The family has spent a good deal of time in the Bahamas, pictures posted on a social media account believed to belong to Lindsay Shiver indicate.

Robert Shiver briefly was a member of at least one NFL team, according to his company’s website. Court documents in the Bahamas misidentify him as Richard Shiver.

The number of migrants crossing the treacherous Darien Gap, a mountainous rainforest region that connects South and Central America, has broken a new record, according to immigration officials in Panama.

The Panama migration authority’s deputy director Maria Isabel Saravia told media that 2022’s already-high number of crossings was surpassed on Monday.

Last year was an “unprecedented year” where a total of 248,284 people crossed the Darién National Park, she said. 2023 now looks set to outstrip that number as the year continues.

“With today and yesterday’s crossings of 1,869 people, there have been 248,901 crossings,” Saravia said Monday.

Around 20% of the people making the dangerous trek are children and adolescents, authorities say.

“Within that age group, at least 51% are five-year-old children or under. As the figures anticipated, we exceeded last year’s number (…) The last three years have been much higher than the last 11 years in crossings,” Saravia added.

Venezuelans and Haitians represent the majority of the people crossing, followed by Colombians, Ecuadorians, and migrants from outside the continent, she said.

The 66-mile (106-kilometer) hike through the Darien Gap brings migrants from Colombia to Panama and is a crucial passage for those hoping to reach the United States and Canada.

Mass migration across the Western Hemisphere has fueled a growing number of people moving north.

But after officials warned that a surge in illegal migration across the US southern border would accompany the May expiration of a Trump-era border restriction, used in the pandemic to turn back migrants at the US-Mexico border, the number of daily encounters along the US border remained low in June.

“As a result of planning and execution – which combined stiffer consequences for unlawful entry with a historic expansion of lawful pathways and processes – unlawful entries between ports of entry along the Southwest Border have decreased by more than 70 percent since May 11,” the Department of Homeland Security said in a news release in June.

It is unclear whether the deterrent effect will last, and human rights advocates say migrants, who were fleeing danger in their home countries, are now living in limbo in Mexico as they wait for their asylum claims.

Others are being forced to take increasingly risky paths to reach the US, advocates said. In June, dozens of people were found dead inside a semi-truck in Texas.

Correction: This story has been updated to correct the length of the Darien Gap.

Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon fell by 66% last month compared to July 2022 and is now at its lowest rate in six years, according to preliminary data released by Brazil’s National Institute for Space Research (INPE) on Thursday.

Nearly 500 square kilometers (193 square miles) of rainforest were cleared in July, a significant fall from the 1,487 square kilometers (574 square miles) cleared last July.

There has been a sharp decline in deforestation since Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva was inaugurated as president in January. Lula has pledged to end deforestation, which had increased rapidly under his predecessor, Jair Bolsonaro.

Brazil’s environment minister, Marina Silva, said government policies, including increasing surveillance and fining perpetrators, has played a big role in bringing rates of deforestation down.

“It is the end of the expectation of impunity,” Silva told journalists at a news conference announcing the results. “When you see the increase in operations … this creates a virtuous circle of no longer expecting impunity.”

The preliminary data should be confirmed in the next few days, and comes as the countries which contain parts of the Amazon prepare to meet on August 8 and 9 in the Brazilian city of Belem, for a summit aimed at increasing protection of the rainforest.

The reduced rate of deforestation is positive news at a time when the Amazon remains critically vulnerable.

Mikaela Weisse, the director of the World Resources Institute’s (WRI) Global Forest Watch, said the data is “incredibly important and promising.”

Some scientists have warned that the rainforest may be approaching a critical tipping point that could see it transformed into a grassy savannah. This would have huge implications for biodiversity as well as the climate crisis – the Amazon stores huge amounts of carbon and has a significant impact on global weather patterns.

“The Amazon rainforest really serves as kind of a motor, for rainfall and precipitation throughout the region. And so I think we would expect to see pretty major implications on agricultural production, for example, in other parts of Brazil and across South America,” Weisse said.

If the Amazon is not protected, it will also be much harder to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, said Weisse. Breaching this threshold risks of triggering major tipping points, including the death of coral reefs and the melting of polar ice sheets.

Continued effort is needed to keep pushing deforestation rates down, Weisse said. “You can’t just reduce the rates and expect that it’s going to stay that way.”

What’s happening in the Brazilian Amazon provides some hope that rainforest destruction rates might start to decline globally. In 2022 an area of global tropical forest the size of Switzerland was lost as forest destruction rose by 10% compared to the previous year, according to a recent report from Global Forest Watch.

Fourteen million children are in “dire need” of humanitarian support in Sudan, the United Nation’s children’s agency warned on Friday, as a deadly conflict in the country deepens its hunger crisis.

“The numbers are staggering. Almost 14 million children – a number roughly equivalent to every single child in Colombia, France, Germany, or Thailand – are in dire need of humanitarian support,” UNICEF deputy executive director Ted Chaiban said in a briefing on Friday.

Over 1.7 million children in Sudan have been forced out of their homes facing risks of hunger, disease, violence, and family separation, he said.

This is in addition to the 1.9 million children who were already displaced in Sudan before this latest crisis.

“Three million children under five are malnourished with 700,000 at risk of severe acute malnutrition and mortality. 1.7 million children under the age of one are at risk of missing critical vaccinations, raising the risk of disease outbreaks,” Chaiban added.

Since the Sudan conflict began in mid-April, at least 435 children have been killed and more than 2,025 injured, according to UNICEF.

Over 20 million people in Sudan face severe hunger, a figure that has nearly doubled since last year, the UN warned on Thursday.

The landscape of college sports continues its drastic change.

The Pac-12 Conference is down to only four schools remaining as the University of Arizona, Arizona State University and the University of Utah announced Friday they are leaving to join the Big 12 Conference.

“We are thrilled to welcome Arizona, Arizona State and Utah to the Big 12,” conference commissioner Brett Yormark said in a statement on Friday. “The Conference is gaining three premier institutions both academically and athletically, and the entire Big 12 looks forward to working alongside their presidents, athletic directors, student-athletes and administrators.”

The University of Oregon and the University of Washington will officially leave the Pac-12 and join the Big Ten Conference starting in 2024, both schools announced earlier Friday.

The decision by the schools to change conferences coincides with the end of the Pac 12’s media rights deal with ESPN and FOX, and marks the latest shift in the collegiate sports landscape jumpstarted by UCLA and USC announcing last year they would be leaving for the Big Ten at the start of the 2024-25 season.

The decision to leave after the conclusion of the Pac-12’s media rights deal saves the schools from having to pay any exit fee.

“Today’s news is incredibly disappointing for our student-athletes, fans, alumni and staff of the Pac-12 who cherish the over 100-year history, tradition and rivalries of the Conference of Champions,” the Pac-12 said in a statement. “We remain focused on securing the best possible future for each of our member universities.”

As part of the decision for the move, Ray Anderson, Arizona State vice president for university athletics, highlighted the financial package and stability of the Big 12.

“The financial package is strong. The stability of the Big 12 is strong. We are ready, and the timing is right,” said Anderson. “The exposure and visibility as well as the resources from the conference will help us compete for championships. From enhancing our ability to recruit Texas for football to the Big 12’s strength in basketball, good days are ahead.”

With the impending addition of the four schools expected ahead of the 2024 college football season, the Big 12 is set to expand from 12 teams to 16 teams, marking a bounce back for the conference after the University of Oklahoma and the University of Texas announced they were leaving to join the SEC earlier this year.

“We are excited for this new chapter, a move that is necessary to remain competitive in top-tier Division 1 athletics,” said Arizona State president Michael Crow. “We are joining a premier athletic conference and bringing with us programs on the rise, our rich traditions and history, and the metro Phoenix media market. We’re in a good spot, and we are pleased to be with UArizona and Utah in the move.”

University of Utah president Taylor Randall thanked the Pac-12 in a statement, saying, “I am grateful for all of the hard work my Pac-12 Conference colleagues invested in an effort to find solutions to keep the conference whole and provide a pathway forward to benefit all of our students, fans and communities.

“Ultimately, stronger forces within national collegiate athletics and the greater media landscape brought us to today’s decision. I am hopeful the relationships we have made over the past 12 years within the Pac-12 remain strong.”

Oregon, UW head to Big Ten

The Big Ten Council of presidents/chancellors voted unanimously on Friday to approve Oregon and Washington to the conference effective August 2, 2024.

“We are excited to welcome the University of Oregon and the University of Washington to the Big Ten Conference,” Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti said in a statement. “We look forward to building long-lasting relationships with the universities, administrators and staff, student-athletes, coaches and fans. Both institutions feature a combination of academic and athletic excellence that will prove a great fit for our future.”

There have now been four schools to leave the Pac-12 conference for the Big Ten since last year. The two southern California powerhouses – USC and UCLA – both announced they would join the Big Ten for the start of the 2024-2025 season. Last month, Colorado announced the school would leave the Pac-12 for the Big 12.

“Accepting membership into the Big Ten Conference is a transformational opportunity for the University of Oregon to change the short and long-term trajectory of our university and athletics department,” Oregon athletic director Rob Mullens said in a statement.

“The stability and exposure of joining the Big Ten is of great benefit to the University of Oregon, and we are grateful to the Big Ten presidents and chancellors for accepting our application to join the conference. We look forward to the opportunity for our student-athletes to compete in this conference, which includes many of the best programs in the nation in every sport.”

Both schools were charter members of the Pac-12 dating back to 1915.

“We have tremendous respect and gratitude for the Pac-12, its treasured history and traditions. At the same time, the college athletics landscape has changed dramatically in recent years,” Washington athletic director Jennifer Cohen said in a statement. “The Big Ten’s history of athletic and academic success and long-term stability best positions our teams for future success, and we are energized at the opportunity to compete at the highest level against some of the best programs in the country.”

Washington State University, Oregon State University, UC Berkeley and Stanford University are the four remaining Pac-12 schools which have not announced any conference changes.

WSU president Kirk Schulz and director of athletics Pat Chun said in a statement, “We are disappointed with the recent decisions by some of our Pac-12 peers.”

Former National Football League quarterback Johnny Manziel reveals in a new documentary his drug usage during his playing career and a suicide attempt following his release from the Cleveland Browns in 2016.

In Netflix’s upcoming documentary “Untold: Johnny Football,” Manziel – who became the first redshirt freshman to win the Heisman Trophy while playing at Texas A&M in 2012 – said that he began using OxyContin and cocaine every day following the 2015 season, which led to his weight dropping from 215 pounds that January to 175 pounds in September.

Poor play and legal troubles soon followed Manziel. A Texas grand jury indicted Manziel on a misdemeanor assault charge of his former girlfriend, Colleen Crowley. Manziel denied hitting Crowley at the time and the charges were later dropped after he met the court’s terms for a dismissal agreement.

The Browns would release Manziel in March 2016, which he said he was later diagnosed with bipolar disorder.

Manziel said he refused to enter rehab twice and began “self-sabotaging,” going on a “$5 million bender” before attempting suicide.

“I had planned to do everything I wanted to do at that point in my life, spend as much money as I possibly could and then my plan was to take my life,” Manziel said in the documentary. “I wanted to get as bad as humanly possible to where it made sense, and it made it seem like an excuse and an out for me.”

Manziel said he had purchased a gun “months earlier” with the intention to use it for suicide but the gun “malfunctioned” when he pulled the trigger.

“Still to this day, don’t know what happened. But the gun just clicked on me,” he said.

Manziel’s relationship with his family at the time was “strained” due to his refusal to seek treatment, he said. Manziel later returned to his family’s home in Texas after leaving Los Angeles following the suicide attempt.

“It’s been a long, long road, and I don’t know if it’s been great or if it’s been bad – that’s kind of still up for debate,” Paul Manziel, his father, said in the documentary. “But we’re blessed. And he’s still with us. And we can mend all the fences still. I think Johnny’s got a lot better days coming than what he’s had.”

Manziel was drafted in the first round of the 2014 NFL Draft. Following his release from the Browns, Manziel played for multiple teams in the Canadian Football League (CFL) and in the now-defunct Alliance of American Football (AAF). Manziel last played in the Fan Controlled Football league.

The Netflix documentary is scheduled to be released on Tuesday.