debut

The youngster joined City’s academy at under-nine level and he really started to make a name for himself last term.

Samba scored 24 goals and provided 10 assists in an eye-catching first full season with the under-18s, including curling home a stunning free-kick to help City win the FA Youth Cup final against rivals Manchester United in May.

On his debut, Samba played the entire 90 minutes and fully grasped his opportunity.

With City struggling for openings, Samba broke the deadlock by flicking home a header – he celebrated by blowing a kiss in the direction of family and friends in the stands, before curling in a delightful second later in the game.

Samba was afforded a generous ovation towards the end of the game when being deservedly named man of the match.

“[I’m] satisfied not just for the goals but for the performance too,” said manager Maresca.

“I asked him in the last three, four days – when I decided to play him as nine – he said he never played there. He is not a nine for sure, but he was good.

“He is young, full of energy, strong, can finish, can set [players up]. He made some good decisions in the first half. I am happy but they are young and we have to go slowly, slowly.

“Hopefully we can give him more chances.”

U.S. Air Force Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) are set to take part in a large-force employment (LFE) exercise for the first time later this year. Sending CCAs to the next iteration of the Emerald Flag test exercise is another important new stepping stone toward fielding the drones operationally.

“We have not yet done a LFE with these [CCAs], for real. The first one is going to be Emerald Flag. That’s in December,” Lt. Col. Lyndon “OTTO” Bartlett, Director of Operations for the Experimental Operations Unit (EOU) at Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada, said earlier today. “That’ll be our first tip dip of the toe in an actual force integration.”

Bartlett was speaking during a panel at the Air & Space Forces Association’s (AFA) 2026 Air, Space & Cyber Conference, at which TWZ is in attendance. The EOU has been leading Air Force efforts to lay the groundwork for future CCA operations. The unit has already been conducting various types of testing using prototypes of the General Atomics FQ-42A Vengeance and Anduril FQ-44 Fury. The Air Force announced in June that its initial operational CCA fleet would consist of a mix of FQ-42s and FQ-44s.

The Air Force’s 96th Test Wing at Eglin Air Force Base in Florida first began hosting Emerald Flag exercises in 2020. The exercise series has historically focused heavily on demonstrating new and improved aerial networking architectures and other command and control capabilities, which will be especially critical elements for future CCA operations. Emerald Flag, with its not purely limited to the air domain, is often tied in with other large force test exercise series. Other branches of the U.S. military regularly take part, as well.

It is worth noting here that Boeing’s MQ-28 Ghost Bat, a CCA-type design, did take part in Valiant Shield 26, another LFE exercise, earlier this year. The EOU was also involved. However, the MQ-28, originally developed for the Royal Australian Air Force, is not officially part of the Air Force’s CCA program at present.

Emerald Flag in December “will, in OTTO’s mind, be the first time that we will ever do some CCA end-to-end chain [demonstration] live. That’s the first time we’ll ever be integrated in a fourth- and fifth-gen combined OCA [offensive counter air] push,” Lt. Col. Bartlett added. “It’ll be small, but those type [sic] of building blocks are where I think you get the intangibles like trust in the CCA.”

“Those learnings are going to be just as valuable as the technical, [like] does the radio work properly? Does the button I push to say ‘target’ work properly?” he continued.

U.S. military officers, including tactical jet pilots, regularly talk about the critical need for trust in autonomous systems to perform as expected when directed in future operations. Establishing that trust, and doing so in real-world environments, is seen as foundational to answering larger outstanding questions about how CCA-type drones will be deployed, launched, recovered, supported, and otherwise operated, let alone employed tactically.

The EOU, together with other partners within the U.S. military and industry, have been working for years now to validate and improve autonomous capabilities in the virtual realm, and then test in more limited real-world contexts. Virtualized testing does offer immense benefits for rapid iterative development of the underlying software ahead of live demonstrations.

“If it’s in a simulated environment, it’s immediate,” Lt. Col. Bartlett said during the panel when asked about the “feedback loop” in testing the EOU is already taking part in. In that environment, “when the mission autonomy iterations are happening, our guys are literally with the programmers … They give the feedback, and if it’s possible to do immediately, they take that feedback. If not, then they work on it on the next turn of the software.”

Real-world testing, of course, offers opportunities to explore additional aspects of future CCA operations, including when it comes to loading weapons and maintenance. A key component of the Air Force’s vision for CCA employment is being able to forward deploy the drones to far-flung locations, including airstrips with limited infrastructure and access to logistics chains. Rapid, distributed deployments like this are central to still-evolving concepts of operations currently referred to collectively as Agile Combat Employment (ACE). The EOU has been involved in at least two rounds of ACE-focused testing this year, one at Edwards Air Force Base in California in April and another at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada in July. TWZ was the first to report on the latter event.

Visualizing ACE

During the panel today, Lt. Col. Bartlett also talked more generally about work EOU has done to date. This has included exploring “sortie generation, how easy they are to maintain, [and] how small a footprint could be.”

“We’ve been pleasantly surprised. The jets are extremely easy to maintain,” he continued. “We’re at a one-to-one maintainer-to-airplane ratio, which is crazy small.”

With “CCAs, [it] seems like because they’re a little bit simpler, because their role is so focused, what we found is that just about any – not just about, but we found that any AFSC [Air Force Specialty Code; alphanumeric codes used to identify specific jobs within this service] can be trained to generate sorties to load weapons, and we’ve done some of those things already,” he further explained. “It’s our job to bring them [CCAs] out and make sure that, beyond the technical specifications of it, that we’re kind of experimenting with the more complex things like logistics, and C2 [command and control], and how do we battle manage these things.”

The head of the EOU did acknowledge challenges that still have to be surmounted. This notably includes hurdles currently imposed by Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) regulations on the operation of fully uncrewed aircraft, even by the U.S. military, within U.S. airspace. This is further compounded by the explicit intention to operate CCAs with far more minimal human engagement compared to most existing drones.

“Mission autonomy is going to be the secret sauce that lets these things become decisive or not, and we’ll know that over the next couple years as that develops,” according to Bartlett. “If I were to identify the two biggest problems from the trenches of the EOU, [one] is FAA integration or policy implications to an autonomous airplane.”

“So these things don’t have pilots. They’re not RPAs [remotely-piloted aircraft]. They’re not manned fighters. They have no pilots,” he continued. “Our system is not set up for that, and that is a challenge that we are finding extremely hard to navigate through, and to not go around, but to make a policy.”

“We need to make sure the Air Force is ready for these things, to set policies that make sure the enterprise and the country is [sic] ready to receive these, and internalize an autonomous fighter that does not have a pilot that is running on a mission autonomy agent that doesn’t listen to ATC [air traffic control],” he added.

The second problem, per Bartlett, is making sure the Air Force develops new internal policies and doctrine that are not “copy and pastes from old regulations” that do not take into account the specific nuances that CCAs will bring. What the service needs is “something that enables us to move quickly with these things, to weigh what we need, and to experiment with novel types of air superiority.”

All of this circles back to the discussion of trust in autonomous capabilities. It also speaks to the potential for future operations where CCAs could operate far more independently.

“It’s in the name that they’re collaborative,” Bartlett said. “Taking them out of that could technically be effective, but would not enhance the joint force the way that we see a collaborative, integrated force package to be.”

“What we need autonomously to do is written down. I won’t discuss the particulars in this forum, but we know what we need it to do, or we know what we think it really needs to do,” he noted. “We’ve structured our experimentation game plan to analyze ‘can it do those things?,’ and if not, then how do they need to be different? And then as they iterate on it, which we’ve already seen a couple times, we get that at the EOU, we get the new version down, we fly it again. Is it fixed? Yes or no.”

Some members of industry are clearly envisioning futures with different definitions of ‘collaborative’ that could lean more toward independent operations involving highly autonomous drones.

What “the whole entire program is trying to do is [figure out] what is the requirement to put out into the field to get to the warfighter and to start operating this thing this [sic; in] real time?” Robert “Otis” Winkler, Vice President of Corporate Development & National Security Programs at dronemaker Kratos, another one of the panelists, said. “The collaborative part of this makes it a much easier, I think, technical problem to be able to limit and grow the autonomy as you field this.”

“I think eventually we may see these aircraft utilized as collaborative aircraft, but not in conjunction with your traditional pulsed operation, but in support of that pulsed operation when the pulse isn’t there yet. But I do think that that is a bit of a stretch goal that’s going to be down the road.”

CCAs “have been designed really around increasing both survivability and lethality of current force packages. So there are many manned platforms that you would describe in the exact same fashion,” Jason Levin, Senior Vice President for Air Dominance and Strike at Anduril, who was also on the panel, said. He was responding here to a specific question about whether his use of the term “fighter” to describe these drones implied more emphasis on independent operations.

All of this underscores the importance of bringing CCAs to Emerald Flag in December, as well as other events in the future offering opportunities to see how the drones really fit in with other crewed platforms. The Air Force is hoping to start seeing CCAs enter operational service around the end of the decade, and have 500 of them, at least, in inventory by 2032.

During the panel today, the EOU’s Lt. Col. Bartlett made clear that “we’re going to learn a lot over the next couple years.”

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

The first edition of “60 Minutes” since CBS News editor in chief Bari Weiss initiated drastic changes to the venerable program made it to air Sunday. But the changes weren’t all that apparent on screen.

The 59th season premiere was highly anticipated following months of turbulence behind the scenes. Weiss fired “60 Minutes” correspondents Sharyn Alfonsi and Cecilia Vega, both of whom complained the executive pushed them to add right-wing talking points to their stories. Longtime correspondent Scott Pelley was ousted after he angrily questioned the firings at a staff meeting.

Weiss — who took over editorial control of CBS News after parent company Paramount acquired her heterodox digital news site the Free Press — also dismissed “60 Minutes” executive producer Tanya Simon and replaced her with screenwriter and documentary filmmaker Nick Bilton, who has no previous experience in TV news.

Weiss restocked the program’s correspondent corps with one new full-timer — Ross Douthat, the longtime conservative opinion writer for the New York Times — and several new contributors, none of whom showed up in the premiere.

Douthat is the only newcomer added to the opening credits where the correspondents introduce themselves on camera. He also did the closing segment called “The Last Minute,” talking about the dangers of AI and the need for “journalism you can trust.”

But the look and tone of “60 Minutes” remained intact, with only a few minor tweaks to the graphics.

The episode was heavily promoted, with one on-air spot drawing on clips with from the program’s storied past. Correspondents throughout CBS News touted the premiere on their social media accounts.

The program opened with Norah O’Donnell’s exclusive interview with the Air Force officer who was shot down over Iran and rescued by special forces. The U.S. fighter jet was the first to be lost over enemy territory in more than 20 years.

The interview gave a detailed account of the rescue mission and steered clear of any political discussion about the Iran war, which O’Donnell described as “costly and unpopular.” Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth sat for an interview, focusing solely on the rescue mission.

The second segment was a hidden-camera investigation showing how self-styled lobbyists are shopping access to President Trump to felons looking for a pardon. Video captured pardon brokers Jack Burkman and Jacob Wohl, who were seen asking for $300,000 for their help, saying they worked with influencers close to Trump who would advocate for their cases. (The White House told “60 Minutes”: “Anyone spending money to lobby for pardons is foolishly wasting their money … President Trump performs his constitutional duties in an ethically sound manner, and to suggest so otherwise is either ill-informed or malicious.”)

Some on social media expressed surprise that “60 Minutes” would do a tough story on the Trump administration under Weiss after repeated reports that she is attempting to make the program more amenable to conservatives. “So I guess Bari Weiss didn’t totally destroy “60 Minutes” after all?” political analyst Chris Cillizza wrote on X.

The Los Angeles Rams made up the third segment in the program, which typically includes sports stories when CBS has a late afternoon football game leading into prime time. The package mostly focused on Rams head coach Sean McVay.

The ratings for “60 Minutes” will be issued by Nielsen later this week. Last year the program averaged 9.1 million weekly viewers, making it the most watched non-sports program in prime time.

Tyler Shough threw an incomplete pass in the end zone on a two-point conversion attempt, allowing the Lions to escape with a 31-30 win in overtime over the New Orleans Saints in Detroit on Sunday.

Saints coach Kellen Moore chose to go for the win instead of tying the game with 1:34 left in overtime after his team came back from a three-touchdown deficit in the third quarter and allowed a touchdown on the opening possession of the extra period.

Jared Goff threw two touchdown passes to Amon-Ra St. Brown, the second score a five-yard throw early in overtime, and Jahmyr Gibbs ran for two touchdowns.

New Orleans rallied from a 21-0 deficit and pulled into a 24-all tie on Shough’s nine-yard touchdown pass to Juwan Johnson with 1:07 left in the game.

Detroit went three-and-out on offense, giving the Saints the ball with a chance to win it and Ryan Wright missed a 62-yard field-goal attempt as time expired.

Gibbs had a career-high 29 carries for 156 yards. He also had five catches for 30 yards.

Goff was 26 of 39 for 206 yards without a turnover.

at Bengals 33, Buccaneers 27: Cincinnati’s new-look defense forced four turnovers — including its first fumble recovery for a touchdown since 2022 — and Joe Burrow passed for 254 yards and a touchdown during a victory over Tampa Bay. Bucs quarterback Baker Mayfield surrendered three fumbles during the loss.

Jets 23, at Titans 10: Breece Hall ran for 102 yards and a touchdown, Geno Smith threw for 215 yards and New York defeated Tennessee. The Jets never trailed and held the ball for just over 38 minutes. Cam Ward was 19 of 32 passing for 140 yards and a late touchdown toss.

Ravens 41, at Colts 23: Derrick Henry ran for three touchdowns to move into third on the NFL’s career list, Lamar Jackson threw for 324 yards and a TD and rushed for a score and Baltimore beat Indianapolis. Jesse Minter won his debut as the Ravens’ coach.

at Steelers 20, Falcons 13: T.J. Watt returned an interception of Cooper Rush 35 yards for a touchdown to help Pittsburgh secure a win over visiting Atlanta. Quarterback Aaron Rodgers passed for 221 yards and a touchdown. Rush, who was filling in for the injured Tua Tagovailoa, threw for a touchdown and a pair of interceptions that Pittsburgh turned into scores.

Bears 59, at Panthers 37: Caleb Williams threw for 269 yards and two touchdowns and ran for 65 yards and two more scores as Chicago defeated Carolina in the highest-scoring season opener in NFL history.

at Jaguars 34, Browns 10: Trevor Lawrence threw for 245 yards and four touchdowns, helping Jacksonville spoil the debut of new Cleveland coach Todd Monken. Cleveland’s Deshaun Watson threw an interception on the opening drive.

Bills 36, at Texans 31: Josh Allen threw a 34-yard touchdown pass to Joshua Palmer with 1:36 remaining to lift Buffalo past host Houston during a back-and-forth season opener. Allen had 334 yards passing with two touchdowns and ran for two more scores. The Texans had a chance to win in the closing seconds, but Greg Rousseau earned his second strip sack of the day, taking down C.J. Stroud at the Buffalo 28.

at Eagles 24, Commanders 22: Jalen Hurts passed for 203 yards and three touchdowns, helping Philadelphia edge Washington. Jayden Daniels passed for 164 yards and two touchdowns, but the Philadelphia defense stuffed a late Commanders two-point conversion attempt to seal the win.

at Vikings 39, Packers 22: Kyler Murray suffered a hit to the head on a run play in the first quarter and was placed in concussion protocol. Carson Wentz replaced Murray and passed for three touchdowns and Jordan Mason and Aaron Jones Sr. added two more rushing scores to help the Vikings beat the Packers.

at Raiders 27, Dolphins 13: Kirk Cousins passed for 160 yards and three touchdowns, helping Las Vegas beat Miami. Both teams were scoreless in the fourth quarter, with the Raiders doing just enough to overcome two Cousins interceptions.

COMO, Italy: Como marked their Champions League debut with a gesture of respect by inviting their older fans to the game against Leipzig on Thursday.

President Mirwan Suwarso and some directors made the magnanimous decision of giving away their own seats, allowing supporters born in 1950 or earlier to attend the sold-out game.

“We will be honored to give up our seat for them,” Suwarso had posted on Instagram.

Capacity was reduced to around 10,000 because the delightful Stadio Giuseppe Sinigaglia stadium on the shores of Lake Como underwent modifications for the Champions League.

The 119-year-old club reached the competition under coach Cesc Fabregas, a standout goal-scoring midfielder during a stellar club career with Arsenal, Chelsea and Barcelona. He played for the Spain team that won the 2010 World Cup.

Fabregas guided Como to fourth place last season ahead of Juventus and AC Milan to claim Serie A’s final Champions League spot with a high-pressing brand of soccer.

Goals have been coming from 22-year-old playmaker Nico Paz, who has stayed on loan from Real Madrid and burly Greece center forward Anastasios Douvikas.

Shaun Wright-Phillips has revealed that he has been speaking to Strictly winner Karen Carney for advice ahead of his own debut on the BBC competition later this month

Shaun Wright-Phillips has played for Manchester City, Chelsea and earned 36 caps for England – but swapping the pitch for the ballroom could prove to be his biggest challenge yet.

Luckily, he’s got the perfect person in his phonebook to offer advice before he takes to the dancefloor later this month.

Fellow footballer Karen Carney knows a thing or two about making the switch, having gone all the way and lifted the Glitterball last year. She’s been on hand to give her pal a few pointers. “She said to just dive straight into it and don’t hold back,” Shaun, 44, explains. “So I’ll take that advice. I’m going to go for it and do the best I can.”

For Shaun, who scored six international goals between 2004 and 2010 and played club football under the watch of titans such as Kevin Keegan and José Mourinho, Strictly is proving to be a whole different ball game.

“It’s something that’s definitely out of my comfort zone,” he says. “I don’t get overly nervous in general, but this is obviously something that’s really new to me.”

Shaun’s family and friends, including his famous footballer dad, Ian Wright, are used to him busting a move on the dancefloor, but usually after a few beers. He is now bracing himself for their reaction when he takes to the floor every weekend.

“I’m sure they’ll be giving me as much feedback as the Strictly judges,” he laughs. “They’re used to seeing me dance at parties, but this will be the first time they’ve seen me dance while sober.

“Everyone was crazy excited when they found out I was taking part. And then all of a sudden my inbox was filled with friends and family trying to get their live show ticket orders in! I’ve received a really nice amount of support so far.”

Over the course of his career, Shaun played for play for Manchester City, Chelsea, Queens Park Rangers and England. He retired from the pitch in 2019, and since then, has carved out a career as a football pundit, appearing across BBC, ITV and Sky Sports.

Last year, he competed on Cooking With The Stars alongside comedian and Outnumbered star Hugh Dennis, former Love Island winner Ekin-Su Culculoglu and This Morning’s Kelly Hoppen.

Shaun became the tenth name announced to compete and the BBC Saturday night favourite will return to screens in just a matter of weeks.

When it was confirmed that he had signed up, he said:: “Dancing is in my blood—but mainly at family events! Strictly is definitely outside my comfort zone, but I’m super excited to get started and really looking forward to the challenge!”

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Jude Terry and Armindo Sieb each scored a goal, Hugo Lloris had his MLS-leading 12th shutout this season, and LAFC beat the New York Red Bulls 2-0 on Wednesday night to end a six-game winless streak.

The Red Bulls (7-11-6) are winless in six straight dating to a 3-2 home victory over Orlando on Aug. 1.

Lloris finished with one save for LAFC (11-7-7).

Son Heung-min cut back to evade a defender, darted toward the end line past another and then fired a shot from the left side of the area that was parried by goalkeeper Ethan Horvath at the near post. Terry, a 17-year-old homegrown, tapped in a first-touch putback from the top of the penalty box in the 21st minute.

Sieb subbed on for Jacob Shaffelburg in the 60th minute and his first MLS goal capped the scoring in the sixth minute of stoppage time. The 23-year-old forward, acquired Aug. 13 from Bayern Munich of the Bundesliga, made his debut for LAFC in a 2-2 tie at Real Salt Lake on Saturday.

LAFC is 11-0-2 this season it scores first.

Dennis Nelich and Sekou Kone, who were added earlier Wednesday from Red Bull New York II, made their MLS debuts. Kone came on for the Red Bulls in the 33rd minute when 17-year-old midfielder Adri Mehmeti went off due to an apparent leg injury.

New York had 57% possession but was outshot 15-8, 8-1 on target.

Horvath had six saves, including three in the closing minutes of the first half.

JEDDAH: “Our Cut of Salt” is an extraordinary debut partly because it understands that the haunted-house story has always been most effective when it is, at heart, a story about people and the fears they carry with them.

Under Palestinian American writer Deena Helm’s pen, a haunted house in Haifa that once was home to a Palestinian family is not merely the site of a ghost story; it is itself a record of displacement, violence and belonging, as well as an indictment of military occupation.

Forthcoming from US publisher Tor’s horror imprint Tor Nightfire on Sept. 22, the gothic horror novel follows three generations of Palestinian women and the history embedded in their ancestral home, Dar Sayadi.

After Nuhad’s death, her granddaughter Marina in Chicago becomes determined to visit the house she has inherited that she only knows of through her grandmother’s stories. Her mother, Haifa — named for the city her family lost and carrying inherited trauma herself — reluctantly agrees to let her go to Palestine.

Nuhad had not returned to the house since the Nakba of 1948, but she continued to carry it in her heart until death. Rania, her childhood friend, becomes a guide and a bridge connecting Marina to her ancestry.

Helm’s characters feel remarkably full and vibrant even when they appear only briefly. The debut author’s measured prose moves deftly between the poetic and the clear-eyed. At times, her language is lyrical and atmospheric, giving the house and its haunting an almost dreamlike quality; at others, it becomes restrained and precise, allowing scenes to speak without being weighed down by narration.

In “Our Cut of Salt,” the supernatural elements expose the inadequacy of ordinary language to describe the psychological consequences of forced expulsion and Israeli military occupation.

Locals and cats alike avoid Dar Sayadi’s perimeter; strange sounds and screams sometimes emanate from within; and any Israeli settlers who occupy it either die or disappear. Even as they keep coming, the house “refuses” to become a sanctuary for the Israeli settlers.

More significantly, Dar Sayadi is a “painful, festering” wound, and as Marina digs into the family past, the illness — symbolizing the Israeli occupation — becomes increasingly physical.

By placing the supernatural alongside the very real horrors that have continued to reverberate since the Nakba of 1948, Helm takes the machinery of the American gothic haunted-house story — the ominous building, unexplained noises, apparitions, a family entering a space where it should not be — and turns it toward a history for which the word “haunting” is more than literal.

Within the architecture of Palestinian belonging, a house is never only walls, windows and a roof: It is also the place from which a family was expelled. Helm’s narrative is tightly wound around the understanding that to lose such a place is not merely to lose property.

A Palestinian home lost to colonization becomes an archive of domestic life, forever tethered to the family that once cared for it, that it continues to belong to. They are rooms in which children grew up, where meals were eaten, arguments took place, prayers were said.

Dar Sayadi’s “sickness,” anger and violation become a way of exposing the inhuman conditions that Israeli occupation has allowed to fester across generations, a violence that continues to reproduce itself in the present.

Beneath the apparitions and hauntings, “Our Cut of Salt” is about inheritance: what mothers transmit to daughters, what displacement severs, and how a place can remain an emotional time capsule even when generations have been physically separated from it.

It was still just the first quarter of his first college football game at USC when Luke Wafle offered a first glimpse of his staggering potential. The freshman defensive end tossed aside a San Jose State tackle with one swift move, then steamrolled a running back standing in his way. In the process, San Jose State’s quarterback was forced from the pocket and Wafle, now sprinting from the other direction, nearly forced a safety.

It would’ve been an eye-opening sequence for any pass rusher, let alone a true freshman. But at USC, those who have watched Wafle for months now say it’s basically what they’ve come to expect from the Trojans’ top defensive prospect.

“He’s a very special player,” said linebacker Desman Stephens II.

“Probably the most talented freshman I’ve gone against in my time here at USC,” said left tackle Elijah Paige.

“Just a beast on the field,” added defensive tackle Floyd Boucard. “He doesn’t play like a freshman.”

Wafle played just 23 snaps in his first game, but he made the most of them. He was the Trojans’ highest-graded defender, according to Pro Football Focus, with two pressures on 13 pass rushes and two stops on the other 10 in the victory.

And when USC takes on Fresno State on Friday night, chances are he’ll get even more reps to wreak havoc.

“A young man like that brings a lot of excitement on the other side of the field,” defensive tackle Kameryn Crawford said with a smile.

He called it “a crazy feeling” just to play along the defensive front with Wafle.

The freshman’s presence alone should help change the trajectory of a Trojan defensive line that’s fallen short of expectations the last few seasons under coach Lincoln Riley. USC’s top pass rusher from a year ago (Crawford) had 5 1/2 sacks last season, while no one outside of Tuli Tuipulotu has had more than 6 1/2 in a single season under Riley at USC.

Wafle might change that this season. That certainly looked like the case last Saturday.

“The thing I liked most about him Saturday is he didn’t hesitate,” Riley said. “He was around the ball. He was around the quarterback. He made some plays for us, obviously, and he was really close to making a bunch of others. And I think that’s just scratching the surface of how good this guy can be.”

USC defensive end Luke Wafle (94) pressures San Jose State quarterback Luke Weaver (3) during the first quarter of the season-opening game last Saturday at the Coliseum.

(Ronaldo Bolanos / Los Angeles Times)

Even beyond Wafle, Riley has reason to feel good about his defensive line. Namely because it’s as deep as it’s been in his five seasons at USC. Two of the Trojans’ better linemen — Jahkeem Stewart and Braylan Shelby — didn’t play in the win, and the unit still looked like the strength of the defense.

Whether those reinforcements will be back Friday remains to be seen. Both were listed on USC’s second depth chart of the season after being absent from the first, suggesting they could suit up.

Safety issues

The reviews coming out of last week’s debut for USC’s defense were less glowing for the secondary, which gave up three pass plays of 20 yards or more in the second half.

Most of those coverage busts came from USC’s backups at the position, but it does beg questions about the depth in the Trojans’ defensive backfield.

Riley acknowledged that the Trojans “need a couple of those guys to play a little sharper” at the safety position, primarily. Redshirt senior safety Prophet Brown said that he tried to put his arm around those young players this week.

“Nobody is perfect,” Brown said. “The greats aren’t perfect. But they do learn from their mistakes.”

How much USC’s secondary will be tested this week by Fresno State remains to be seen. The Bulldogs are breaking in a new quarterback, junior Jayden Mandal.

Shares in fast-fashion giant Shein fell as much as 10% on their trading debut on Hong Kong’s stock market on Tuesday, before recovering some of their losses, following years of delay to the company’s plans to list publicly and regulatory setbacks in Europe and in the US.

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Shein’s initial public offering opened on 24 August, with the final share price set a week later on 31 August. Trading began the following day, on Tuesday.

The gap reflects standard IPO process, as investors placed their orders over about a week, the banks running the deal then fixed the final price and decided who got shares, and trading opened a few business days later once the exchange gave the final go-ahead.

The listing marks the end of a long search for a stock market willing to take Shein after plans to list in New York and London stalled amid scrutiny over its Chinese supply chains, forcing the company to turn to Hong Kong instead.

New US and EU tariffs on low-cost parcels from China, along with rising shipping costs from the war in Iran, have contributed to Shein’s swing from a $395 million (€340mn) profit to a $99 million (€85mn) loss in the first quarter of this year.

Shein raised about $1.7 billion (€1.46bn), pricing shares at HK$48.56 (€5.33) each, in one of the city’s biggest share sales this year.

“Shein’s Hong Kong listing marks a new starting point,” said Leigh Gui, Shein’s chief financial officer, in a short speech at its listing ceremony.

But in early trading, the shares fell to below HK$44 (€4.83) before losses narrowed.

Tariffs squeeze profits

Shein has built its appeal to customers on ultra-fast, affordable fashion, delivered from China to the West within days.

However, the end of “de minimis” tariff exemptions in the US and the European Union has raised duties on low-value parcels from China, including Shein’s products. Higher logistics costs, driven partly by the war in Iran, have also squeezed the company’s low-price business model and profitability.

Tariff costs have forced Shein to raise prices, “cutting into its main advantage,” said Jacob Cooke, CEO of WPIC Marketing + Technologies.

Back to its roots

Shein, pronounced “she-in,” earlier explored listing its shares in New York and London, and moved its headquarters from China to Singapore in 2021.

But increasingly strict scrutiny by Beijing and by regulators in the US and Europe led it to embrace its Chinese roots and switch to a Hong Kong listing.

Launched in 2012 in China, much of Shein’s operations were in the southern province of Guangdong before it moved its corporate headquarters out of the country.

“Guangdong is Shein’s roots, and the starting point of our journey,” founder Sky Xu said in a speech in February.

Pivoting its focus back to China also highlighted the advantages Shein derives from a supply chain system that “only exists” in Guangdong, said William Ma of GROW Investment Group, referring to its small-batch, fast-response manufacturing model.

Shein has hit other roadblocks in expanding in Europe. In February, the EU launched a probe into the company with a focus on “illegal” products, including alleged child sexual abuse material.

In May, Shein acquired San Francisco-based eco-friendly clothing retailer Everlane, a move some analysts said was not the best fit.

Hong Kong’s IPO boost

The company’s market value was roughly $27 billion (€23.2bn) as it listed in Hong Kong, a fraction of its peak valuation a few years ago.

“Shein has probably missed its golden listing window due to the shift of momentum toward AI and tariffs, which can affect valuations and profitability,” said Gary Ng, a senior economist for Asia Pacific at French bank Natixis.

Still, Shein’s listing is welcome news for Hong Kong, as the Chinese territory makes increasing efforts to hold onto its role as a global financial hub following a downturn in 2023.

Hong Kong’s stock exchange has had a strong year for IPOs, raising more than $40 billion (€34.4bn) so far.

There is also a backlog of companies seeking to list there, said Lorraine Tan at investment research firm Morningstar.

Naya Rivera and Ryan Dorsey’s son is making his film acting debut.

The “Glee” star’s 10-year-old son, Josey Hollis Dorsey, booked an on-screen role in “The Burning Valley” alongside his dad, Ryan. The two will play the role of father and son in the debut feature film from writer-director Evan Coury that started shooting this month northeast of Pittsburgh.

In an interview with the Tribune-Review, the filmmaker said the movie is about a steelworker who loses his job when the mill announces a shutdown. “It sets him on a journey as he wanders through his Rust Belt town,” Coury said. “My hope is to encapsulate the history of our region through one guy’s personal experience.”

The news of Josey’s big-screen debut comes six years after the tragic death of Rivera in 2020, when she accidentally drowned after renting a boat to take Josey, then 4 years old, fishing in Ventura County’s Lake Piru.

Josey’s foray into acting seems only natural considering his pro parents. Rivera is best known for her portrayal of the Afro-Latino queer cheerleader Santana Lopez in “Glee,” and Dorsey has acted in TV shows including “Justified” and “Palm Royale.” In a 2021 interview with “Entertainment Tonight,” Rivera’s mother, Yolanda Previtire, and sister, Nickayla Rivera, described Josey as the spitting image of his mother. “His tenacity, his drive, his zeal, his adventure for life. He’s just Naya in boy form,” Previtire said.

“He loves entertaining,” Nickayla added. “He loves singing at the top of his lungs.”

And last year, Dorsey told People that Josey, or “Jojo,” had already acted in a couple of plays. “He hasn’t had the the lead part or anything, but he’s so good,” he said, adding that Josey wasn’t “begging” to be an actor just yet.

“I’m just trying to expose him to all the things,” he continued. “He’s playing violin, he’s playing piano, he’s in the chess club, he’s pretty good at baseball. He’s not very good at basketball. He’s played soccer, but I want to continue to expose him to things. I think it could be an outlet for him as he gets older; he can have a good life being creative. It’s definitely in his blood.”

Aug. 24 (UPI) — Chinese fast-fashion giant Shein announced plans Monday to raise $1.77 billion in its long-awaited IPO on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.

In a filing to the SEHK, Shein said it will offer nearly 280 million shares with a price range of $6.07 and $6.32 in its Sept. 1 debut, valuing the company at a little under $27 billion. The final price will be fixed on Aug. 31.

The valuation is sharply down from the $100 billion it was valued at in 2020, due to higher costs and a slowdown in the growth of sales, and follows effort to float on the New York, NASDAQ and London stock exchanges in 2023 and 2024 that were abandoned amid roadblocks erected by regulators and lawmakers on both sides of the Atlantic.

Analysts said the firm had been hit hard by U.S. President Donald Trump‘s summer 2025 scrapping of the so-called de minimis import tariff exemption on low value packages on which its business model depended, with Shein reporting a $99 million loss in Q1, down from a $395 million profit in the same period in 2025.

The European Union imposed its own flat $3.50 import tax on low value packages coming into its single market, effective July 1, with Britain, another big market for the Chinese online retailers, also expected to implement similar measures to the United States and EU in 2028.

With the Hong Kong stock market’s attention focused on a string of highly sought after AI and chipmaker IPOs, investor enthusiasm for Shein has dwindled along with much of its appeal with consumers under the age of 35 amid the challenge from competition from firms like Temu.

The firm has also had reputational issues with scrutiny over multiple issues from environmental pollution to working conditions in its supply chain, including the possible use of forced labor in its supply chain.

In February, the EU launched an investigation alleging the design of Shein’s app was addictive, a lack of transparency of recommender systems, as well as the sale of illegal products, including “child sexual abuse material.”

Fast-fashion giant Shein could see its stock market valuation reach almost $27bn (£19.8bn) when its makes its debut in Hong Kong on 1 September.

The long-awaited move comes after failed attempts to list in the US and London due to regulatory challenges amid scrutiny of the firm, which has its headquarters in Singapore but was founded in China.

Since it was founded in 2008, Shein has risen to become one of the world’s biggest fast-fashion retailers, with customers in more than 150 countries.

The e-commerce giant is known for selling ultra-cheap clothes, backed by a vast network of factories in China that are able to quickly manufacture new products based on the latest trends.

Shein said in a filing on Monday, external that it will offer nearly 280 million shares for between HK$47.60 ($6.07; £4.45) and HK$49.50 each.

At the top of the range, the share sale would raise $1.77bn (£1.3bn) for the company and give it a market valuation of $26.8bn.

But that is much lower than the $100bn it was worth in 2022, reflecting weaker sales growth and higher costs.

The initial public offering (IPO) is being backed by Wall Street investment giants Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and JP Morgan.

The company will make its highly anticipated debut on the Hong Kong stock exchange after efforts to go public since 2023.

Hong Kong has been revived as “one of the largest IPO markets” after attracting more firms from mainland China, said economics associate professor Feng Qu from the Nanyang Technological University.

Shein is likely to command a higher valuation in Hong Kong than it would in London, where regulatory scrutiny derailed its plans to sell shares there, Feng said.

Chinese companies may also be wary of selling shares in the US as tensions between the world’s two largest economies could result in firms being de-listed, he added.