dream

Argentina striker Julian Alvarez says he wants to leave Atletico Madrid to “fulfil his dream”.

The 26-year-old has reportedly drawn interest from Barcelona and Paris St-Germain, while Atletico rejected a 150m euro (£130m) offer for Alvarez from rivals Real Madrid earlier in June.

Alvarez is currently at the World Cup with Argentina and has come off the bench in their first two games after recovering from an ankle injury.

“I spoke with the people at [Atletico] I needed to speak with, and the best thing for everyone is a transfer. I want to fulfil my dream,” Alvarez said after Argentina’s World Cup win over Austria.

“It’s ‌not the time ‌to talk about this, but I also can’t ‌hide it. I try to be an honest person.”

Alvarez joined Atletico from Manchester City for £81.5m in the summer of 2024 and has scored 49 goals in 106 games, as well as providing 17 assists, for Diego Simeone’s side.

Having scored 17 goals in his first season in La Liga, the former River Plate forward managed only eight in 2025-26.

However, he excelled in the Champions League, scoring 10 goals to help Atletico reach the semi-finals, where they were beaten by Arsenal.

And yet to set foot in a WeFly cockpit is to be alternately in awe and overwhelmed. I was in a near 1:1 replica of the insides of a Boeing 737 Max. Buttons, knobs, switches and flashing lights surrounded me. And to fly a plane, I would have to let go of everything I knew about driving a car. Turning in the air, for instance, is much different than turning on a runway. And do I watch the screen, or look out the windshield? Often the former, even though I enjoyed buzzing Long Beach’s Queen Mary, flying under the Golden Gate Bridge and circling Chicago’s Wrigley Field. When it came time to land however, my palms got a little sweaty. Navigating height, winds and the steadiness of my plane was a challenge, one akin to handing a grade-schooler a calculus book, summarized Joyce. Let’s just say I needed his co-piloting skills. And I’m not great at math.

Typically, WeFly’s clientele, says Joyce, are a mix of aviation aficionados or non-commercial pilots. The space also gets a fair share of those with a fear of flight, arriving at WeFly with the hopes to conquer it. “They want a sense of control,” Joyce tells me. But WeFly is also ideal for anyone who is amazed by air flight, or those who may someday dream of being a pilot. Though it uses “Microsoft Flight Simulator,” it is no game. Sessions for 30 minutes start at $129, and WeFly’s trainers will tailor it toward one’s experience. I made sure, for instance, that crashing was turned off. But I forgot, however, to turn with the brakes when it came time to land. Yet the plane was intact, and, as Joyce reminded me, “At least you’re on airport property.”

Los Angeles, United States – Draped with a US flag, Alex Saldivar could hardly contain his broad smile as he exited the stadium after the United States beat Paraguay 4-1.

Not only did his team win their World Cup opener, they did so on home soil – and the 23-year-old got to witness it.

“This is a dream come true, a serious dream come true. I don’t know what to say,” Saldivar said, as he swayed from side to side, alternating his standing foot.

His excitement sums up the historic day for US football.

Tens of thousands of fans had descended on SoFi Stadium, putting on an eccentric display of oversized hats and US flag-themed outfits.

White and red striped dungarees, blue and white hair, star-spangled trousers, painted faces and Uncle Sam suits – supporters represented their country’s colours in every possible way.

Ryan Schellhous, who came to Los Angeles from San Jose in northern California, was dressed literally from head to toe in US flag colours, including a mask that only showed his eyes.

He told Al Jazeera it was great to have the World Cup in the US.

“There’s a lot of excitement for soccer in America right now, and this is great,” Schellhous said, adding that he expected Team USA to go deep in the tournament if players perform to the best of their ability.

For many fans, the World Cup is offering a rare opportunity to experience football at its best. And they are cherishing the moment.

Michele Churchill, who travelled from Virginia with her three children to attend the opening match, called it a “bucket list” event.

Asked about the exorbitant ticket prices, she said the experience is worth it.

Churchill also had a bold prediction for the US team’s fortunes at the tournament.

“They’re going to win. They’re going to take the cup,” she told Al Jazeera.

Law enforcement

Fans started streaming into the stadium four hours before the game. One was dressed in a Gulf-style thobe with a US flag as a headscarf. Another was in an outfit resembling George Washington, the first president of the US.

Despite concerns about logistics and organisation, everything went largely smoothly with armies of staff and volunteers ensuring safety and orderliness.

An alphabet soup of law enforcement agencies was present.

The Transportation Security Administration staffed entrances to oversee the airport-style security checkpoints. Agents from the Drug Enforcement Administration, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, and Department of Homeland Security were also at the scene.

On the local level, heavily armed agents from the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department were also deployed around the stadium, as were Inglewood Police officers.

Many agents were accompanied by police dogs. Before crowds started to arrive, some had their canine companions pose for a photo next to the oversized World Cup ball outside the stadium.

Reports that President Donald Trump may attend the first game ultimately did not materialise to the apparent relief of many fans in mostly liberal Los Angeles.

Inside the stadium, it was celebrities – the likes of Tom Cruise and David Beckham – who got the cheers from the crowd.

Stadium atmosphere

It took a while for the stadium to fill out.

About an hour from kickoff, during the first part of the opening ceremony, which featured several rappers, including Future and Rema, the venue was still almost half-empty and the crowd was quiet.

But coinciding with Katy Perry taking the stage before the first whistle, the stadium started to come to life, and chants of “USA, USA” grew louder.

It was really forward Christian Pulisic who electrified the crowd with his first-half display, running straight at his markers and producing dangerous crosses or shots.

The once faint chants turned into deafening roars when the US scored their first, courtesy of a Paraguayan own goal in the seventh minute.

The distinct screams of goal celebrations would ring out three more times for Team USA at the stadium, with Folarin Balogun finding the net twice and Giovanni Reyna scoring a gorgeous curler from the edge of the box to wrap up the game.

A stadium announcer said more than 70,000 people were in attendance.

“We have a full house,” he said to the cheers of the crowd.

But the announcement did not pass the eye test.

Many seats throughout the stadium remained empty, especially in the most expensive sections overlooking the middle of the field.

It is possible that organisers FIFA did sell every seat but resellers struggled to offload some tickets.

The bottom line – ticket prices and Trump’s travel policies may be dampening the buzz around the World Cup, but the tournament is still delivering what football promises: happiness, excitement and a sense of togetherness.

USA beat Paraguay 4-1 in Los Angeles as each of the three World Cup cohosts have now staged a game in the 2026 edition.

The United States could scarcely have scripted a better start to their World Cup as a Folarin Balogun brace and a Gio Reyna curler fired the cohosts to a 4-1 drubbing of Paraguay in front of Hollywood royalty in Los Angeles.

The hosts took the lead in the tournament’s first game on US soil within seven minutes thanks to an own goal, and by the end of an utterly dominant half, the home fans were in dreamland, their side up by three.

Tom Cruise, Leonardo DiCaprio and Paris Hilton were among a sold-out 70,492 crowd as the US – cohosting the tournament with Mexico and Canada – piled wave after wave of attacks on the South Americans, with Reyna polishing off the win late in stoppage time after Mauricio had pulled one back.

The win and emphatic scoreline put the US in a favourable position already to progress from Group D, which also contains Australia and Turkiye.

The night’s only potential sour note was the half-time withdrawal of Christian Pulisic, the US attacking talisman who is carrying the hopes of the nation as they attempt a deep run into the World Cup knockouts for the first time since their quarterfinal appearance in 2002.

Paraguay could not have been more obliging guests from kickoff. In the seventh minute, Weston McKennie picked up the ball in the centre circle and drove upfield, finding Pulisic.

Pulisic darted between two defenders and returned the ball to McKennie, whose pass to striker Balogun was bundled into his own net by a hapless Damian Bobadilla.

The stadium erupted, and a US onslaught began.

The hosts oozed confidence. Both McKennie and Tillman played backheel through balls into the area, while captain Tim Ream sprayed out passes from the heart of defence.

Balogun had a goal ruled out in the 28th minute. He had strayed offside, as had Pulisic in the buildup.

But the Monaco striker had the ball in the net again three minutes later, thanks to a superb ball down the left flank by Antonee Robinson to Pulisic, whose cross to Balogun took a slight fortuitous deflection.

The US added a third on the cusp of half-time. Tillman found Balogun down the right, who evaded Omar Alderete’s challenge, skipped inside Gustavo Gomez and curled his shot perfectly into the top left corner.

It could have been four or five, with Chris Richards – returning from injury – flashing a header barely an inch wide. The US had 75 percent possession in the first half.

Now, without the dangerous Pulisic, the hosts sat back slightly in the second half.

Paraguay finally offered a threat. Their dangerous forward Julio Enciso, who started despite a hamstring injury, picked up the ball on the edge of the area and fed in Brazil-born substitute Mauricio, who pulled one back.

Reyna scored a superb fourth with the outside of his right foot that curled just inside the far post.

The game had been preceded by a Tinseltown-style opening ceremony. Katy Perry delivered the headline performance, accompanied by singers Future, Tyla, Anitta and K-pop singer Lisa.

Performers danced around a giant World Cup trophy beneath enormous “FIFA” letters in the gold favoured by US President Donald Trump – who did not attend, instead wishing the team luck via phone before kickoff.

Shrek’s abs are more defined than some might expect. Or is it that the shade of his green skin makes them appear more chiseled under bright lights? Maybe it’s just disorienting because no one anticipated gawking at his torso inside the historic downtown Los Angeles venue founded by Hollywood legends Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks and D.W. Griffith.

These are thoughts that swirl in one’s head while attending this year’s Las Culturistas Culture Awards ceremony, held on a recent Saturday night at the United Theater. An offshoot of the popular podcast that actor-comedians Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang have hosted since 2016, the award show aims to celebrate the year’s biggest pop culture moments and plays like a fever dream more dazzling and deliciously random than a late-night scroll session on TikTok.

After launching in 2022 as a live event outdoors at Lincoln Center, the guerrilla awards show reached TV screens for the first time last year. This year’s ceremony, which will air June 17 on Bravo and stream on Peacock, coincides with the podcast’s 10th anniversary and features a kaleidoscopic array of attendees, including screen veterans like Lisa Kudrow and Will Ferrell, reality TV favorites like “Summer House’s” Ciara Miller and “The Real Housewives of Dubai’s” Chanel Ayan, and anthropomorphic icons like Miss Piggy and a certain green ogre. And the prizes? It’s the only place you can find categories like “Real Housewives Award for Best Way to Start a Confrontation,” “Pornhub Category We Would Never Click On” and “Hilary Duff Award for Millennial Excellence.”

Over lunch at the NBCUniversal lot in Universal City, Rogers and Yang discussed the show’s evolution. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.

Matt Rogers, left foreground, and Bowen Yang perform a musical number inspired by “Heated Rivalry” during this year’s Las Culturistas Culture Awards.

(Monty Brinton / Bravo)

I will probably regret starting our conversation this way, but we all have our blind spots and, to thoroughly prepare for this interview, I watched “Shrek” for the first time last night.

Yang: Oh great! The first one?

Rogers: How’d you feel?

I get it now.

Rogers: Get what, that he is attractive or …?

I’m not quite there yet. You guys reference the film a lot on your podcast and Shrek has also been a figure on the awards show, including this year. I was hoping you’d explain Shrek as a heartthrob to me as if we’re in a pop culture class. When did this idea really take shape?

Yang: Over at least a couple years, to my knowledge, there’s been this online meme culture around Shrek, where it’s like, “Oh my God, Shrek is like a sex king,” but now it’s even spilled over into like dating life. I don’t know if you’ve heard of this, but there’s a verb called Shreking in dating, where it has to do with women dating a guy that’s below their league because he will be nice to them; he will be a Shrek to their Fiona. That’s an interesting thing — you date someone slightly in another zone than you, so that you can be like, “Well, that’s my Shrek,” but meanwhile, there’s the tension between that and Shrek being someone that people are actually attracted to. This just speaks to the enduring power of Shrek as a pop culture icon.

Rogers: I think what it is, is he has an amazing accent. It’s a very powerful thing. He’s independent, he’s self-sufficient, he’s a movie star.

Yang: He said it at the awards. I mean, he’s a rich celebrity.

Rogers: We saw the real Shrek at the awards and he looks pretty f—ing good to me.

Yang: He looked good to me. I don’t know what these Gen Zers are talking about with this Shrek being below your league.

What are the calls with publicists like now to get their clients to participate?

Yang: Last year was a communication puzzle to solve. We were like, “OK, we have to really convey this the right way.” We thought, perhaps naively, now that we’ve done it, now that there’s a proof of concept, it’s going to be much clearer. I think it was clearer, but there was still that degree of, “oh, this is …” — not to like give ourselves too much credit, but this is a concentric circle outside of what is very established in the form of an award show. You’ve got publicists who are like, “Well, we would love for our client to win an award.” And you’re like, “No, that’s not really the point.”

Rogers: Presenting is just as good as winning, just as good as performing. But I think it’s weird that we have been so late to stumble on what the show really is, which is it’s a variety show. And, so, in wrapping your head around it that way, it’s actually pretty easy to get across. It just has the drag of an award show, and that’s our way in.

But I do understand the publicist hesitation because I will say, in a world where it’s your job to protect your client, you’re putting them in a situation that is like, “OK, they’re going to an award show — that’s something this town takes very seriously.” So, it’s an ask to be like, “Hey, can you come take the piss out of this concept that you’re then probably gonna spend eight months of the year trying to actually achieve?” I would be lying if I said that we didn’t want one day to win one of those awards. It’s an acknowledgment of your work, but in that, Bowen and I think the No. 1 thing that’s the funniest thing in the world is people who take themselves that seriously. It’s a healthy mix of appreciation for this thing that was actually a big element of the culture that made us say culture was for us, which was watching award shows when we were kids, and also the reality that we now know as people that are in the industry of what they really are, which is they’re just shows. We’re not condemning them, we’re having fun with it.

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1. Scenes from the 2025 Las Culturistas Culture Awards: Jeff Goldblum, left, accepting the award for Most Amazing Impact in Film for his appearance in “Jurassic Park,” alongside presenter Patti Harrison. (Griffin Nagel / Bravo) 2. Allison Janney was a guest of honor, receiving the Lifetime of Culture award. (Jordan Strauss / Bravo)

Have you been asked to tweak the name of a category or punch it up even more?

Yang: Last week was the window when our producers could be very honest with us and say if something may not be working. Back to the Shrek [bit in this year’s show], actually, that ended up being much dirtier and bluer than it was on stage.

Really? I already knew I wouldn’t be able to include the award category because of Times standards. So the actual bit was raunchier?

Yang: It was even raunchier. It went for it.

Rogers: But it’s also a testament to how much freedom they give us to make our show. If they were concerned at all about us desecrating the image of Shrek, we certainly did not feel that way. I am really shocked and grateful that we get to do something that it feels like we’re getting away with something.

Take me back in time with young Bowen and young Matt. What do you remember about your enthusiasm for award shows growing up?

Yang: It was watching Billy Crystal at the Oscars do song and dance numbers, zing these things in for a laugh that we’re referencing the year, being in these video packages where he was in the movies. That it was live television and just this pageantry of people congratulating themselves, congratulating each other. I would tune in live every single year to all the award shows and I would follow the host changes. I remember Whoopi’s first year [hosting the Oscars]; I remember Ellen’s first year. I was really obsessive. It opened the door for all these things that I currently love, and that I’ve somehow had a fortunate experience in, which is live television, song and dance numbers — everything that Billy Crystal was doing. It keyed me in on how show business works, down to production elements and how filmmaking comes together.

Rogers: I just remember, I looked at the screen and I was like, “Oh, that’s where I belong. I belong with them. I don’t belong out here.” I was one of those Gold Derby kids — I would be on the forums; I still sometimes look at the odds and rankings and stuff. It was like gay sports, particularly with the best actress and best supporting actress races. And then obviously the Grammys, and all of that. One year I was watching, I think it was the People’s Choice Awards or the American Music Awards or something, and Shania Twain lost to LeAnn Rimes, and I cried for a day. I took it so seriously and my mother turned to me and said, “You need to stop.” But you couldn’t tell me it didn’t matter at the time. [Reporter’s note: Twain lost the favorite country new artist award to Rimes at the 1997 American Music Awards.]

As the profile of Bowen Yang and Matt Rogers’ variety-style award show has risen, getting stars on board is an interesting puzzle: “You’ve got publicists who are like, ‘Well, we would love for our client to win an award,’” Yang says. “And you’re like, ‘No, that’s not really the point.’”

(Jason Armond / Los Angeles Times)

What do you remember about your first experience at a major awards show?

Rogers: He was nominated as writer for “SNL” and took me as his date. We were sitting there — the “Queer Eye” guys were sitting like three rows behind us.

Yang: We watched Phoebe Waller-Bridge sweep with “Fleabag.”

Rogers: We watched Michelle Williams win for “Fosse/Verdon.” It was funny because we had gone to the bar and were double-fisting drinks back to the seats and I said to Bowen, “Oh my God, I’m like the Busy Philipps to your Michelle Williams.”

Yang: And who shows up behind us?

Rogers: Busy Philipps taps on our shoulders and goes, “You guys are killing it with those drinks.” And I’m like, she doesn’t even know I’m her. Cut to minutes later, Michelle walking up and giving a banger of a speech.

Yang: That was like our first brush with it. Even now we go to these, and we’re like, this is really something; it’s incredible. We were at the Oscars last year, front row, witnessing all of it go down, witnessing the moment where upsets would happen, feeling the vibe in the room shift. The benefit of our show is that the vibe is pretty high throughout; it does not decline as soon as there are losers in the room.

Las Culturistas Culture Awards took place in late May and is being telecast roughly two weeks later. Do you see it ever going the live route?

Yang: We don’t know. That is my not so secret dream, is to do it live one day. There’s just something about doing it live — and it occurs to me now that I’ve been very lucky and fortunate to have have my reps in. There’s just something so wonderful about it being this event where everyone is tuning in, enjoying it the same time you are. That is really something special.

Rogers: If he’s down, I’m down.

I’m sure this changes each year, but who’s your dream person to snag for an appearance?

Rogers: I would say the people that make it very apparent that they have sketch comedy and impression skills, and maybe you wouldn’t necessarily know that they do until they show that.

Yang: Ariana Grande.

Rogers: Our dream was for Ariana to come do an original character. We actually floated to her the idea — there was going to be like a Banksy reveal of MsMojo, and it was going to be revealed that it was Ariana Grande was MsMojo. But she actually was in rehearsals for the Eternal Sunshine World Tour. Little did we know she also was recording “Petal.” She was a bit too busy to play MsMojo, I guess, this time.

Yang: These two are forever paired in my head, but it’s because she’s another sketch performer: Cher. And sometimes the dream guests are not big names, it’s the people that we came up with in comedy. And actually one of the consumer research reports that we got back before we started writing this year’s show was that the thing that people loved about the Culture Awards was this crossover of reality talent, A-listers and Oscar winners, and comedy people — that mix, those three [types of] people mingling together is what the viewers want.

Rogers: I’m just so proud in every single way of the diverse array of talent that we were able to bring together. I looked out in the audience and it was just a party of so many friends and people we’ve met in the business — people that I didn’t even get to meet that night, but I was just gagged they’re there, especially in the edit, which you’ll see. This is Bowen’s first year in the edit, he had to miss it last year, but that’s what’s so cool about going through the footage, is you’re like, “Oh my God, there’s someone I’ve loved my entire life next to my cousin.” We were saying to each other that it ended up being like a weird love letter to our younger selves, having Mandy Moore and singing “Only Hope” with her and doing the “Pokémon” theme song and getting to hang out with Pikachu.

Do you worry about it ever getting too big?

Rogers: If it ever gets to a point where it couldn’t be funny, that wouldn’t work. We want it to always stay true to what it is, which is it’s our comedy special together. As long as it doesn’t feel like it’s selling out — and I can understand people watching it and being like, “Oh, they obviously had to have Nintendo characters because it’s NBCUniversal or obviously they had to include “Summer House” — none of that is true.

Yang: There’s no mandate.

Rogers: This is genuinely what we would want the show to be, and so as long as it’s that, we’re good.

So what’s your “I don’t think so, honey” on awards shows?

Rogers: I don’t think so, honey — 10 nominees for best picture at the Oscars. Why?

Yang: Totally. Tea.

Rogers: I actually think it helps things that are weirder win because it’s too many. And the way that they ranked choices. I’m a popular-vote person anyway.

Yang: I need us to really get on the same page about play-off music. Sometimes people are encouraged to go on, sometimes we turn against that. Let’s stop innovating, let’s stop trying to break the mold on them. Let’s just respect that as much as we can, unless it’s egregious.

And it’s always a bit within the show.

Yang: This is what I was about to get to. The hosts now are always trying to bitify that; it’s more of a practical thing to keep the show moving. Don’t try to put a hat on top of a hat by making it a comedic moment too. We’ve never really played with that trope, even though we could, and maybe should. For now, my attitude towards play-off music is, these people might not ever be on this stage again.

How soon do you start planning the next one?

Rogers: Hopefully, they give us the green light.

Ana Gasteyer, left, Jamie Lee Curtis and Patti Harrison at the 2025 Las Culturistas Culture Awards.

(Jordan Strauss / Bravo)

How did you go about deciding which categories would return this year and which you invent along the way?

Yang: We did an audit this year of all the categories from the last few years of doing this.

Rogers: Less made it back last year.

Yang: I think maybe about 30 max previous categories [returned] — that’s a decent ratio, 70-30 is nice. From there, we just kind of molded the clay on the table a little bit. We have the benefit of making this a recursive reinvented show every year; the categories itself are the premise, it’s the micro-premise within the segment or the element. The jokes are the nominees. Why not create new opportunities at every turn.

“Las Culturistas” expanded into a video podcast last year. How do you feel about this evolution we’re seeing to the format?

Rogers: It’s not that when I’m on camera with Bowen doing the podcast, like, “Oh, I wish I could be more relaxed,” I just wish the whole industry hadn’t gone this way because I feel like when you’re on camera, you can’t help but be a little bit more self-conscious, and that is going to come through in the podcast product. If I had my druthers, none of them would be on film. I can understand that it helps a lot and I can note a marked difference in the amount of times I get recognized now that we are on social media. It absolutely “helped” our podcast get bigger. That being said, I don’t think it was a good thing for podcasting that they all became TV shows.

Yang: It changes the register and the tone by nature. You cannot help but be motivated by different things, by the appearance of it, by the presentation of it, beyond what it was, which is just radio, which is a really important American form.

As two people who grew up being connoisseurs of pop culture, what is it like to be on the other side of it, to feel the intensity of it — I’m talking about what happened with the Jasmine Crockett comments — to become part of the conversation? What lesson came from that?

Yang: We are experiencing something in an acute way that I think everyone is experiencing, which is we are seeing ourselves in the third person. Everyone is kind of modulating their behavior based on how they are appearing out of body. It’s the way we all move through the world now, which can be snapshot and projected very widely out into the world for whatever reason.

Rogers: When you’re talking candidly, you can never know what piece of what you’re saying is going to be the piece that gets scrutinized again and again and again and again by what feels like the entire internet. And if you did, you would, of course, be more specific, and you would be able to really clearly say why you are saying what you are saying. We have had learning experiences with that, and so what we can do going forward is be more clear about the things that we do believe and stand by. That is something that even 10 years in the game we are learning how to do.

Yang: And I think on a very large scale, what is going to happen is that we are all going to adjust for the fact that we have behaviorally changed because of this idea that we’re seeing ourselves in the third person constantly. For me, personally, I’ve had to wrestle with this idea after being on “SNL” for seven years and having to evaluate myself and having an audience evaluate me every week. I’ve changed behaviorally; I need to get over this fear of being seen. I need to get better about listening to my own voice.

Rogers: The internet is a very weird place and the thing is, it deliberately ignores nuance. It willfully tries to make something seem lowest common denominator, so that there can be a community based around that thing. And that is not good for the world. It’s not good for discourse. It’s not good for our politics. It’s really bad for our politics. Until we can all get on the same page about the ways in which we are willfully misunderstanding each other and calling it discourse, it won’t get better.

Yang: The misunderstandings are about people’s tones, and not necessarily about the things that people are pointing toward.

HELEN Flanagan has revealed her “dream” to be a foster parent when her kids with ex fiance Scott Sinclair have grown up.

The Coronation Street actress, 35, is a mum-of-three to Matilda, 10, and Delilah, seven, and five-year-old son Charlie.

Helen parted ways from her long-term fiancé in 2022 after 13 years together and she has been open about how it isn’t always plain sailing.

She was recently forced out of her £1million family home by Scott as they never married and the house near Bolton is solely in his name.

Yet since the huge change it’s clear she has her sights firmly set on the future and offering her care and support to foster children.

She told the Daily Star of her life path and said: “I absolutely love children.

HEL YEAH

Helen Flanagan looks incredible as she re-wears iconic dress 13 years later

frill-ing

Helen Flanagan wows in skimpy corset dress as she puts rows with Scott behind her

“When I’m older, I think fostering could be something lovely to do.

“I’ve always adored kids”.

Foster carers temporarily or permanently welcome children into their homes who cannot live with their biological families, offering a safe and stable place to live.

Helen previously candidly told The Sun how she “felt lost” until she became a mum.

She then reinforced her point on ITV daytime show Loose Women and said: “I’m in my element being a mum.

“Before I was a bit lost and now I have got Matilda [eldest daughter] she has really completed me.“

“She just made me so much happier. It gives you so much perspective, I’m besotted with her.”

Helen previously told of her parenting approach and said of her brood: “I love them so much, they are my world.

“Sometimes I shout which makes me feel awful and I always say sorry if I do which I think is important.

“I tell them how much I love them, one thing a day they have done a day that makes me proud.”

She added: “Being a mum is amazing but just really hard. I suppose you can just do your best.”

Helen, who co-parents her brood with Scott, has previously spoken about suffering from mum guilt, and the raw emotional pull she feels while working away.

Speaking to the Sun on behalf of Paddy Power, she said: “I feel mum guilt all the time.

“It’s something I deal with constantly. But I try to remind myself that I’m working for my children, so it’s ultimately for them.

“When they’re with their dad, I also see that as encouraging their relationship, which is important.

“I do still feel guilty, but I try to reframe it and look at the bigger picture.”

Still, 80,000 seats is a lot to shift and in today’s environment, only the top heavyweights, plus a handful of other stars including Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez and Naoya Inoue can hit such heights.

For Taylor, 39, and her team to have ambitions to command such an audience is evidence of the reverence in which she is held.

After Friday’s news conference, the Bray native and team set off on a four-day promotional tour around the island of Ireland, beginning in her home town.

It may be a farewell, but a test and not a testimonial is how Taylor wants to sign off.

The opportunity to regain the WBC portion of the light-welterweight title [which was made vacant after last year’s Serrano win] and retire undisputed is the dream.

But she has no designs on getting swept up in the emotion with undefeated Frenchwoman Flora Pili standing in her way.

The Croke Park door appeared shut when an agreement could not be reached between Hearn and stadium authorities three years ago, so what has changed?

With costs to hire the stadium “twice as much as Wembley” according to the Matchroom chairman, it was difficult to see how the impasse would be broken.

For the company there is “not a whole lot financially” to be gained, but just as the rematch between Carl Froch and George Groves at Wembley Stadium in 2014 proved a big night for Matchroom, 80,000 at Croke Park can do likewise according to Hearn.

“That a female is fighting in front of 80,000 people, I think it’s the greatest moment of our [Matchroom’s] boxing history,” he said.

“We’re not going to be making much money on the night, but this is about more than that. My dad [Barry, Matchroom founder and president] might kill me, but what does it really matter what we make on a night like this?

“What we leave with is something we’ll never forget and also it’s important for the brand of our business.”

“Being so close to a childhood dream of mine, to play in a World Cup, and now it has been taken away from me with an injury. It’s been a tough one to get my head around.

“Your support and kind messages over the last few days mean the world to me and haven’t gone unnoticed, so thank you so much.

“I’ll see you all back doing what I love again soon, but until then, let’s get behind the team and cheer them on. Come on Scotland!”

Scotland have qualified for their first World Cup finals since 1998.

Head coach Steve Clarke and his squad left Glasgow for the United States on Sunday and face Bolivia in their final warm-up friendly on Saturday in New Jersey.

Scotland start their Group C campaign against Haiti on Sunday, 14 June before playing Morocco and Brazil.

Just one of the nine Supreme Court justices thought it was appropriate for Roger Goodell — whose primary job as NFL commissioner is to protect the league — to decide whether the NFL’s hiring practices are still racist.

And it happens to be the same justice whose close friend is an NFL owner.

In fact, the friendship between Justice Brett Kavanaugh and Arizona Cardinals owner Michael Bidwill dates back decades, to high school. So when President Trump nominated Kavanaugh for the highest court in the land, Bidwill used the team’s official website to advocate for his confirmation. Not sure how the “stick to sports” crowd feels about it, considering how they react when players express opinions, but it felt like an overreach to me.

Obviously when a decision related to NFL owners came before the court, Kavanaugh should have recused himself. But by now we’re used to justices ignoring their own ethics rules. What I find most disturbing in this instance is Kavanaugh’s dissent.

Here’s how the hiring discrimination case came to be: Former New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick texted the wrong Brian with congratulations for getting the New York Giants’ head coaching job, according to a lawsuit filed by former Dolphins head coach and former Patriots assistant coach Brian Flores, who is Black. In the 2022 suit, Flores said the Giants interviewed him for their vacant head coaching job under disingenuous circumstances. How can we tell? Because Belichick’s congratulations came three days before Flores’ interview with the Giants. The team had apparently already decided to hire Brian Daboll, who is white.

The NFL has spent the last three-plus years attempting to settle the dispute through NFL-controlled arbitration and fought to keep it out of court. The league lifted its appeal to the Supreme Court after failing to get Goodell in position to handle it via the lower courts.

In addition to the damning text exchange, Flores also has history on his side.

During one 60-season stretch, the NFL had no Black head coaches. To address the glaring discrepancy, the league established the “Rooney rule” in 2003, requiring teams to interview at least two minority candidates for head coach and other senior management vacancies.

Prior to that, most teams interviewed only white men.

The results have been mixed.

Yes, more minority candidates get interviewed now — perhaps after a white man has quietly been chosen for the job, but still … they get interviewed.

And yes, Tony Dungy and Mike Tomlin, both of whom are Black, not only got hired but also led their franchises to Super Bowl victories after the rule was put into place.

Still, two decades into the Rooney-rule era, roughly a third of the league’s owners had never hired a minority to lead their team. This includes the century-old New York Giants, who after firing Daboll at the end of the season, hired another white man to take his place. This is the backdrop of the discrimination lawsuit filed by Flores.

And still Kavanaugh felt this case could be handled internally by the organization that allowed it to happen.

Even Clarence Thomas, a judge known for ruling against anything that helps Black people, thought the NFL should have to defend itself in court.

Consider this: The year before Flores filed his suit, the NFL settled a different discrimination lawsuit for $1 billion. That case arose because for decades, to help determine the payout from a concussion settlement between retired players and the league, the NFL used “race norming” — a methodology that assumes Black players are less intelligent than white players, making it more difficult for Black men to prove brain damage than white men. In a league that is roughly 70% nonwhite, the racist practice saved the billionaire owners millions.

Or how about this: After the Supreme Court ruled that Duke Power Co. used a controversial cognitive test to prevent Black employees from getting higher-paying jobs back in the 1970s, the NFL began using it. The league kept it in place until 2022.

And still Kavanaugh felt the league should handle Flores’ case.

I’m not sure what factors the justice was considering before his dissent, but it could not have been league history.

YouTube: @LZGrandersonShow

Scotland striker Lawrence Shankland says he is fulfilling his “dream” of joining “boyhood club” Rangers after completing his transfer from Scottish Premiership rivals Heart of Midlothian.

The 30-year-old, who has agreed a two-year deal at Ibrox with the option of a further 12 months, scored 88 goals in 171 appearances across four campaigns at Tynecastle.

And he captained the Edinburgh side to second place this season, missing out on the title to Celtic on the final day, with Rangers in third, eight points behind Hearts.

Shankland will miss out on Champions League qualifiers with Hearts but told Rangers TV: “Rangers is my boyhood club and it has always been a dream to play here, so I was really keen to get it done.

“The club are in a position where they want to get back to winning silverware more regularly and I want to be a big part of that, so that’s what I have come here to do.”

Shankland was out of contract at Hearts last summer – and was linked with a move to Ibrox then – before signing a three-year deal in late June.

The former Queen’s Park, Aberdeen, Ayr United, Dundee United and Beerschot forward went on to hit 20 goals in 34 games in all competitions, including four against Rangers, as Derek McInnes’ side chased a first title since 1960.

Rangers head coach Danny Rohl said: “He is a player with proven quality, leadership and work ethic – and his goalscoring record in Scotland speaks for itself.

“He understands the demands and expectations that come with playing for Rangers and we believe his character and experience will be a huge asset for the group.”

Immediately after completing his transfer, Shankland, who has scored four times in 18 Scotland outings, will join Steve Clarke’s squad for the World Cup.

“I wish him well at the World Cup this summer and look forward to welcoming him back to Glasgow during pre-season,” Rohl added.

A family’s long-awaited Easter getaway turned into a nightmare after travelling hundreds of miles only to find their booked resort shut and fenced off

After months of planning a relaxing family break abroad, one couple thought they had everything organised down to the last detail. But what awaited them at the end of a nine-hour journey across Europe was something they never could have prepared for.

The couple, who asked not to be identified due to the man’s occupation, had booked a stay at the Waterside Elegance Sky Pad at the Your Nature Resort in Belgium through Booking.com last October. Having previously visited the resort, they were eagerly anticipating their return with their two young sons in April, only to arrive and discover the site appeared to be closed.

Instead of checking into their accommodation and settling in for a long-awaited family holiday, the couple claim they were met by locked entrance gates, construction fencing and an eerily empty car park. Signs displayed outside the resort also appeared to indicate the site was no longer operating.

The Waterside Elegance Sky Pad is a luxury duplex cabin located within the 280-hectare Your Nature Eco Forest Resort in Antoing, Belgium. The £105 million resort has reportedly been fenced off and forced into bankruptcy, leaving holidaymakers stranded after it allegedly exceeded €15 million in losses, according to Forbes.

In a lengthy Reddit post, the man explained how the family’s entire trip had been carefully planned around the needs of their children, including their eldest son who is autistic and non-verbal. But after arriving at the resort entrance and, by chance, speaking with a site manager, the couple claim they were informed the resort had gone into administration months earlier in October.

This is despite Booking.com allegedly repeatedly reassuring the family their holiday would go ahead as planned, with emails recognising the reservation remained valid. The Reddit post also claims the company accepted tourism tax payments and issued a check-in voucher just weeks before the family travelled to Belgium.

“If you think your holiday is secure because you have a confirmed booking voucher, think again,” he warned.

Speaking to The Mirror, the man detailed how the family were left scrambling after the revelation, with hundreds of pounds spent on Le Shuttle crossings, fuel, food and overnight accommodation in France. He also claimed Booking.com later suggested alternative accommodation options, though the family considered them unsuitable.

Booking.com is understood to have refunded the original accommodation costs, though disputes between the two parties are said to remain ongoing.

The family are seeking compensation for more than £400 in additional travel expenses incurred during the ordeal. They claim the online travel agency is refusing to accept liability, despite allegedly issuing a separate payment of 150 EUR which they say they have refused to accept.

In the Reddit post, the man referenced provisions within the Consumer Rights Act 2015 and Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008, arguing the family relied on written assurances when booking non-refundable travel arrangements. However, no court has ruled on the claims and Booking.com disputes wrongdoing.

A Booking.com spokesperson told The Mirror: “We’re sorry to hear about this customer’s experience. When a property chooses to list on Booking.com they must agree to our terms and conditions, which includes keeping their room availability up to date.

“If an accommodation partner wants to end their agreement or remove their listing, we have simple processes and clear guidance to help them do this. We can confirm this property is currently closed on our platform, and that we’re also in touch with the customer to offer support.”

Consumer experts regularly advise travellers to retain booking confirmations, receipts and written correspondence when arranging holidays online. According to Citizens Advice, customers may have rights if services are not provided as described, although compensation outcomes can vary depending on individual circumstances and booking terms.

On the eve of the City Section championship baseball game at Dodger Stadium, let’s explore a sometimes forgotten character trait: Patience.

When JJ Saffie walks onto hallowed ground Saturday as a starting left fielder for 10-time City champion El Camino Real High in the Open Division championship game against Birmingham, he will be finishing a journey few want to travel these days.

He spent three years on the junior varsity team waiting and grinding before getting his chance to start on varsity this season.

“Very patient,” he said. “Freshman year, played frosh-soph, called up for a few JV games. Sophomore year, on and off starter on JVs. Junior year is when it started clicking for me. I found my bat, I found the style I like to play, I started hitting real good.”

He was part of an outstanding JV team his junior year, called up as a pinch runner for the playoffs. He developed power and a knack for hitting balls over El Camino Real’s left-field fence during batting practice.

“I’ve hit two windows and six cars,” said the 18-year-old, who likes to cause mayhem for insurance companies.

El Camino Real celebrates a 4-3 win over Granada Hills to earn a trip to Dodger Stadium on Saturday.

(Craig Weston)

He’s hit two home runs this season and become a key player for the Royals.

Now he gets to start at Dodger Stadium, a moment every high school baseball player in the City Section dreams of reaching.

“I’m a big believer in good things will come to those who are patient,” he said. “I knew I needed to be patient, work on my game and eventually success would come my way and I’d have my opportunities and here’s my opportunity. I’m trying to prove that Saturday.”

El Camino Real needed a two-run single by RJ De La Rosa in the bottom of the sixth inning on Wednesday to defeat Granada Hills 4-3 in the semifinals at Cal State Northridge.

“I saw my pitch,” De La Rosa said. “I wanted to take advantage. It was the bottom of the sixth. The team needed me most and I pulled through. It was an amazing moment. These boys are my brothers. I will fight for them. I will do everything for them. I can’t wait to make some memories at Dodger Stadium.”

For Saffie, staying and fighting to get better rather than running away from a challenge is a great lesson for others.

“I had a few people tell me to transfer,” he said. “But my sister came here, my dad. I want to prove myself at this school.”

Top-seeded Birmingham will have junior Nathan Soto starting on the mound in the 1 p.m. game. It’s a big assignment and he’ll be working on his mental part of the game.

“It’s just another game,” he said after the Patriots’ 4-1 semifinal win over Carson. “I think it’s everyone’s dream to pitch there, but you have to keep it as a normal game.”

Pitcher Carlos Acuna grinded out a complete game in Birmingham’s 4-1 win over Carson to send the Patriots to Dodger Stadium.

(Craig Weston)

Birmingham can thank Carlos Acuna for putting together a sophomore season to remember. His pitching season is done. He finished with an 11-0 record after a complete-game win against Carson.

“It’s an amazing season he’s having,” coach Matt Mowry said.

In six of the seven innings on Wednesday, Carson got the leadoff batter aboard, forcing Acuna to work extra hard while throwing 102 pitches.

“He was on the edge of coming out,” Mowry said.

Acuna wouldn’t let him.

“I love this team,” Acuna said. “I want to play one last game.”

He’ll start on Saturday at second or third base in a game matching two of the most successful programs in City baseball history. El Camino Real is seeking a record 11th title. Birmingham wants its ninth title.

The 10 a.m. game at Dodger Stadium has Verdugo Hills taking on Taft in the Division I final.

Fans will come for the sun, the hot dogs, the fun of cheering on someone they know or enjoying a moment of distraction at Los Angeles’ most sacred stadium.

Just remember those are teenagers out there who’ve sacrificed and spent years working toward this moment. There’s no losers when you get to play at Dodger Stadium as a high school kid.

For Saffie, it validates his belief in trusting the process and trusting himself. He didn’t run when the going got tough. He persevered and learned a valuable lesson: patience still pays off.

Welcome back to the Times of Troy newsletter, where USC and Notre Dame are back at the bargaining table — as you first read in this space last Monday — and also back to bickering about who’s to blame for blowing up their century-old rivalry in the first place. One step closer to order being restored!

I have less faith in the rest of college football and its leadership, which now appears to be mobilizing around a playoff format that’s almost universally disliked by actual consumers of college football. The 24-team playoff is a great deal for coaches, who want to be able to point to as many playoff berths as possible for job security. It’s probably a good deal for athletic directors, digging through couch cushions for extra NIL dollars. And for the TV networks, it’s especially juicy. Twenty four teams means more than double the number of games, and each of those games is pulling in an average of between 10 million and 20 million viewers. That’s a lot of eyeballs and a lot of advertising dollars. (For everyone but ESPN, which currently has exclusive rights up to 14 teams.)

It’s also a good deal for Notre Dame, whose athletic director Pete Bevacqua came out this week in support of the 24-team playoff in an interview with the Athletic. The Irish would essentially assure themselves of a bid in most years, which, per Bevacqua, would make it easier to clear the way for USC and Notre Dame to play again.

Big Ten commissioner Tony Pettiti has been leading the charge on the 24-team playoff. So while USC athletic director Jennifer Cohen hasn’t said anything about her preference, it would be a surprise to hear her publicly oppose what the rest of the conference has been pushing.

But why do we have to push anywhere? Why do we have to keep fixing the playoff? And if you must keep tinkering with college football, well, there are plenty of ways to fix it that won’t water down the product and devalue the regular season the way playoff expansion does. Plus, who’s to say that after two seasons at 24 teams, the conference commissioners don’t decide they want to expand again? To 28 teams? To 36 teams?

The 12-team playoff already makes a lot of money. But like everything now, it has to make the most possible money or be as big as possible. I actually long for the days when college football’s leaders did whatever they could to keep the game from changing.

Now it’s the only thing that feels inevitable these days around college football.

Back to school

Marqise Lee at his graduation ceremony.

(USC)

Marqise Lee stepped to the lectern Friday, in full cap and gown, looked out over a full crowd at Galen Center, and cleared his throat. For so many reasons, the former USC wideout still couldn’t quite believe he was standing there.

Growing up, no part of Lee thought that college would even be available to him. He was brought up in the most difficult of circumstances in Inglewood. Separated at a young age from his sister and his mother, who was deaf. Thrust alone into the foster care system. He ended up living in a motel for three years.

When he did make it to USC, class hadn’t been a priority. Football was his focus from the start, and it would ultimately lead him to the NFL, where he’d never really taken the idea of returning to school that seriously. A counselor would try to convince him on a few occasions and even got him onto campus to set up a schedule.

“But it just never happened,” Lee told me.

Then, his football career ended, and his daughters started getting older. They never got to see him play football. He started thinking about what it would mean to show them what he could accomplish. So Lee decided to go back.

It wasn’t easy at first. He was taking five classes, a full course load. He felt uncomfortable being the oldest student in the class.

“When I first sat in there,” he said, ”I was like, I really don’t need to come back.”

His statistics class, especially, was daunting. He looked for any reason to leave. Then, he thought of his daughters.

“To go back to school and tell my daughters, yeah, I went back, but I wasn’t successful — and expect them to succeed?” Lee said. “Yeah, I can’t.”

But before long, Lee found that he actually liked his classes now. He enjoyed the group projects where he used to only do the bare minimum.

After sloughing off his final semester the first time around at USC, Lee needed at least three B’s and two A’s. No easy feat at USC.

Lee ended up getting A’s across the board. At the end of the semester, the school asked him to be the speaker at its student athlete commencement. Which is what led Lee to that stage, where he delivered a hell of a speech Friday.

“It was just like, this is something that you never ever dreamed about,” Lee said. “You never dreamed about graduating from college. So like to get that done was amazing. And then, I have an opportunity to sit up here and say to these kids and get them prepared for their future, by at least letting them understand where I come from and how hard it is. So they know that we actually can fight through anything that comes our way.”

Next up for Lee?

“I’m about to try and go get my master’s degree after this,” he said.

Cofie’s plans changing?

Jacob Cofie reacts after a layup and a foul during a win over Washington State last season.

(Steve Galluzzo / For The Times)

A month ago, USC basketball announced that Jacob Cofie, one of its starters from last season, planned to return next season. It was a huge coup for Eric Musselman, who had a grand total of two returning players in two seasons as USC’s coach.

Cofie decided to still take part in the G League scouting combine. But in the process, he became one of five players who earned invites to the NBA scouting combine last weekend.

While in Chicago, Cofie was asked if he’d considered keeping his name in the draft. And he didn’t say no. “I’m leaving that up to my agent right now,” he said.

But even with the combine invite, I don’t expect that Cofie could climb any higher than the second round of this NBA draft. And depending on where he would be drafted, if he’s drafted at all, he might actually stand to make more at USC in revenue sharing dollars and NIL.

Cofie has nine days, technically, to make a decision. But I expect we’ll hear sooner than that on his future, and I’d be shocked to hear he’ll be spending next season anywhere but USC.

—USC baseball locked up the fourth seed in the Big Ten tournament. But what about hosting a regional? The Trojans managed to take one of three against Oregon to at least lock up a bye until Friday in the Big Ten tournament. But right now, USC is likely on the outside looking in at hosting its first NCAA regional since 2002. All that could change with a run in the Big Ten tournament. Doing so, though, probably means pulling off an upset of No. 1 UCLA. If USC wins its first tournament matchup against whomever emerges out of Illinois, Iowa, Michigan State and Purdue, then the Bruins will almost certainly be on tap. Win that game, and their hosting fate could change fast.

—Pete Carroll is coming back to teach “The Game of Life” at USC. The former USC coach delivered the commencement address for the Marshall School of Business last Friday, and in the process, announced that he’ll be making his triumphant return as Professor Pete next school year. A spot in Carroll’s class was one of the most coveted on campus in his first go-round — good luck getting off that waitlist the second time!

—Honor Fa’alave Johnson, USC’s top commit in 2027, reaffirmed his plans to sign with USC. That was after a group of USC coaches flew down to the safety’s hometown of San Diego via helicopter. Not a bad way to show you mean business — especially as Texas was doing its best to flip Fa’alave Johnson.

—Some Big Ten championship results from the weekend: The USC men finished fourth in the Big Ten track and field championships, while the USC women finished third. Meanwhile, women’s rowing placed sixth at their Big Ten championships.

What I’m Reading This Week

Patrick Radden Keefe writes for the New Yorker.

(Manuel Balce Ceneta / Associated Press)

It’s a quiet time for new TV, so I took the radical step of picking up a new book this week. (Crazy, I know.) That said, I’m always game for reading something new from New Yorker staff writer Patrick Radden Keefe, who, for my money, is one of our greatest living nonfiction writers. His latest book, “London Falling” follows an American family investigating the death of their 19-year-old son, who they find was living a secret life within London’s criminal underworld mysteriously before he jumped mysteriously from a building into the Thames River in 2019.

Keefe is a tremendous reporter and writer, capable of turning a nonfiction narrative into a roller coaster, page-turning story that reads like a crime novel. This book, like “Say Nothing” and “Empire of Pain” before it, is one I won’t forget any time soon.

Scheduling note

I said I’d be off this week, however the Lee graduation was so nice that waiting to report on it seemed wrong. But the newsletter will be on hiatus the next two weeks.

In case you missed it

NCAA to expand March Madness fields to 76 teams

A star pitcher at USC, he was cut after six years in the minors. Then Banana Ball came calling

Until next time …

That concludes today’s newsletter. If you have any feedback, ideas for improvement or things you’d like to see, email me at ryan.kartje@latimes.com, and follow me on X at @Ryan_Kartje. To get this newsletter in your inbox, click here.

Brace yourself, Coronado. The hospitality maven who brought San Diego its most over-the-top maximalist hotel — the Lafayette in North Park — is back with another glitzy project, this time in the wealthy island city known for its traditional bent.

Opening Thursday, Baby Grand includes a 35-foot faux rock wall, a 20-foot waterfall, a Mediterranean restaurant that feels like a Greek ruin being consumed by a jungle and a hidden oyster bar full of crystal and mirrors. All of this, including the Spanish statuary, Moroccan fixtures and Murano glass, is squeezed onto an Orange Avenue lot that once held a 1950s motel. If Liberace had run away with an art historian, they might have landed here.

The idea was “to create this little mirage within the mirage that is Coronado,” said Arsalun Tafazoli, founder of CH Projects, the group behind a multitude of design-intensive establishments across San Diego including the speakeasy Raised by Wolves, the hi-fi listening bar Part Time Lover and the Middle Eastern restaurant Leila.

The Baby Grand hotel and its restaurant Night Hawk stands along Orange Avenue about a block from the Hotel del Coronado.

The patio dining area of Coronado’s new Night Hawk includes seating for about 150.

Baby Grand’s high-density, high-gloss environment, which cost about $17 million and took about five years to complete, will come as no surprise to those who have followed Tafazoli’s earlier ventures.

Asked about the design philosophy behind the 2023 renovation of the Lafayette — the company’s first hotel — Tafazoli had a simple answer: “More is more.”

The Baby Grand project, put together in collaboration with design studio Post Company, is cut from the same cloth, describing itself as a “polychromatic pastiche” on its website. The goal, Tafazoli said, is to enrich Coronado’s culture and give people a respite in an anxiety-ridden time. But “it is different,” he said. “I don’t know if it is going to be embraced.”

Getting the necessary city permissions “was definitely a struggle,” Tafazoli said. “Had I known how difficult this was going to be, I don’t know …”

In the days before the hotel’s opening, Tafazoli, 44, led a tour of the site. The entrepreneur, whose heritage is Persian, wore his hair in braids and a button-down Supreme shirt featuring Barack Obama.

The Baby Grand hotel’s guest rooms feature separate tub and shower.

“I have a very one-dimensional existence. I’m single. I have no kids. This is what I do,” said Tafazoli, who grew up in San Diego and studied at UC San Diego. He lives now in downtown San Diego’s East Village, where his company is based and where his first CH venture, Neighborhood, opened in 2007.

Though his company started with eating and drinking establishments, Tafazoli said, his goals were always to create and run hotels, “the pinnacle of hospitality.” As a child of divorce, he said, he may have a heightened awareness of when the energy feels right in a room and when it doesn’t. Creating social environments, he said, gives him some control over that. Moreover, he added later, “beauty is important to me, because it conveys care.”

To make the most of Baby Grand’s compact location (2/3 of an acre), the CH team has exported parking. Instead of leaving their cars on site, guests will hand keys to valets who will deposit vehicles in a Bank of America parking structure a block away. That move freed up space for not only palm trees, torches, tables, booths and 21 pieces of statuary from Spain, but also a little faux beach with a 4-foot-deep wading pool that can hold a handful of people.

“I can’t tell you how many iterations of sand were brought in and taken out,” Tafazoli said. “Sand is its own universe. You want local sand. But local sand was not conducive to that feeling.” So the sand is from Turkey.

1

2

3

1. Guest shower in an en suite bathroom. 2. Hotel design touches include guest bathroom door handles. 3. Fiberglass clamshells serve as headboard in guest rooms.

The property’s main restaurant, Night Hawk, is Mediterranean, with cooking by open fire, a Greek ruins vibe and seating for about 150. The second restaurant lurks behind the lobby — a hidden oyster-and-Champagne bar that holds about 35 people, reservation only. The space, called Fallen Empire, features red mohair booths, built-in Champagne buckets, mirrored walls and chandeliers, sconces and lamps from the Italian glass-blowing island of Murano. The floor is a custom mosaic of sea creatures.

There are 31 guest rooms, beginning at $350 per night. Each is dominated by a custom-made clamshell headboard (fiberglass). Beds are surrounded by animal-print seating, parquet oak flooring, marble tables, mirrored cabinets and custom wallpaper. The rooms measure roughly 300 square feet each, nearly half of that space taken up by their elaborate bathrooms, each with separate tub and shower, sinks from Morocco.

Now picture all of that placed in the heart of Coronado (population 20,192), which sits next to Naval Air Station North Island and is known for attracting well-heeled retirees. The median home value is $2.5 million.

Up the block from the Baby Grand is the grand dame of San Diego County tourism, the Hotel del Coronado, which went up in 1888, completed a $550-million renovation last year and starts its rates north of $600. Another option is the Bower Coronado, also a dramatically upgraded motel that reopened in 2025 with prices similar to Baby Grand’s but a much more buttoned-down style.

This view from above at the Night Hawk restaurant space shows a stone booth, elaborately patterned cushion and table top.

All of those properties stand close to Coronado’s wide, sandy beaches — which means they all face challenges as waters are often fouled by the northward flow of untreated sewage from greater Tijuana. The longstanding problem has worsened in recent years, and Coronado’s Central Beach was closed to bathers on 129 days in 2025 because of unsafe bacteria levels. The U.S. and Mexican government say they have sewage-treatment projects in progress, with improvements expected by the end of 2027.

“We are, unfortunately, not marine scientists just a group of deeply overcaffeinated hoteliers with strong opinions about lighting, linen textures, and good design. So please check local water conditions before swimming,” Tafazoli wrote in a statement.

Asked his target market for the new hotel, Tafazoli said he was looking close to home.

“I see this as a staycation for locals” from San Diego County, Tafazoli said. “The big risk is that we don’t get locals and it doesn’t resonate with tourists who like the status quo.”

That said, Baby Grand and Coronado might be a better match than some imagine. Christine Stokes, executive director of the Coronado Historical Assn. and Museum, sees at least a few parallels to Baby Grand in local history, beginning with the historical association’s own building. From the 1950s into the 1990s, Stokes noted in an email, Marco’s Restaurant operated in the space, with a “Roman Room” bar — “a dark and immersive hidden gem where bartenders performed sleight-of-hand magic tricks.”

Guest rooms, including No. 103, are labeled with inscribed brass clamshells.

Then there was the Hotel del Coronado’s Circus Room restaurant, open from the 1930s into the 1960s. That was “an immersive environment, using specialized murals and striped tents on the walls,” Stokes wrote. It’s also where, in 1950, the manager of an L.A. TV station spotted a promising young piano player and decided to give him a chance on screen. The pianist’s name was Liberace.

However people respond to the particulars of the new hotel, Tafazoli said, he knows that the larger setting of Coronado is a special place.

From his office in San Diego’s East Village, “it’s a six-minute drive,” he said. “I come off that bridge, and I feel like I’m in a different place.” It’s amazing, he said, “to be so close and feel so far away.”

Ticket buyer: Alec Mackie of Los Angeles

Events: Men’s baseball gold medal finals, women’s basketball gold medal finals, men’s soccer gold medal finals, swimming preliminary and tennis quarter final mixed doubles

Thoughts: ”My uncle made a spreadsheet. The tickets are for me, my uncle, friends and I’m hoping to take my nephew as well. I was 10 years old at the 1984 Olympics and got to go to gymnastics, swimming and closing ceremonies, and my nephew will be 10 in 2028. I know L.A. is going to have an amazing Olympics, we are Los Angeles! Ten million creative, beautiful people, always dreaming and we know how to wow people. I can’t wait and hopefully traffic is smooth, a glamorous sequel to ’84.”

Some 8,000 years ago, behind the retreating glaciers, a remarkable environment was born on the western fringes of Scotland’s Outer Hebridean islands, forged by the wind and waves. It began with rising sea levels and sweeping Atlantic gales depositing crushed shell-sand inland; this settled over glacial sediment to form a coastal belt of lime-rich soil. Buffered from the sea by mounting sand dunes, this winter-wet and summer-sunned substrate produced one of Europe’s rarest habitats: the “machair”, Gaelic for “fertile grassy plain”. Abounding in diverse, colourful wildflowers and an array of associated wildlife, coastal machair is a precious, globally important outpost of biodiversity, supporting everything from purple orchids and nodding blue campanulas to endangered birdlife, otters and rare bumblebees.

As a wildflower fanatic, visiting the Outer Hebrides in peak machair bloom has long been an aspiration. Over the years, I’d read accounts of its arresting, vibrant seasonality – its shifting blankets of red and white clover, yellow trefoil and creamy eyebright, bold against the sky. Although remnant machair is also found in north-west Ireland, its greatest extent lies on this Scottish archipelago, notably the islands of Barra, Uist and Harris.

On Sunday night, tens of thousands of Hungarians packed the banks of the Danube waving flags, crying of joy, popping bottles. Celebrating something that political analysts had spent years telling them was almost impossible: the electoral defeat of Viktor Orbán, the autocrat whose ploys and manipulations made him a uniquely disturbing force in the European Union. After 16 years in power, Hungary’s self-proclaimed architect of “illiberal democracy” conceded defeat within hours of the polls closing.

His rival, Péter Magyar (the equivalent of Pedro Veneco), had won 137 seats in a 199-seat parliament, a two-thirds supermajority that gave him not just a government, but the ability to rewrite the very constitution Orbán had rigged to protect himself. This appears to be the plan.

Venezuelans watching from afar could be forgiven for feeling two things at once: genuine joy, and a familiar, creeping doubt. 

Sure, but that’s Hungary.

The doubt is understandable. It’s also, at this particular moment in Venezuelan history, worth interrogating.

To understand whether Hungary provides a useful lesson, we need to venture farther than our diasporic links, like La Danubio, Catherine Fulop and Shirley Varnagy. You first need a category distinction that political scientists call the difference between a closed authoritarian regime and a competitive one. A closed autocracy doesn’t bother with the pretense of real elections. Or when it does, it simply invents the results. Especially after July 2024, Venezuela had become exactly this: we all know what happened. Politically, there was no game to play unless you played by the regime’s rules. The game was a charade. 

Orbán’s Hungary was something different, more insidious. Similar to what Chávez did to the institutions in the 2000s, while using hyper-ideological and reactionary rhetoric. The European Parliament had classified it as a “hybrid regime of electoral autocracy.” Orbán bent every institution he could reach: the judiciary, the media, the electoral rules themselves.

The scene on the Danube on Sunday night was a piece of great news in a political era that doesn’t offer many of them. The scenes in Budapest matter to us. But it shouldn’t be mistaken for a mirror.

He gerrymandered the system to favor the largest single party, confident that party would always be his. But he never quite crossed the line into fabricating vote counts, à la Maduro or Lukashenko. The game was still real, even if the playing field was tilted.

That distinction is now relevant because Venezuela’s political reality has shifted in ways that were unimaginable five months ago. The current regime Delcy Rodríguez leads is not identical to that of 2024 and 2025. Under US pressure, a few hundred political prisoners have been released and an amnesty law was approved in February. albeit with mixed results (more than 500 political prisoners are still behind bars, and amnesty has been formally denied to high-profile politicians and NGO leaders like Javier Tarazona). Overall, we see gestures that try to transmit magnanimity, but are moves meant to look like compliance while chavismo waits for Washington’s attention to wander.

But here’s the thing: even performative openings create real cracks, and the cracks are showing. In February alone, Venezuela has recorded dozens of protests, an exponential increase compared to the same month in 2025. Workers and students have taken to the streets of Caracas four times this year demanding salary increases, openly calling on the Rodríguez siblings to answer for their pleas. Last weekend in Valencia, in a football game between Carabobo and Universidad Central (a game which has enough backdrop to make a book about it), football fans directed chants against the son of Alexander Granko Arteaga (who plays for UCV): “¡Dónde están que no se ven, los enchufados de la UCV,” loud enough so it could be hear transmission (that would translate roughly to “nowhere to be seen, the UCV cronies are nowhere to be seen”). In 2025, that chant would have landed them in jail. That was exactly the outcome in the last domestic football final.

Waiting for the opportunity

Venezuela is still not a democracy. But the differences remain significant: a regime slowly, reluctantly slipping out of its authoritarian fortress, coming to terms with the fact that it will eventually have to face a reckoning at the ballot box. That’s what happened to Orbán. He controlled the courts, the media, the electoral geometry, and still got swept out because of the accumulated weight of economic failure, corruption, and sheer exhaustion that eventually overwhelmed the machinery he had built.

The lesson is not that rigged systems are beatable through optimism. It is that rigged systems have structural limits, and that opposition alliances which survive long enough, and build broad enough coalitions, tend to be standing when those limits are reached. In our case, we’ve seen all possible iterations of what an opposition can be. In 2024, the Maria Corina-led movement became the most formidable electoral force the country has seen in a while. That should have been our Orbán down moment. Nonetheless, the inertia we have seen since the beginning of the year is too good to let it slip away.

Political scientist Yascha Mounk, writing about Magyar’s victory, made an interesting observation that some might believe applies to Venezuelan democratic forces: the Hungarian opposition ousted Orbán on its fourth try, after years of humiliation, internal divisions and strategic errors. Patience, he argues, is its own form of political discipline.

This is Mounk’s post-populist dilemma, live, and a miniature preview of what a potential democratic government in Caracas would have in front of itself.

Again, the Venezuelan opposition doesn’t need that lesson. It already learned it, the hard way, and on a harder playing field. In 2015, it won a supermajority in the Asamblea and watched its powers get neutered one by one. In July 2024, it beat Maduro overwhelmingly and proved its victory with the official tally sheets. Edmundo González Urrutia did not become president because the movement backing him lacked organization, or coalition-building, or the kind of credible leadership that Magyar built from scratch since leaving Orban’s party two years ago. González Urrutia failed to take power because the regime decided that electoral results were optional.

The question was never whether the Venezuelan opposition could win an election. They already did in a way that should clarify the terrain for future opportunities. The actas and the popular support are powerful symbols that should endure. The question is whether they can repeat that performance, seizing the minimal opening they have in front of them whatever the broader circumstances. Then yes, the patience Mounk mentions is relevant.

The post-autocracy trap

Mounk is right to poop the party a little bit with a warning he calls the “post-populist dilemma.” Even with his supermajority, Magyar inherits a State that Orbán hollowed out and refilled with loyalists. He has two options: either fire them and bring about an anti-Fidesz purge; or leave them in place and be sabotaged from within. In his first week in power, Magyar is showing he wants to go for the first option. He has already called for the resignation of several key ministers of the Orban regime.

Venezuela would face this dilemma on steroids. Chavismo has had 27 years to embed itself across nearly everything. Rodríguez herself operates within a questionable agency on security forces (a certain someone remains interior minister and vice president for security). Any future Venezuelan government elected under competitive conditions would inherit an institutional landscape far more captured and complex than anything Magyar faces in Budapest.

This is not a reason for despair, but it does require confronting an uncomfortable asymmetry. When Magyar navigated Hungary’s post-populist transition, he did so with the EU at his back, a bloc that had spent years dangling billions in frozen funds as an incentive for democratic reform, and whose membership gave Hungarian voters a concrete, tangible alternative to Orbán’s model. Venezuela’s external anchor is the Trump administration, which has been explicit about its priorities: oil first, stability second, elections somewhere further down the list. Rubio’s three-phase roadmap (stabilization, economic recovery, reconciliation and transition) is not an explicit democratic transition plan. It is a business plan with democracy on the side.

Preparation, then, means the opposition must be the one holding the democratic line demanding verifiable electoral conditions, refusing to let institutional reform become a performance to please DC, and cementing a coalition broad enough that can translate the popular inertia and mood towards a margin so big it can’t be tweaked. The EU didn’t save Hungary. Hungarians did. The lesson travels.

Magyar won because Hungarians were organized, patient and ready when the moment arrived. Venezuelans have already proven they can do the same.

Magyar isn’t waiting. Within 72 hours of his victory, he demanded that Hungary’s president resign immediately, and sent the same message to the heads of the Supreme Court, the Constitutional Court, the State Audit Office and the media authority calling them “puppets who have been in power for the past 16 years.” On Wednesday morning, in his first radio interview in over a year and a half, he told the State broadcaster its news operation would be shut down and relaunched as a true public service. Some are already calling it a witch hunt. Others call it the bare minimum required to transform the country.

This is Mounk’s post-populist dilemma, live, and a miniature preview of what a potential democratic government in Caracas would have in front of itself. If Magyar, armed with a two-thirds supermajority and the EU at his back, is already navigating accusations of overreach on day three, imagine what a Venezuelan opposition government would face trying to dismantle 27 years of institutional occupation in the police, intelligence agencies, the military, the public media, the judiciary. The task ahead is massive, and solving the dilemma probably requires an orderly phase-out agreed before the next presidential vote.

The scene on the Danube on Sunday night was a piece of great news in a political era that doesn’t offer many of them. The scenes in Budapest matter to us. But it shouldn’t be mistaken for a mirror.

Venezuela is not Hungary. Delcy is not Orbán, she is arguably more pragmatic, but also more constrained. Orbán was a standalone autocrat who built his system around his own political survival. Rodríguez governs by a permanent balancing act: between Washington’s demands, the military high command, the hardline faction and other peripheral actors. The competitive opening, if it comes, will be narrower, more fragile and more dangerous than anything Magyar navigated.

These are reasons to take the Hungarian lesson seriously without taking it literally. Magyar won because Hungarians were organized, patient and ready when the moment arrived. Venezuelans have already proven they can do the same. The question now is simpler, and harder: when the moment comes again, can the popular will (and not just the results) be allowed to stand?