rating

As well as bearing the pressure of her first tournament in charge, Sciver-Brunt’s all-round performances will also go a long way to deciding England’s fortunes.

So often, she is their sole saviour with the bat but she will at least have the comfort of Knight’s return from injury, providing extra stability and maturity in the middle order which they lacked against India this summer.

Edwards wasted no time in changing England’s opening partnership, reinstating Amy Jones with Tammy Beaumont, but again it was difficult to take too much from their back-to-back stands of more than 200 against West Indies considering the weakness of the bowling attack.

They were far less convincing against a superior India, with a stand of 54 sandwiched between partnerships of eight and seven.

England are also very inexperienced in India as only Knight, Beaumont and Danni Wyatt-Hodge have 10 or more ODIs to their name here – though they are more familiar with the conditions from the Women’s Premier League, a T20 franchise tournament.

In terms of the bowling, much will also depend on how many overs Sciver-Brunt can deliver, having not bowled since the Ashes because of an Achilles problem.

Edwards made the bold call to omit the experienced Kate Cross from the squad, which leaves Lauren Bell, Lauren Filer and Em Arlott as the quicks and Sarah Glenn, Charlie Dean and world number one Sophie Ecclestone as the spinners.

Bell has quickly become one of the first names on the England team sheet over the past two years, but there are still a lot of unknowns about the surfaces in India and Sri Lanka, with their group games due to be played at four different venues.

If the surfaces do not offer much spin, especially in the early stages, England could find themselves a seamer light or lacking Cross’ experience, with Arlott and Filer still searching for consistency in international cricket.

Arlott is also the only new addition to the squad since the Ashes, another indication that England’s depth is yet to materialise in order to challenge the mainstays, though it was always unlikely the team would see wholesale changes from the summer considering the enormity of the challenge of this tournament and the need for experience.

Jimmy Kimmel’s show is gone. So is Stephen Colbert’s. And if President Trump has his way, Seth Meyers and Jimmy Fallon will be next.

In the MAGA establishment’s ongoing censorship campaign against Trump’s critics, “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” became its latest victim when ABC announced Wednesday that it was pulling the show “indefinitely.” The network’s abrupt announcement followed an outcry from Trump’s supporters that the show’s host — a longtime critic of the president — had inaccurately described the political motivations of Tyler Robinson, the suspect in last week’s killing of right-wing activist Charlie Kirk.

The network’s announcement came hours after Brendan Carr, the Trump-nominated chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, targeted Kimmel on a right-wing podcast and suggested the FCC could take action against ABC because of remarks made by the host. He said Kimmel’s remarks were part of a “concerted effort to lie to the American people,” and that the FCC was “going to have remedies that we can look at.”

“Frankly, when you see stuff like this — I mean, we can do this the easy way or the hard way,” he told the podcast’s host, Benny Johnson. “These companies can find ways to change conduct and take action, frankly, on Kimmel, or there’s going to be additional work for the FCC ahead.”

The alleged “lies” cited by Kimmel in his Monday night monologue? That MAGA was trying to paint Robinson as “anything other than one of them.”

“We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and doing everything they can to score political points from it,” Kimmel said. “In between the finger-pointing, there was, uh, grieving on Friday — the White House flew the flags at half-staff, which got some criticism, but on a human level, you can see how hard the president is taking this.”

Kimmel then cut to a clip showing Trump taking questions from reporters, and when the president was asked how he was holding up, he said, “I think very good, and by the way, right there where you see all the trucks, they just started construction of the new ballroom for the White House.” Trump went on to discuss the plans for the ballroom and said the results will “be a beauty.”

It wasn’t Kimmel’s best work, but it certainly wasn’t a bombshell, either. Yet in today’s environment, it was enough to spook ABC into pulling a late-night franchise that’s endured for decades.

The FCC unsurprisingly did not apply the same standards to an outburst Monday by Greg Gutfeld, Fox News’ conservative answer to network television’s thinning herd of late-night hosts. Gutfeld cursed on air, demeaned the loss of life from another assassination earlier this year and cited information that was incorrect to back his tirade.

On Fox’s show “The Five,” Gutfeld asserted that political violence in the U.S. was only going one way — from left to right — during a conversation with co-host Jessica Tarlov. When she pushed back on his argument by bringing up the June assassination of the Democratic speaker of the Minnesota House of Representatives, Melissa Hortman, and her husband, Mark, Gutfeld exploded.

“What is interesting here is, why is only this happening on the left and not the right?” he asked. “That’s all we need to know.”

“You wanna talk about Melissa Hortman?” he shouted at her. “Did you know her name before it happened? None of us did. None of us were spending every single day talking about Mrs. Hortman — I never heard of her until after she died.”

“So, it doesn’t matter?” Tarlov asked.

“Don’t play that bulls— with me!” Gutfeld shouted. “You know what I’m talking … What I’m saying is there was no demonization, amplification about that woman before she died. It was a specific crime against her by somebody who knew her.”

No evidence has been publicly presented that the alleged killer of the Hortmans, Vance Boelter, knew the couple. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, Boelter “had a list of possible targets,” and investigators have suggested that the suspect’s right-wing political views played a role in the attacks.

Carr’s assail of Kimmel is the latest attack against the media by Trump and his administration. Trump sued ABC last year in a case that the network paid $15 million to settle. On Monday, the president filed a $15-billion defamation lawsuit against the New York Times and four of its reporters.

In July, CBS also canceled storied network franchise “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert,” claiming that the cancellation was a financial decision, but the timing also suggests it was done to placate Trump while Paramount was awaiting the FCC’s approval of a major merger between CBS’ owner Paramount and Skydance Media. A few weeks after CBS agreed to pay $16 million to settle Trump’s lawsuit against CBS News’ “60 Minutes,” the merger was approved.

Ratings for late-night television have been slipping over the last decade due to a number of factors, including the decline of linear TV as a whole and changing viewing habits with the advent of streaming and online engagement. In the 1990s, for example, Johnny Carson’s final episode in 1992 drew 50 million viewers. Letterman averaged around 7.8 million viewers in the same year. In the second quarter of 2025, “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert” topped the 11:35 p.m. hour with an average of 2.417 million viewers. “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” came in second with an average of 1.772 million viewers. NBC’s “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” finished third with an average of 1.188 million viewers.

On Wednesday, Trump posted a celebratory comment about Kimmel’s show being pulled: “Great News for America: The ratings challenged Jimmy Kimmel Show is CANCELLED. Congratulations to ABC for finally having the courage to do what had to be done,” Trump wrote. “Kimmel has ZERO talent, and worse ratings than even Colbert, if that’s possible. That leaves Jimmy and Seth, two total losers, on Fake News NBC. Their ratings are also horrible. Do it NBC!!! President DJT”

But the true loser here isn’t Trump’s critics or his enemy, the left. It’s freedom of speech.

The 2020 presidential election is history, but a legal dispute over Fox News’ reporting on President Trump’s false claims of voter fraud is heating up.

A motion for summary judgment by voting equipment company Smartmatic filed Tuesday in New York Supreme Court laid out in detail how phony allegations that it manipulated votes to swing the election to Joe Biden were amplified on Fox News.

The motion also described how the Fox News Media hosts who are defendants in the suit — the late Lou Dobbs, Jeanine Pirro and Maria Bartiromo of Fox Business — were allegedly committed to helping Trump prove his fraud theories so he could remain in office.

“I work so hard for the President and the party,” Pirro wrote in a text to Ronna McDaniel, then chair of the Republican National Committee.

Pirro left Fox News in May to become U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia.

Smartmatic is suing Fox News for $2.7 billion in damages, claiming that the network’s airing of the false statements hurt the London-based company’s ability to expand its business in the U.S.

Fox News settled a similar suit from Dominion Voting Systems for $787.5 million in 2023.

The motion alleged that on-air hosts repeated the fraud claims even though executives and producers were told they were false.

The Fox News research department, known as the “Brainroom,” allegedly informed network producers that Smartmatic’s role in the 2020 election was limited to Los Angeles County and that the company’s software was not used in Dominion voting machines, another false claim made on the air.

Fox News maintains the network’s reporting on President Trump’s false claims were newsworthy and protected by the 1st Amendment. But part of the company’s legal strategy has been focused on minimizing the damage claims.

Fox News has asserted that any problems Smartmatic has experienced in attracting new business are rooted not in its reporting but in the federal investigation into the company’s activities with overseas governments.

Last year, Smartmatic’s founder, Roger Alejandro Piñate Martinez, and two other company officials were indicted by the U.S. attorney’s office and charged with bribing Philippine officials in order to get voting machine contracts in the country in 2016.

While the Trump camp’s assertions that the election was fixed were not believed throughout Fox News and parent company Fox Corp., the conservative-leaning network gave continued to give them oxygen to keep its audience tuned in, the motion alleged.

The motion described a “pivot” that occurred on Nov. 8, 2020, when then-Fox News Executive Chairman Rupert Murdoch and his son Lachlan asked Fox News Media Chief Executive Suzanne Scott to address the decline in the network’s ratings after Biden was declared the winner of the election. The network also looked at research to evaluate why viewers were leaving.

“The conclusion reached based on performance analytics: give the audience more election fraud,” the court document stated.

Such thinking, the filing said, permeated the company, already in a panic over losing viewers to right-leaning network Newsmax. The upstart outlet saw a ratings surge after Biden’s win due to its unwavering support of Trump’s claims.

“Think about how incredible our ratings would be if Fox went ALL in on STOP THE STEAL,” Fox News host Jesse Watters said in a text to his colleague Greg Gutfeld.

Throughout November and December 2020, the three hosts named in the suit, Dobbs, Pirro and Bartiromo, repeatedly featured Trump’s attorneys Rudolph Giuliani and Sidney Powell as guests. They spread the falsehoods that Smartmatic software was used in Dominion voting machines and altered millions of votes.

Smartmatic’s work in Los Angeles during the 2020 election was meant to be an entry point for the company to expand its domestic business. The company’s defamation suit claims that Fox News obliterated those efforts by presenting the false fraud claims.

But Fox News believes that issues with Smartmatic’s $282-million contract with Los Angeles County could help advance its case.

On Aug. 1, federal prosecutors filing a legal brief alleging that taxpayer funds from the county went into a slush fund held by a shell company to help pay for its illegal activities.

Federal prosecutors handling the case involving Smartmatic’s business in the Philippines said they plan to detail similar alleged schemes out of L.A. County and Venezuela to show that the bribery fits a larger pattern.

Fox News attorneys have filed a brief asking for county records that they believe will help bolster their case. The network is also expected to try to get the Smartmatic indictments in front of the court to raise doubts about the company’s reputation.

A Smartmatic representative said Fox News’ records request is a diversion tactic.

“Fox lies and when caught they lie again to distract,” a Smartmatic representative said in a statement. “Fox’s latest filing is just another attempt to divert attention from its long-standing campaign of falsehoods and defamation against Smartmatic.”

The company added that it abided with the law in Los Angeles County and “every jurisdiction where we operate.”

Smartmatic’s Tuesday court filing also included information that contradicted public statements Fox News made at the time.

The document alleged that Fox News fired political analyst Chris Stirewalt and longtime Washington bureau executives Bill Sammon for their involvement in calling the state of Arizona for Biden on election night. The early call of the close result in the state upset the Trump camp and alienated his supporters.

At the time, Fox News said Stirewalt departed as part of a reorganization and Sammon retired.

But the motion said Rupert Murdoch himself signed off on the decision to sever Stirewalt and Sammon from the company in an effort to assuage angry viewers who defected.

The motion cited a communication from Dana Perino, co-host of Fox News show “The Five,” describing a phone call with Stirewalt after his dismissal.

“I explained to him — you were right, you didn’t cave, and you got fired for doing the right thing,” Perino said.

Both Sammon and Stirewalt now work in the Washington bureau of NewsNation, the cable news network owned by Nexstar Media Group.

Having high expectations when you’re visiting the best hotel in England isn’t a bad thing, but Danielle Kate Wroe was holding her breath to see whether Mallory Court could live up to them…

Danielle is a Social News Reporter for the social newsdesk, serving titles including The Mirror. She previously worked as a Lifestyle Writer for The Mirror. She has a special interest in books, feminism, stories from the LGBTQ+ community, and fashion. She’s also worked for Reach PLC’s InYourArea team as a Senior Community Content Curator.

The expectations are high when arriving at a hotel that has been named the best in England.

Earlier this year, the Mallory Court Country House Hotel and Spa was crowned the best large hotel by a panel of VisitEngland judges, who fell in love with the Warwickshire manor.

The experts heaped praise on Mallory Court, describing it as providing ‘a serene base ‘set within 10 acres of landscaped gardens, crammed full of all the modern amenities and luxury trimmings you could possibly want.

What’s more, the hotel was recently described as being an absolute bargain, with one reviewer noting that the price of a room for the night is half that of a similar country house. So, a lot to live up to.

Do you have a travel story you think we should cover? Let us know! Email [email protected]

We wandered around the gardens, and General Manager Josefine Blomqvist told us that Mallory Court is working to become more sustainable by growing its own produce—and the bees that buzz around the garden are part of that effort.

After getting ready for dinner, we headed to the lovely garden area and drank a glass of champagne as we enjoyed the stunning views. It felt like I’d stepped straight into an episode of Bridgerton, pretending that I was the lady of the manor. Once we’d enjoyed some olives and salted beans with our drink, we were taken through into the dining area.

My partner and I opted for the tasting menu curated by MasterChef winner Stu Deeley. I hadn’t indulged in a tasting menu for quite some time, so this was an exciting fine-dining experience. Plus, the sommelier went to great lengths to find the perfect bottle of wine for us to share as we dined. We opted for a Chinon Blanc Les Bondonnières Couly-Dutheil 2023, and it complemented each course perfectly. It was crisp but not too sweet—I’d definitely buy a bottle to enjoy at home.

We started with canapés and an amuse-bouche, one of which was the most melt-in-the-mouth goat cheese I have ever tasted. This was followed by a malted loaf from Silvertree Bakery with estate dairy cultured butter, burrata with pea and mint gazpacho and artichoke, a crispy Burford Brown egg, barbecued leek and warm tartare sauce, Cornish monkfish, borlotti bean cassoulet, baby courgette, brown shrimps, Espelette and nduja sauce, and finally the Oxfordshire hogget with potato terrine, French beans, and salsa verde.

The meal delivered flavour sensations like I’ve never experienced before, especially the warm tartare sauce. It was unusual, but divine. The final part of the meal was, of course, dessert. The chocolate fondant tart was incredibly luxurious, with the mint ice cream providing a somewhat nostalgic taste. It reminded me of being a child and smelling mint in my mum’s garden—so it was not only delicious but also evoked lovely memories.

We finished off with some warm madeleines, a welcome way to round off the meal perfectly. We dined for three and a half hours, laughing and joking with our lovely waitress all night long, and left very satisfied.

Upon returning to the room, we were thrilled to see it had been turned down for the evening: the curtains were drawn, the fan turned back on, and we’d been left a gorgeous little jar of honey from the Mallory Bees. This was a lovely touch, given to guests for special occasions. I can confirm—it’s one of the nicest honeys I’ve ever tasted.

We got ready for bed, and I had a perfect night’s sleep. I didn’t even stir once, which, in the heat we were experiencing, was a surprise. The bed wasn’t too soft nor too firm—a real Goldilocks bed, if you will.

The morning after, I made full use of the garden and went outside to read before getting ready for the day, while my partner made use of the spa facilities. He used the indoor and outdoor pools, and I went to have a nosy—they were immaculately clean and lovely. We headed to breakfast, where I enjoyed eggs royale and my partner had a full English. We also had orange juice and coffee. Again, the staff were lovely and welcoming and truly couldn’t do enough for us. Afterwards, we wandered past our private garden and into the hotel grounds, exploring the nooks and crannies. It’s like a magical fairy world.

I can truly appreciate why this hotel won Large Hotel of the Year at the VisitEngland Awards for Excellence 2025. My only query is: why on earth isn’t this hotel five-star? Because it more than deserves to be. It’s undeniably the nicest place I’ve stayed in this country—and I’ve been to some seriously fancy hotels. But Mallory Court is magical.

Book it

A classic room costs between £240 and £340 per night. Visit Mallory’s website to book.

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Following a broad weekly rally on Wall Street amid a de-escalation in the US-China trade war, risk-off sentiment once again prevailed in global markets following a major downgrade of US credit ratings by Moody’s. Global equity indices fell during Monday’s Asian session as sell-offs in US assets resumed, with US stock futures, the dollar, and government bonds all declining.

Moody’s downgrades US credit ratings

On Friday, Moody’s Ratings, a major American credit rating agency, downgraded the “US long-term issuer and senior unsecured ratings” to Aa1 from the top-tier Aaa due to mounting concerns over rising government debt and widening fiscal deficits.

The agency stated: “Over more than a decade, US federal debt has risen sharply due to continuous fiscal deficits. During that time, federal spending has increased while tax cuts have reduced government revenues. As deficits and debt have grown, and interest rates have risen, interest payments on government debt have increased markedly.”

Moody’s downgrade followed similar moves by rival agencies: Standard & Poor’s cut its US sovereign credit rating to AA+ in 2011, and Fitch Ratings made the same downgrade in 2023.

The decision led to a rise in US government bond yields as investors demanded a higher premium to compensate for perceived risks. The 10-year Treasury yield rose by 5 basis points (1 basis point = 0.01 percentage point) to 4.48% on Friday, climbing further to 4.51% during Monday’s Asian session. The downgrade also appeared to dampen investor appetite for other US assets, including equities and the dollar.

Moody’s expects federal budget flexibility to remain “limited” without adjustments to taxation and government spending. The agency projected that the US deficit would expand by approximately $4 trillion (€3.58 trillion) over the next decade if the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act is extended. “Federal interest payments are likely to absorb around 30% of revenue by 2035, up from about 18% in 2024 and 9% in 2021,” Moody’s added.

“It does speak to a level of market risk in US debt, which is to say that the value of US bonds could be compromised if the economy can no longer run at the growth rates necessary to service the government’s liabilities,” Kyle Rodda, senior market analyst at Capital.com in Australia, said.

Risk-off sentiment prevails

US equity futures fell sharply during Monday’s Asian session following Moody’s downgrade. As of 4:42 am CEST, futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average were down 0.65%, the S&P 500 dropped 0.92%, and the Nasdaq Composite declined by 1.22%.

Asian equities also came under pressure amid the risk-off tone. Japan’s Nikkei 225 dropped 0.66%, Australia’s ASX 200 declined 0.46%, and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index slid 0.56% during the same period.

The ripple effect is expected to spill into European markets, though major indices such as the Euro Stoxx 600 and the DAX were set to open flat.

The US dollar also weakened against other G10 currencies, particularly safe-haven currencies including the euro, the Japanese yen, and the Swiss franc. Gold prices rose amid increased haven demand, although the yellow metal pulled back from an intraday high, likely due to pressure from rising US bond yields. Gold futures initially surged over 1% before retreating and were 0.8% higher, trading at $3,213 per ounce as of 4:12 am CEST.

Despite market jitters, Rodda believes the impact of Moody’s move will be short-lived. “I don’t think it will have a lasting impact,” he said, although he views the downgrade as “a reminder of the very loose fiscal policy the US is running and the structural problems related to US public finance.”

May 17 (UPI) — Moody’s Ratings downgraded U.S. debt, becoming the last of the three major credit rating agencies to move in that direction.

The New York-based agency downgraded government long-term issuer and senior unsecured ratings to Aa1 from Aaa this week, while also changing its outlook to negative from a previous rating of stable, Moody’s said in a media release.

“This one-notch downgrade on our 21-notch rating scale reflects the increase over more than a decade in government debt and interest payment ratios to levels that are significantly higher than similarly rated sovereigns,” Moody’s said in the company’s statement.

“Successive U.S. administrations and Congress have failed to agree on measures to reverse the trend of large annual fiscal deficits and growing interest costs. We do not believe that material multi-year reductions in mandatory spending and deficits will result from current fiscal proposals under consideration.”

Standard & Poor’s in 2011 became the first of the three nationally recognized statistical rating organizations to lower its U.S. debt rating. It later accused the Justice Department of “retaliation” for filing a $5-billion lawsuit against the credit rating agency.

Fitch Ratings followed in 2021, dropping its American long-term foreign-currency issuer default rating from top-ranked AAA to AA+ amid a political battle over the U.S. debt ceiling. That move elicited then-Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen to blast the move at the time, calling it “unwarranted.”

Moody’s in 2023 signaled it could move in the same direction, putting U.S. banks on a negative watch list and warning of a ‘mild’ recession, and later that year lowering its outlook of U.S. debt.

The agency in November then warned of a potential downgrade.

“Over more than a decade, U.S. federal debt has risen sharply due to continuous fiscal deficits. During that time, federal spending has increased while tax cuts have reduced government revenues. As deficits and debt have grown, and interest rates have risen, interest payments on government debt have increased markedly,” Moody’s said in its statement this week.

“If the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act is extended, which is our base case, it will add around $4 trillion to the federal fiscal primary deficit over the next decade. While we recognize the U.S.’ significant economic and financial strengths, we believe these no longer fully counterbalance the decline in fiscal metrics.”

The White House attempted to shift the blame to former President Joe Biden‘s administration.

“The Trump administration and Republicans are focused on fixing Biden’s mess by slashing the waste, fraud, and abuse in government and passing The One, Big, Beautiful Bill to get our house back in order,” White House spokesperson Kush Desai told reporters Friday.

“If Moody’s had any credibility, they would not have stayed silent as the fiscal disaster of the past four years unfolded.”

Moody’s said it does not expect further downgrades in the near future.

“The U.S. economy is unique among the sovereigns we rate. It combines very large scale, high average incomes, strong growth potential and a track-record of innovation that supports productivity and GDP growth. While GDP growth is likely to slow in the short term as the economy adjusts to higher tariffs, we do not expect that the US’ long-term growth will be significantly affected,” the agency said in its statement.

Moody’s cited rising debt, saying US had repeatedly failed to end the trend of large annual fiscal deficits and interest.

Moody’s Ratings has stripped the United States government of its top credit rating, citing successive governments’ failure to stop a rising tide of debt.

On Friday, Moody’s lowered the rating from a gold-standard Aaa to Aa1. “Successive US administrations and Congress have failed to agree on measures to reverse the trend of large annual fiscal deficits and growing interest costs,” it said as it changed its outlook on the US to “stable” from “negative”.

But, it added, the US “retains exceptional credit strengths such as the size, resilience and dynamism of its economy and the role of the US dollar as global reserve currency.”

Moody’s is the last of the three major rating agencies to lower the federal government’s credit rating. Standard & Poor’s downgraded federal debt in 2011, and Fitch Ratings followed in 2023.

In a statement, Moody’s said: “We expect federal deficits to widen, reaching nearly 9 percent of [the US economy] by 2035, up from 6.4 percent in 2024, driven mainly by increased interest payments on debt, rising entitlement spending, and relatively low revenue generation.’’

Extending President Donald Trump’s 2017 tax cuts, a priority of the Republican-controlled Congress, Moody’s said, would add $4 trillion over the next decade to the federal primary deficit, which does not include interest payments.

The White House adopted an aggressive tone towards Moody’s after the ratings agency downgraded the US credit rating.

White House communications director Steven Cheung reacted to the downgrade via a social media post, singling out Moody’s economist, Mark Zandi, for criticism. He called Zandi a political opponent of Trump.

“Nobody takes his ‘analysis’ seriously. He has been proven wrong time and time again,” Cheung said.

A gridlocked political system has been unable to tackle the huge deficits accumulated by the US. Republicans reject tax increases, and Democrats are reluctant to cut spending.

On Friday, House Republicans failed to push a big package of tax breaks and spending cuts through the Budget Committee. A small group of hard-right Republican lawmakers, insisting on steeper cuts to Medicaid and President Joe Biden’s green energy tax breaks, joined all Democrats in opposing it, a rare political setback for the Republican president.