sports

There are some stories about Diego Maradona that you cannot believe. One that you can, starts in a small school with a sunny courtyard that has trees in bloom and involves an orange. Maradona attended primary school in the poor, working-class city of Villa Fiorito on the outskirts of Buenos Aires.

Football is a great leveller. Not everyone goes to a school with a rugby pitch and not everyone can afford a pony. However, from the favelas of Rio de Janeiro to the slums of Nairobi to the playgrounds of Monaco and Beverly Hills, you will see children kicking a football about.

Teachers are at the heart of education, and their valuable work must also lead to better salaries and working conditions, the heads of three UN agencies and a partner organization said on Wednesday.

Paris has become the latest European city to protest against the playing of the FIFA World Cup in Qatar by canceling the public screening of matches. Other French cities have announced a similar move and several European football federations are also looking at ways to protest against the tournament being held in Qatar without going as far as a complete boycott.

The wushu event of international competitions kicked off on Wednesday in Samsun, Turkey. Iranian student Mohammad-Ali Mojiri has defeated his rivals and won gold medal with 9.3 scores. He attained the first gold medal for the Iranian team present in the sport event.

Bosnia and Herzegovina will play Russia in a friendly match in November, the country's Football Association announced on its official website on Friday, sparking harsh criticism from Bosnia's star players and fans alike.

England beat Germany 2-1 to win the European football championships on Sunday, their first major women's trophy.  

For civil servant Silas Sihombing, the reasons for eating dog meat could not be much simpler. “Today I’m eating dog because I’m hungry,” Sihombing told Al Jazeera in between mouthfuls of grilled dog meat at Lau Dimbo Simalem restaurant in Medan, North Sumatra.

Embattled Ukraine inched a step closer to qualifying for the World Cup, after handing Scotland a 3-1 defeat on Wednesday. 

Iran played Qatar in its first match in the AFC U-23 Asian Cup on Wednesday in Tashkent, the capital city of Uzbekistan.