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BERLIN: Borussia Dortmund continued their impressive start to the season as Jude Bellingham scored in a comfortable 3-0 Champions League home win over FC Copenhagen on Tuesday. With striker Sebastien Haller, who is currently undergoing treatment for testicular cancer, watching on in the stands, Dortmund were composed and dominant throughout despite fielding four Champions League debutants in the starting XI. After a furious opening stanza dominated by the home side, Marco Reus dribbled past two Copenhagen defenders before hammering the ball past Australian goalkeeper Mathew Ryan and into the back of the net on 35 minutes. Just seven minutes later, American forward Giovanni Reyna — who was subbed on for the injured Thorgan Hazard in the 23rd minute — set Raphael Guerreiro up for an easy tap-in to double his side’s lead. Dortmund, who have won four from five in the Bundesliga this season, were roared on by their famous yellow wall, which was allowed to feature standing fans for the first time since 1998 under new UEFA regulations. Dortmund continued their dominance into the second half and went close several times through the creative Julian Brandt, before Bellingham converted another assist from Reyna in the 83rd minute. Copenhagen looked to have scored a late consolation goal through Rasmus Falk, but it was chalked off for offside. The game was the fourth time in seven competitive games this term that Dortmund have kept a clean sheet. Despite the win, Dortmund lost Hazard early and now have nine first-team players out injured just six weeks into the campaign.

JEDDAH: Saudi Arabia is in talks with sports chiefs in Egypt and Greece over an audacious joint bid to host the 2030 football World Cup finals. “The three countries are working flat out” and “the application to organize the tournament is being studied,” Mohammed Fawzi, spokesman for the Egyptian Sports Ministry, said on Friday. Egypt had hosted many world championships in the past three years, Fawzi said, and was well qualified to stage football’s premier tournament. A source at Greece’s Hellenic Football Federation in Athens confirmed that the three countries were holding discussions about a joint bid. If the bid is successful, the tournament would take place in the winter of 2030 to avoid the extreme summer heat, as with this year’s World Cup finals in Qatar in November and December. The bid will face competition from at least two other joint proposals. Argentina, Chile, Paraguay and Uruguay launched a bid in early August to host the 2030 World Cup, while Spain and Portugal announced their joint candidacy last year. The joint South American bid aims to stage the 2030 final in the same Centenario stadium in Montevideo that hosted the first final 100 years earlier. World football’s governing body FIFA will select a host for the 2030 tournament in 2024. Hosting major international sporting events, including European club football and boxing world title bouts, is a key part of Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 development strategy.

NEWYORK: Britain’s Joe Salisbury donned a black armband in honor of Queen Elizabeth as he won the US Open men’s doubles title with American partner Rajeev Ram on Friday. Top seeds Salisbury and Ram defeated Wesley Koolhof of the Netherlands and Neal Skupski of Britain 7-6 (7/4), 7-5. It was the pair’s second successive title in New York as they became the first back-to-back champions at the tournament since 1996. Skupski wore a black ribbon on his shirt as the two British players paid tribute to Queen Elizabeth who died Thursday at the age of 96.

PARIS: Two Juventus fans will be tried in Paris for racism at the Parc des Princes during a Champions League match against Paris Saint-Germain, a source in the city’s prosecutor’s office told AFP on Friday. Three adults and a minor were arrested Tuesday night in Paris after Italian fans made Nazi salutes or monkey gestures at the game. The four were identified by police video surveillance cameras at the stadium and were in the area reserved for Juve fans, a police source said. The Paris prosecutor’s office said that two of the three adults had been summoned to be tried by the criminal court, one for “public insult of a racist nature” and the other for “apology for crimes against humanity.” No charges were made against the third adult as the evidence did not clearly show he had committed a possible crime. The minor was banned from the Ile-de-France region for six months, the public prosecutor said. UEFA has opened disciplinary proceedings, with the appointment of an “inspector” to investigate “suspicions of discriminatory behavior by Juventus supporters” during the match, which PSG won 2-1.

RIO DE JANEIRO: Gabriel Jesus and Philippe Coutinho were both left out of Brazil’s squad for upcoming friendlies against Ghana and Tunisia on Friday as Tite’s side warm up for the World Cup. The five-time world champions face Ghana in French city Le Havre on September 23 before taking on Tunisia four days later at the Parc des Princes. Jesus, who has impressed this season since joining Premier League leaders Arsenal from Manchester City, featured 11 times for Brazil in World Cup qualifying without scoring. The tournament gets underway in Qatar on November 20. Coutinho, who has scored 21 goals in 68 international appearances, has made a slow start to the campaign with Steven Gerrard’s struggling Aston Villa. Paris Saint-Germain star Neymar is unsurprisingly in the squad and could play at his home club ground in the Tunisia game, alongside PSG teammate Marquinhos. Brazil will start their bid for a sixth World Cup against Serbia on November 24 in Lusail, with further Group G games against Switzerland and Cameroon.

MADRID: Barcelona’s summer asset sale allowed them to lift their salary cap from minus 144.3 million euros ($144.8 million) in March to a positive balance of 656.4 million by September, La Liga reported Friday. The Spanish league made public the salary limits available to teams after the summer transfer window. The figures reveal the complete transformation of Barcelona’s finances and the huge divide between the richest clubs and the rest. Barcelona spent some 153 million euros on transfer fees alone as they splurged on a platoon of stars including Robert Lewandowski, Raphinha and Jules Kounde and free agents Andreas Christensen and Franck Kessie, but took in far more by selling future rights. The club sold 25 percent of their domestic television rights for the next quarter of a century to US investment firm Sixth Street for around 400 million euros and just under 50 percent of Barca Studios, which manages the club’s digital business and audiovisual productions, to two investors for 200 million euros. La Liga updates the salary cap, based on the difference between revenue and costs, several times each season. The cap specifies the amount clubs can spend on players, head coach, assistant coach and the first-team fitness coach as well as subsidiaries and youth academies. Real Madrid continue to lead with a cap of 683.4 million euros, down from 739 million euros last March. Barcelona are now just behind. There is a significant gap to Atletico Madrid, who are third, on 341 million euros with Sevilla next on almost 200 million euros. Eight clubs have caps of 52 million euros or less. Real Madrid’s salary cap is bigger than the total for the 12 clubs with the smallest caps added together.