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Barcelona crashed out of the Champions League Wednesday after being stunned by Atletico Madrid at the quarterfinal stage. The reigning champion, which led 2-1 from the first leg, was beaten 2-0 in Madrid and sent packing 3-2 on aggregate. Antoine Griezmann scored twice to send Atletico through to the semifinals and end Barcelona's hopes of becoming the first team to retain the Champions League title. Only once in the past eight seasons had Barcelona failed to reach the semifinal stage of the competition -- that was back in 2014 when it was knocked out in the last eight by Atletico. The Vicente Calderon errupts as @AntoGriezmann heads @atletienglish ahead against @FCBarcelona . #AtletiFCB #UCL https://t.co/f9RkUEOnb9 — BT Sport Football (@btsportfootball) 13 April 2016 Holders tumble No team has ever successfully defended its Champions League title but this year was supposed to be different. Only a few weeks ago Barcelona was playing football...

Maria Sharapova hit out at some media accounts of her doping case that she termed "wrong" in an open letter to her fans on Facebook on Friday. Maria Sharapova speaks to the media announcing a failed drug test after the Australian Open during a press conference today at The LA Hotel Downtown. (Jayne Kamin-Oncea-USA TODAY Sports) Sharapova, who tested positive for the banned drug meldonium at the Australian Open in January, is facing a suspension of up to four years by the International Tennis Federation (ITF) and has already lost numerous sponsorships in the aftermath. The former world number one thanked her fans for their "tremendous outpouring of support" before launching into a critique of what she believed were some inaccurate reports. "A report said that I had been warned five times about the upcoming ban on the medicine I was taking. That is not true and it never happened," Sharapova wrote. The 28-year-old Russian said she was m...

The jury decided to award Erin Andrews $55 million on Monday, due to her lawsuit over a 2008 peeping Tom video of the sportscaster shot at a Nashville Marriott at Vanderbilt University. Sportscaster and TV host Erin Andrews sued a Nashville Marriott franchise owner for $75 million, saying the hotel was negligent in allowing a man who stalked her to stay in a room next to hers. According to reporter Jesse Knutson, the jury found that the hotel operator, owner and Michael Barrett, the man who shot the videos, all partially responsible. The hotel operator, hotel owner, and Michael Barrett were all found at fault by the jury #ErinAndrews — Jesse Knutson (@NC5_JKnutson) 7 Maret 2016 The jury declared Barrett 51 percent liable, so he is on the hook for more than $28 million. The hotel's ownership group was found 49 percent liable, so they will have to pay more than $26 million. Soon after the decision was announced, Andrews expressed her gratitude to the court a...

Maria Sharapova, the world's richest female athlete, will be suspended from tennis after she admitted to failing a drug test at the Australian Open in January. A sombre looking Sharapova, speaking at a press conference in Los Angeles Monday, said she'd been taking the drug, meldonium, since 2006 and didn't realize it was declared a banned substance by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) at the start of 2016. The International Tennis Federation, about an hour after her admission, then said on its website that the 28-year old would be provisionally banned from March 12 "pending determination of the case." The usual penalty for first-time offenders is two years. The failed drug test came on January 26 -- after Sharapova lost to Serena Williams in the quarterfinals -- and she was charged with an anti-doping violation on March 2, the governing body additionally said. There was much speculation that Sharapova's Monday briefing with reporters...

A rare mechanical failure was happened to Lewis Hamilton's Mercedes on Friday as Formula One teams wrapped up pre-season testing in Barcelona with Ferrari back on top of the timesheets. Formula One - Barcelona tests - Barcelona-Catalunya racetrack, Montmelo, Barcelona, Spain - 4/3/16.Mercedes F1 driver Lewis Hamilton drives. (Reuters/Albert Gea) "I'm kind of glad I broke the car at the end of my final run today because it's better to have found something now than in Melbourne," said the triple world champion, who completed 69 laps in the morning. Mercedes, whose cars have pounded out 1,294 laps of the Circuit de Catalunya, said a transmission problem was to blame. The sport's dominant team have otherwise enjoyed relentless reliability over the eight days of testing with Hamilton and German team mate Nico Rosberg completing the equivalent of nearly 20 race d...

FIFA must make the 2026 World Cup bidding process "absolutely bullet-proof" because the entire organisation's credibility is at stake, new president Gianni Infantino said on Friday. Newly elected FIFA President Gianni Infantino attends a news conference during the Extraordinary FIFA Congress in Zurich, Switzerland February 26, 2016. (Reuters/Ruben Sprich) Infantino, elected Fifa boss last week, hopes to start 2026 bidding within three months after it was delayed by the wide-reaching corruption scandal that rocked the governing body last year. "We have to get the 2026 bidding process absolutely right," Infantino told the BBC. "It's certainly the commitment that I want to give; that I will do everything I can to make sure that this happens because I think that the credibility of FI...

New Zealander middle-distance runner Nick Willis and his wife already have a toddler, and they're looking to add to their family. Concern over the Zika virus makes the plans have to wait. American athlete Hope Solo, goalie for the U.S. women’s national soccer team, says, regarding Zika virus fears, “All I can do is speak for myself. If the Olympics were today, I would not go.” (AP Photo/Tony Gutierrez, File) Willis, the 2008 Olympic silver medalist in the 1,500 meters, hopes to compete this summer at the games in Rio de Janeiro. Wife Sierra is one of his coaches. "We've had a lot of conversations about the Zika virus. ... We have a 2 1/2-year-old son, my wife and I, and we'd like to add to that family and grow it," Willis said. "The biggest impact, I suppose, is we've decided not to try to get pregnant now." Willis, 32, suggested that perhaps he'd consider freezing his sperm until the...

Nike ends its endorsement on Manny Pacquiao due to his latest disparaging comment about gay. It may not be the only endorsement Pacquiao loses, even as he and promoter Bob Arum scramble to contain the damage done by a television interview in the Philippines in which the boxer said gay people "are worse than animals." "What he's saying is diametrically opposed to what I believe," said Arum, who is promoting Pacquiao's upcoming fight with Timothy Bradley. "I'm in favor of gay rights and same sex marriage. I'm apologetic personally to the gay movement in the United States." Nike issued a brief statement Wednesday saying it was severing its ties with the boxer over his comments about gays. The company said it no longer will have any business dealings with the boxer. "We find Manny Pacquiao's comments abhorrent," the statement said. "Nike strongly opposes discrimination of any kind and has a long history of supp...

Please meet fencer Ibtihaj Muhammad. She hasn't earned an Olympic medal just yet, but is already making history. The 30-year-old Maplewood, New Jersey, native will be the first U.S. athlete to compete in the Olympic Games in a hijab, a headscarf worn by some Muslim women to show modesty. It's been quite a few days for Muhammad. Last week, she clenched a spot on the U.S. Olympic team during an event in Athens, Greece. And not to bury the lede, but President Barack Obama gave her a shout-out on Wednesday while delivering a speech at a mosque in Baltimore. Obama asked Muhammad to stand up for a round of applause and gave her some words of encouragement. "Bring home the gold... No pressure," he said. The three-time All-American from Duke University was one of several Muslim community leaders who sat down with Obama for a roundtable discussion about the state of Islam and Islamophobia in the United States before his speech. "It's a struggle to be a Mus...

Has not been offered a new contract, Chelsea captain and defender John Terry, will leave the club at the end of the season. The 35-year-old defender, who joined the club at the age of 14, has won four Premier League titles, five FA Cups and the Champions League with the Blues. "Ideally I would have loved to stay, but the club's moving in a different direction," he said. However, a club spokesman said later on Sunday that Terry could yet be offered a new deal. Terry has played 696 times for Chelsea and hopes to continue his career, but not with another English club. 'Channels of dialogue open' Guus Hiddink, who replaced the sacked Jose Mourinho in December, is in charge of the Blues until the end of the season. "They said that when the new manager comes in, things might change," Terry said after Chelsea's FA Cup win at MK Dons. "It's a no at the minute. I needed to know now like I have done every January and sometimes it takes ...

Real Madrid are still table toppers when it comes to earnings even they may not have won a league title since the 2011-12 season. Figures calculated by accountants Deloitte, published Thursday, show that the Spanish giants are the highest-earning football club in the world for the 11th year running. During 2014-15, "Los Blancos" raked in $628.3 million in revenue, narrowly ahead of bitter La Liga rival Barcelona who came in second with $610.7 million. The Catalan club move up a place ahead of Manchester United whose income totaled $565.7 last year, but the overall trend for English Premier League clubs is upwards with a staggering 17 English teams making the top 30. This number looks is set to rise with the introduction of next season's new $8 billion television rights deal. The size of the TV deal, combined with Manchester United's new kit deal with Adidas -- worth a reported $117m per year -- has led Deloitte to predict the Red Devils will end Real Madri...