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John Higgins has found it tough going at the Barbican in recent years (Picture: Getty Images) John Higgins admits that a poor run of results at the UK Championship leaves him expecting the worst when games go close in York. The Wizard of Wishaw is a three-time UK champion, so it seems absurd to suggest he has a poor record in the event, but recent years have been underwhelming for him at the Barbican. The last of his three triumphs came in 2010 and since then he has not been beyond the quarter-finals of the UK Championship and hasn’t been to the last eight since 2019. He gets his latest campaign underway on Saturday evening against Ben Woollaston and admits he struggles to get excited to go to a venue where he has struggled for wins. ‘I wouldn’t go as strong as to say dreading it, but it’s a tournament that doesn’t really get me excited, because I’ve had so many poor performances at the Barbican,’ said Higgins. ‘It doesn’t seem to be a good venue for myself.’ The 50-year-old feels like he has lost a lot of tight matches at the UK Championship and despite being known as having one of the great temperaments in snooker, he feels like a defeat is coming if he goes to a deciding frame. ‘It’s maybe a little bit of everything, a little bit of feeling, a little bit of where you stay sometimes,’ he said of his York troubles. Higgins reached the International Championship final this month, losing to Wu Yize (Picture: Getty Images) ‘I just seem to have lost on a lot of deciders in the last little while and it’s as if that’s always going to happen. You get to five-each and I’ve got a chance and then I’m thinking bad thoughts, thinking “here we go again” and then it happens again. ‘It just seems to be quite a poor event for myself.’ Higgins was beaten by Judd Trump in a deciding frame last year, but that was actually his first loss in a York decider since 2021. Five of the Wizard’s last 10 defeats at the UK Championship have come in deciding frames. John Higgins' last 10 UK Championship defeats 2024: 6-5 Judd Trump Last 16 2023: 6-3 Zhou Yuelong Last 16 2022: 6-4 Tom Ford Last 32 2021: 6-5 Zhao Xintong Last 32 2020: 6-2 Zhou Yuelong Last 16 2019: 6-3 Yan Bingtao Quarter-final 2018: 6-5 Alan McManus Last 64 2017: 6-5 Mark King Last 16 2016: 6-5 Mark Selby Quarter-final 2015: 6-5 Neil Robertson Quarter-final Higgins arrives at York this year after a good few months on the table, which see him ranked number six in the world at 50 years old. He won the World Open and Tour Championship at the back end of last season and, while he hasn’t lifted silverware yet this campaign, he reached the International Championship final and British Open semis. Still highly motivated to add to his tally of 33 ranking titles, the Wizard is installing a home gym to keep his fitness levels up in his sixth decade. ‘It has got me down a little bit because I’ve put a lot of my weight back on that I’d lost,’ he said. ‘So I’ve got a gym just getting built at the house to just give me a little bit more motivation to try and stay a little bit fitter again. Higgins’ last UK Championship title came 15 years ago (Picture: Getty Images) ‘Hopefully that can help you with your mental attitude to the game as well. So I’ll try and get a little bit fitter again and hopefully that can give you a bit of a boost as well.’ Higgins takes on Woollaston in the last 32 on Saturday at 7pm, boasting a healthy 6-1 lead over the Englishman in their head-to-head in all competitions. Woollaston hasn’t beaten the Wizard for over 10 years, but is coming off two good wins in qualifying over Liu Hongyu and Joe O’Connor. Comment now Comments Add Metro as a Preferred Source on Google Add as preferred source

Luigi Cucu and Costela Soare both of Smethwick, Sandwell, were arrested in March 2023 for their roles in exploiting the women. (Picture: West Midlands Police) A couple have been jailed after they were found guilty of running a brothel and human trafficking ring which trapped more than a dozen women in modern slavery. Luigi Cucu, 46, and Costela Soare, 37, of Smethwick near Birmingham, exploited 14 women between 2018 and 2023. One victim, who was trafficked to the UK in 2015, was physically and verbally abused, introduced to abusing drugs which resulted in her accumulating large debts and controlled financially. She was denied medical care and forced to work 20-hour days. Another victim was severely malnourished, as she did not have enough funds to buy food, and her bones were protruding from her skin. Sign up for all of the latest stories Start your day informed with Metro's News Updates newsletter or get Breaking News alerts the moment it happens. Police launched a three-year investigation into the couple, after they discovered online posts advertising women for prostitution. After a warrant, the pair were arrested in March 2023. Officers from the West Midlands Police Major Crime Team found that the couple had profited significantly from their exploitation, earning an estimated £734,400 by selling sexual services to men across the country. Cucu was charged with arranging or facilitating the travel of a person for exploitation, along with controlling prostitution for financial gain. After pleading guilty at Wolverhampton Crown Court on November 21, he was sentenced to nine years and seven months in prison. Soare also plead guilty to controlling prostitution for gain and was jailed for three years and two months. Leading the investigation Detective Constable Mahadi Hasan, from the Major Crime Team, said: ‘We’ve worked hard to bring these charges against both Cucu and Soare. ‘It’s been a very in-depth and thorough investigation over the course of three years to comb through evidence to piece together the couple’s crimes and the abuse their victims went through. ‘We’ve supported and safeguarded the victims and I’m glad that both Cucu and Soare have now been put behind bars for their crimes.’ Find out how to spot the signs of modern slavery and human trafficking and how to make a report here. Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk. For more stories like this, check our news page. Comment now Comments Add Metro as a Preferred Source on Google Add as preferred source

Adrian Sutil raced in F1 from 2007 to 2014 and was good friends with Lewis Hamilton (Photo: Getty) Former Formula 1 driver Adrian Sutil has been arrested on suspicion of fraud and embezzlement during an international raid, according to reports in Germany. Bild reports that Sutil, who raced in F1 from 2007 to 2014, was detained on Thursday morning by German police. Sutil was arrested as part of a raid that took place simultaneously at three addresses in Monaco, Switzerland and Sindelfingen in Germany, with the 42-year-old found at the latter. A spokesperson for the Stuttgart public prosecutor’s office said: ‘Several properties were searched in cooperation with the Baden-Wurttemberg State Criminal Police Office.’ According to investigators, Sutil is suspected of ‘joint fraud in a particularly serious case and joint embezzlement’. An arrest warrant had been issued for the German, who it is now said is in pre-trial detention in a Baden-Württemberg prison. At the time of writing, the former motorsport star and his lawyer have not commented publicly on the matter. During his F1 career, Sutil raced for Skyker, Force India and Sauber, competing in 128 grand prix and holds the unwanted record of most career starts without a podium, a record he re-inherited this year after Nico Hulkenberg’s shock podium at the British Grand Prix. Sutil raced for Spyker, Force India and Sauber and was reserve driver for Williams (Photo: Getty) Since leaving the sport, his motor racing career has been non-existent bar competing in the Ferrari Challenge Europe series in 2022 and 2023. This is not Sutil’s first brush with the law however, with a previous controversy almost ending his F1 career back in 2011. Whilst at a Shanghai nightclub, celebrating Lewis Hamilton’s victory at the Chinese Grand Prix, Sutil was involved in an incident that left Lotus team executive Eric Lux with injuries from a champagne glass. The German holds the record for most F1 starts without a podium (Photo: Getty) Sutil said he did not mean to cause the injuries, but was later convicted of causing grievous bodily harm and given an 18-month suspended sentence and a €200,000 (£175,000) fine. The incident played a part in the driver losing his seat at Force India for the 2012 season but he returned to the grid the following year. At the time, Sutil and Hamilton were good friends and the seven-timeworld champion was named as a defence witness for the case, but he did not appear at court, instead providing a written statement to say he did not see the incident. Sutil subsequently ended their friendship, saying Hamilton was ‘not a man’ before adding: ‘Lewis is a coward, I don’t want to be friends with someone like that.’ As for matters on the track, the 2025 F1 season is coming to an end, with Britain’s Lando Norris having the chance to be crowned champion on Sunday at the Qatar Grand Prix. For more stories like this, check our sport page. Follow Metro Sport for the latest news on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Comment now Comments Add Metro as a Preferred Source on Google Add as preferred source

Harper’s parents knew something was seriously wrong (Picture: Jam Press/@hope.4.harper) In July this year, two-year-old Harper Gibson’s parents noticed that the toddler was a little more tired than usual and could tell that their little girl wasn’t ‘quite herself’. ‘It was tiny things that, at first, didn’t seem like much,’ her father, George, explains. ‘We made several trips to the GP and A&E, each time being told it was tonsillitis or an ear infection.’ Although Harper was prescribed antibiotics, they did nothing to help – and, as time went on, her worried mum and dad couldn’t shake the feeling something was wrong. ‘Every visit ended the same way – reassurances that she’d be fine,’ George adds. ‘But inside, we both knew something wasn’t right.’ Just a month later, the family received the devastating news that Harper actaully had medulloblastoma, the second most common brain tumour in children, which is potentially life-threatening and sees 52 diagnoses each year. Her mother Laura, and dad George, from Staffordshire, only managed to the root of their daughter’s condition after a friend suggested a routine eye-test after noticing Harper had a lazy eye, so they took her to their local optician. Harper has been positive throughout her whole cancer journey (Picture: Jam Press/@hope.4.harper) ‘It’s that instinct parents have; you know your child better than anyone, and we could feel something deeper was wrong,’ George says. ‘The Specsavers team in Safford were incredible. ‘They were calm but serious, and when the optician stopped the test halfway through and explained that something didn’t look right, everything changed.’ Within minutes, they were referred to a local hospital, where scans found a 1.5 square-inch mass on Harper’s brain, with a large amount of fluid at the front. The litttle girl was quickly transferred to Birmingham Children’s Hospital for specialist treatment, and within two days of the eye test, on 14 August, she was undergoing brain surgery to remove the tumour and find out whether it was cancerous or benign. ‘Waiting through that surgery felt like a lifetime. You sit there as a parent, knowing there’s absolutely nothing you can do but hope,’ recalls George. While the operation was a success, just a week later the family were back in the hospital nervously waiting for the results. ‘We heard the words that will stay with us forever: the tumour was cancerous,’ George recalls. ‘No parent is ever prepared for that moment. https://www.instagram.com/p/DReG0VpjflN/?img_index=4 ‘It’s a kind of pain that rips through you in silence. You want to scream, cry, do anything to take it away from them, but you can’t. ‘That night, we both remember feeling like the world had stopped. Everything that used to matter suddenly meant nothing.’ Within days Harper, now three, had begun chemotherapy treatment with the oncology team, but her parents admit it has been hard to watch their little girl go through so much. ‘Before all of this, Harper was full of energy and mischief, a proper little character,’ says George. ‘She loves her doggy BearBear, dancing around the living room, and running circles around us. ‘She was the kind of child who made everyone around her smile. To see that light fade, and to see her hooked up to machines and unable to play, is breaking us. ‘You spend your life protecting your child from harm, then suddenly you’re powerless, watching them go through something no one should have to face.’ Medulloblastoma Medulloblastoma is the second most common brain tumour in children. It’s the most common malignant (high grade) children’s brain tumour. It develops at the back of the brain and is more likely to grow quickly, as well as spread to other areas of the brain and spinal chord. Your child might have symptoms for a few weeks or months before they are diagnosed with medulloblastoma. Many symptoms are general and non specific. Some are similar to less serious childhood illnesses. Symptoms might include: headaches in…