Two killed and 19 injured as sailing ship crashes into New York’s Brooklyn Bridge

Two people have been killed and 19 injured after a sailing ship crashed into the Brooklyn Bridge on New York City’s East River.

The Cuauhtémoc, a three-masted Mexican Navy ship, was carrying around 277 people when the collision occurred just before 9 p.m. on Saturday.

All three of the ship’s 147-foot-tall masts struck the bridge and snapped as the vessel appeared to be moving backward.

Videos and photos circulated online showed multiple sailors clinging to rigging high on the masts.

Bystanders on the Brooklyn waterfront caught the incident on video. The ship appeared to strike some type of scaffolding or gantry on the underside of the bridge, which can then be seen swinging. Debris could be seen falling toward the deck of the ship, including portions of the masts, lights and rigging. The sails were not up at the time.

At a press conference, New York City Mayor Eric Adams confirmed 19 people were injured, five critically. Contrary to earlier reports, though, no one fell into the water.

How the British Red Cross tried to blow the whistle about conditions inside crisis-hit migrant detention centres

The Home Office failed to act on grave warnings from the British Red Cross about an unfolding crisis at two immigration centres, despite employing them to support migrants at the sites and report back, newly released documents reveal.

The documents – that the Home Office took more than two years to release – raise questions about officials’ handling of Western Jet Foil migrant processing centre in Dover and Manston centre in Kent in the autumn of 2022.

Emails, performance reports and letters sent by the Red Cross to senior Home Office officials between September and November 2022 – disclosed to The Independent under freedom of information laws – show how the charity raised “deeply troubling observations” at the two sites and tried to get the Home Office to act.

Among the issues raised were the confiscation of crucial medication, concerns about migrants’ access to urgent medical care, and people being housed in leaking tents without adequate sleeping provisions.

Red Cross staff were on site at both centres in the autumn of 2022, when a humanitarian crisis began. Manston became severely overcrowded, with migrants unable to access healthcare and forced to sleep on damp and mouldy wooden flooring.

As conditions spiralled out of control, the Home Office came under increasing pressure from MPs, unions and the media to act. The Kent site, which was designed to hold up to 1,600 people, was housing 4,000 at the end of October 2022. On 19th November, a detainee died.

After weeks of delay, on 22nd November, the government announced that Manston had been emptied.

This period coincided with the tumultuous 49-day Liz Truss premiership. The home secretary at the time, Suella Braverman, was forced to resign on 19 October for using her personal email, resulting in Grant Shapps taking up the position for six days, until Ms Braverman returned on 25 October when Rishi Sunak became prime minister.

Documents show that the security situation became so concerning that the Red Cross decided to withdraw completely from Western Jet Foil, a smaller processing site that can house up to 250 migrants. Just two weeks after this, far-right extremist Andrew Leak firebombed the facility and later killed himself at a nearby petrol station.

Red Cross staff also attempted to contact the Home Office’s whistleblowing email address in late October but received a response saying the service would not accept “correspondence from an external source”.

An inquiry into the crisis at Manston processing centre is underway to establish what went wrong and why, though it is not clear whether this probe will cover Western Jet Foil.

The Red Cross programme, named the Channel Crossing pilot, was launched on 8 August 2022, with teams aiming to be at either Western Jet Foil or Manston sites for a few days each week. They would provide humanitarian support to the migrants on site, escalate problems to the contractors and Home Office, and regularly give feedback to civil servants about what was happening.

Both sites were being used as temporary holding facilities for small boat migrants who had just arrived in the UK. At the time, migrants should only have been held at these sites for no more than 24 hours.

By early September, the Red Cross teams were identifying concerns about Manston and Western Jet Foil and relaying these back to the Home Office, documents show. They pressed for the Home Office to provide better translation services at the sites, and to screen migrants for medical issues and vulnerabilities such as signs of modern slavery.

They told officials that clarity was needed to determine how migrants could get urgent medical care, and explained that some asylum seekers had had crucial medication confiscated.

They reported that staff at the site were making regular jokes about guessing the ages of young migrants, and there was widespread use of glance age assessments, the charity reported.

Later that month, the charity asked that the Home Office provide people with things to do, such as colouring books, magazines or toys to help dispel tensions and boredom at Manston, and they asked for more bed rolls and blankets so that people could sleep.

Conditions were getting worse and in late September the charity continued to press for action, concerned that people were being held far beyond the 24-hour limit at Manston. Numbers had now started to exceed capacity as more migrants arrived and weren’t moved out.

In a brief sent on 30 September, the Red Cross noted that the medical unit at Manston was being overwhelmed, with skin rashes and respiratory issues affecting more and more people.

“Conditions were generally poor with no dedicated accommodation; limited access to medical care; sanitary provisions, fresh air or good quality food. Staff we spoke to were well aware of the poor conditions with many expressing frustration that more wasn’t being done to make immediate improvements,” the report said.

The team had particular worries about block 10, a unit holding 50 or so families in two medium-sized halls. The buildings were mouldy, damp and poorly ventilated, the charity reported, and had no heating. Clean clothes, underwear and sanitary products were running low, people were complaining of respiratory problems and headaches, and were sleeping on the floor without blankets, the brief warned.

By early October, news about what was happening at Manston started filtering out, with the Prison Officers Association raising the alarm on the 6th. Their statement likened the situation “to a pressure cooker coming to the boil with a jammed release valve”.

Emails reveal that the day before this statement was issued, Red Cross staff were pushing for an urgent meeting with Home Office directors to address their concerns and to seek assurances that action was being taken to deal with the situation.

On 10 October, Red Cross teams at Western Jet Foil were reporting significant numbers of new arrivals, with staff tired and shouting at people. Tents had been put up overnight to increase capacity, some were leaking, and not all had sleeping mats.

A report about a visit to Western Jet Foil on 12 October reveals that Red Cross staff were told by the Border Force commander that up to 1,000 people were expected to attempt the Channel crossing that day as the weather was looking good. This was on top of the 325 people already being processed at Western Jet Foil.

Red Cross staff found that around 100 adult men were being held in the main holding area on benches or sitting on the floor, with some exhibiting “a state of agitation”.

At 1pm that day, immigration officers asked the Red Cross to vacate their on-site office so that they could undertake age assessments of the migrants. The report of the day continued: “The only option offered was an internal office within the holding area where 50 male detainees were shouting, acting aggressively towards security staff and jumping up and down on wooden benches. This was totally unsuitable”.

Describing the conditions, the Red Cross brief said: “Many of the detainees were in poor health with obvious lung infections and previously some BRC staff have reported flea/ insect bites. The presence of such numbers of confused, frustrated and in some cases, aggressive male detainees was very intimidating. There was a palpable air of unease among Border Force and Interforce security staff as more detainees arrived for processing and tempers were obviously short.”

At 1.30pm, the team decided to leave due to the “inherent potential dangers of the site” – and suspended their in-person work at the site two days later.

A day after the Western Jet Foil visit, the Red Cross’s director of refugee support sent a formal letter to three senior Home Office officials demanding urgent action at the Kent and Dover sites, in light of the department’s failure to act on the charity’s fortnightly reports.

The letter was sent as a follow-up to a meeting between the Red Cross and senior Home Office officials on the 11th.

The letter listed the team’s “deeply troubling observations” from their time at Manston and Western Jet Foil, warned that the government was at risk of breaching the Human Rights Act, and said they were probably detaining people unlawfully.

It was also accompanied by a letter sent by the Red Cross’s legal department to the Home Office’s legal department.

Despite an acknowledgment from the Clandestine Threats commander Dan O’Mahoney and attempts to arrange a further meeting, the Red Cross would not receive a formal response to their concerns for two weeks – two days after Manston was cleared of asylum seekers and the crisis had abated.

Among other concerns, the letter reported that staff were refusing to let people sleep when there were high arrival numbers, were removing individuals to isolation buses as a form of punishment, and acting rudely or insensitively towards migrants.

A week after the Red Cross sent the ultimatum letter, it emerged publicly that some migrants at Manston had been diagnosed with diphtheria, a contagious infection that affects the skin, nose and throat.

On receiving no substantial response to their 13th October letter, the Red Cross tried to whistleblow about their concerns and contacted the internal Home Office whistleblowing email address on 27th October.

A response from the whistleblowing email address on 9th November said that it would not accept “correspondence from an external source”.

As officials rushed to ease the overcrowding, a group of 11 asylum seekers were left at a central London station without accommodation after being taken out of Manston. The Home Office said at the time that they believed the migrants had accommodation with friends or family available to them.

Now battling accusations that she had ignored legal advice and blocked plans to use hotels to ease the overcrowding at Manston, Ms Braverman arrived at the immigration centre in a Chinook helicopter on 3rd November.

She also visited Western Jet Foil, which was by this point was reeling from a firebomb attack.

Having exhausted all avenues for escalation, on 11th November, chief executive of the Red Cross Mike Adamson wrote to senior Home Office officials, requesting urgent action once more.

The Red Cross finally got a formal response from Mr O’Mahoney on 24 November where he admitted that the “situation at Western Jet Foil and Manston has been really challenging over the last four months”. He explained: “We have been in a situation where the inflow of arrivals has outstripped the capability to move people into onward accommodation. This has presented us with real logistical issues.”

Alex Fraser, British Red Cross UK director for refugee support, said: “In 2022, the British Red Cross was asked by the Home Office to run a local pilot to provide humanitarian support to some of the men, women and children who had made the dangerous journey to cross the Channel in a small boat.

“We were extremely concerned about the humanitarian situation at Western Jet Foil and Manston and we made this clear at the time. No one should experience overcrowded accommodation that puts them at risk of disease and potentially being detained unlawfully. We know from our work supporting people in similar temporary accommodation what a damaging impact it can have on them.

 “The serious problems at these two sites are indicative of the wider issues facing the asylum system. We need a more efficient, compassionate asylum system – one that treats people with humanity, dignity and processes their claims fairly.”

A Home Office spokesperson said: “The home secretary acted on the advice she was given to establish an independent inquiry into events at the Manston Short-Term Holding Facility between June and November 2022, in line with the commitments made by her predecessors, and on the terms agreed through the subsequent legal process.

“That inquiry will now proceed, and we are supporting it fully. It would be inappropriate to comment further whilst it is ongoing.”

Princess Eugenie tells of her childhood scoliosis surgery

Princess Eugenie has opened up about her experience of scoliosis surgery as a child amid her ongoing support for patients with spinal injuries.

The 35-year-old is patron of Horatio’s Garden, a charity that creates peaceful garden spaces for spinal injury patients, and visited the charity’s garden at Salisbury District Hospital this week.

In an interview with the Telegraph, she reflected on her spinal surgery at age 12, and expressed strong support for the charity’s work.

She said: “Horatio’s Garden’s mission is to reach every spinal injuries unit in the UK. I’m happy to be on that journey with them. It needs to happen.”

The princess, 12th in line to the throne, recalled her own recovery at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital in Stanmore, where she spent 10 days on her back after surgeons inserted titanium rods into her spine to correct curvature caused by scoliosis.

She told the Telegraph: “I couldn’t get out of bed or do anything for myself”, adding that she felt “very embarrassed” ahead of the operation and later struggled with the emotional impact of post-surgery care.

It was four months before she was able to return to school.

She also spoke about the emotional impact of surgery, recalling how it was her mother, Sarah, Duchess of York, who helped her see her surgical scar as a “badge of honour”.

Eugenie said: “She’d (Sarah) turn me around and say, ‘my daughter is superhuman, you’ve got to check out her scar’.”

At her 2018 wedding, Eugenie wore a dress that revealed her scar to raise awareness of scoliosis.

Eugenie said she often received messages from anxious parents whose children are about to undergo spinal surgery, and she makes a point of offering encouragement and reassurance to help them through the experience.

She added: “I tell them not to feel ashamed, not just of the scar but of the whole experience; bed pans, the lot.”

Now a working mother of two, Eugenie juggles charity work alongside her role at international gallery Hauser & Wirth and said she and sister Beatrice feel a strong sense of duty to help others because of guidance from their grandmother, the late Queen.

She said: “My mum always taught me that giving back to others is the most important thing in life.

“Bea and I feel very strongly about this.

“My grandmother’s sense of duty was also instilled from a young age; we watched my parents, my granny and other family members working very hard.”

NHS services for children and cancer patients axed to save money

NHS leaders are being forced to consider cutting hospital beds, closing hospitals, and even reducing services for children and cancer patients, a new study has claimed.

In a bid to meet savings targets from the government and reduce its £6.6 billion deficit, hospital leaders are now cutting or rationing patient care, according to think tank the King’s Fund.

A new study, published on Sunday, reveals NHS leaders said they have been forced to cut services thought of as not essential including hospital beds, community paediatric services, community phlebotomy, mental health support for cancer patients.

Hospital leaders also claimed they may have to consolidate hospital beds for services such as stroke or critical care beds.

The cuts come in a bid to meet government savings demands, called “eyewatering” by NHS leaders, to reduce the £6.6 billion deficit facing the NHS.

The government has been warned it could be repeating the mistakes made under a previous Labour government that led to the Mid Staffordshire scandal, in which between 400 and 1,200 patients, from January 2005 to March 2009, were estimated to have died as a result of poor care, by the Mid Staffordshire Hospitals trust.

A public inquiry into the scandal, led by Sir Robert Francis, revealed in 2013 that the failures were in part a consequence of the trust’s focus on achieving financial balance.

The King’s Fund report comes after hospital waiting lists in England rose for the first time in seven months to 7.42 treatments, 6.25 million patients, at the end of March. This is up from 7.40 million treatments and 6.24 million patients at the end of February.

Meanwhile, waiting lists for community services in England jumped from 1,077,514 in April 2024 to 1,090,356.

For community paediatric services, a service being cut by leaders according to the King’s Fund, waiting lists have risen from 125,603 in March 2024 to 171,092 children waiting for community paediatric services.

The King’s Fund report said: “Leaders also gave examples of non-core services they are reducing or cutting completely, such as community phlebotomy or community paediatrics, to maintain patient safety and focus on services that most impact clinical outcomes, often emergency or specialist treatments.

“An example of a non-core service, now seen as a ‘nice to have’, was clinical psychiatry to support people with cancer – a service that is key to patient experience but not considered core to clinical treatment.”

Responding to the report, Royal College of Nursing general secretary and chief executive Professor Nicola Ranger said: “It’s an appalling state of affairs when trust leaders talk about cutting frontline roles and closing beds to make savings. Nursing staff already face an almost impossible job as they try to keep patients safe amidst a workforce crisis and rising demand. The prospect of this situation worsening will fill every nursing professional with dread.

“This problem starts with the government, and ministers must stop putting arbitrary financial targets ahead of patient safety. That’s what happened at Mid Staffs, and I fear they could be set to repeat the mistakes of the past.

“This report shows there is no hope of delivering the government’s reforms whilst the NHS is simultaneously being asked to cut staff and services.”

As part of the drive, hospital leaders also told the think tank that services which are now being delivered by private providers at a cheaper rate than the NHS, could be cut altogether if the suppliers go bust or if the NHS cannot take these services back on.

“You cut fat, muscle, bone, and I think we’re at the bone point for most services and clinicians,” one leader told the think tank.

The report said hospital leaders are having to consider cutting hospital beds, or closing services, despite the UK having lower bed numbers compared to other high-income countries.

Earlier this month a survey of NHS trust leaders by NHS Providers revealed chiefs have already begun cutting frontline clinical posts in a bid to save money.

According to the King’s Fund in order to limit staffing costs providers are freezing recruitment of new staff, reducing overtime payments, and limiting their use of bank and agency staff.

A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: “This government invested an extra £26 billion through the Autumn Budget to fix the broken health and care system we inherited and make it fit for the future.”

“Through our Plan for Change, we are determined to tackle inefficiencies and drive-up productivity in the NHS.

“Investment must go hand in hand with reform, and the Secretary of State has told the NHS to go back to basics – halving the number of national targets and giving local leaders a clear direction to focus on the things that matter to patients.”

I’m an adult child of divorce – and we’re not talked about enough

The day my parents officially announced they were divorcing, I was newly 30. It was, if I’m completely honest, a relief. They had already been separated for about two years by this point, a long, acrimonious process that grew even more caustic after my mother moved out of our family home. Before the ink dried on their divorce papers, I cried.

Things were different for Ellie Coverdale, whose parents’ divorce shook her world when she turned 23. Now 36, Coverdale can still recall the precise moment she was told. “It was over a video call,” she says. “I was in my flat, I was working late. It felt surreal, like the ground shifted under me. I remember I was completely quiet, I didn’t know what to say. It took some time to accept it as a fact.”

Our experiences may differ, but the thing we have in common is that we were both fully fledged adults when our parents split up. It’s an aspect of divorce that is often overlooked – after all, adult children will have already flown the nest, may be settling down into their own relationships and careers, and may even have children of their own. But there is a growing number of us due to the increase in “silver splitters”, a term coined to describe couples divorcing in later life.

Figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show that divorces among people aged 65 and over have been steadily increasing for the past two decades. In 2021, one in four divorces took place after the age of 50. Some of the reasons behind “silver splits” are cause for celebration. For example, it’s undoubtedly a positive development that more women are becoming financially independent enough to leave an unhappy marriage – a far cry from the days when women had little choice but to stick things out in misery. Divorce has also become much more of a societal norm and, with the introduction of no-fault divorce in the UK in 2022, the path to less contentious separations has also been made clear.

But while there are plenty of resources for families of young children and teenagers navigating the choppy waters of divorce, adult children are usually left to their own devices. “There is an expectation that adult children will just get over it if their parents get divorced,” says Kate Daly, a specialist in all things divorce. “But it’s just not true – the impact on adult children is just as big as it would’ve been had they been kids when their parents made this decision.”

Daly, who co-founded separation service Amicable, explains that some things stay the same no matter how old children are when their parents split, such as how to navigate birthdays, holidays, weddings and other life events after the fact. Parents with younger children also feel more of a need to shelter them from the more contentious aspects of divorce, whereas those with adult children feel like they should be able to handle the darker side of things.

The emotional aftermath of my parents’ divorce left me reeling. One moment I was re-evaluating every relationship I’d ever had, wondering if my own marriage was doomed. The next moment I was trying to push my feelings aside to focus on my work and setting goals for my future. My younger sister found the news especially difficult. I imagined myself as her buoy, keeping her afloat among the crashing waves of turmoil. The storm went on, and on, and on. It is only now, nearly three years later, that I feel like I’m on the other side of it, and I can’t help but wonder how other adult children cope with it.

Coverdale says her parents’ divorce brought up a lot of questions about her childhood, despite sensing “constant tension” between them as she was growing up. “They weren’t openly unhappy,” she says, but recalls “lots of silence, small arguments, misunderstandings – like if they were not on the same page. It felt like they were more like roommates than a couple.”

“We hear from a lot of people who question their entire childhood when their parents announce a divorce,” Daly says. “Some even start to question their own relationships, because they’re not sure what a happy relationship looks like anymore. If there are grandchildren involved, more questions arise: how do you tell them that Grandpa and Grandma aren’t living together anymore? What about inviting them to birthday parties and Christmas if they don’t want to see each other? Are they getting enough time with the children individually? Is it fair?”

My childhood until the age of 10 was, for the most part, a happy one. But after that, the cracks in my parents’ marriage began to reveal themselves. They tried to plaster them over with religion, becoming active members of a local evangelical church, but the cracks grew into chasms that not even a divine miracle could heal. But instead of conceding that the relationship was over, my parents stubbornly stayed together, believing that it would be better for me and my siblings if they held out.

The idea of “staying together for the kids” has long been the source of unhappy, yet enduring marriages. But therapist Mandy Saligari says this approach can cause more harm than good. The unspoken agreement here is this: if parents are to sacrifice their happiness so their kids have a good childhood, their children had better be worth it – which is a wholly unfair position to put them in.

“Staying together for the benefit of the children means that parents put their happiness on hold because they ‘want their children to be happy’, which is a tremendous pressure to place on your children if you’re not modelling that behaviour yourself,” she explains.

One of the reasons some parents stay together when they don’t want to is the belief that the traditional nuclear family unit is their best chance at – to put it bluntly – not messing up their children. But Saligari says that children pick up way more than most parents think they do, even learning attachment styles between the ages of nought to six that will go on to shape their own future relationships.

“If Mum and Dad are pretending to be happy through gritted teeth and they go, ‘No, nothing to see here’, their child is taught to distrust their instincts because they feel something is wrong but are told everything’s fine,” explains Saligari. “This means that when they go on to form relationships, they’re likely to have an anxious attachment or anxious-avoidant style because they will not trust their gut instinct. ‘I like this bloke, we seem to be happy – but are we?’”

Thankfully, modern developments in the divorce process, as well as more access to support for families, means that parents have less reason to stay in a relationship for the sake of the kids. My parents, and other silver splitters, were part of a generation that saw divorce as a great failure and felt pressure to make things work even when they were desperately unhappy. At the end of the day, everyone suffered. I can’t help but look at friends whose parents split up when they were between the ages of 13 and 15, and wishing mine had done the same. While there is no “good” time for parents to divorce, there are ways to ensure it does the least amount of harm possible to all involved, says Saligari.

“How a divorce is handled is what damages children, not the divorce itself,” she explains. “So if parents get involved in blame and ask children to take sides, that’s when the divorce becomes toxic. If your children are genuinely your priority, then put your ego aside and listen to one another, and try, as adults, to come to some kind of decision. Either work through whatever’s going on, with or without help, or come to a peaceful decision that the relationship is over.

“Children, no matter how old they are, just need clarity. They need to know that Mum and Dad are as happy as can be, given that ‘happy’ is a relative term. Then they’re able to take that responsibility for themselves and make up their own mind about their parents.”

I often wonder what my life would have looked like had my parents called it quits when I was younger. I’m not alone, either.

“Sometimes I wish they had done it earlier,” Coverdale tells me, with a sigh. “Maybe we all could have been happier sooner.”

Celebration villa breaks: find your perfect luxury getaway

If you’re planning a milestone birthday, a big anniversary, or a long-awaited reunion, a villa holiday is hard to beat. Imagine clinking glasses on a rooftop terrace at sunset or gathering loved ones around a candlelit garden table for a leisurely dinner under the night sky.

These special occasions deserve much more than booking out a busy hotel, and nothing beats having your own sun-drenched sanctuary where you have the space and privacy to celebrate in style. Whether you’re heading to Marrakech in the shadow of the Atlas Mountains, to the rolling hills of Tuscany, or a tropical oasis further afield, Villas are the perfect home-away-from-home for celebrating something, or someone, special.

CV Villas’ luxurious ABOVE collection offers the perfect backdrop for unforgettable moments – think breathtaking settings, total privacy, and the kind of comfort and space that makes everyone feel at home. All come with stunning interiors, sweeping views as far as the eye can see, and enviable locations in some of the world’s most sought-after spots. Each villa is hand-picked by dedicated CV Villa specialists, who are experts in helping people craft their dream getaway. Many come with their own infinity pools, breathtaking views and large alfresco dining areas, perfect for spending quality time together during life’s most important moments. Villas aren’t just places to stay, they’re a big part of the celebration itself.

From the moment you book your stay to your arrival back home, the CV Villas Concierge team is there to make everything as seamless and stress-free as possible. They are dedicated to looking after you and your party before and throughout your holiday so that you can focus on the things that really matter, like spending quality time together and celebrating without having to worry about the minor details. The team tailors each trip to exactly what you’re after, whether you’re looking to book a private boat day or need to organise a surprise celebration dinner, nothing is too much trouble. Many of the five-star villas even come with their own butlers and chefs so that you can be waited on hand and foot during your special getaway.

ABOVE villas are the epitome of luxury and come with designer interiors, infinity pools boasting panoramic ocean views, and terraces made for golden hour cocktails  – properties with serious star quality. What’s more, they’re located all around the world, from the sun-soaked shores of Spain and Greece to the palm-fringed beaches of far-flung Sri Lanka and beyond.

Sampling delicious local food is a big part of a holiday, but catering for a large group can often mean juggling different requests and palates. Luckily for you, many of these luxury villas come with their very own in-villa chefs – perfect for when you’d rather toast the moment with a glass of fizz than spend time flapping around in the kitchen. Instead, let your chef whip up multi-course meals morning till night, using the freshest local produce, all based on your personal tastes and dietary requirements, before tucking into it alfresco under the undisturbed starry night sky.

The little luxuries make a big difference to a bucket-list trip: daily housekeeping to keep things spic and span, spa treatments for when you need a little R&R, wine tastings for the adults, yoga sessions with epic views, and even round-the-clock babysitting. All of this can be arranged to make your stay feel even more indulgent.

Maison Emilion, France

This rustic French villa is practically made for wine lovers, aptly located amidst the rolling vineyards of Bordeaux. This six-bedroom hilltop hangout boasts views of the working vineyards from every angle, including from the heated pool and surrounding sunbeds. Wander into the nearby village of Saint-Émilion, then enjoy the included wine-tasting experience before settling into the garden for dinner with nothing but the glow of flickering candlelight and the moonlit sky.

Oleander, Corfu

It doesn’t get much more luxurious than Oleander in Corfu, a five-bedroom villa overlooking Avlaki Bay and the picturesque town of Kassiopi. It’s located high above the Ionian Sea and is the ideal villa for memorable summer celebrations. Soak up the sunshine from the infinity pool while enjoying views of Albania’s craggy Ceraunian Mountains, or hang out on the wrap-around terraces and communal outside dining areas. During peak season at Oleander, chef service is also included, so you can enjoy meals with your loved ones without even having to leave the villa.

Spirit of Son Fuster, Mallorca

Spirit of Son Fuster in Mallorca is hard to beat for large groups and multigenerational stays. This five-star bolthole is set in a stunning natural landscape at the foot of the Alaro twin mountains, right near the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Serra de Tramuntana, and is as secluded as it gets. This gorgeous ​​14th-century manor house sleeps twenty people across ten bedrooms and even has its own on-site spa and hammam where everyone can enjoy treatments in the dedicated treatment rooms. There’s even a private cinema room for movie nights and a well-stocked wine cellar filled with local vintage wines.

Masseria Giardini, Puglia

Masseria Giardini in Puglia is the height of luxury and the perfect home-away-from-home for families and large groups. It was built in 1750 and is surrounded by leafy olive groves and landscaped gardens curated by Chelsea Flower Show winners Urquhart & Hunt. Enjoy unparalleled views of the Canale Di Pirro Valley from this ten-bedroom farmhouse and spend days lazing around in the heated pool. This villa is an architectural masterpiece, with signature stone domed roofs and hand-carved stone baths in five of the ten bedrooms.

For more travel information and inspiration and to book your perfect villa getaway, visit CV Villas

Rahm hunts Scheffler in dramatic final round of PGA Championship

Scottie Scheffler is in position to clinch the third major title of his career after dominating the back nine at Quail Hollow on Saturday to open up a three-shot lead.

The world No 1 picked up five shots in the final five holes, making a mockery of the notorious last three known as the Green Mile. Scheffler produced a stunning eagle on 14 followed by birdies on 16, 17 and 18 to leave himself on the brink of a first PGA Championship title.

But there is plenty of quality and experience in the chasing pack, with Sweden’s Alex Noren three shots behind and Americans JT Poston and Davis Riley a futher shot adrift on seven under par. Jon Rahm lurks on six under, while Bryson DeChambeau and Matt Fitzpatrick begin this final round on five under.

Follow all the latest action from the PGA Championship third round below.

Why Palace’s victory provides hope for the future of English football

A good two hours after the final whistle at Wembley, Crystal Palace staff were still bringing crates of beer into the dressing room, as the players started to emerge. Manager Oliver Glasner had already told them inside that he long ago felt this was a “special group”, who could do “impossible things”. This victory was certainly something that felt so agonisingly out of reach for the club for so long. As such, some of the players were just buzzing from the euphoria, others were joyfully refreshed. Match-winning star Eberechi Eze had a huge smile as he strode out, proudly displaying his winner’s medal. Will Hughes was a few yards behind, bottle of Kopparberg in hand, singing the goalscorer’s name. Joel Ward, after what was one of his last games for the club, was displaying the FA Cup itself. Chairman Steve Parish was meanwhile with his young son, talking about what it means for everyone.

Some in the Palace contingent were by then able to admit the sheer terror they felt when the board showed 10 minutes stoppage time, and the idea that this could be an even closer and crueller way to lose it than in 1990 and 2016. That didn’t happen. Oliver Glasner’s team stayed resolute, not letting anything through.

The fans could then let it all out. The number of Palace supporters openly weeping was moving. On the tube from Wembley Park, some could be heard talking about “all those 0-0s on Boxing Day, rain on the Holmesdale”. It was a timely reminder of what football is supposed to be about, and also important for English football for other reasons.

On that, Glasner is a manager who players say is tough, and he can be difficult, but he offered some genuinely stirring words on that illuminating element of victory. The Austrian had been discussing some of the more technical aspects of the 1-0 win over Manchester City, when he stopped himself.

“The biggest achievement we can have, the biggest success we can have is not winning the trophy,” Glasner began. “It’s that we could give thousands of our supporters a moment for their lives. We can give them great times. Maybe they have problems at home, we give them hours and days they can forget all of this, and just be happy.

“This is the biggest achievement sportsmen can do. We did it for many, many people.”

This, to repeat a phrase commonly used on the day, is what it’s all about. It is not, if you wanted to extend that further, for state-owned clubs or investment funds to just accumulate trophies and parade them for political or financial capital.

And that is why there is an importance to this win beyond the euphoria that Palace enjoyed.

It has been written on these pages countless times that football – and especially English football – has been enduring an era of increasing financial disparity and declining unpredictability. The same wealthy clubs tend to win all of the time.

Even the comparable joy that Newcastle United had on winning the Carabao Cup was caveated by the fact it was made possible through the takeover of the Saudi sovereign wealth fund.

This season has admittedly felt more diverse and unpredictable, with a temporarily strong middle class that have competed for some one-off reasons. That had translated to the FA Cup, but there was this consistent concern that it would just end with the most predictable result possible: City winning again.

Palace did everything possible to ensure that didn’t happen. And the club finally lifted the FA Cup, their first ever major trophy, after 119 years and two lost finals. You only had to look across Wembley to see what it meant.

So while that was obviously the greatest moment in Palace’s history, it is also essential for English football. The game needs to show clubs can have hope. Palace can be an inspiration – and an example.

When you speak to people in football about the club, there is huge respect, but they don’t speak of any secret formula. There’s not Brighton’s analytics. Palace have actually built a fine modern team, in a slightly old-fashioned way.

The appointment of Glasner was obviously the key. You can see why Palace quoted Bayern Munich at least £30m for him last summer. Parish has since described it as “a moment in time”. They went for a brilliant coach on the up, whose career has also evolved in an old-fashioned way. Glasner has now won two valuable major trophies for lesser-resourced clubs, after the 2021-22 Europa League with Eintracht Frankfurt. That was another victory, he said, that “no one expected”.

Except maybe him, and his squad, given the belief he instilled. Palace fancied this. You could sense it around Wembley beforehand, that this was their day. Glasner is also particularly suited to the group.

Palace are famously sitting on one of the three most fertile areas for footballers in the world, in south London. And, although they often lose young talent to Chelsea, this squad has really maximised that talent.

Everyone now wants Eze. He is the pick of a brilliant young squad, complemented by astute signings. Dean Henderson, the man of the day, was a surprising signing when first made but a calculated upgrade in goal. Daichi Kamada put in everything. Daniel Munoz, the official man of the match, has brilliantly linked Glasner’s team together. There’s then that defence, which rivals now say is one of the best in the Premier League – and potentially Europe, where Palace are now going for the first time, through Europa League qualification.

Glasner has built the team on the robustness of Chris Richards, Marc Guehi and Maxence Lacroix. The Austrian smiled as he spoke about the “passion” they put into “sliding tackles”, adding “we had to defend at a top, top level”.

From that, Palace may also be one of the finest counter-attacking sides around. There is certainly a belief that the team could have qualified for Europe through the league had Adam Wharton been fit for more of the season.

All of this is amplified by a supreme spirit, which could be seen around the dressing room after the final, and that Glasner quickly intuited. It is also something amplified by the Christian beliefs of many of the players, who pray together a lot – especially the backline. That is something not always discussed, but is developing into a trend in the modern Premier League.

There is then that extra element that people in football enthuse about with Palace, that naturally has quasi-religious elements: the fans. They certainly enjoyed deliverance, salvation, rapture, whatever you want to call it.

Glasner said “you can see what you get with patience”. He made a point of mentioning the support that stayed with them during a difficult start to the season when they lost five of their first eight games and didn’t win until their ninth in late October.

“Then you deserve it, when you always stick together.”

There are few lessons there, and an example. There’s also inspiration. How couldn’t there be, from such joy? This really is what it’s all about.