MONACO (AP) — Monaco's bid for a Champions League spot next season could be boosted by the return of midfielder Paul Pogba.
The former France star recently returned to light training following a lengthy injury layoff due to a persistent left calf problem, and on Thursday he scored in a friendly match against Premier League team Brentford.
The 2018 World Cup winner Pogba joined Monaco on a two-year contract last summer but has played only about 30 minutes since making his debut at the end of November.
Monaco is sixth in Ligue 1 with seven rounds remaining. The top three qualify directly for next season's Champions League and the team finishing fourth goes through qualifying.
Coach Sébastien Pocognoli has turned Monaco's fortunes around and his side is on a six-game winning run and just three points behind third-place Marseille. Monaco hosts Marseille on April 5, after the international break.
Pogba scored in the World Cup final win over Croatia eight years ago, when he was considered among the best midfielders in the world.
He also dealt with thigh and ankle problems since joining Monaco, after more than two years out of the game in a career derailed by injuries, off-field problems and a doping ban.
He previously played for Juventus and Manchester United.
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FILE - France's Paul Pogba runs with the ball during an international friendly soccer match against Cote d'Ivoire at the Velodrome stadium in Marseille, France, March 25, 2022. (AP Photo/Daniel Cole, File)
MILAN (AP) — Italian authorities have impounded 20 million euros ($23 million) worth of property, artworks and financial assets in and around Florence that were allegedly purchased with money stolen from original Bond girl Ursula Andress, Italy’s financial police said in a statement on Thursday.
The seizures were the result of an investigation launched after Andress reported to Swiss authorities that she had been swindled out of assets by financial advisers.
The 90-year-old former Bond girl told Swiss newspaper Blick in January that she had been defrauded out of 18 million Swiss francs, approximately 20 million euros, by her longtime financial adviser over an eight-year period. The newspaper said the adviser had died in the meantime.
“I am still in shock,’’ Andress was quoted as saying. “I was deliberately chosen as a victim. For eight years, I was courted and wooed. They lied to me shamelessly and exploited my goodwill in a perfidious, indeed criminal, way in order to take everything from me. They took advantage of my age.’’
The stolen funds were invested in foreign companies, used to buy assets and then channeled through transactions designed to conceal their source, Italian authorities said.
They were traced to the purchase of 11 real estate properties, 14 plots of land cultivated as vineyards and olive groves, along with artworks and financial assets in Florence and the neighboring Tuscan countryside.
Authorities did not say if any arrests were made.
Swiss-born Andress is best known as the first Bond girl, Honey Ryder, in 1962’s “Dr. No,” which featured her memorable entrance emerging from the sea in a white bikini. She went on to work with Elvis Presley in “Fun in Acapulco” and Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin in “Four for Texas.” She later transitioned to a European cinema and television career, before retiring in the early 2000s.
FILE - Ursula Andress arrives for the screening of "Biutiful", at the 63rd international film festival, in Cannes, southern France, Monday, May 17, 2010. (AP Photo/Matt Sayles, File)
