Mercury içinde 2021-09-20 için içindekiler tablosu

PETER Tshiguvho’s journey to leading one of the biggest and most successful financial services companies in South Africa is a lesson in fortitude, foresight, and determination that circumstances do not define one. Self-belief in a better future is critical to success, he says. Before taking up his current position, Peter began his career in the financial services sector at Old Mutual as a trainee administration head, thereafter taking up a position as an assistant manager (sales support manager). After nearly 10 years with Old Mutual he moved on to Sage Life as a divisional manager, which was the beginning of his sales and distribution trajectory. There followed a variety of similar roles in different insurance companies, including companies like African Life, Ithala, Avbob and Absa Financial Services, progressing to senior…

Viwe Ndongeni-Ntlebi viwe.ndongeni@inl.co.za You probably know when it’s time to get a replacement for your worn out and outdated clothing items or when it’s time to change your old, uncomfortable shoes. But chances are it’s not that easy to detect when you should change your toothbrush. According to Dr Nosipho Mzobe from The SA Dental Association, a toothbrush should be changed after two to three months depending on the condition of the bristles. Other contributing factors can vary from one person to another depending on your preference, usage and health. September is National Oral Health Month, and dental experts are sharing a “hack” for a healthier mouth, which will only take a minute or two each day and can help you enjoy a longer life. Dental and oral health…

MAMA mia! Nineteen missed tackles as against five by the Aussies! The stats tell a story about the Boks’ debacle on Saturday. But not the whole story. As discussed last week, rugby is a matter of kop as much as brawn and skill. Kop was missing, even more than on the previous Saturday. The panel of experts on TV were bemused as anybody as to what is amiss with the Boks. Sixty percent of possession and territory, yet yielding only one try. A running crabwise by the threequarters so the wings were hemmed into the touchline. Some shocking handling. How does one explain it? Itchy powder in the jockstraps? Witchcraft? The panel of experts had no explanation. Nor did the panel of hearties with whom I watched from a venue…

MALCOLM MITCHELL | Hillcrest HAVING been retired for some time, I regularly listen to the SABC radio programme in the mornings between 7am and 9am. “With my tongue in my cheek” I suggest that during this morning traffic peak period, by far the most commonly used phrase on the radio is “another broken down truck blocking the road”. So far as I remember, a number of years ago a roadside survey revealed that of the heavy vehicles pulled off the road, about 70% or more of the trucks had either defective brakes, defective tyres, defective lights, defective steering, or a combination of these deficiencies. In the light of the fact that we in South Africa have the worst road safety record in the world, when do you think…

MOHAMED SAEED | Pietermaritzburg SINCE the emergence of coronavirus in December 2019, both young and old have been affected and sadly, many have succumbed to the virus. Through enormous research, funding and co-operation among scientists and biopharmaceutical manufacturers and regulators moving more swiftly than normal, the Covid-19 vaccine was approved for human use. This discovery of modern medical science, a well-meaning ingenuity, was comforting news after months of continuous concern. Initially, I was cautious about taking the vaccine, not because I am anti-science or believed the constant weird theories of anti-vaxxers being posted on social media; I was undecided about the choice of injection to take. Finally, after discussing with medical professionals, in August I took my first of two vaccine doses and a few days ago, I…

Karen Singh karen.singh@inl.co.za More than R2.3 million worth of pure heroin powder was seized in Glenwood by members of the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigation (Hawks) on Saturday. Hawks members from the Durban Serious Organised Crime Investigation team working together with Crime Intelligence and the Durban Metro Police Drug Team arrested a 47-year-old suspect for dealing in drugs. Hawks spokesperson Captain Simphiwe Mhlongo said police received information about a suspect who was distributing heroin in various places in the province. “An intelligence-driven operation was conducted at Glenwood and the suspect was caught red-handed carrying a bag leaving his place of residence. Police found packs of pure heroin powder to the street value of approximately R2 340 000.00,” he said. Mhlongo said the suspect was arrested and charged for dealing in…

Sakhiseni Nxumalo sakhiseni.nxumalo@inl.co.za Problems with the online registration system and the poor turn-out of youth at voting stations were among the concerns raised by different political parties in KwaZulu-Natal. Yesterday and on Saturday, the Electoral Commission of SA (IEC) held its final voter registration weekend for the November 1 local government elections. Political parties visited various voting stations across the province to encourage voters to register and to monitor the registration proceedings. The DA in KZN said that in many parts of Durban, the system was an issue with some voting stations not having manual capturing forms. “The first day was not a good day, however, the second day was far better with the system working. In many places I’ve been to, there was a very slow movement of people…

Peter Hain and Co were metaphorically ‘taking the knee’ decades ago HE WAS the scourge of privileged white sportsmen, administrators, politicians and fans in apartheid South Africa. How dare this upstart from a white middle class family in Johannesburg turn traitor against his own community! Despite threats of attacks and imprisonment, he was one of the architects of a militant direct action and political activism movement in exile that brought apartheid sports to its knees, depriving sports-mad white South Africans of any international competition in cricket and rugby in the five decades leading up to democracy in 1994. In the UK, Peter Hain and his fellow activists achieved this through the effective disruptive tactic of pitch invasions that were the bane of apartheid sport, especially in Britain, Australia and New…

TEL AVIV: Israeli forces yesterday caught the last two of six Palestinian militants who tunnelled out of a maximum security Israeli jail nearly two weeks ago. The two members of the Islamic Jihad militant group were apprehended before dawn from a house in the Palestinian city of Jenin in the occupied West Bank, Israeli Police Commissioner Yaakov Shabtai said. Palestinians see members of armed groups jailed by Israel as heroes in the struggle for statehood in the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem, territory Israel captured in the 1967 Middle East war. Israel considers them terrorists.…

A rebel group has claimed a series of mortar attacks launched on the airport of Bujumbura, Burundi’s economic capital, a day before President Evariste Ndayishimiye was due to fly out for the UN General Assembly in New York. The attacks, which did not claim any victims or cause damage, were heard as far away as the city centre late on Saturday. “We fired several shells towards the Bujumbura international airport,” RED-Tabara rebels tweeted. “We also had an hour-long exchange of fire with the military in one of the positions protecting the airport.” An airport official, who refused to be named, said he heard “shell explosions and the firing of automatic weapons” overnight. “We were really scared. There is no damage, a Kenya Airways plane even landed this morning without any…

Mediterranean nations must lead the way in addressing climate change, the Greek prime minister said, warning that the cost of doing nothing was unimaginable, with mankind possibly struggling to survive beyond the turn of the next century. Greece, Turkey, Cyprus and Spain were ravaged by wildfires and record high temperatures this summer, with scientists warning the region had turned into a “wildfire hot spot”. Germany, Turkey and China were pounded with devastating floods. “I no longer want to talk about climate change. I want to talk about the climate crisis, it’s already here,” Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said in an interview. “And in order to address it, we need horizontal policies which permeate every aspect of our economic and our social life.” A UN climate panel has warned that deadly…

comment by Wynona Louw wynona.louw@inl.co.za Have the Springboks’ two defeats against Australia rendered their 100th Test against New Zealand meaningless? At the weekend, the Boks produced one their poorest performances in recent years to fall to a 30-17 defeat against the Wallabies in Brisbane. Last week, they lost 28-26 in Gold Coast. Bok coach Jacques Nienaber after the game admitted that it was their worst performance in years after being comprehensively outplayed on Saturday. The Wallabies scored four tries to the Boks’ one as the South Africans produced another error-filled performance to not only lose their No 1 ranking, but they also all but killed their aspirations of winning the Rugby Championship. The result continued the Boks’ woeful record in Australia, where they have not won since 2013. After…

Argentina coach Mario Ledesma praised the performance of Santiago Carreras after the 23-year-old excelled for the Pumas in his new role as flyhalf against New Zealand in their Rugby Championship clash in Brisbane on Saturday. Carreras was shifted from fullback following an injury to Nicolas Sanchez in last week’s meeting with the All Blacks, and he did not disappoint despite Argentina slipping to a second successive loss against Ian Foster’s team. “It’s been a while already that we wanted to play him at No 10 and for different reasons we didn’t,” said Ledesma. “But we were pretty confident and he had a really good week in training, really good energy, very committed. “He was blocked a couple of times getting out of our half, but other than that I thought…

Herman Gibbs herman.gibbs@africannewsagency ORLANDO Pirates interim co-coach Mandla Ncikazi was a troubled man after his side’s flattering come-from-behind 3-1 win over Chippa at the Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium in the Eastern Cape on Saturday. “I wish we could have started better, but I am grateful we got the result,” said Ncikazi after the game. “If we can get a result with such a (average) performance, I can imagine if we play better than this, then the signs are positive. “We were clumsy, but I understand the processes, and that we as a team are going through some transformation. “There has been a change in leadership, and we can’t run away from that. We’re tweaking a few things but at the same time, we were struggling with scoring goals. “For a…

Matshelane Mamabolo ABOUT an hour after he had made a victorious return to the ring and lapping up the congratulations from family, friends and fans, Thomas Oosthuizen walked back to his dressing-room and stood in front of the mirror. “I still look pretty, hey,” Oosthuizen chuckled as his trainer Harry Ramogoadi cut off the bandages from his hands. Except for those bandages and the shorts he wore, an uninformed observer would not have told that “Tommy Gun” had just gone through eight rounds of a cruiserweight fight that he had won on a majority points decision against the Democratic Republic of Congo’s Youssouuf Mwanza. Still, like a child eager to hear what his dad’s thought of his showing, the former two-time world champion enquired of his trainer: “Coach, your honest…

Thami Magubane thami.magubane@inl.co.za Thousands of KwaZulu-Natal pupils who qualify for the government’s scholar transport programme are yet to be included in it because of budgetary constraints. In addition, due to the constraints on the programme and the number of available buses, 9 763 pupils who are in the programme are deemed as “overloads”. These revelations are contained in parliamentary replies from questions posed by the DA to the KZN departments of Transport and Education on the functioning of the Learner Transport programme and to the national Basic Education Department. In the response from the national department, it said in KZN there are 179 318 pupils that qualify to be transported. Of this amount, only 62 070 were currently being transported. The transportation of pupils is the responsibility…

A READER wrote in response to my question: what brings readers joy? “Your column regarding the ’process of life’ struck a resonant chord with me. I have an adult daughter working in the humanitarian field. She is home on a break. On Sunday we were driving past her old high school where she was so happy. The school had supported our family through difficult times. “I warned her to prepare for a nostalgic moment. “She replied quite candidly, that while she had been extremely happy at school, it would be sad for her as a 30-something young woman to long for her school days. “I realised I too felt the same. I had pride in my daughter for the career she has forged for herself and the good that she…

JOAN CAMP | Glenhills There is a municipal department that absolutely excels. Those dealing with plans for the northern sector, being the Plan Submission, Town Planning and Building Inspectorate divisions under the auspices of Selvan Naidoo, Marius Taljaard and Thejbehari Ramphal respectively, along with their incredibly dedicated, diligent and astute teams which supply service delivery of the highest calibre, extremely promptly. As a professional, I am extremely blessed being able to practise knowing that these highly efficient individuals process my applications with due diligence. This also applies to Avril from Registry.…

Robots are taking over jobs around the world in places where their human counterparts are aging the most rapidly. That is the conclusion of a new study that looked at demographic and industry-level data in 60 countries and found a powerful link between aging workforces – defined as the ratio of workers aged 56 and older, compared with those aged 21 to 55 – and robot use, focusing in particular on industrial settings. The research showed age alone accounted for 35% of the variation between countries in their adoption of robots, with those having older workers more likely to adopt the machines. “Aging is a huge part of the story” in robot adoption, said Daron Acemoglu, an economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who conducted the study with Pascual…

| Mercury Reporter The Constitutional Court announced yesterday that it will hand down its decision in the matter brought by the DA against the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) today. It said in a statement to the media that the judgment would be handed down electronically by circulation to the parties’ legal representatives by email and will be published by the Registrar on the Constitutional Court’s website and released to the Southern African Legal Information Institute (SAFLII). The court is dealing with an application brought by the DA to challenge the IEC’s decision to reopen the candidate nomination process for the November 1 local government elections. The IEC made the decision after the Concourt ruled that the elections had to be held between October and November 1 this…

Siphokazi Vuso siphokazi.vuso@inl.co.za A criminal docket has been opened after a group of people protested against vaccines at the Sea Point swimming pool in Cape Town on Saturday. The group, who were not wearing masks, carried placards reading “stop medical apartheid” and “you can stick your new world order up your *ss”, calling on people to “say no to the experimental jab”. Police spokesperson Joseph Swartbooi said a case docket in terms of the Disaster Management Act (DMA) will be opened, as the demonstration was unlawful. “The protesters were peaceful and we confirm no damages or injuries were reported as Sea Point police monitored the movement of the protesters. “A case docket (DMA) will be opened as the march was illegal,” he said. The demonstration was led by the World…

Ntombi Nkosi and Baldwin Ndaba The family of Joburg mayor, Jolidee Matongo, have said they are devastated by his sudden death. Matongo, 46, died in a horror crash on the Golden Highway. His two protectors were rushed to a hospital. The crash also claimed the life of the driver of a Nissan bakkie who had tried to avoid hitting a pedestrian, who also died. Speaking to Independent Media yesterday, family spokesperson Muzikayise Ndlovu said the family was hurt and that it was very difficult to cope with what happened. “Some of the family members have gone to KZN because we had prepared a ceremony. Matongo was also due to go to KZN when his untimely death happened. We are very distraught, we are very hurt and we are still…

Kabul: A pickup truck carrying Taliban fighters was the target of a bomb in the Afghan city of Jalalabad yesterday, a day after at least two people were killed in a series of blasts in the area. Witnesses said several wounded Taliban fighters were taken to hospital after the explosion, which one journalist said happened near an interchange for transport to and from the capital, Kabul. At least two people were killed in Jalalabad on Saturday in the first deadly blast since the last US forces withdrew from Afghanistan on August 30. The eastern city is the capital of Nangarhar province, the heartland of the Islamic State group’s Afghanistan branch.…

New York: It’s held disgraced producer Harvey Weinstein, rapper Tupac Shakur and ex-IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn: New York’s notorious Rikers Island prison is now under intense scrutiny over the deaths of at least nine inmates this year. Officials who visited the high-profile jail, and former inmates spoken to, say conditions have worsened dramatically at the sprawling complex due to widespread staff shortages during the pandemic. “It’s the wild, wild West in there,” said Johnny Perez, who was in and out of Rikers between 1996 and 2001 on robbery and gun possession charges. Glenn Martin, who spent three days in Rikers, where he was stabbed four times in an attack after a shoplifting arrest as a 16-year-old in the late 1980s, calls it a “hellhole”. “It’s described as a gladiator school…

Sydney: An under-fire Australian minister who accepted an anonymous donation to sue public broadcaster ABC after it published rape allegations against him has resigned, Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced yesterday. The accusation that an unnamed senior government minister raped a girl, 16, in 1988 sparked nationwide women’s rights protests. Then-attorney general Christian Porter went public to deny the allegations. He is expected to remain as an MP but will sit on the backbench. The woman at the centre of the story died in June 2020, by suicide.…

A series of accidents has added to the challenges facing Mexican state-owned energy giant Pemex, which is battling back from what it called the worst crisis in its history. Pemex has suffered seven significant accidents since 2013 that generated around a billion dollars of mitigation and repair costs, according to its chief Octavio Romero. On August 22, a fire on a platform in the Gulf of Mexico during maintenance work left five people dead and shut down more than 100 oil wells that relied on it for electricity and injections of natural gas. On July 2, a spectacular blaze and gas leak from an underwater pipeline in the Gulf of Mexico caused what was dubbed an “eye of fire” in the sea, though no victims. Other incidents included fires in…

Mike Greenaway mike.greenaway@inl.co.za WHILE the Springboks were licking their wounds in the change-room at Lang Park on Saturday, the All Blacks were out on the pitch defeating Argentina 36-13, with the margin of the victory being enough to knock the Boks off pole position on the World Rugby rankings. The Boks had been No 1 since winning the World Cup in 2019, taking over at the top from the New Zealanders, but it could be a while before the Springboks again sit on top of the mountain given their worrying form which is in stark contrast to the irrepressible rugby the Kiwis are playing. And All Blacks will be in a mean mood in this Saturday’s momentous 100th match between the old rivals. Their captain, Ardie Savea, said after the…

Sibusiso Mboto sibusiso.mboto@inl.co.za EFF leader Julius Malema says no amount of intimidation will deter him and his supporters from campaigning in every corner of South Africa, especially in KwaZulu-Natal. This is after ugly scenes of confrontation between ANC and EFF supporters were captured live on television in Dambuza, Edendale, in Pietermaritzburg yesterday. The two groups of supporters had set up tables outside the voting station as part of campaigning for their respective parties and throughout sought to out-sing each other. However, tempers flared when the EFF leader arrived, and ANC supporters attempted to block him from entering the hall. Dambuza is home to SACP secretary-general Blade Nzimande and late ANC leader Harry Gwala, and the area is regarded as an ANC stronghold. ANC members said Malema was not allowed to…

DUNCAN DU BOIS | Bluff Mary de Haas rightly encourages interrogation of the issues concerning Covid-19 and vaccination (The Mercury, September 17). The following perspectives may further illuminate that interrogation. Although the Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) test is regarded as the “gold standard” in detecting Covid-19, it is important to note what Reuters Fact Checking stated on November 13, 2020 in response to social media claims that PCR tests are “fraudulent”. Reuters found that “detecting viral material by PCR does not indicate that the virus is infectious and able to infect others and that there are limitations in detecting specific levels of a virus from a sample using PCR testing”. It is, therefore, not unreasonable to consider the extent to which PCR tests may have overstated the actual…

FAROUK ARAIE | Benoni MEDIA reports that teachers are to be retrenched in KwaZulu-Natal (The Mercury, September 17), due to budgetary constraints, is an act of monumental folly that will haunt this nation for years to come. On September 10, 2014, then Communications minister Faith Muthambi, issued a statement saying, “Denying a child an education is a crime”. If this is not a crime in our education system, then we need to seriously evaluate if it is in our interest to support the governing party at the polls on November 1. By retrenching teachers, we are condemning a whole generation to illiteracy. Education is a fundamental right to development and growth. In today’s world, technologies, discourses, practices, basic and specialised knowledge are evolving and birthing so fast that…

MARTIN MEYER | DA KZN spokesperson on Human Settlements YOU know it is election time when you see political posters on street poles and when you see newspaper adverts telling you how well the government is performing – when of course we all know better. On Thursday, it was the turn of KwaZulu-Natal’s Human Settlements Department to boast – with more carefully posed photos than actual achievements – about how brilliantly they are apparently doing. One of the department’s self-sung praises is the fast-tracking of title deeds in our province. This is surprising when a quick Google search reveals that this so-called “fast-tracking” has been going on for years, while in reality the backlog continues to grow and while the department also continues to miss its own delivery…

| African News Agency (ANA) A 38-year-old man has been sentenced to four years in jail for contravening the Tax Administration Act, the Hawks in the Free State said. Hawks spokesperson Captain Christopher Singo said Mayisewa Alpheous Makhubo and his company, Thembiselwa Trading CC, appeared in the Frankfort Regional Court last week, where he was convicted and sentenced. “A preliminary probe by the SA Revenue Services (Sars) uncovered Makhubo’s fraudulent activities that cost the Receiver of Revenue in excess of R1 million.” The activities took place between 2016 and 2019. The matter was reported to the Hawks’ Serious Commercial Crime Investigation in Bloemfontein for further investigation. “Makhubo was served court summons on October 18, 2019. He appeared in court on several occasions, culminating in his recent conviction. The court…

a Canadian couple have donated the money they received as a wedding present to a South African children’s home, as they said they wanted to step in to support local organisations that were affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. Anneke and Ben Lovegrove from Bradford, Ontario, in Canada, donated the money to the Jakaranda and Louis Botha children’s homes in Pretoria. Anneke, who emigrated to Canada as a teenager and owns a business in Ontario said she knew that charitable organisations were severely affected by the pandemic. | Mercury Correspondent…

THE registration weekend by the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) has generally gone well with hundreds of thousands of people registering to cast their votes in November. The IEC had to work within a limited period given the tight deadlines after the recent Constitutional Court judgment. Voters turned out in numbers in different parts of the country to register, and this is the first part of the road ahead. The commission now has to prepare 80 million ballot papers for all the candidates contesting the elections. Political parties have used the registration weekend to campaign in provinces and key battlegrounds like Cape Town, Johannesburg and eThekwini. All the major parties are eyeing the key metros. But some coalitions collapsed later, as happened in Nelson Mandela Bay, Tshwane and Johannesburg.…

PARIS: France will discuss the new Nato strategic concept bearing in mind the crisis in its relations with the US, which formed a new strategic partnership with London and Canberra behind its ally’s back, French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian has said. On Friday, Paris for the first time in history recalled its ambassadors from Washington and Canberra after finding out that Australia abandoned a $66 billion (R973bn) submarine contract with France to obtain nuclear-powered submarines instead within the trilateral partnership with the UK and the US (AUKUS). Australia’s keeping France in the dark about breaking the submarine deal was a “stab in the back”.…

A monument listing 102 163 Dutch victims of the Holocaust was unveiled by King Willem-Alexander in Amsterdam yesterday, the first national memorial to be built in the Netherlands. The monument, designed by Daniel Libeskind, 75, who lost relatives in the Holocaust, lies in the centre of the Dutch capital and is a labyrinth of brick walls that, when seen from above, form Hebrew letters reading “in remembrance”. Each stone carries the name of a Jew, Roma or Sinti who was deported from the Netherlands and who died in Nazi concentration camps during World War II. It is the first memorial to commemorate all the victims from across the Netherlands in one place. “It gives the feeling that they really existed,” said Hetty de Roode, a Jew whose parents, brother…

ALGIERS: Algeria yesterday buried Abdelaziz Bouteflika, the North African country’s longest-serving president, at a cemetery for its independence heroes, but without the honours accorded to his predecessors. Bouteflika died on Friday aged 84, after a career which ended with a humbling fall from power. The veteran strongman had lived as a recluse since quitting office in April 2019 after the military abandoned him following weeks of street protests sparked by his bid to run for a fifth presidential term. His muted funeral reflected a mixed legacy that left many Algerians indifferent to the ceremony. Graft under Bouteflika and his circle left Africa’s largest nation by surface area, with vast oil wealth, with poor infrastructure and high unemployment. Bouteflika also faced criticism from rights groups and opponents who accused him…

Mihlali Baleka mihlali.baleka@inl.co.za soccer COACH Stuart Baxter says the screams that advocated for Njabulo Ngcobo to be thrown in the deep end at Kaizer Chiefs hasn’t helped his cause after an “okay” debut during their embarrassing defeat to Royal AM at home on Saturday. After a stellar debut season in top-flight football with Swallows FC, Ngcobo scooped the PSL Defender of the Season award in June. But he made the switch from Dobsonville to Naturena when the transfer window opened about three months ago. The Brit finally handed Ngcobo his full debut against Royal AM. But it was a day to forget for the 27-year-old at the office as Chiefs were hammered 4-1 by Royal AM at FNB Stadium. Ngcobo looked out of place for the better part of…

soccer Cristiano Ronaldo scored his fourth goal in three matches since his return to Manchester United yesterday before Jesse Lingard grabbed a late winner on his return to West Ham in a 2-1 win yesterday. Ronaldo tapped in to cancel out Said Benrahma’s opener and substitute Lingard appeared to have won the match for the visitors in the 89th minute. But there was time for late, late drama when the home side were awarded a penalty for a Luke Shaw handball in added time. Mark Noble came on to take the spot kick but United goalkeeper David de Gea dived to his left to keep it out, sparking a frenzy among United players. West Ham, without suspended forward Michail Antonio, engineered the first clear opening of the game when De…

Mike Greenaway mike.greenaway@inl.co.za The Springboks have less than a week to pick themselves up off the Rugby Championship canvas and then go toe-to-toe with the heavyweight All Blacks in Saturday’s 100th meeting between the teams. That is not a lot of time to sort themselves out, but there are some obvious areas that need fixing ... Mike Greenaway looks at five areas where the Boks must shine up. Tighten up the defence: For so long the Bok defence was virtually impregnable, but all of a sudden they are falling off tackles. It doesn’t make sense, given the pride the Boks take in their tackling and it is also coach Jacques Nienaber’s area of expertise. The Boks missed 21 tackles in their first defeat to the Wallabies and then missed…

Ducati's Francesco Bagnaia won his home San Marino MotoGP with a dominant display from pole at Misano yesterday. The Italian, who celebrated his debut win in the premier category last weekend in Aragon, came under intense pressure from championship leader Fabio Quartararo in the closing laps. But he had enough left in the tank to hold off Yamaha's French rider. Despite missing out on adding to his five wins this term Quartararo, 22, still had plenty to smile about. With four races left his lead remains a solid one at 48 points over Bagnaia whose red-hot form is ensuring there is nothing at all processional about Quartararo's attempt to become the first ever French MotoGP world champion. Defending champion Joan Mir is 67 points adrift in third. "When I saw…