Stephen Curry is set to make his Olympic debut for the United States at the age of 36 after being named in the 12-strong men’s basketball squad for Paris on Wednesday.

The Golden State Warriors guard joins three-time Olympic champion Kevin Durant and the NBA’s all-time leading scorer LeBron James in an experienced squad named by national team managing director Grant Hill.

Durant, 35, helped Team USA to gold at each of the last three Olympics, while Los Angeles Lakers forward James, 39, will make his first appearance since London 2012, having also won gold in Beijing in 2008 and bronze in Athens in 2004.

Besides the Phoenix Suns’ Durant, four other members of the Tokyo squad return with Miami Heat centre Bam Adebayo, Phoenix guard Devin Booker, guard Jrue Holiday and forward Jayson Tatum – both of the Boston Celtics – included.

Los Angeles Lakers centre Anthony Davis will, like James, make his first Olympic appearance since London 2012.

Making their debuts on the biggest international stage alongside Curry will be Minnesota Timberwolves swingman Anthony Edwards, Indiana Pacers guard Tyrese Haliburton, Los Angeles Clippers forward Kawhi Leonard and Philadelphia 76ers’ Joel Embiid, the NBA’s reigning Most Valuable Player.

The United States have won gold at each of the last four Olympics and 16 in all, but finished a disappointing fourth at last year’s World Cup.

Curry’s Golden State coach Steve Kerr will lead the team in Paris.

The United States are due to start a training camp in Las Vegas on July 6 before a series of exhibition games that includes tilts against South Sudan and Germany on July 20 and 22 in London. Their opening game in Paris will be against Serbia on July 28.

Kieran Reilly has talked up his chances of winning a BMX freestyle gold at the Olympic Games next year, following a series of landmark victories in 2023.

The 22-year-old from Gateshead said victory in Paris was “always going to be the goal” and he does not have his “head in the clouds” as focus turns to the showpiece event.

Reilly won the National BMX Freestyle Championships in Nottingham last month, which added to the gold medals he won at the European Games in Krakow in June and the UCI Cycling World Championships in Glasgow in August, beating reigning Olympic champion Logan Martin in the latter.

He shot to fame in January 2021 after breaking a world record by completing the world’s first triple flair on a BMX.

Reilly, a Red Bull athlete, told the PA news agency: “I think the year I’ve had this year, the biggest growth for me has been confidence, learning so much about myself that I can beat these riders who, growing up, [were] guys that I idolised.

“It took a while to really flip the switch on my mindset and want to beat these guys, and I’ve done that this year at the biggest events.

“Everyone who attended the Tokyo Olympics was at the World Championships in Glasgow, and if beating the Olympic champion wasn’t going to give me the confidence to beat him at the Olympics then I don’t know what was.”

BMX freestyle will appear at the Olympics for a second time after making its debut at the Tokyo 2020 games, with a total of 24 riders – 12 men and 12 women – competing at La Concorde Urban Park in Paris.

Two qualifying events in Shanghai and Budapest will be held in May and June next year to determine who will appear at the Games, but Reilly said the showpiece event was already firmly in his thoughts.

“The competitive mindset I have, the second I qualify for these Games the mindset and goal switches from getting there to getting gold and that’s always going to be the goal,” he continued.

“I think that gold is a good goal for me – I haven’t got my head in the clouds thinking that, and when I get to Paris that’s going to be what I’ve got my sights set on.”

It is likely that those two events will be only competitive BMX meets before the Olympics and Reilly acknowledged “there’s a lot of unknown” going into the Games, but he insisted he hopes to debut some new tricks of his own and would “have some surprises” ready for Paris.

He is currently practising these tricks at his training base – Adrenaline Alley in Corby, Northamptonshire – but this remains one of very few purpose-built professional riding areas in England.

Reilly said BMX was now at a position where it deserves greater investment in facilities, particularly with the UK’s recent success in competitions and its growing popularity.

He said: “Now I think, on the British Cycling Team, we have seven or eight guys and three girls and they all are podium potential at the Games and at every single World Cup.

“We have arguably the biggest [and] one of the most competitive teams of riders going into any of these events, so it almost makes sense for a sport where we have this potential to dominate, why wouldn’t you try and find that missing factor and help with facilities?”

Reilly stressed the investment was even more critical as more people now take BMX seriously alongside more established sports, such as football and swimming.

He added: “Now parents are pushing their kids into it. It was more of a hobby that parents weren’t really supporting.

“A lot of kids went into playing football for a Saturday team and riding their bikes was just a side hobby. Now parents have seen that you can have a career in this sport.

“I’ve seen a lot more parents at the skate park now rooting on their kids and entering their kids in amateur competitions.”

Ireland centre Robbie Henshaw is expected to be unavailable until at least the semi-finals of the Rugby World Cup due to a hamstring injury.

The Leinster centre sustained the issue in training this week, ruling him out of Saturday evening’s pivotal Pool B clash with Scotland in Paris.

Ireland will monitor Henshaw’s fitness for the time being but head coach Andy Farrell is weighing up his options and could eventually make a change to his 33-man squad.

“He pulled up with a hamstring unfortunately at the end of the session on Tuesday and the diagnosis with hamstrings, they want to see how things settle down,” said Farrell.

“It probably takes about five days for that type of thing to happen but it looks like it could be a minimum of a couple of weeks at this stage.”

Asked if Henshaw will remain in France, Farrell replied: “Obviously, we’ll assess that as we go.

“Certainly he’ll be around rehabbing and we’ll see how the weekend goes with other injuries, etc, and assess how Robbie’s going along the way also.”

Ulster’s Stuart McCloskey has taken Henshaw’s place among the replacements for this weekend’s Stade de France showdown, while hooker Dan Sheehan and lock Iain Henderson have been selected ahead of benched pair Ronan Kelleher and James Ryan.

Vice-captain Ryan suffered a wrist injury in Ireland’s 13-8 success over South Africa a fortnight ago.

Farrell insists the Leinster second row is fully fit and has trained well, including coming close to flattening captain Johnny Sexton on more than one occasion.

“He’s fit,” Farrell said of Ryan.

“He had a bit of a niggle on a wrist but that’s fine and he trained the house down, actually trained the best I’ve seen him train in a good amount of years yesterday.

“He actually nearly took Johnny’s head off three or four times so he’s fit and raring to go, there’s no doubt.”

Ireland will progress to the knockout stages with a win or draw, while a defeat will leave them reliant on Scotland’s margin of victory and bonus points gained.

Farrell suggested the recalled Henderson, who came off the bench in the victories over Romania, Tonga and the Springboks, could be handy in calculating the permutations.

“We want to win,” said Farrell. “It’s a massive game. It’s so important to us and certainly obviously to them.

“But to the travelling fans and the people back home it’s a huge game.

“We have Iain Henderson in our group who is good at maths, so we’re across everything as far as that’s concerned.

“But the easiest way is to make sure that we perform well and deserve to win the game outright.”

Skipper Sexton will start for the fourth successive match following his return from injury and suspension at the beginning of the tournament, while flanker Peter O’Mahony will win his 100th Ireland cap.

“It is a knockout game,” said 38-year-old fly-half Sexton.

“We’ve viewed it as a last 16, we’ve spoken about it and that’s why it’s important we got our preparation right.

“We need to go out and get our performance right now.”

Ireland are optimistic sidelined number eight Jack Conan will be fit to feature in next weekend’s Rugby World Cup showdown with defending champions South Africa in Paris.

British and Irish Lion Conan, who suffered a foot injury in his country’s opening warm-up match with Italy, missed Saturday’s 82-8 win over Romania and will once again sit out on Saturday against Tonga in Nantes.

The 31-year-old was able to take part in basic on-field training on Wednesday morning following a series of gym sessions, raising hope of him being fit for the Springboks.

Team manager Mick Kearney said: “(It was a) very good training session today and everybody came through that really well.

“Jack was out running, which was a real positive.

“While Saturday will come a little bit early for him, I think the signs are really positive in terms of being able to train fully next week, and hopefully he will be available for South Africa.”

Every other member of Andy Farrell’s 33-man squad trained fully at Ireland’s base in Tours, including centre Robbie Henshaw, who was a late withdrawal from the Romania game due to a hamstring issue, prop Dave Kilcoyne and hooker Dan Sheehan.

Asked if it was Conan’s first on-field session since arriving in France, Kearney replied: “Not since we got to Tours, but it’s his first for the last few days.

“He has been doing most of his rehab in the gym with the physios.

“Today was obviously a very big day for him in terms of getting out and running. He ran really well, it’s really positive and he was in a good place afterwards.”

Stars from both ends of the experience spectrum are among those boasting gold medal hopes for Great Britain at next year’s Paris Olympics.

With one year to go to the Games, the PA news agency picks out five of the potentially biggest headline-grabbers.

Sky Brown

Aged just 13 when she won skateboard bronze in Tokyo in 2021, Brown is back and looking better than ever ahead of Paris, having scooped X Games and Dew Tour titles in 2022 and followed them up by being crowned women’s park world champion in Sharjah in February.

Jessica Gadirova

The precociously talented 18-year-old gymnast won world all-around gold in Liverpool last year and followed it up by winning this year’s European crown. Having been part of GB’s stunning bronze medal team triumph in Tokyo, Gadirova is well equipped to target her sport’s ultimate individual prize.

Keely Hodgkinson

Silver linings are no longer enough for the 800-metre star who was pipped by American rival Athing Mu at both the Tokyo Olympics and the subsequent World Championship. Gold at this year’s European Indoors in Istanbul will have whetted her appetite to go one better when her rivalry with Mu resumes in the French capital.

Carl Hester

After three straight Olympic medals in team dressage – including gold at London 2012 – 56-year-old Hester is targeting a fourth in what will be his final Games. Having missed last year’s team world silver in Denmark due to an injury to his horse, Hester will be determined to go out on a high.

Tom Dean

While Adam Peaty takes a well-deserved back seat, Dean has splashed into focus as he bids to better his historic haul from Tokyo 2020, at which he became the first British swimmer to claim more than one gold medal at a single Games in 113 years.

Two-time Olympic champion Helen Glover says coming out of retirement after the Tokyo Games felt like more of “a natural decision” as she targets further success.

The 37-year-old made her comeback to compete at Tokyo just one year after giving birth to twins and narrowly missed out on a podium spot with a fourth-placed finish.

However, Glover has come out of retirement for a second time to target a potential fourth Olympics in Paris next year and says the decision is “working well” so far.

“I think this time actually felt like a more natural decision,” she told PA news agency.

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“When I started to come back for Tokyo, that was way more left field, didn’t see it coming, it was purely from circumstance.

“I spent that whole year going up to Tokyo thinking ‘can it be done?’ and having done it, it made me think – I spent so much time thinking you’re trying to change things, push barriers and move things around to make it work to be a mum coming back into sport.

“Now I know it can be done – how well can it be done? I think there were so many unanswered questions, now they’ve been answered it’s like ‘we can get to work now’.

“It really excites me and I think that after Tokyo, coming back and spending some time with family, there was no real reason for me to retire.

“It’s working well with family life, my body still is in good enough condition to do it.

“I think until the day that something slips, either my body can’t do it anymore or the kids don’t become a priority, that’s the day that I will stop doing it.”

Glover’s return has already seen her earn two silvers this year rowing in the women’s four at the World Rowing Cup II and the European Rowing Championship.

An Olympic spot is up for grabs at the World Championships in September and, although her Olympic medals were won in the pair, Glover insists competing in a four has not changed her preparations.

“It’s not been too different from the pair,” she said.

“I think essentially if you’re in a boat with somebody else, you’re turning up for them, you’re being at training on time, you’re having to tow the line along with the rest of the team.

Glover has three children with her husband, the television presenter and naturalist Steve Backshall, and became the first mother to row for GB at the Tokyo Olympics.

However, she admits the unpredictability of balancing parenthood alongside being an athlete is something that she has had to relax with.

“I think it’s definitely less kind of predictable than I expected, once you have a family, you just don’t know what you’re going to be doing in two weeks’ time,” Glover said.

“I can have a run of a good few weeks of training and think ‘yeah, I’ve got it nailed, everything’s fine’ then suddenly someone will get chicken pox and everything changes.

“I think that unpredictability is something I’m having to relax a little bit with, it goes a little bit against the elite athlete mindset of everything having to be perfect.”

Glover was speaking ahead of the launch of Team GB’s Mini Mascot campaign, where five children will get an extraordinary opportunity to be part of Team GB as the official mascots to the team.

Once selected the five Mini Mascots will experience extraordinary moments on the journey to Paris 2024, from meeting the athletes, to sending Team GB on their way to the Games.

For Glover, reaching a potential fourth Games would be “even more special” with her children able to watch on in Paris.

She said: “I think I’ll be in great shape to go to the Games, but I never want to say I’m there because I know a lot can happen!

“I think reaching a fourth Olympics Games would be something I wouldn’t have believed in my wildest dreams; it’ll be even more special because my kids can be there watching from the finish line.”

Parents or guardians can nominate their child to become a mascot by entering their details at www.teamgb.com/mascot

The prospect of pulling off “mission impossible” and becoming the first taekwondo athlete in history to win three Olympic gold medals has spurred Jade Jones to shrug off the painful memories of Tokyo and plot another ascent to the top of her sport.

Right back to the aftermath of her improbable first Olympic title as a teenager at London 2012, Jones has always been honest about her struggle to find the motivation to submit to the gruelling process of repeating her success through another Olympic cycle.

But one year from the opening of the Paris Olympics finds the 30-year-old Jones full of reasons to breathe new life into her taekwondo career, from making history to erasing an uncomfortable chapter in the Japanese capital that saw her surrender her title at the last-16 stage.

“The hunger is fully back with me,” Jones told the PA news agency. “Tokyo didn’t go well and I’ve since realised that my mind just wasn’t right but I quickly realised I didn’t want to leave my career like that – I wanted another shot at making sporting history.”

Jones’ shock loss to Refugee Team competitor Kimia Alizadeh left the Flint athlete close to tears and threatened to prove her swansong on the Olympic stage, as she openly admitted to experiencing anxiety and not enjoying a Games sanitised by small crowds and lingering lockdown regulations.

“There was so much expectation on me in the build-up to Tokyo because everyone expected me to go out there and get the third gold, and I went to Tokyo feeling that I had everything to lose,” added Jones.

“Everything was pressure. There was pressure on me as the athlete and there was all the pandemic stuff that meant I didn’t enjoy it.

“I’d grown so used to being cheered on in my big competitions by friends and family, and to have no spectators there just made it a really strange experience. The whole thing just made it feel like it wasn’t happening for me out there, and it wasn’t meant to be.”

Jones returned home to inevitable questions about her future and took an extended break from competition, returning to take bronze at the 2022 World Championships in Guadalajara.

After falling in the quarter-finals of the 2023 World Championships to Taipei’s Lo Chia-ling in Baku in May, Jones rebounded the following month, underscoring her commitment to the Paris process by winning her second European Games gold medal in Krakow.

It was a timely triumph for Jones, who must see off her domestic rival, the three-time world bronze medallist Aaliyah Powell, to secure the solitary -57kg squad on Great Britain’s Olympic team, before she can even think about overcoming the weight of her sport’s history.

A number of athletes have won two Olympic gold medals, but even the seemingly invincible American Steven Lopez fell short of an historic third in Beijing in 2008, when he had to settle for bronze after a controversial judging call in his semi-final against Italy’s Mauro Sarmiento.

“No-one has won three Olympic gold medals in taekwondo,” added Jones. “It’s been mission impossible so far, and that’s why no-one has managed to do it.

“But I believe I can be the person to do it and I will leave everything out there. Now that I’m older and after what happened in Tokyo, it’s not expected of me so much. People are starting to write me off. Deep down that gives me more hunger because I feel like I have something to prove again.”

Sixteen-year-old Mirra Andreeva believes Andy Murray is her lucky charm after she claimed her first senior grand slam victory at the French Open.

The Russian, who only celebrated her birthday last month, has been making rapid strides in the women’s game and brushed aside experienced American Alison Riske-Amritraj 6-2 6-1 at Roland Garros.

That followed a breakthrough week at the Madrid Open when Andreeva reached the fourth round and revealed herself to be a big fan of Murray.

“When you’re here and take a lunch with all these stars, you see Andy Murray, you see his face and he’s so beautiful in life, he is so amazing,” she told Tennis Channel.

“Imagine how good she’s going to be when she gets her eyes fixed,” was Murray’s self-deprecating response.

But the pair have kept in touch and Andreeva said on Tuesday: “I didn’t see Andy Murray since Madrid because he is not here but, after he won a Challenger, I texted him.

“I said, ‘Congratulations’. He actually answered me, so I was really happy about it. He said, ‘Thank you and good luck in Roland Garros’. Maybe that’s why I’m playing that good now.”

Andreeva was runner-up in the girls’ singles at the Australian Open but has had no problem adjusting to life on the women’s tour and, after winning three matches in qualifying in Paris and one in the main draw, she is closing in on a place in the top 100.

“Of course, it feels amazing for me,” said the teenager. “I’m really excited that I managed to win this match after passing the qualis draw. So, of course, I’m really happy, and I’m looking forward to playing the next round.”

Last year’s beaten finalist Coco Gauff looked in trouble at a set down to Spaniard Rebeka Masarova but she responded well to win 3-6 6-1 6-2.

Sixth seed Ons Jabeur suffered a shock first-round exit last year when she was among the title favourites but eased through this time, beating Lucia Bronzetti 6-4 6-1.

The Tunisian said: “Playing on Philippe Chatrier is such a beautiful court, but I don’t have a good history with it. Every first round is very difficult in a grand slam. I was pretty stressed, I’ve got to say, but I was just trying to play my game.”

Shericka Jackson was third in the 60m dash at the Paris Indoor Meeting on Sunday.