London, Jan. 18 : England players could be forced to choose between the Indian Premier League and their country - and Australia''s might have to do the same - after IPL boss Lalit Modi decided the players'' two-week availability for the tournament is not long enough.

England play the West Indies in their first Test starting on May 6, giving the players about 15 days to play IPL.

London, Jan. 18 : Brit Sikh detective sergeant Gurpal Virdi is suing the Metropolitan Police Force for the fifth time after he was passed over for promotion to inspector.

His lawyers will argue that privately the Met still believes he is guilty of sending racist e-mails to his colleagues, despite two independent tribunals clearing him nine years ago.

The claim will feature in a case brought by a high profile Asian detective involved in the longest running discrimination dispute within the Met.

According to The Times, a watchdog has launched an inquiry into whether the Metropolitan Police department responsible for improving the recruitment and retention of ethnic officers is shredding damaging documents about the selection process.

London, Jan 18 : Katy Perry has been wrongly handed the trophy for best international song at the NRJ Awards in Cannes.

London, Jan. 18 : Manchester City owner Sheikh Mansour has lost 440 million pounds, which is nearly double the amount that he is expected to fork out for purchasing Brazilian soccer ace Kaka.

The Arab tycoon, who hopes to sign AC Milan's Kaka for 243 million pounds, was stunned after Barclays shares crashed by 25 per cent, wiping 2.7 billion pounds off the bank's market value.

The Sheikh, 38, had plunged 3.5 billion pounds of his estimated 33 billion pound fortune into Barclays last October, giving him a 16.3 per cent stake, reports The Sun.

"You wake up preparing to make history with the biggest ever offer to a footballer. Hours later, you're down 440 million pounds," a bank insider was quoted, as saying.

London, Jan 18 : An Army officer, who trained with Prince Harry at the Sandhurst military academy, has told military investigators that he believes the video in which the royal refers to a colleague as `Paki' was stolen from his laptop computer.

The officer, believed to be a member of the Household Cavalry - the same regiment as Prince Harry - told the special investigation branch (SIB) of the Royal Military Police that a copy of the video could have been downloaded from his laptop computer, reports the Telegraph.

London, Jan 18 : Freida Pinto, who won over audiences across the globe with her performance in `Slumdog Millionaire', has revealed that she once

turned down a Bollywood role after a lusty director demanded she strip off for a sex scene.

The 25-year-old from Mumbai was asked to bare all - even though the director had no intention of including the shots in his finished movie.

Pinto has been one of India's hottest models. She posed for sexy shoots when she was on the books of top agency Elite Model Management.

However, all the time she was dreaming of acting glory.

"I remember harbouring dreams of being an actor since I was five years old," the Daily Star quoted her, as saying.