Justin

Crystal Palace’s Justin Devenny said he relished the challenge of playing a new position for Northern Ireland in their 2-1 friendly defeat by Denmark on Saturday.

The game in Copenhagen saw manager Michael O’Neill pick the 21-year-old to start at wing-back for the first time at international level.

Devenny, who won the FA Cup with Oliver Glasner’s side this season, performed admirably throughout, creating Northern Ireland’s early goal while also managing the threat posed by Lazio’s Gustav Isaksen.

“It was a new position for me but I enjoyed it and wherever I play for the team I’m willing to do a shift,” he said of what was his fourth cap.

“Michael had told me he was thinking of playing me there and we did a few bits and bobs in training. To be fair, I’m familiar with it from Palace as well.

“I know the roles and responsibilities of it and it’s just putting that into place.”

O’Neill has previously played the right-footed Brodie Spencer on the left side of his backline with the Huddersfield Town man performing well in recent internationals.

The manager thought that Devenny’s comfort on the ball gave his side a “nice outlet” at Parken Stadium.

“I thought he did really well,” O’Neill said.

“He’s got his hands full against a winger that obviously causes you a lot of problems. Justin’s a midfield player but he’s left-sided and I thought he dealt with it very, very well.

“He gave us a nice outlet on the left-hand side as well in terms of his use of the ball, so he was a big, big positive.”

In the latest twist in the legal saga between Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni, Lively is dropping two claims against Baldoni of emotional distress.

As if the drama couldn’t get any messier, the accusations continue to fly. Baldoni’s lawyer filed a letter requesting that the judge in the case compel Lively to “identify her medical and mental health care providers” — signing a HIPAA release to open up access to her therapy notes and pertinent medical info, as People reported.

Rather than do so, the letter says, Lively requested to withdraw her claims of emotional distress, but maybe just for now. Baldoni’s attorney Kevin Fritz said the actor wanted to keep the right to re-file those emotional distress claims at a later time — but Lively “can’t have it both ways.”

Lively’s lawyers take another view.

Esra Hudson and Mike Gottlieb accused Baldoni’s legal counsel of a “press stunt,” saying they are simply “preparing our case for trial by streamlining and focusing it,” as per Deadline’s reporting.

U.S. District Court Judge Lewis J. Liman had this to say on Tuesday: The two parties must decide “whether the dismissal is with or without prejudice” before proceeding further — the claims are either to be dismissed forever or possibly pursued again, but there is no in-between.

Representatives of Baldoni and Lively did not immediately respond to emails seeking comment on Tuesday.

The order comes as the latest event in the lawsuit, with a trial set to begin in March 2026. Lively initially filed a sexual harassment and retaliation complaint in September.

She accused Baldoni, along with his team, of orchestrating a smear campaign against her after she reported on-set sexual harassment, as first reported by the New York Times.

Most recently, Lively sought to dismiss a defamation countersuit from Baldoni. The motion, filed in March, cites a California law that prohibits “weaponizing defamation lawsuits” against those who have filed suit or “spoken out about sexual harassment and retaliation.”

Baldoni’s attorney Bryan Freedman later called the motion “one of the most abhorrent examples of abusing our legal system.”

But Lively’s motion only picked up steam as it drew widespread support from advocacy groups. Equal Rights Advocates, a gender equity and workplace protection-oriented nonprofit based in San Francisco, urged a federal judge to support the motion and uphold the aforementioned law.

Jessica Schidlow, legal director at Child USA, a nonprofit that pushes for more legal protection of abuse victims, told The Times in May that if the law were to be struck down, it would “essentially do away with the protections for all survivors.”

“It would be a devastating setback and completely undermine the purpose of the law, which was to make it easier for victims to come forward and to speak their truth without fear of retaliation,” she added.

Amid all of Casandra Ventura’s troubling testimony this week about life with Sean “Diddy” Combs and his “freak-off” fetish, don’t be troubled thinking about what might have happened between Combs and Justin Bieber, who was launched into the mogul’s circle when he was a teen.

Despite persistent speculation as footage of the two together has surfaced, Team Bieber said Thursday that nothing happened. Move along, nothing to see here.

The speculation comes at a time when Bieber has been worrying fans with photos showing him smoking — a shot posted Thursday had the self-declared former substance abuser sitting with a bong quite obviously in his lap — and “It’s a cult” rumors about the church he has been attending, Churchome in Beverly Hills. (Churchome pastor Judah Smith denies those rumors, by the way.) Bieber’s decision in recent years to sell his catalog for $200 million is said to have been motivated by the pop star allegedly finding himself completely broke despite generating many millions for himself and others while touring.

The new dad’s marriage is rumored to be in trouble as well, though on Friday the Biebs tagged wife Hailey in an Instagram story showing a male lion lovingly caressing a female lion with its nose and teeth.

Combs, of course, is on trial on charges of sex trafficking, racketeering and more. This week in court has seen dramatic testimony from Combs’ former girlfriend Cassie.

But back to Bieber, who was discovered by Scooter Braun in 2008 and quickly signed to a label run by Braun and Usher. Usher was a Combs protégé who was sent by record executive and producer L.A. Reid to live with the mogul in the ’90s and maybe learn a few things. The “Yeah” singer was 15 when he moved to New York. Combs became Usher’s legal guardian.

Reid wrote in his 2016 tell-all memoir “Sing to Me,” via Rolling Stone, “‘Will you take this kid and teach him your swagger?’ I said. ‘Can you just give him some of your flavor?’ And so I sent Usher to New York for what I called the ‘Puffy Flavor Camp.’”

He added, “I was turning him over to the wildest party guy in the country at an age when I still needed to get his mother’s permission, but he went to New York for almost a year. I didn’t know whether I was being irresponsible or having an epiphany.”

Usher would tell Howard Stern in 2016 that he “got a chance to see some things” while living with Combs.

“I went there to see the lifestyle, and I saw it. I don’t know if I could indulge and understand what I was even looking at,” he said on Stern’s show. “I had curiosity of my own. I just didn’t understand it. It was pretty wild. It was crazy.”

Usher said he was mostly focused on making music at the time, no matter what “curious” things might have gone on around him.

So when Bieber and Usher connected, could a Combs meet be far behind?

Sean “Diddy” Combs, from left, Justin Bieber and Rick Ross at a Ciroc vodka party in Atlanta in early 2014, when Bieber was 19.

(Prince Williams / FilmMagic via Getty Images)

Combs and the “Baby” singer made news with an interview on Jimmy Kimmel’s show after the “Justin Bieber’s 48 Hrs with Diddy” video was posted on YouTube in November 2009.

In the video, Combs showed Bieber a silver Lamborghini and told him, “The keys is yours, you know, when you hit 16.” That was after Bieber pitched driving it right away with Combs in the passenger seat, because he had his permit. After staring at the kid for a moment, Combs simply said, “No.” Then he promised him the mansion when he turned 18. Combs didn’t have legal guardianship of Bieber like he did with Usher, he said, but they would be together for the next 48 hours.

“He knows better than to talk about the things that he’s done with big brother Puff on national television,” Combs said later in the Kimmel interview, adding, “Everything ain’t for everybody.” That was after he described Bieber as “a little brother” and “one of the greatest kids you could ever know” who could always call up and ask him for industry advice.

The two would continue to cross paths, including at parties for Combs’ vodka Ciroc, a brand the embattled mogul cut ties with in January 2024.

Bieber’s camp released a statement Thursday asserting that nothing untoward ever happened between the two.

“Although Justin is not among Sean Combs’ victims, there are individuals who were genuinely harmed by him,” a spokesperson for Bieber told TMZ. “Shifting focus away from this reality detracts from the justice these victims rightfully deserve.”

The Times was unable to reach a Bieber representative Friday.

JUSTIN Bieber has broken his silence on explosive rumours that he was abused by Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs.

Hip-hop star Diddy, 55, whose sex trafficking trial kicked off this week, infamously hosted a teenage Justin at his home in 2009.

5

5

And since the rap mogul’s arrest last year, unfounded gossip online has linked the Canadian singer reported mental health problems with his former mentor’s alleged crimes.

Sean Combs – who is charged with sex trafficking and prostitution – strongly denies all allegations of misconduct.

Now, Justin, 31, has released a statement refuting claims he was targeted by the rapper.

A spokesperson told TMZ: “Although Justin is not among Sean Combs’ victims, there are individuals who were genuinely harmed by him.

“Shifting focus away from this reality detracts from the justice these victims rightfully deserve.”

Last year, video emerged of Diddy and Justin spending “48 hours” together.

Fans online branded the clip “disturbing” considering the 24-year age gap between the pair.

Justin also sang on Combs’ 2023 record The Love Album: Off The Grid which sources now say the pop superstar deeply regrets.

A source told the Mail Online: “He was featured on Diddy’s most recent album, and had he known any of this, there is no way he would have done it.”

This comes as Combs’s ex Cassie Ventura claims she had sex for up to four days with male escorts while living in fear that he would beat her.

The pregnant 38-year-old told a court: “You make the wrong face . . . then I was getting hit in the face.”’

Singer Cassie said she was a sexual novice when she fell in love with Diddy having been won over by his huge wealth and charm.

Within a year, she said she agreed to marathon “freak off” sex sessions with strangers to prove her love and keep him happy.

But Cassie told the court in New York how she began to experience a different side of Diddy — what she called “his abusive side”.

She added: “Very controlling over my life, the things I wanted to do . . . but there’s still love there.

“Control was everything from the way I looked, what I was working on that day, who I was speaking to.

“You make the wrong face and the next thing I knew I was getting hit in the face.”

Cassie testified despite being eight-and-a-half months pregnant with her third child with husband, Alex Fine, a personal trainer hired by Combs to work with her.

She said she was 19 when the rapper signed her on a ten-record deal to his Bad Boy Records label in 2006.

P Diddy, who denies all the charges, faces life imprisonment if convicted.

5

5

5

Minnesota Vikings head coach Kevin O’Connell believes NFL fans and newcomers to the sport in Ireland will be seeing the best wide receiver “on the planet” in Justin Jefferson when his side play in Dublin in September.

On Tuesday, the Vikings were confirmed as the Pittsburgh Steelers’ opponents for the first ever regular-season game in Ireland.

As part of a record seven international matches to be played in 2025, the sides will meet at Croke Park on 28 September with the Vikings then going on to face the Cleveland Browns at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium the following week.

In four-time All-Pro selection Justin Jefferson, the Vikings will have one of the game’s genuine superstars in their ranks.

“Justin Jefferson, if fans don’t know about him yet, they certainly will very soon,” O’Connell said.

“Getting the opportunity to see the best wide receiver on the planet in my opinion is a great start to getting to know the Minnesota Vikings, as well as a whole lot of great players on our offence and our defence.

“It’s a heck of a match-up with the Steelers and two great franchises battling it out to get a very important win.”

DURING the past year, Justin Bieber has cut himself off from those in his trusted inner circle.

Even this week his wife Hailey stood alone as she posed for pictures at the Met Gala while Justin stayed at home.

12

12

12

Yet one person is closer than ever to the millionaire singer: His pastor Judah Smith.

The 44-year-old spiritual guru heads Churchome — a trendy non- denominational church beloved by Beverly Hills celebrities, which counts Kourtney Kardashian and Lana Del Rey among its congregation.

Justin’s recent erratic behaviour, gaunt appearance and rumoured rift with the mother of his baby son have insiders concerned about the pastor’s influence over the star.

Smith’s controversial megachurch — which draws in 10,000 people weekly — is trailed by a string of rape and sexual abuse scandals and even had to face down accusations of being a cult.

And it is not the first time ­Justin has become attached to a controversial preacher.

‘Cause of rumoured marriage troubles’

He broke ties with his previous spiritual confidant, tattooed Carl Lentz, after the married pastor was fired from New York-based Christian church Hillsong in 2020 over an affair he had with Ex On The Beach star Ranin Karim, who later described their relationship as “toxic”.

Lentz was originally introduced to Justin by Smith, who has known the Love Yourself hitmaker and his mum Pattie since Justin was 15.

A source close to the singer previously revealed: “Justin started to add Judah to the boards of his businesses — he is ­buying him $300,000 Rolexes and all this kind of stuff. Everyone around Justin is part of this church.”

Some say Judah could not only be behind the rift between the pop star and his former inner ­circle, but the very cause of his rumoured marriage troubles.

Speaking exclusively to The Sun, a source close to Canadian Justin, 31, and 28-year-old model Hailey slammed Judah’s influence over the star as “total insanity”. “Judah is a manipulator,” they said.

“He is taking advantage of Justin’s situation, telling him that things are alright and that he is on top of his game — how Justin isn’t making mistakes and is just enjoying life.

“He is a toxic person, and Hailey and Justin have had a lot of arguments as she wants him out of their life.

“It’s complete madness — he trusts a guy who is known for being a manipulative person, and Hailey hates it.”

Instead of attending the New York Met Gala on Monday, Justin spent the evening on the sofa cheering on his ice hockey team.

And he made little effort to hide the bong on the floor next to him in an Instagram post only the day before, despite denials of drug use being issued by his team.

Just a few weeks before, at the Coachella festival, the singer was spotted smoking what looked like marijuana next to his 15-year-old half-brother, Jaxon.

“Justin keeps sinking and acting like a child,” our insider added.

“He is doing too much s**t, he is going lower and lower, and Judah is there alongside him. Despite all this, he puts him in every business meeting and includes him on projects.

“This has led to Justin cutting ties with a lot of people, as well as not being a responsible person and focused dad.

“The whole world is seeing Justin going down a hole, but Judah is telling him otherwise. It’s total insanity.”

Fans and friends alike have tried their hardest to raise the alarm.

Almost every part of Justin’s life is becoming swallowed up by the church and its charismatic leader.

And Justin is rejecting those who cut ties with the church, giving his inner circle a complete overhaul.

12

12

12

Nowhere can this be seen more clearly than in the rift between the chart star and his former friend and business partner Ryan Good.

The pals jointly created clothing brand Drew House in 2019, and in the same year Ryan was best man at Justin’s ­wedding, at which Judah ­officiated.

But things turned sour after Bieber added Smith to the board.

Ryan and Smith are also understood to have a frosty relationship, which culminated in Ryan quitting the church altogether last year.

Insiders repeatedly said he felt Churchome was a cult.

When Ryan chose to leave the church, he basically got excommunicated

A source close to the Biebers

It is now understood that Ryan and Justin have not spoken to each other in more than a year.

“When Ryan chose to leave the church, he basically got excommunicated”, a source previously revealed.

And Justin is far from keen to welcome him back.

On April 3, the pop star launched his new fashion brand, Skylrk, with an animated video showing Bieber burning down a house full of relics from the past, including the Drew House logo. He also lashed out in a now-deleted post on Instagram.

He wrote: “Drew House doesn’t represent me or my family or life.

“If you’re rocking with the human Justin Bieber, don’t waste your money on Drew House.”

‘If we’re a cult, we’re worst cult in history’

Also in the video was a scooter that runs out of charge — a perhaps not-so-subtle reference to his old manager Scott “Scooter” Braun, who he has severed ties with.

Now Justin’s life increasingly revolves around Smith and his megachurch.

The pair are so close that in 2017, they got matching tattoos which read: “Better at 70”.

The pastor, with his casual denim jackets, baggy trousers and necklaces, looks more like a pop star than a priest and has also featured on some of the star’s songs.

Before Justin’s involvement, Churchome was just an average-sized church based in Seattle.

12

12

12

The singer began to become close to Smith in 2010 after Justin’s mum Pattie made an offer to the pastor to attend a gig over her concerns about fame’s effect on her son.

“He needs some good influences in his life. Would you come?” she reportedly asked.

Now Smith’s church draws in thousands of worshippers across its five locations, and has launched an app that reportedly attracts more than 300,000 users every week.

The pastor boasts more than 720,000 followers on Instagram, where he posts clips of sermons.

And not only does Smith have the ear of some of Hollywood’s most famous faces, but it seems to be earning him a pretty penny too.

In 2018, Marie Claire mag reported that Churchome brought in total revenue of at least $20million, while Judah is thought to be living alongside his wife Chelsea and their three kids in a $2.5million ­California mansion which he described as “an investment in Churchome’s future”.

But its slick image and massive earnings have prompted comparisons with the Church of Scientology, also beloved by celebrities.

Their charismatic leader David Miscavige even officiated at Tom Cruise’s wedding — as Smith did with Justin.

And Smith’s church has also dealt with its fair share of controversy.

In February 2023, the church came under fire for rehiring ­Braylon Oliver, a pastor who had been previously let go after a woman accused him of rape.

If we’re a cult, we are the worst cult in the history of all cults

Judah Smith

Churchome claimed that Oliver had demonstrated “spiritual and personal growth” since the time of the alleged incident and claimed that reports surrounding his ­rehiring were “misleading”.

Another woman, Payton Jones, accused Churchome of protecting one of its employees when she claimed church intern Zachary Jaquith sexually assaulted her in 2019, alleging she was discouraged from filing a report with police by the church’s general legal counsel Troy Anderson.

Zachary and Troy both deny the accusations.

Churchome also faced a lawsuit in 2023 over its policy of forcing all staff members to donate ten per cent of their wages back to the church, the outcome of which is unclear.

But are they a cult? Smith laughed off the allegations in a sermon posted to Instagram last week.

He said: “If we’re a cult, we are the worst cult in the history of all cults. We meet once a month, guys! We’ve got to get better at this.”

The Sun has approached Churchome for comment.

What’s Justin up to?

THE Sun revealed on Wednesday that despite his recent troubles, Justin Bieber has been spending time at a remote recording studio in Iceland where he’s been working on his “comeback

The singer hasn’t released an album since 2021’s Justice, and has been open about his struggles in recent months after fans raised concerns over his erratic behaviour and seemingly-escalating drug use.

Sources close to the star also insisted he’s been throwing himself into work, despite reports.

“Bieber is doing what he does best right now, turning his pain into art,” they told The Sun US.

“He does have good people around him, including friends he’s had for years.”

The famous Floki Studios in Iceland has previously welcomed artists scuh as Calvin Harris and Pharrell Williams over the years, and is situated in the far north of the country.

12

12

12

“Forever…,” the 1975 Judy Blume YA novel about teenagers losing their virginity, has inspired a Netflix series with changes you’re free to regard as substantial or superficial. Premiering Thursday, it’s a very sweet show, full of characters whose differing needs and ideas sometimes put them at odds, but who are for the most part very nice. The worst you can say about any of them is that they are clueless or confused in the way that people, especially young people, with their incompletely formed brains — a scientific fact someone raises helpfully — often are.

I’ve never read any of Blume’s books, though I have read reviews and synopses of “Forever…,” and visited Reddit groups where contributors recall secretly passing the novel around in high, middle or even elementary school — Blume (already a kid-lit superstar for “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret”) plus sex being an irresistible combination: adolescent hot stuff, mid-’70s style. I can report at least that in both the novel and the series, a character has named his penis Ralph.

The TV show, created by Mara Brock Akil (“Girlfriends”), cuts the ellipses from the book’s title. The characters are Black, a change that is both superficial and substantial. It honors the shape and intent of the novel while adding issues not on Blume’s agenda regarding Black culture and advancement. More significantly, the series has been set in the near-present day — 2018 — and moved from quiet suburban New Jersey to sophisticated, sprawling Los Angeles. The first episode is directed by Regina King (“One Night in Miami”).

Things have changed in the half-century since “Forever…” was published, even subtracting the years the series backtracks. Not that teenagers weren’t falling in love and having sex — or not falling in love but having sex — in the year that Captain & Tennille released “Love Will Keep Us Together.” But the texting and blocking, the free-for-all backwaters of the internet and the carnal shenanigans that color contemporary TV teendom do put a different complexion on growing up. Of course, young people can be having a lot of sex while not, in the strict formulation, “having sex,” if you get my meaning. Yet a show about a couple of high school kids who, whatever else, have never Gone All the Way, and take the prospect seriously, can feel like a throwback to more innocent times — and that is not a bad feeling at all.

Justin (Michael Cooper Jr.) and Keisha (Lovie Simone) are our young lovers, who meet, or meet again — they had known each other in elementary school — at a New Year’s Eve party, thrown by Keisha’s rich but not snooty friend Chloe (Ali Gallo), the series’ only regular white character. (There is fondue, the whitest of all foods.) Justin and Keisha come from different sides of the tracks , or “the 10,” in L.A. psychogeography; his family has a big modern mansion in the hills, while she lives with her mother, Shelly (Xosha Roquemore), in an apartment down around Slauson and Crenshaw.

Playing Justin’s (Michael Cooper Jr.) parents are Wood Harris and Karen Pittman.

(Elizabeth Morris / Netflix)

Keisha is an A student (and track star) whose friends call her Urkel; her mother struggles to pay for the Catholic school to which she’s recently transferred. A full-ride scholarship to Howard University is in her sights, and there’s no reason to think that she won’t get it, even with a sex tape that’s gone around.

Justin, who has “a learning difference” and problems with “executive function,” struggles in school, but his mother, Dawn (Karen Pittman), a successful executive — it’s one of those jobs that requires barking into a phone while walking quickly through a room — has supplied him with tutors and wants big things from him; he’s not sure what he wants. (Mother and son alike may be putting perhaps too much faith in Justin’s ability to shoot three-pointers when it comes to college admissions.) His father, Eric (Wood Harris), who cooks for the family and runs restaurants — including, in this TV reality, the real-life Linden, a Hollywood center of Black society — and never went to college, is more easygoing. (“Life works things out when it’s supposed to,” says he.)

The kids are honest and sincere, not stuck up, not phony. Keisha seems a little more on top of things, life-wise, though she will jump to conclusions. Justin, less interested in whatever high-powered business future his mother imagines for him, dreams of a career in music, which in this context means “making beats.” Though Simone and Cooper are not actual teenagers, they are fresh-faced and radiant and youthful; they’re pretty adorable. Their parents, too, are likable, loving, hard-working people, a little bossy now and then, but genuinely concerned for their children. As in the real world, the kids handle some of their business better than their elders, and sometimes the elders prove wiser than the kids. (Not too often though — this is a series aimed at young viewers, who won’t have come for a lecture.)

Keisha and Justin bumble into and out of a bad first date, but before too long, he’s texting her, “think I woke up with a girlfriend can u confirm” and she is replying “how can I be ur girlfriend if u haven’t asked me.” (He will.) Things get better and worse and better, happier and sadder and so on, as the couple travels through eight episodes of mostly ordinary drama — jealousy and insecurity, mopiness and mooniness, desolation and elation, miscommunication and reconciliation — on the way to maturity. They’ll get into minor trouble with school and parents. The infamous sex tape — something shot by Keisha’s former boyfriend, Christian (Xavier Mills), but distributed by an offscreen character — leads to a conversation or two, but is more or less old news by the time story begins. Justin isn’t bothered.

Interestingly for a modern teen show, nobody’s getting drunk or doing drugs, apart from a couple of pot-smoking adults and flirty old friend Shannon (Zora Casebere), who comes on to Justin during the family’s annual summer decampment to Martha’s Vineyard. “I want you to be my first,” she says, “It would be awkward and we would laugh through it.” He thinks love should have something to do with it.

As a coming-of-age story, it’s more about the electrifying present than the unwritten future, however often that future comes up for discussion. Ultimately, it leads our heroes to the common enough question of what happens to their union after graduation. Not to give anything away, but anyone who’s survived their youth will understand that the title is ironic — or, with Blume’s ellipses, reattached for the title of the final episode, at least inconclusive.