Sporting Digest: Football

FA Cup finalists Newcastle are to play a pre-season friendly against newly-promoted Livingston on Tuesday, 20 July. The Scottish First Division club will also play Premier League champions Rangers at Almondvale 10 days earlier.

Belarus will be without their injured midfielder, Vyacheslav Gerashchenko, in their Euro 2000 Group one qualifier against Denmark on 5 June. The Belarus coach, Mikhail Vergeenko, said that Gerashchenko, who broke his ankle during Wednesday's friendly against Russia, faced a long lay-off.

France, deprived of Zinedine Zidane and Bixente Lizarazu through injury, sprang no surprises in their squad announced yesterday for their Euro 2000 qualifiers against Russia and Andorra next month. Roma's Vincent Candela, a member of France's World Cup-winning squad, returns for Lizarazu.