Bale to miss PSG clash through injury

The Wales international has suffered a recurrence of the calf injury that plagued the early part of his season and will miss the Champions League match with the Ligue 1 champions

Gareth Bale will miss Real Madrid's Champions League clash with Paris Saint-Germain after suffering a calf injury, the Spanish side have confirmed.

Video: Driving the $5 million Batmobile

Well, really, it wasn't that close of a call. But then this wasn't just any Batmobile. This was the original.

It wasn't one of those matte black military-looking machines from the movies. It wasn't driven by a brooding and emotionally conflicted Batman with visible emotional scars.

This was the Batmobile from the 1960s TV show, shiny with neon orange stripes. It was driven by my childhood hero, the comically uptight, painfully polite defender of the good citizens of Gotham as played by Adam West.
I sat in the same seat Adam West sat in. It felt pretty cool, and I was the only journalist who got the opportunity. I drove the same Batmobile I watched him drive in "Batman" reruns over 40 years ago. There were others made for the show that he would have also driven but this was the first.

It's for sale. Asking price: $5 million.
And I almost ran it off the road. You see, the Batmobile, like the aging TV star it is, is in kind of rough shape. It's tough to get replacement parts for what was, in 1955, an experimental concept car built by Ford . Back then, it was called the Lincoln Futura.

Tech: Russian woman's remarkable mission to restore Soviet jet airliner

(CNN)For nearly three decades, an old Soviet airliner lay abandoned on a small airfield deep inside Siberia.

Years of neglect under the harsh Siberian climate had reduced the Aeroflot Tupolev Tu-104A to little more than a decaying wreck.

Until Maria Karmanova came into the picture. 

On hearing about the old Tupolev rusting away at her local aerodrome at Berdsk, near Novosibirsk, she set herself the challenge of restoring it to its former glory.

Tech: Japan's robot hotel opens its (automatic) doors

(CNN)When the reception desk is staffed by a robot dinosaur, the chances of a room upgrade are going to be fairly slim.

That hasn't stopped the first guests checking in to what's billed as the world's first robot hotel.

The five-star Japanese Henn-na Hotel -- a name that translates as Strange Hotel -- this week opened its doors to bemused visitors to Huis Ten Bosch, a theme park in Nagasaki Prefecture. 

Humanoid robots greet Japanese-speaking guests at reception, while English-speaking guests are met, for reasons that aren't exactly clear, by a robotic dinosaur.

Real Madrid have Europe's most expensive squad, Uefa figures confirm

The European football authority's annual Benchmarking Report shows that the Spanish heavyweights spent the most on players and wages during the financial year 2014

 Real Madrid have assembled the most expensive squad in Europe, figures released by Uefa have confirmed.

The 10-times European champions' playing staff was found to have cost the club a staggering €629 million, according to figures from the 2014 financial year due to be published on Wednesday in Uefa's annual Benchmarking Report, to which Goal has been granted advance access.

Ballon d'Or is reserved for Messi- Neymar

The Brazilian forward believes the world's most recognisable individual award is destined to go to his Blaugrana team-mate and maintained that the Argentinian deserves it

The 2015 Ballon d'Or has already been "reserved" for Lionel Messi, according to Barcelona team-mate Neymar.

Messi is the current favourite to claim the game's top individual prize after inspiring Barcelona to the treble last season before reaching the final of the Copa America with Argentina.

Messi is a 10, Ronaldo is three points lower-Aguero

Argentina striker Sergio Aguero has praised his close friend and team-mate Lionel Messi, joking that his Real Madrid rival, who wears the No.7 shirt, is some way off his level

Sergio Aguero says Argentina team-mate Lionel Messi is a "10", and that Cristiano Ronaldo is "three points lower".

Aguero and Messi have been close friends since lining up alongside each other at the Under-20 World Cup in 2005, and their families often spend time together away from football.