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HULL, England -- Leicester opened its title defense with a shock 2-1 loss to newly-promoted Hull on the first day of the Premier League season on Saturday.Having sprung one of soccers biggest surprises by winning the league last season, Leicester was on the receiving end of an upset after Robert Snodgrass rifled home Hulls winner in the 57th minute.Despite facing a side that was already mired in difficulties off the pitch, Leicester became the first champion to lose its opening league game of the following season since the Premier League began in 1992-93.Hull is still without a manager after Steve Bruce left in July, and a club that only secured promotion through the Championship playoffs has been badly hit by both injuries and protests by fans against its owners.I thought the players had it in them to produce something, Hulls caretaker manager Mike Phelan told Sky Sports. Obviously characters a big issue when a lot of things are not going your way in preseason... a lot of the time it was fingers crossed to make sure that we had enough players to get out onto this field today.But all credit to the football players. They showed a lot of the determination... At this level, you have to master the ball, you have to take the ball and play with confidence, character and courage. And I thought everything came out today.Along with the missed chances, Leicester manager Claudio Ranieri pointed to a lack of teamwork from his side.We made a lot of effort but not as a team, and they defended very well and they tried to play counter-attack and played well, the Italian said.They played better, we tried to do our best. The effort was amazing, but individual effort -- not as a team. And I think this is the key of the match.Despite the backdrop to its top-flight return, Hull took the lead in first-half stoppage time with an acrobatic shot by Adama Diomande.Leicester equalized with a penalty converted by Riyad Mahrez almost immediately after the re-start, but Snodgrass restored Hulls lead for good in the 57th minute with a powerful low shot from inside the area.It was a particularly frustrating afternoon for England striker Jamie Vardy, whose 24 Premier League goals propelled Leicester to the title last season but who missed a string of first-half chances on Saturday.He began by completely miskicking an inviting cut-back from Ahmed Musa on the Nigerian forwards debut in the 20th minute. Mahrez then pounced on the loose ball but the Leicester playmaker could only send a rising shot into the side netting.Leicester nearly made the breakthrough when Christian Fuchs worked a one-two with Musa for a close-range shot that was parried by Hull goalkeeper Eldin Jakupovic. Vardy met the rebound with a shot that was charged down and Mahrez followed up with a short run and a curling drive that flew wide of the post.The chances kept coming for the champions, who missed yet another chance two minutes before the break. Musa intercepted a sloppy pass and burst forward before sliding the ball to Vardy -- who sent his shot skyward.Just as it looked likely to finish level at the break, Hull took the lead against the run of play. A header from Curtis Davies was just tipped away by Kasper Schmeichel but Diomande leapt into the air to hook the ball into the far corner of the net.Leicesters luck changed within seconds of the restart, with the visitors gifted an equalizer after a clumsy challenge by Tom Huddlestone on Demarai Gray on the edge of the area. Mahrez blasted his spot-kick straight down the middle as Jakupovic dived.Snodgrass replied by scoring Hulls winner with a fine left-foot shot on the bounce, following a partial clearance by a Leicester back line that lacked composure without suspended central defender Robert Huth. Air Max Plus Clearance . Both players have lower body injuries that will keep them out of the lineup until at least January 31, which is the first game they can be activated from IR. Cheap Air Max Plus . After Mondays hard-fought loss, the wait seemed longer than usual. Getting set to go their separate ways for a short Christmas break, the Raptors coach credited his team for their effort on a seemingly impossible three-game road trip, urging them to build on that success when they get back to work at the end of the week. http://www.clearanceairmaxplus.com/ . -- Timbers coach Caleb Porter didnt stray from his business-like approach to the season even after Portland downed the two-time defending league champion Los Angeles Galaxy to gain crucial playoff position. Cheap Air Max Plus Wholesale . - The Oakland Raiders re-signed offensive lineman Khalif Barnes on Friday. Air Max Plus Free Shipping . - After leading the Saints to a fourth playoff appearance in five seasons, Drew Brees expressed confidence in the direction of his team and, perhaps more importantly, showed a willingness to listen to contract proposals if the team needs his help getting under the NFLs salary cap. PARIS -- By blowing themselves up at Frances national stadium, suicide bombers created a link, indelibly marked in blood, between football and extremist terror -- things that, in normal circumstances, are worlds apart.Since that night last November, it has been impossible to think of one without the other at the vast arena where Frances national team was playing Germany and where, on Sunday night, it will play Portugal in the European Championship final.That unwanted bond now also gives football, the French team and the Stade de France important roles in the long healing process that France is still only part-way through.Regardless of whether Les Bleus win or lose against Cristiano Ronaldos team, hosting and celebrating the championship game will be one more step back toward the carefree life France is famous for, even if the reality was never as picture-postcard perfect.The scale of the horror on Nov. 13, the 130 dead and hundreds injured, rendered frivolities like football completely irrelevant. It is no exaggeration to say that it seemed as though France might never be happy again. The emotions were of the rawest kind: fear, fury, confusion, and survivors guilt.On the airwaves, first aiders spoke of battlefield wounds. The president spoke of war and declared a state of emergency -- still in force today. Soldiers, heavily armed and in camouflage gear that in any other context would have been comical because they stick out like sore thumbs against the limestone backdrop of urban Paris, patrolled the streets -- a sight both reassuring and worrying because it suggested that France had been permanently changed, which it was.Soldiers still patrol. Its frightening how quickly one gets used to having them around.For the second time in the year, kids came back from school with notes to inform their parents that theyd be observing a moment of silence, as they did after the attack on the Charlie Hebdo satirical magazine in January.As flowers, candles and cards stacked up outside the Bataclan concert hall where casualties were most concentrated, people also went in ones, twos and small groups to the 80,000-seat stadium in Paris northern outskirts which, before three bombers targeted it, was associated most strongly with happy memories of Frances greatest sporting triumph, when Zinedine Zidane scored twice to down mighty Brazil in the 1998 World Cup final.The visitors wanted answers but got only more questions because there is no explaining the unexplainable. Some took photos of the flecks of bombers flesh on walls and tarmac before municipal cleaners power-hosed them down the sewers. The souvenir snappers motivations werent necessarily voyeuristic or macabre. They were merely mapping the new fault lines the attacks opened in Frances history and future.Foottball, of course, cannot wash away Frances trauma nor does it pretend to.dddddddddddd But it is true to say that, because it is a powerful positive collective experience, winning at football can have unique restorative powers for a society that has just shared a powerful collective but negative experience.Hosting the 24-nation Euro and Les Bleus advance through six games to the trophy match has put distance between then and now. Winning, especially a 2-0 semifinal victory against world champions Germany, restored a sensation of power and national pride for a country that in November seemed vulnerable and weak, one which despite its nuclear arsenal and permanent seat in the U.N. Security Council could be hurt so grievously by shadowy enemies both within and based far away in Islamic State-controlled territory.Perhaps best of all, and because football is a sport that so celebrates and encourages these things, the tournament and the teams success has opened the gates for mass French silliness; allowed them to be wacky, bonkers, cuckoo and to go bananas; to yelp, shriek, howl and yowl; to have beer for breakfast; to bounce up and down together so vigorously in the Metro that it seems carriages could jump their tracks; to walk around with stuffed cockerels on their heads, with faces painted red, white and blue and in body-hugging skin-tight suits that unfortunately leave nothing to the imagination.In short, football has again enabled the French to not give a damn, at least in 90-minute bursts. And that has been wondrous. Unbridled joy on French faces that were so etched with pain has been the best legacy of this four-week breath of much-needed fresh air, better than spectacular goals, shots, saves or any of the other on-pitch dramas.On Sunday, as I cannot help but do since November, I will walk to the stadium to report on the final thinking again about the chauffeur who was killed outside after dropping clients off for the exhibition match against Germany that France won 2-0, a victory no one celebrated. Although I would much rather not, I will probably puzzle for the umpteenth time about what the suicide bombers were thinking.But then the clouds will be blown away by the sight of French people making merry, something that in November seemed might never happen again. At least not soon, in such numbers and with such heart.Being brutally reminded of the vulnerability of life also changed it. But football has also helped ensure that life, even changed, does go on.---John Leicester is an international sports columnist for The Associated Press. Write to him at jleicester(at)ap.org or follow him at http://twitter.com/johnleicester ' ' '