■Rugby Union
All Blacks dispute settled
The New Zealand Rugby Players Association, representing the All Blacks, have finally reached agreement with the New Zealand Rugby Union (NZRU) on a World Cup-winning bonus payment. "While remuneration negotiations are always difficult processes in any industry or profession, the NZRU is pleased both parties were able to resolve this issue once we went to mediation," NZRU chief executive Chris Moller told reporters yesterday. The All Blacks will be paid a total of NZ$80,000 (US$47,110) if they lift the cup. Agreement was reached yesterday morning after 12 hours of negotiations in front of a Department of Labor mediator broke up after midnight on Tuesday. The NZRU had said if agreement could not be reached, a "worst case scenario" would be the selection of a second or third-string team to travel to Australia for the World Cup which starts in October.
■ Tennis
Henin-Hardenne advances
Third seed Justine Henin-Hardenne showed the form that won her this year's French Open title when she destroyed Greece's Eleni Daniilidou 6-1 6-1 in the second round of the US$1 million Acura Classic on Tuesday. In her first WTA Tour match since she lost to world No. 1 Serena Williams in the Wimbledon semifinals on July 3, the Belgian was too strong for Daniilidou, 21, who won their only previous meeting, in the Netherlands on grass last year. "I'm a completely different player now," Henin-Hardenne told reporters. "I gave up seven match points there and, at that time, I wasn't in good mental shape. "Tonight I played aggressive when I needed to and I was patient when I had to be. I served well and pushed her into mistakes."
Agencies
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier