■ Soccer
Best banned from driving
Former Northern Ireland and Manchester United star George Best was banned from driving for 20 months and fined ?1,500 (US$2,700) yesterday after pleading guilty to drunk driving. Best, 57, who has a long history of alcohol abuse, was arrested early last Friday in southwest London. Breathalyzer tests showed he was nearly two-and-a-half times over the legal alcohol limit. Wimbledon Magistrate Sally Marley described Best's conduct as "irresponsible and unacceptable." Best agreed to enroll in a safe-driving course, which could get his 20-month ban reduced. Best's lawyers said the former player was upset after having a big argument with his son, Callum, at a restaurant. He was trying to drive himself to a rehabilitation center when he was stopped by police for erratic driving.
■ Soccer
Match descends into chaos
Players traded punches on the pitch after the final whistle in a Portuguese first division game between Guimaraes and Boavista, and irate fans threw coins and chairs at match officials before clashing with police outside the stadium. Police said "a small number" of fans received hospital treatment after the 1-1 game late Sunday but did not provide further details. Boavista's team bus was hit by rocks on a highway when it left the Guimaraes stadium under police escort two hours after the match. Players and fans contested the referee's performance. At the end players brawled and local fans ripped up plastic seats, which they hurled at the referee and linesmen as they entered the tunnel.
■ Soccer
Scottish great dies
Former Scotland manager Ally McLeod, who led his country to the 1978 World Cup finals in Argentina, has died at the age of 72, the Scottish Football Association (SFA) Web site said on Sunday.
McLeod had been suffering from Alzheimer's disease. "Obviously, everybody in Scottish football is saddened to hear of his death," an SFA spokesman said. "Although he is perhaps best known as the Scotland manager in 1977 and 1978, Ally was a guy who devoted his entire life to football as a player with several clubs and then as manager." McLeod succeeded Willie Ormond as Scotland manager in 1977 and had high hopes of success in the following year's World Cup. The team endured a dismal campaign, however, exiting the tournament after the first round despite possessing talented players such as Kenny Dalglish and Graeme Souness.
Tire trouble ends NASCAR stars' endurance bid
■ Motor Racing
NASCAR aces miss out
A broken suspension piece cost NASCAR stars Tony Stewart and Dale Earnhardt Jr. and road racing ace Andy Wallace a victory in the Rolex 24 sports cars endurance race, an event they appeared to have won until the final hour. Instead of the two Nextel Cup drivers and four-time 24-hours champion Wallace celebrating in the familiar Victory Lane at Daytona International Speedway, it was Andy Pilgrim, Terry Borcheller, Christian Fittipaldi and Forest Barber spraying the champagne Sunday afternoon. Stewart was at the wheel of the Chevrolet-powered Crawford when the left rear tire pulled off the rim and sent the 2002 Winston Cup champion spinning to a stop on the backstretch, just missing the concrete wall. Pilgrim drove into the lead with 15 minutes remaining
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