Thousands of fans filled the streets and squares of Milan and surrounding towns after AC Milan won their 17th Italian title on Sunday with a 1-0 win over their only remaining challengers, AS Roma.
Celebrating supporters waved flags and blasted horns after a win that goes some way to erasing the memory of Milan's shock elimination from the Champions League by Deportivo Coruna.
"We are invincible. We have been unlucky in the Champions League but we got our payback with winning the Italian title," said Milan supporter Giorgio Mariotti.
PHOTO: AP PHOTO
A second-minute header from Ukrainian Andriy Shevchenko ensured the victory for Milan, who moved nine points clear of Roma with just two matches remaining.
The celebrations went on for hours with people and cars moving through the city's streets displaying scarves, banners and hats sporting the team's red and black colors.
The noise of car horns and the sight of convoys of young fans on scooters was played out in other towns in Lombardia where loyalties are split between Milan and city rivals Inter.
The partying in the streets made up for the sour atmosphere at the stadium where the game was twice interrupted in the second half after Roma fans hurled fireworks and missiles on to the pitch.
Milan's Gennaro Gattuso was stunned by a powerful firework that exploded near him, and Milan goalkeeper Dida had to receive medical attention after he was twice struck by objects thrown from the crowd.
But after the final whistle was blown Milan's players danced in front of their supporters at the southern end of the stadium, linking arms and throwing themselves on to the pitch to huge roars from the 81,000 crowd.
English Premier League
Leeds United's hopes of premier league survival disappeared in eight awful second-half minutes on Sunday as a 1-0 lead turned into a 4-1 defeat at Bolton Wanderers that, barring a miracle, will send them down.
The result left Leeds six points behind Manchester City with two games remaining but with City boasting a goal difference better by 36, relegation is a formality.
Leicester City were relegated on Saturday and Wolverhampton Wanderers look certain to join them.
In the battle for fourth place Liverpool and Aston Villa both won to edge ahead of Newcastle United, beaten 1-0 by Manchester City on Saturday.
Liverpool beat Middlesbrough 2-0 with a Danny Murphy penalty and a goal for Emile Heskey, while Aston Villa beat Tottenham Hotspur 1-0 with an early header by Juan Pablo Angel.
Liverpool have 56 points, Villa 55 and Newcastle, with a game in hand, 53. Liverpool host Newcastle on the last day of the season in what looks likely to decide who makes the Champions League qualifying round.
Three years ago to the day Leeds were playing Valencia in the semi-finals of Europe's elite competition but now, with most of that team long sold and the club still in debt, their immediate future looks bleak.
Leeds, ever-present in the premier league and the last team to win the old first division title in 1992, knew they had to win on Sunday and got the ideal start when Mark Viduka converted a penalty in the 27th minute.
But the Australian played only six more minutes before being sent off for a second yellow card in two minutes, both for elbowing. His second red card in a month proved costly.
Bolton were level two minutes after halftime when Youri Djorkaeff latched on to a clever Jay-Jay Okocha pass to score from close range and the Frenchman got his second six minutes later.
Bolton remain on course for their highest premier league finish as their fourth win in a row takes them up to seventh.
Liverpool were always on top at Anfield and, after Michael Owen hit a post and Harry Kewell had a goal disallowed for offside in the first half, Danny Murphy broke the deadlock with a 49th-minute penalty after Owen was brought down.
Substitute Emile Heskey got the second four minutes later and the home side eased through the rest of the game.
Spanish League
Valencia closed in on their second Spanish title in three seasons after they opened a four-point gap at the top of the standings thanks to an emphatic 2-0 win at home to Real Betis on Sunday.
Goals either side of halftime from defender Curro Torres and rugged midfielder Ruben Baraja gave Valencia a deserved victory and put them firmly in the driving seat as the title race reaches its climax.
With three games to go Rafa Benitez's side lead the table on 74 points, followed by champions Real Madrid, who slumped to their second successive defeat on Saturday when they lost 2-0 at Deportivo Coruna, on 70.
Third-placed Barcelona are just a point behind Real on 69 after they stretched their unbeaten run to 17 games, coming from a goal down to claim a sparkling 4-1 win over struggling neighbors Espanyol.
Striker Raul Tamudo put the visitors ahead from the penalty spot on 19 minutes, but Ronaldinho produced yet another virtuoso display to help steer his side towards victory.
Fifth-placed Athletic Bilbao remained on course for a place in next season's UEFA Cup despite losing 2-0 at Sevilla, and Atletico Madrid moved up to sixth after a breathless 3-2 win at home to relegation-threatened Celta Vigo on Saturday.
The fight for survival remains as intense as ever but Albacete and Real Mallorca went a long way to assuring their future in the top flight with important home wins.
Albacete beat fellow strugglers Real Zaragoza 3-1, while Mallorca owed their 2-1 victory over Malaga to a double from newly crowned African Player of the Year Samuel Eto'o.
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