■ Cricket
Hansie Cronje -- The Movie
The life of disgraced South African cricket skipper Hansie Cronje will soon be captured on the silver screen. Two South African production companies have joined forces with a Los Angeles-based company to make a film of his life. His older brother, Frans Cronje, announced on Wednesday that the full-length film would be shot next year in South Africa, England, India and Australia. Cronje, once the darling of South African cricket, fell spectacularly from grace when Indian police announced in 2000 he was under investigation for taking money to throw matches. He first denied the allegations but later admitted to receiving money from bookies in a match-fixing scandal that sent shockwaves through the cricketing world. Cronje was subsequently banned from cricket for life. After finally starting to piece his life back together again, he died aged 33 in a plane crash two years ago.
■ Soccer
Liverpool, Everton on edge
Liverpool and Everton will decide by the end of the month whether Merseyside's Premier League rivals will share a new stadium, Everton said on Wednesday. British Sports Minister Richard Caborn met with officials from the two clubs in London to discuss the possibility, which has been on the agenda for the past year. Everton last year shelved plans to move from Goodison Park to a new ground at Liverpool's King's Dock after the projected cost soared to nearly US$384.6 million. Liverpool have been been hit by the price tag of their switch from Anfield to a planned new 60,000-seater stadium at Stanley Park rising from an estimated US$120 million to US$190 million.
■ Tennis
High security for Davis Cup
This weekend's Davis Cup final between hosts Spain and the US is set to draw the biggest crowd in the event's 104-year history -- but the political tension emanating from the US-led war in Iraq means the number of security personnel on hand will also hit a high. Some 2,000 police -- including secret police and private security guards -- will be present to ensure the final goes ahead safely, but organizers are taking no chances. The two teams arrived last weekend but security will be stepped up progressively as the final approaches, with airspace restrictions imposed from today over the southern city of Seville, a measure normally associated with Olympic Games. Only police helicopters will be allowed to fly in the vicinity of the 26,000-capacity stadium. Police sniffer dogs will also comb the venue each morning, while visitors will have to pass through airport-style metal detectors and have their bags searched by portable scanners.
■ Soccer
Libertadores Cup enlarged
South America unveiled a new-look and enlarged Libertadores Cup when the draw for next year's tournament took place at the confederation's headquarters yesterday. Thirty-eight teams, two more than last year, from 11 countries will take part in the continent's equivalent of the Champions League, which was this year won by Colombian outsiders Once Caldas. The participants range from some of the world's most prestigious clubs, such as Argentine pair Boca Juniors and River Plate, to little-known Mineros de Guayana, a provincial team from the heart of Venezuela.
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