■ Football
Lewis caught with meth
Former NFL defensive back Darryll Lewis was charged on Wednesday with evading Los Angeles police during a 30-minute chase that ended with five officers forcibly dragging him to the ground. Lewis, 36, was also charged with felony possession of a controlled substance and three misdemeanors for allegedly being under the influence of a controlled substance, resisting arrest and possession of a smoking device. Authorities said methamphetamine was found in Lewis' truck. Lewis was released on US$85,000 bail and could face more than three years in prison if convicted.
■ Rugby
Singapore Union looted
The Singapore Rugby Union (SRU) has reported that one of its former employees allegedly embezzled more than US$177,514, police said yesterday. It is believed to be one of the largest thefts from a national sports association and has rocked the sports fraternity in the city-state. A police report has been filed against Sean Lee, who worked as a finance executive with the association since 1997, the Straits Times reported. He resigned last month and his whereabouts are unknown, but the money was found missing on his last day at work.
■ Olympics
China puts Taiwan on route
China wants the Olympic torch for the 2008 Beijing Games to pass through rival Taiwan though the International Olympic Committee has yet to approve the diplomatically thorny request, officials said yesterday. Beijing Olympic organizers submitted a draft plan for the torch relay -- with its inclusion of Taiwan -- in meetings this week with International Olympic Committee officials assessing preparations for the Games, said Wang Wei (王偉), executive vice-president of the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games. Wang said Taiwan is on the proposed route but was not specifically discussed during the coordination commission meetings, which began in Beijing on Tuesday and were set to conclude today.
■ Rugby
Irish pubs bar Umaga
New Zealand captain Tana Umaga could be hard pushed to get a pint in Dublin this weekend after a number of pubs put up posters telling him he's barred. Umaga, who dumped Ireland skipper Brian O'Driscoll out of the British and Ireland Lions tour of New Zealand this year with a controversial spear tackle, has incurred the wrath of Ireland fans, including Charlie Chawke, owner of at least six popular Dublin pubs. "We believe he tried to destroy the man and he could have deprived us all in Ireland of a great rugby legend," Chawke said. Posters in the windows of Chawke's pubs, including city center sporting pubs The Bank and The Oval, show Umaga's face with "Barred" emblazoned above it.
■ Soccer
Police arrest coach, referee
Vietnamese police yesterday arrested a V-League soccer coach and a referee for bribery as part of a widening investigation into match-fixing. Coach Nguyen Thanh Vinh was taken into police custody in Ho Chi Minh City and FIFA-certified referee Truong The Toan was arrested in Hanoi for their involvement in the scam, a Ministry of Public Security official said yesterday on customary condition of anonymity. Vinh, coach of the East Asia-Pomina Steel team, was accused of or-dering his assistant to give bribes to a referee.
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