■ Rugby Union
Jonny out of England tour
Jonny Wilkinson's hopes of playing for England again in Australia, where he helped them win the World Cup in 2003, were shattered yesterday when he was ruled out of the forthcoming tour. Wilkinson played the last 50 minutes of Newcastle's 27-22 defeat to London Irish in the European Challenge Cup semi-final as he continued his comeback from a groin injury, but ended the match limping. Asked after the game if Wilkinson would benefit from touring with the national squads during the off-season, Newcastle director of rugby Rob Andrew replied: "Jonny won't be touring this summer, to Australia, Canada or anywhere else." Yesterday's game was Wilkinson's second game in his comeback from a groin injury.
■ Cricket
Contracts still unresolved
West Indies cricket officials are threatening again to overlook players for the national team if they can't settle on contracts within the next 10 days. The 18-month-old dispute could force West Indies to resort to fielding second-rate teams as it did last year against South Africa and Sri Lanka. The West Indies Cricket Board gave a deadline of last Friday to complete central contracts with its top players, but no agreement was reached between board representative Deryck Murray and Players Association chief Dinanath Ramnarine, both agreed to meet again today.
■ Soccer
Socceroos hit by injuries
Australia's World Cup hopes were hit by a four-pronged injury scare following the weekend's FA Cup and Premier League matches in England. First-choice goalkeeper Mark Schwarzer suffered a suspected fractured cheekbone, winger Harry Kewell a groin problem and midfielder Tim Cahill a knee injury. Striker Mark Viduka failed to start Middlesbrough's FA Cup semi-final against West Ham United due to a thigh injury. Australia begin their first World Cup finals campaign for 32 years on June 12 against Japan. Brazil and Croatia are the other teams in Group F.
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