■ Golf
Fred Couples withdraws
Former US Masters champion Fred Couples has withdrawn from next week's Singapore Open due to illness. Couples fell sick with a viral illness during Saturday's World Golf Championship at Akron, Ohio, and his doctor has advised him not to travel, Singapore Open organizers said in an statement yesterday. Couples, who won the Masters in 1992, was to be one of the headliners at the tournament which begins next Thursday at Singapore's Sentosa Golf Club, which is co-sanctioned by the Asian and European Tours. Other top participants at the US$3 million Singapore Open include defending champion Adam Scott of Australia, three-time major winner Ernie Els, US Open winner Michael Campbell, England's Lee Westwood and Shingo Katayama of Japan.
■ Weightlifting
Bulgarian in drug trouble
A Bulgarian female weightlifter tested positive for steroids and is awaiting the results of her backup "B" sample. Rumyana Petkova, who competes in the 75kg category, tested positive for stanozolol earlier this month, Bulgarian weightlifting chief Andon Nikolov said yesterday. The Bulgarians were notified of the "A" test result by the International Weightlifting Federation. "Our federation will decide whether we will send our representative for analysis of the `B' test, although it is 100 percent sure that the result will be the same," Nikolov said. If the second sample is also positive, Petkova would face a two-year ban "Some people haven't learned their lesson and continue doping," Nikolov said. Petkova finished sixth at the European Championships in Wladislawowo, Poland, in May, and was included in the national team for next month's World Championships in San Diego.
■ Rugby Union
Thion suffers rib injury
Biarritz' French international lock Jerome Thion looks set to miss the French champions mouthwatering clash on Sunday with Toulouse after suffering a rib injury. Thion complained of a pain in his ribs early on in the 54-0 whitewash of Bayonne on Wednesday and exited in the 12th minute. First prognosis was that Thion, who stood in for the suspended Fabien Pelous as captain in the November test last year against South Africa where he suffered a fractured larynx after being hit by Springbok skipper Jon Smit, had a badly bruised right side rib, although, he was to undergo further tests yesterday. Sunday's match is a rematch of last season's championship final which Biarritz won in convincing fashion 40-13.
■ Rugby Union
Caucaunibuca has typhoid
Fijian rugby winger Rupeni Caucaunibuca told the Fiji Times newspaper that he was not able to rejoin his French club Agen because he is recovering from typhoid fever. Caucaunibuca said yesterday he was recently admitted to a Fiji hospital and lost 12kg. Symptoms of typhoid include slow pulse, stomach pain and a rash. He said his illness was the only reason that he did not report to Agen, where he has been the leading try scorer in French rugby for the past two seasons. French newspapers reported that Caucaunibuca was quitting the club because of homesickness. The star winger told the Fiji Times he intended to return to Agen for the coming French season when his health allowed.
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