■ Soccer
Nine-man WBA defeated
English Championship team West Bromwich Albion had two players sent off and their hopes of automatic promotion to the Premier League virtually ended by a 1-0 defeat at home to Sheffield Wednesday on Friday. Deon Burton scored the winner in the 59th minute as West Brom goalkeeper Dean Kiely dived in vain to prevent the ball from crossing the line. Tempers boiled over in injury time when Neil Clement was dismissed for head-butting substitute Leon Clarke. Darren Carter followed seconds later, picking up his second yellow card for a late tackle on Clarke. West Brom remained fourth, in line for the playoffs which involve the teams third to sixth in the table.
■ Baseball
Agent smuggled players
A California-based sports agent has been convicted of smuggling five Cuban baseball players into the US. Gus Dominguez, 48, was found guilty on Thursday of nearly two dozen federal charges, including conspiracy, smuggling, transporting and harboring, court documents showed. His attorney, Stephen Salter, said they would appeal the convictions. Most of the charges carry a maximum penalty of 10 years each in prison. Dominguez helped organize two smuggling trips across the Florida Straits in 2004, prosecutors said. The first one failed; the second succeeded with the players reaching Big Pine Key.
■ Soccer
Ribery to leave Marseille
Marseille president Pape Diouf sparked an expected transfer scramble on Friday when he admitted that star winger Franck Ribery has a green light to leave the French club at the end of the season. Diouf fought tooth and nail to keep Ribery at the 1993 European Cup winners last year, despite strong interest from the likes of Lyon, Real Madrid and Arsenal. But now he seems resigned to the France player's imminent exit. "This season he is welcome to leave, although that is not to say that he will automatically leave," Diouf told television channel Infosport. "I will be less intransigent this season than last in the case of an eventual exit by Franck."
■ Rugby Union
Robinson signs off in style
England World Cup winner Jason Robinson signed off his club career with a Hollywood ending on Friday as he scored the winning try to give his club Sale a 25-23 English Premiership victory over Bath. The 32-year-old left it late to leave his mark as he touched down just 10 seconds from time. Juan Martin Fernandez Lobbe's converted try and two Lee Thomas penalties helped the Sharks into a 13-3 lead. But Bath then rattled up 20 unanswered points. Selorm Kuadey put Sale back in touch with a converted try before Robinson signed off in style as he burst onto the ball 30m out and broke through the Bath defense. Robinson missed the conversion but few cared as the injury-ravaged Sharks collected a first victory since January.
A sumo star was born in Japan on Sunday when 24-year-old Takerufuji became the first wrestler in 110 years to win a top-division tournament on his debut, triumphing at the 15-day Spring Grand Sumo Tournament in Osaka despite injuring his ankle on the penultimate day. Takerufuji, whose injury had left him in a wheelchair outside the ring, shoved out the higher-ranked Gonoyama at the Edion Arena Osaka to the delight of the crowd, giving him an unassailable record of 13 wins and two losses to claim the Emperor’s Cup. “I did it just through willpower. I didn’t really know what was going
The US’ Ilia Malinin on Saturday produced six scintillating quadruple jumps, including a quadruple Axel, in the men’s free skate to capture his first figure skating world title. The 19-year-old nicknamed the “Quad god,” who is the only skater to land a quadruple Axel in competition, dazzled with an array of breathtakingly executed jumps starting with his quad Axel and including a quadruple Lutz in combination with a triple flip and a quadruple toe loop in combination with a triple toe. He added an unexpected triple-triple combination at the end to earn a world-record 227.79 in the free program for a championship
Shohei Ohtani’s interpreter is being criminally investigated by the IRS, and the attorney for his alleged bookmaker said Thursday that the ex-Los Angeles Dodgers employee placed bets on international soccer — but not baseball. The IRS confirmed Thursday that interpreter Ippei Mizuhara and Mathew Bowyer, the alleged illegal bookmaker, are under criminal investigation through the agency’s Los Angeles Field Office. IRS Criminal Investigation spokesperson Scott Villiard said he could not provide additional details. Mizuhara, 39, was fired by the Dodgers on Wednesday following reports from the Los Angeles Times and ESPN about his alleged ties to an illegal bookmaker and debts well
MLB on Friday announced a formal investigation into the scandal swirling around Shohei Ohtani and his former interpreter amid charges that the Los Angeles Dodgers superstar was the victim of “massive theft.” The Dodgers on Wednesday fired Ippei Mizuhara, Ohtani’s long-time interpreter and close friend, after Ohtani’s representatives alleged that the Japanese two-way star had been the victim of theft, which was reported to involve millions of dollars and link Mizuhara to a suspected illegal bookmaker in California. “Major League Baseball has been gathering information since we learned about the allegations involving Shohei Ohtani and Ippei Mizuhara from the news media,” MLB