Gabriel Milito and Lionel Messi scored first-half goals and Argentina beat Venezuela 2-0 on Tuesday to win their second match in four days, giving it the early lead in South American World Cup qualifying.
Milito scored in the 16th minute with a header off a free kick from Juan Ramon Riquelme of Spain's Villarreal that was far beyond the reach of Venezuelan goalkeeper Renny Vega.
Venezuela, who were coming off Saturday's 1-0 victory over Ecuador, repeatedly pushed past Argentina's defense during the first half but failed to finish their chances.
PHOTO: AP
Messi added his goal in the 43rd minute, splitting two defenders and placing a left-footed blast into the upper right corner. Messi had a chance for a second goal in the 61st, but the score was voided because of offside.
Venezuela's best opportunity came in the 49th when Giancarlo Maldonado broke in alone against Argentine goalkeeper Roberto Abbondanzieri. Maldonado chipped the ball off to the right to the dismay of tens of thousands of fans at Jose Encarnacion Romero in the western city of Maracaibo.
"Venezuela faced off with a big rival, but we showed them that we can compete," Venezuela manager Richard Paez said.
Both teams play their next qualifiers in mid-November. Argentina will be at home against Bolivia while Venezuela will travel to face Colombia.
New Zealand scored a goal in each half to beat Fiji 2-0 in an Oceania World Cup qualifying soccer match at Churchill Park yesterday.
Ivan Vicelich beat Fiji's offside trap to head home New Zealand's first goal in the 32nd minute and striker Shane Smeltz drove a shot past goalkeeper Simione Taimanisau for the Kiwis' second goal after 86 minutes.
New Zealand had to overcome an intimidating atmosphere, produced by a crowd of many thousands, to win the match which is part of the Oceania qualifying tournament for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa.
Relations between New Zealand and Fiji became strained when the New Zealand government refused Taimanisau a visa to play in the scheduled opening match of the tournament in Auckland last Saturday.
Taimanisau was barred from entering New Zealand under sanctions imposed after Fiji's military coup last December, which affect members of the Fiji military and their relatives. The father of Taimanisau's fiance is a military policeman.
Soccer's world governing body, FIFA, reacted by calling off the match, saying the interference of the New Zealand government was unacceptable. The match is still likely to go ahead at a neutral venue but an alternative date and site has yet to be selected.
Yesterday's match was marked by several vigorous physical clashes and the mood of the crowd was hostile to the New Zealand team.
Fiji took advantage of the situation to dominate the early stages of the match, as the New Zealanders struggled to settle, but Kiwi midfielder Tim Brown helped his team establish control.
Brown, the New Zealand captain, was able to provide dangerous passes to Smeltz and Celtic striker Chris Killen.
Fiji produced several chances through the middle of the first half before Vicelich's header, against the run of play, gave New Zealand the lead.
The home side continued to press New Zealand through the second half but the Kiwi defense closed down several dangerous raids and Smeltz's late strike sealed the match.
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