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SPORTS BRIEFS

■ ICE HOCKEY
Modano breaks record
Mike Modano scored two goals to become the all-time leading scorer among US-born players as the Dallas Stars beat the San Jose Sharks 3-1 on Wednesday. Dallas won their third consecutive National Hockey League game while the Sharks dropped to one win and four losses at home. Modano broke Phil Housley's record of 1,232 points by a US player in the first period when he beat goaltender Evgeni Nabokov on a breakaway. Two minutes earlier, he had tied the record with a laser shot that beat Nabokov to the glove side giving the Stars a 1-0 lead. The Livonia, Michigan, native has 1,233 points in 1,253 career games.

■ TENNIS
Nalbandian stays put
Former champion David Nalbandian will not travel to the Masters Cup in China as the first alternate because it's too far away. Nalbandian beat Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal twice each en route to Masters Series victories in Madrid and Paris in the last three weeks and missed out on the eight-man season-ending ATP championships by 11 points. A three-time participant in the Masters Cup, he won it in 2005 as a replacement. But he and coach Martin Jaite decided not to attend the tournament starting on Sunday. "To travel as an alternate to Shanghai would be a very long trip," Nalbandian told a news conference in Cordoba on Wednesday.

■ OLYMPICS
Blood campaign launched
Beijing has launched a drive to boost stocks of a blood type rare in China but likely to be more common among the thousands of visitors expected during the Olympics, state media reported yesterday. Beijing Red Cross Blood Center wants to double its stocks of rhesus negative blood in time for next year's Games, the official Xinhua news agency said. Only 0.3 percent of ethnic Chinese have rhesus negative blood, compared to 15 percent of Caucasians, Xinhua said. "All healthy Chinese citizens, no matter what type of blood they have, should contribute to the Olympic Games," said Yang Lan (楊瀾), a TV anchorwoman who is promoting the blood drive.

■ SOCCER
Stadium workers down tools
Construction at one of the stadiums being built for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa came to a halt on Wednesday after workers went on strike in a pay dispute. "Our members downed tools this morning" at the Moses Mabhida stadium in Durban, National Union of Mine Workers (NUM) spokesman Lesiba Seshoka said. "We are hoping to do the same in a number of days to come until the employer comes up with something quite clearly positive," he said.

■ HORSE RACING
Fallon reveals Owen tips
Six time champion jockey Kieren Fallon was contacted every day by England soccer star Michael Owen for racing tips, the Old Bailey heard on Wednesday. The 42-year-old Irishman revealed Owen's interest during a trial into an alleged race-fixing scam involving a syndicate run by professional gambler Miles Rodgers. He said the Newcastle striker, who owns several racehorses, regularly sent text messages to him asking for his opinion on forthcoming races. Fallon also gave tips to his former driver Philip Sherkle but did not realize they were being passed on to Rodgers. He said in an interview with detectives: "I thought that by texting Phil he was having his own couple of quid on it."

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