England's Test tour of Sri Lanka hit a low yesterday after injury scares to two key bowlers increased the agony of a miserable batting display in a practice match.
With Steve Harmison already a doubtful starter for the first Test in Kandy starting on Saturday due to back spasms, fellow paceman James Anderson was temporarily sidelined with an injury to his left ankle.
Anderson did not take the field in Sri Lanka Cricket XI's second innings after the tourists were shot out for 134 on the second day of the three-day match in Colombo.
Fast bowler Matthew Hoggard finally gave England reason to smile with a hostile opening spell late in the evening that produced five wickets, including three in one over.
The home team, who made 298-9 declared in the first innings, slumped to 77-8 in their second knock by stumps, a lead of 241 runs with the injured Kaushal Lokuarachchi unlikely to bat.
England will attempt to chase a morale-boosting win on the final day on a slow wicket on which 26 wickets have fallen on the first two days.
England's batting was left in disarray by a second-string attack in their last practice match before three back-to-back Tests.
Ravi Bopara top-scored with 47 as six batsmen failed to reach double figures and Harmison did not bat after suffering spasms in the lower back while bowling on the first day.
The 22-year-old Essex all-rounder hoping to make his Test debut after playing in 19 one-day internationals, was the lone batsman to defy the home team as wickets tumbled at the other end.
He then shared the new ball with Hoggard in the absence of Harmison and Anderson, and claimed Test contender Malinda Warnapura leg-before for four.
Hoggard bowled the in-form Upul Tharanga in his second over and removed captain Tillekeratne Dilshan, Jehan Mubarak and Chamara Kapugedara in the space of four balls in his fifth over.
Hoggard ended the day with 5-25 from nine overs.
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