■TENNIS
Injuries plague Croatia
Former world No.3 Ivan Ljubicic pulled out of the Beijing Olympics singles tournament yesterday, joining fellow Croats Ivo Karlovic and Mario Ancic on the sidelines. Ljubicic, who has slipped to 51 in the world rankings, withdrew with an unspecified injury and his place was taken by Devon Mullings of the Bahamas, the world 1025, who now plays Argentina’s Agustin Calleri in the first round. Karlovic, the world number 18 who recently defeated Roger Federer in Cincinnati, pulled out on Friday after developing a high temperature. Ancic pulled out earlier this month, also because of illness, leaving rising youngster Marin Cilic as Croatia’s only men’s hope.
■ARCHERY
South Korea dominates
Defending Olympic champion Park Sung-hyun’s record-tying effort highlighted South Korea’s dominance on the opening day of women’s archery competition yesterday. Park’s score of 673 in the individual ranking round equaled the Olympic record set by Lina Herasymenko of the Ukraine in 1996. Park set the still-standing world record of 682 in the same round in 2004. South Korean Yun Ok-hee, who holds the world’s No. 1 ranking, finished second with a score of 667, while teammate Joo Hyun-jung followed with a score of 664.
■HANDBALL
France’s women beat Angola
Former world champions France beat Angola 30-24 in the opening preliminary match of the women’s handball at the Olympics yesterday, making up for a weak first half by smothering their opponents in the second. Angola led narrowly in the first half, but started to flag after right wing Nair Filipe Pires de Almeida hurt her shoulder. South Korea tied 29-29 with Russia, prompting Russian left wing Emiliya Turey to say her team lost control of the game in the second half. In their next match, Russia will face Sweden, who lost 24-30 to Hungary yesterday. Romania easily beat Kazakhstan 31-19 in a heated match, Romanian center back Valeria Bese receiving a red card 11 minutes into the second half after a push.
■GYMNASTICS
Chinese team shines
China’s all-conquering men’s gymnastics team powered to top spot in their qualification section before an ecstatic crowd yesterday, shouldering aside the US on the way. Every routine from a Chinese team was met with cheers and applause in the 18,000-seater National Indoor Stadium as the hosts crushed the opposition in the second of three qualifying rounds. China remain favorites for a swag of medals when the gymnastics finals begin on Tuesday, qualifying first in section two with 374.675 points, with Japan second on 369.55 and Russia third on 366.225.
■EQUESTRIAN
Couple lead dressage phase
Australian couple Lucinda and Clayton Fredericks led the first session of equestrian eventing’s dressage phase yesterday. Lucinda provisionally took top spot with 30.40 penalty points on Headley Britannia with her husband second on 37.0 points on Ben Along Time. Lucinda won the Badminton Horse Trials last year and Burghley in 2006. “I thoroughly enjoyed my ride. She’s so little, she’s actually quite easy to maneuver,” Lucinda told reporters of her horse. US rider Gina Miles, riding McKinlaigh, came third with 39.30 penalty points. New Zealand’s Mark Todd, competing in his sixth Olympics, lies ninth with a score of 49.40 on Gandalf.
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