■CRICKET
Rain washes out Dhaka Test
Wet conditions forced the umpires to call off play on the third day of the second Test between Bangladesh and New Zealand in Dhaka yesterday. The first two days were also washed out due to rain and bad weather. With only two days remaining in the match, Bangladesh have lost all realistic hopes of squaring the two-match series. They lost the first Test by three wickets at Chittagong last week.
■FIGURE SKATING
Kim wins Skate America
South Korea’s Kim Yu-na led an Asian sweep at Skate America in Everett, Washington, winning the title in a runaway Sunday over Japan’s Yukari Nakano and Miki Ando. With a lead of nearly 12 points entering the free skate, the 18-year-old Kim added to her substantial cushion, ending with a total of 193.45. Nakano, 23, won silver with a score of 172.53, and Ando, last year’s world champion, took bronze with 168.42. Skating with power and grace, the long-limbed Kim landed six triples in a program with no substantial gaffes. She changed a triple loop to a single and was charged with minor flaws on two spins. No Americans made the podium, with Rachael Flatt finishing fourth.
■MOTOR RACING
Edwards wins Atlanta race
Carl Edwards won his seventh race of the season at Atlanta Motor Speedway on Sunday, but points leader Jimmie Johnson increased his lead in his quest for a third consecutive NASCAR championship. Johnson roared from 11th place to second in the final eight laps to boost his points lead to 183 over Edwards with three races remaining. Johnson had dropped as low as 30th when he received a penalty for speeding on pit road. Denny Hamlin finished third, followed by Matt Kenseth and Kyle Busch.
■RUGBY UNION
Henson inspires Ospreys
Gavin Henson scored a superb solo try, which saw him beat former Wallaby star Chris Latham, as holders Ospreys moved nearer the semi-finals of the Anglo-Welsh Cup with a 37-22 win over Worcester. The Wales star’s 40m run suggested he was ready for the Six Nations title-holders match against world champions South Africa at the Millennium Stadium next Saturday. Wales wing Shane Williams scored one of the Ospreys’ other three tries with Test outside-half/center James Hook kicking 17 points. In the day’s other Anglo-Welsh tie, Scotland international Gordon Ross kicked 23 points in Saracens’ 33-19 victory over rival Premiership side Northampton. Both team scored two tries, with England Under-20 left-wing Noah Cato and scrum-half Moses Rauluni crossing for Saracens while full-back Ben Foden and Roger Wilson touched down for the Saints.
■GOLF
Player fined for freak shot
A South Korean golfer has paid a heavy price for an embarrassing shot that landed his caddy in hospital. The golfer, identified by the country’s Supreme Court only as “Jung,” was fined 2 million won (US$1,400) for the incident, which occurred at a club in Gunsan Province more than two years ago. Media reports said Jung had wound up a huge swing at the third hole, but when his left foot slipped, the ball rocketed off in the wrong direction and struck his caddy — standing 8m behind him — in the stomach. The caddy needed seven weeks of hospital treatment. The Supreme Court recognized lower courts’ ruling that Jung had violated the duty of due care to prevent injury to others while playing a sport.
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