■SOCCER
Italian trial set to begin
The criminal trial probing the 2006 match-fixing scandal which rocked Italian soccer was set to begin in Naples yesterday. The affair, which involved clubs trying to procure favorable referees, led to Juventus being stripped of their 2005 and 2006 Serie A titles and being demoted to the second tier while five other clubs were deducted points. Former Juventus general manager Luciano Moggi and Lazio president Claudio Lotito are among 24 club directors, referees and former Italian soccer federation officials standing trial. A separate fast-track procedure has been reserved for 11 others implicated in the affair. Moggi, who has no link to a Juve side now back in Serie A, was banned from football for five years by a sporting tribunal in 2006 and earlier this month was given an 18-month suspended jail sentence after a separate soccer corruption trial.
■SOCCER
Espanol sack coach Mane
Struggling Spanish side announced yesterday the sacking of coach Mane. Mane, whose full name is Jose Manuel Esnal, had only been in the job for six weeks, since taking over from Bartolome Marquez in November. The final nail in Mane’s coffin was Sunday’s 4-0 thrashing away to Malaga, a result which leaves the Catalan club third from bottom in La Liga. Mane will be replaced by Argentine Mauricio Pochettino, popular at the club after his many years there as central defender.
■SOCCER
Ibrahimovic wins award
Inter forward Zlatan Ibrahimovic gained some consolation for missing out on the World Player of the Year prize and Ballon D’Or by scooping the Italian Player of the Year award on Monday. The Swede was the star performer as Inter romped to a third consecutive title and as well as picking up the top award at the Italian football Oscars, as they are known, he was also named best foreign player. Veteran Italy and Juventus forward Alessandro Del Piero picked up the best Italian award, while Fiorentina boss Cesare Prandelli was named best coach. Gianluigi Buffon of Juventus was named best goalkeeper, his teammate Giorgio Chiellini best defender, Napoli’s Marek Hamsik best young player and Roberto Rosetti best referee.
■SUMO
Asashoryu extends streak
Grand champion Asashoryu extended his winning streak to 10 bouts yesterday, staying tied solely for the lead at the New Year Sumo tournament. He grabbed the belt of Japanese opponent, Kotomitsuki, and quickly shoved him out of the ring in the day’s final bout in Tokyo. Fellow Mongolian grand champion Hakuho suffered his first defeat at the 15-day tournament, losing to newly promoted ozeki and compatriot Harumafuji. Hakuho slipped to 9-1.
■BOXING
Jose ‘Chegui’ Torres dies
Jose “Chegui” Torres, a former light heavyweight world champion and Olympic silver medalist, died on Monday, his widow said. He was 72. He died of a heart attack at home in his native Puerto Rico, his wife Ramonita Ortiz told reporters. Torres won the light heavyweight title in 1965 by stopping Willie Pastrano at Madison Square Garden in New York. He made three title defenses before losing a close decision to Dick Tiger in 1966. He finished with a record of 41-3-1, with 29 knockouts. The mayor of Torres’ hometown of Ponce declared three days of mourning and ordered flags be flown at half-mast.
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