■ITALY
Lazio rally to down Juve
Lazio came from behind to beat Juventus 2-1 at home in the first leg of their Italian Cup semi-final on Tuesday thanks to second-half goals by Goran Pandev and Tommaso Rocchi. Macedonia striker Pandev controlled a rebounded Stephan Lichtsteiner shot, before spinning around and finding the far corner of the net on 65 minutes. Rocchi then sprinted onto a though ball and slid in to fire home and give the Rome side a precious advantage 12 minutes from time. Midfielder Marco Marchionni had put Juventus in front in the 34th minute, intercepting a loose clearance and driving in with the help of a deflection. The visitors made the brighter start and striker Vincenzo Iaquinta had a goal disallowed for offside early on, although TV replays suggested he was in line with the last defender. Lazio responded well and Juve keeper Alex Manninger, standing in for the rested Gianluigi Buffon, did well to repel a diagonal Rocchi shot and a Cristian Ledesma free-kick later in the first half. The hosts keep pressing hard after Pandev’s goal and Pasquale Foggia forced two more good saves from Manninger before Rocchi scored the deserved winner.
■GERMANY
Mainz stun Schalke
Second-division Mainz got a goal from Aristide Bance in the 88th minute to beat Schalke 04 1-0 and reach the semi-finals of the German Cup for the first time on Tuesday. Bance sneaked behind Schalke’s defense to meet a long free-kick and slotted the ball home unopposed from close range. Mainz, the second-placed team in the second division, sent Schalke deeper into troubled water. Fred Routen’s team were third last season in the Bundesliga, but they have been unable to challenge for the title and are stuck in eighth place. Tuesday’s loss meant Schalke are out of the running for any title. “It was a really dumb goal to concede,” Schalke manager Andreas Mueller said.
■FRANCE
Guingamp defeat Le Mans
Bakary Kone scored a late winner as Ligue 2 side En Avant Guingamp defeated top flight Le Mans 1-0 to reach the quarter-finals of the French Cup on Tuesday. Kone got the clinching goal in the 83rd minute. A Xavier Pentecote double earned Toulouse a 2-0 win at Ligue 2 side Boulogne-sur-Mer. Pentecote, who has featured in only three Ligue 1 games this season, opened the scoring four minutes before the break when he latched onto an Alexandre Bonnet cross. The 22-year-old striker grabbed his second on 62 minutes by beating Boulogne keeper Florian Bague from close range. Grenoble went through after winning a penalty shootout 4-2 at Ligue 2 side Dijon following a 1-1 draw. Defender Stephane Morisot’s 15th-minute opener for the home side was canceled out three minutes later by Grenoble striker Nassim Akrour.
■SERBIA
Platini rejects Kosovo
UEFA president Michel Platini said on Tuesday that Kosovo could not join the organization until it was recognized by the UN. “The situation is very simple: UEFA, FIFA do not go in for politics ... the only thing UEFA can do at the present is to respect the statutes of UEFA and the statutes clearly say that to be affiliated with UEFA it is necessary to be recognized by the United Nations,” Platini told reporters in Belgrade. Kosovo, which unilaterally declared independence from Serbia a year ago, has been recognized by more than 50 countries, including the US and most of the EU.
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