The Dallas Cowboys will open their new US$1.1 billion stadium against the New York Giants on Sept. 20. The match was revealed with the release of this year’s NFL schedule on Tuesday.
The reigning Super Bowl champion Pittsburgh Steelers meet their division rival Baltimore Ravens twice in five weeks late in the season after they faced off in the AFC title game. They play on Nov. 29 and Dec. 27.
PRIME-TIME GAMES
The NFC champion Arizona Cardinals, who were edged by the Steelers in the Super Bowl, are scheduled for three nationally televised prime-time games: Sept. 27 at home against Indianapolis; Oct. 25 at home versus the Giants; and Dec. 14 at San Francisco.
On Oct. 11, the New England Patriots take on Denver and former offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels, now the Broncos’ coach. New England renews its rivalry with the Indianapolis Colts on Nov. 15.
The NFL had already announced the opening weekend’s main games.
STEELERS DEFENSE
The Steelers begin their title defense on Sept. 10 against the Tennessee Titans, who had the league’s best record last year and beat the Steelers 31-14 in the regular season.
The first Monday game features the Patriots — in what they hope is quarterback Tom Brady’s return — against the Buffalo Bills, in receiver Terrell Owens’ debut. Also that night, the San Diego Chargers visit the Oakland Raiders as the league pays tribute to the American Football League, which would have been 50 years old next year. All four of those teams are original AFL franchises.
New England also plays Tampa Bay in London on Oct. 25, with the Buccaneers as the host team.
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