■BRAZIL
Flamengo win title
Goalkeeper Bruno saved a penalty in regulation and two more in a shootout against Botafogo to give Flamengo their third straight Rio de Janeiro state title on Sunday. In Sao Paulo, Ronaldo’s Corinthians clinched that state’s title unbeaten after a 1-1 draw against Santos. After a 2-2 draw in regulation time at the packed Maracana stadium, Bruno stopped shots by defenders Juninho and Leandro Guerreiro, giving Brazil’s most popular club a 4-2 win and a 31st state title. Bruno had stopped a penalty shot by Victor Simoes in the second half. Led by three-time FIFA player of the year Ronaldo, Corinthians held Santos to a 1-1 draw to become the first unbeaten Sao Paulo state champion in 37 years. Corinthians had won the first leg 3-1 last week at Vila Belmiro in Santos and could have clinched the title even if they had lost Sunday’s match by a difference of two goals. In Belo Horizonte, Cruzeiro won the Minas Gerais state title with a 1-1 draw against Atletico Mineiro. Cruzeiro had won the first leg 5-0. In Curitiba, Atletico Paranaense secured the Parana state title with a 2-0 win over Cianorte.
■NETHERLANDS
Twente earn crucial win
Goals from Kenneth Perez, Peter Wisgerhof and Eljero Elia earned Steve McClaren’s FC Twente a 3-0 victory over AZ Alkmaar on Sunday and a place in next season’s Champions League. Perez and Wisgerhof gave Twente a 2-0 lead by the hour mark and the match slipped further from AZ’s grasp three minutes later when they were reduced to 10 men, following a red card for Gill Swerts. Elia added Twente’s third goal in the 78th minute. With AZ Alkmaar already having won the Dutch league, Twente is now certain to finish second as they have a four-point lead over third-place Ajax. Ajax will now play in next season’s Europa League, joining PSV Eindhoven. PSV finished up drawing 1-1 with NEC Nijmegen on Sunday after taking the lead before having two men sent off and then conceding an equalizer in stoppage time.
■PORTUGAL
Porto extend lead
Porto extended their lead at the top of the Premier League to six points with a 3-0 win at Maritimo on Sunday after second-placed Sporting were held to a scoreless draw at Academica. Porto lead on 63 points from 27 matches and can clinch their fourth successive title if they beat Nacional at home on May 11. Sporting have 57 points and Benfica are five points further adrift. The champions started strongly against Marititimo with defender Bruno Alves hitting the post in the second minute. Moments later Raul Meireles opened the scoring with a low drive which Maritimo keeper Marcos should have saved. Defender Rolando doubled the lead in the 64th minute, heading in from a Cristian Rodriguez free kick from just outside the area and Tomas Costa added a third on 83 minutes following a counter-attacking move.
■ENGLAND
Blues back in big time
Birmingham City sealed their return to the Premier League after a 2-1 win over Reading ensured them automatic promotion from the Championship. “I’m really delighted for everyone at the club,” Birmingham manager Alex McLeish said. “Last week we wondered if our chance had gone and there were some tired legs out there today. Before the match we just asked the lads to play the best game they’ve played all season. Now it is not the time to start talking about what we are going to do in the Premier League. We just need to savor this moment.”
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