The Columbus Crew of the US and Mexican club Toluca both played out draws on Tuesday to earn quarter-final berths in the CONCACAF Champions League.
In the final round of group matches, the Crew drew 1-1 with the Puerto Rico Islanders to clinch second place in Group C. Toluca drew 1-1 with US club D.C. United to claim first place in Group B.
Mexico’s Cruz Azul, which had already advanced, defeated Saprissa of Costa Rica 2-1 in Group C.
Five teams have now qualified for the quarters with Mexico’s Pachuca, Cruz Azul and Pumas already in the last eight ahead of Tuesday.
In Bayamon, Puerto Rico, Emilio Renteria scored the equalizer 15 minutes from time for Columbus after Noah Delgado opened the scoring in the 33rd minute.
The victory gives the Crew eight points in Group C. Saprissa have five after their loss.
Israel Lopez’s 62nd minute penalty lifted Toluca to a 1-1 draw with D.C. United in Mexico City. Chris Pontius scored for the Americans in the fifth minute.
The draw gives Toluca 13 points and first place in Group B. United have 10 points.
The US club will have to wait until today’s Group B match between Marathon of Honduras and Jabloteh of Trinidad to know if they finish second and advance to the last eight.
Marathon have nine points. If Marathon draw, D.C. United advance because they have a better goal difference in their two head-to-head matches against Marathon.
Marathon will claim second place with a victory.
In San Jose, Costa Rica, Ramon Nunez and Pablo Zeballos scored late goals to give Cruz Azul a 2-1 win in Group C. Kendall Watson opened the scoring in the 40th for Saprissa.
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