■BASEBALL
Wang placed on disabled list
Taiwanese pitcher Wang Chien-ming was placed on the 60-day disabled list by the Washington Nationals on Sunday. Wang, still recovering from arthroscopic surgery on his throwing shoulder, last threw in a bullpen session on March 26. The Nationals were due to open their Major League Baseball season yesterday at home against the Philadelphia Phillies.
■SOCCER
French title race heats up
Auxerre squandered an opportunity to go top of Ligue 1 after being held to a 1-1 home draw by Paris St Germain on Sunday. They had to settle for a three-way tie on 57 points with leaders Olympique Lyon and second-placed Montpellier. Auxerre are third on goal difference with seven games left. Romania striker Daniel Niculae put Auxerre in front in the 11th minute but their advantage was quickly cancelled out by Younousse Sankhare. Lyon earned a 2-1 win at Stade Rennes while Montpellier were held 0-0 at home by Monaco on Saturday. “We’re disappointed to see we couldn’t get three points but let’s wait the end of the season before drawing any conclusion,” Auxerre coach Jean Fernandez told Canal Plus television. Olympique Marseille closed to within one point of the top three after a first-half header from Brandao secured a 1-0 victory at home to Racing Lens earlier on Sunday. Marseille, who ended the game with 10 men after defender Stephane Mbia was sent off with 15 minutes left, are fifth on 56 points, behind fourth-placed Girondins Bordeaux on goal difference. Both clubs have two games in hand. Bordeaux lost 2-1 at home to Nancy on Saturday.
■SOCCER
Keane on target again
Robbie Keane fired home a penalty for his 12th goal in 12 games as Celtic won 1-0 at Hibernian on Sunday to cut Rangers’ lead in the Scottish Premier League to 10 points. On loan from Tottenham, Keane drove the spot kick home in the 62nd minute after Hibs’ Anthony Stokes had caught Aiden McGeady in the face with a high kick. In Sunday’s late game, Kilmarnock beat Aberdeen 2-0 for their first win in seven matches to move up one place to 10th and further away from relegation trouble. Aberdeen defender Davide Grassi turned a shot by Scott Severin into his own net in the 25th minute and Allan Russell added Kilmarnock’s second in the 73rd.
■SOCCER
Five-goal Nalchik go top
Spartak Nalchik clinched their third win of the season to go top of the Russian Premier League following a confident 5-2 victory over Rostov. Nalchik have 10 points from four matches, two ahead of Terek Grozny, who beat Samara 2-0, and reigning champions Rubin Kazan, who were held to a goalless draw at Ramenkoye. Midfielder Vladimir Dyadyun netted a double to secure Nalchik’s well-deserved win and take his season’s tally to four goals. Nine-time champions Spartak Moscow dropped points again as they were held to a 2-2 draw at Tomsk. Forward Sergei Kornilenko gave Tomsk a 1-0 lead with a precise spot-kick in the eighth minute after Spartak goalkeeper Soslan Dzhanaev fouled Georgy Dzhioev. Spartak leveled through Brazilian marksman Welliton, who scored from Sergei Parshivlyuk’s cross in the 29th minute. Valery Klimov restored Tomsk’s lead after a piece of good individual work just five minutes later. However, Brazilian midfielder Ibson swept home a rebound after Sergei Pareiko’s blunder just two minutes after the interval to give Spartak a point.
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