■SOCCER
Marseilles close in on title
Mathieu Valbuena scored the winner as Marseille moved a step closer to clinching the French title for the first time in 18 years by beating Saint-Etienne 1-0 on Sunday. Valbuena’s sixth-minute goal at Stade Velodrome kept Marseille five points clear of second-place Auxerre with only four games remaining. Marseille have won their last seven league matches and are unbeaten in Ligue 1 since Jan. 30. Marseille can move eight points clear at the top and all but wrap up the title if they win at Auxerre on Friday. Poland striker Ireneusz Jelen scored twice as Auxerre won 3-0 at Toulouse. Lens drew 1-1 with Valenciennes in Sunday’s other game.
■SOCCER
Bride before World Cup
Sampdoria striker Antonio Cassano has all but ruled himself out of a late Italy recall for the World Cup after saying he would not postpone his wedding in June. Cassano has been ignored by Italy coach Marcello Lippi for two years despite the world champions crying out for more creativity. The 27-year-old, whose bad boy image from the past has influenced Lippi, has matured markedly in recent years and is back on top form as Sampdoria seek qualification for next season’s Champions League. “No way,” Cassano told reporters when asked if he would postpone his June 19 wedding if Lippi changed his mind or had an injury crisis. “I’ve thought about the blue shirt since I was born but it’s not my problem,” the former AS Roma and Real Madrid man said. Cassano was a surprise choice in Roberto Donadoni’s squad for Euro 2008, but has not played since for Lippi.
■TENNIS
Nishikori to skip Cup tie
Japan’s hottest prospect Kei Nishikori will skip the Davis Cup tie against Australia in Brisbane next month as he has not fully recovered from injury, the national tennis association said yesterday. The 20-year-old, who returned to competition last month after an 11-month lay-off, is instead preparing to take part in the French Open around two weeks later. The Japan Tennis Association, in announcing the squad against Australia, said they had passed over Nishikori as “his recovery is not complete.” Nishikori said on his Web site last week he would compete in the French Open after two clay-court events in the US in the coming weeks. In the Japan squad to face Australia are Go Soeda, Yuichi Sugita, Tatsuma Ito and Takao Suzuki, whose world rankings are 184th, 200th, 256th and 315th respectively. Australia’s team is to be announced today.
■FORMULA ONE
Schumi’s car to be switched
Mercedes will switch Michael Schumacher’s car for next week’s Spanish Grand Prix to try and get the seven times Formula One champion back up to speed, team principal Ross Brawn said yesterday. “It’s not a new chassis per se, it’s a chassis we used in testing,” Brawn said. “The one he had got damaged during the first few races and we repaired it as best we could at the races. But now we are back at base we are going to re-introduce the test chassis and he will be using that in Barcelona.” Brawn said the wheelbase would also be changed to improve weight distribution, and Mercedes are also planning a major aerodynamic revamp for the first race of the European season after four in the Middle and Far East. Schumacher is making his Formula One comeback at the age of 41 and after retiring at the end of 2006. The German has been outqualified and beaten in all four races to date by teammate Nico Rosberg, with concern mounting that Schumacher is finding it hard to replicate his form of old.
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