■SOCCER
Clerics ban United shirt
Manchester United’s fans in Malaysia erupted in astonishment and anger on social media yesterday after clerics warned Muslims against wearing the team’s famous jersey with its “devil” emblem. Manchester United and the rest of the English Premier League are hugely popular in Muslim-majority Malaysia, where conservative religious leaders said the jersey should be banned. Social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook were flooded with comments from fans. “Maybe the religious leaders are just fans of Liverpool,” quipped one supporter on Twitter. “What am I gonna do with all my Man Utd jerseys? And my sons’ jerseys?” Sharifah, a Muslim mother of two and an IT programmer, asked on her Twitter account. Malaysian clerics said on Wednesday that Muslims must not wear the iconic red jersey because devils should be shunned, not celebrated.
■SOCCER
Zheng scores on his return
Former China captain Zheng Zhi helped his new team to a 10-0 win on his return to Chinese soccer on Wednesday, a drubbing made all the easier by a strike over pay that left the opposition with just two regular starters. The former Charlton Athletic and Celtic playmaker got on the score sheet as Guangzhou ran riot in their home Jia League (second division) encounter with Nanjing Youyou, who initially traveled to the match with just seven players. The regular Nanjing players refused to participate in protest at not having been paid — one told local media he was owed four years wages — and the fixture was only able to go ahead after five youth team players were drafted in. Their only substitution was a goalkeeper, who did not have his own jersey and had to use tape to change the number on the starter’s shirt from one to 40 when he came on, the Guangzhou Daily reported.
■SOCCER
Player gets 27-match ban
A player who tried to strangle a referee during a Chilean league game has been banned for 27 matches. Paraguayan defender Jose Pedroso blew his top during a highly charged Chilean second division match between his Rangers team and Deportes Concepcion when he was red-carded. He responded by grabbing referee Marcelo Miranda by the throat, before being pulled away by his teammates. “An act of aggression like this merits 20 matches and we have decided to add five matches more for the attempted attack on the referee and two more for the red card,” said Angel Botto, president of the disciplinary tribunal.
■SOCCER
Shakhtar sign Eduardo
Shakhtar Donetsk signed Croatian international striker Eduardo from English Premier League side Arsenal on a four-year deal on Wednesday, the Ukrainian champions said on their Web site. Reports said Shakhtar paid the Gunners 7 million euros (US$8.9 million) for the 27-year-old Croatian forward who joined Arsenal in July 2007.
■FIELD HOCKEY
Coach quits after allegations
The male coach of India’s women’s team resigned on Wednesday after allegations of sexual misconduct leveled by one of the players. The allegations against Maharaj Kaushik of sexual harassment were contained in a letter sent to the hockey federation by an unidentified player. Kaushik, who played in India’s victorious men’s hockey side at the 1980 Olympics, has denied any wrongdoing and said the charges were a “big-time conspiracy” by players who had failed to find a place in the 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