Surprise package Espanyol moved up to fourth in La Liga after two late penalties helped them to a 3-0 home win over promoted Hercules on Sunday.
Atletico Madrid climbed to sixth place after a Sergio Aguero double enabled his side come back to beat promoted Real Socieded 4-2 away in the late game.
Sevilla had earlier missed out on the chance to climb into the Champions League qualification places when they fell to a late Pierre Webo goal and went down 2-1 at home to Real Mallorca.
Espanyol maintained their 100 percent home record after Joan Verdu finished off a swift counterattack from a Hercules corner in the 15th minute at Estadi -Cornella-El Prat.
Argentine striker Pablo Osvaldo doubled the lead from the penalty spot 10 minutes from time when Hercules goalkeeper Juan Calatayud brought him down for a penalty to earn a red card. Luis Garcia converted a second penalty at the end.
Atletico were trailing at the Estadio Anoeta when Tomas Ujfalusi helped Joseba Llorente’s shot into his own net after 12 minutes, but they turned it round late in the second half.
Uruguay’s Diego Forlan leveled after a wonderful piece of skill from Aguero in the 72nd minute and the Argentine then scored twice in four minutes.
Diego Rivas pulled one back for the hosts in the 85th minute after an error from Simao Sabrosa, but the Portuguese made amends scoring a stoppage-time penalty after Jose Antonio Reyes was brought down in the area.
Sevilla fell behind at the Estadio Ramon Sanchez Pizjuan when Mallorca’s Michael Pereira netted at the near post on a counterattack in the 36th minute.
The hosts gradually came back into it and Brazil striker Luis Fabiano looked to have grabbed a point when he struck two minutes from time, but Mallorca’s Cameroon striker Webo rose to head the winner at a free-kick on the stroke of fulltime.
Elsewhere, Chilean coach Manuel Pellegrini’s winning start at Malaga came to an end with a 3-0 defeat at Deportivo La Coruna.
Ecuador striker Felipe Caicedo scored twice as Levante climbed out of the relegation places with a 3-1 win at home to Racing Santander, and Osasuna beat Sporting Gijon 1-0 at home.
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
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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