SPAIN
Real lose, but still advance
Real Madrid, cushioned by an 8-0 first-leg lead, secured their place in the Copa del Rey quarter-finals on Thursday despite a 2-0 defeat in the return match at Levante. Levante’s two second-half goals by Xisco Nadal and Sergio Gonzalez were not enough to overturn Real’s huge advantage, and the Spanish giants pushed through 8-2 on aggregate. Atletico Madrid, who took a 1-0 lead to Espanyol, made it through to the last eight after clinching a 1-1 draw to wrap up a 2-1 aggregate win. Real Betis ended the hopes of top-flight Getafe with a 3-1 win that overturned the Madrid’s club’s 2-1 advantage from the first leg. The Seville-based side are now the only lower-tier club left in the competition. The Seville-based team advanced 4-3 on aggregate. Almeria scored four first-half goals in a 4-3 win at Real Mallorca to advance 8-6 on aggregate, while Villarreal made it to the quarter-finals after defeating Valencia 4-2 following their goalless draw last month.
ARGENTINA
River to release Ortega
River Plate have decided to dispense with brilliant but troubled former Argentina forward Aril Ortega. The 36-year-old veteran of three World Cups, who has a drinking habit, missed Wednesday’s first practice of the summer recess, turning up on Thursday, but slinking away without speaking to reporters. “It’s true Ortega won’t be staying at River,” said a club source, who asked to remain anonymous. “They told me they would not be taking me into account,” Ortega was later quoted as saying on the sports daily Ole’s Web site when asked whether he would be part of the team for the championship starting next month.
ENGLAND
Beckham a gamble: Keegan
Signing Los Angeles Galaxy’s David Beckham on a short-term loan would be a big gamble, former England manager Kevin Keegan said on Thursday. The 35-year-old midfielder is hoping to clinch a temporary move to the Premier League during the MLS off-season, with fourth-placed Tottenham Hotspur keen to do business, but Keegan said the former Manchester United and Real Madrid player would find it difficult. “I think it’s too high risk. If I were a manager, I don’t think I would do the deal because there’s a chance it could upset the apple cart,” Keegan said. “You would get a lot of publicity. It might work, but it might backfire. It’s a risk.”
ENGLAND
Ipswich sack Roy Keane
Former Manchester United captain Roy Keane has been sacked as manager of English Championship club Ipswich Town, local media reported yesterday. Ipswich, who travel to Premier League champions Chelsea in the FA Cup third round tomorrow, did not make an immediate comment on the widespread media reports, but said on their Web site they would be holding a press conference later yesterday.
GERMANY
Ballack back in action
Injury-plagued Michael Ballack played his first game in four months when he came on at halftime in Bayer Leverkusen’s friendly against Rot-Weiss Oberhausen on Thursday. Ballack helped his team win 2-1 against the second division outfit in his first match since Sept. 11, when he fractured his shinbone in a 2-2 draw with Hannover 96. “I needed match practice and this was a good start,” the 34-year-old said on Kicker magazine’s Web site.
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