RUGBY UNION
Japan obliterate UAE 111-0
Japan pulverized the United Arab Emirates (UAE) 111-0 to capture the Asian Five Nations for the fourth time in a row and with a game to spare, Japanese rugby officials said on yesterday. The “Brave Blossoms” exploded for 17 tries in Friday’s game in Dubai to make it a perfect three wins from three and move to an unassailable 18 points. Japan, warming up for this year’s World Cup in New Zealand which kicks off on Sept. 9, play Sri Lanka in their last match next weekend. Lock Hitoshi Ono, whose family’s dairy farm has been threatened by collapse by the current nuclear crisis at the crippled power plant north of Tokyo, was given the captain’s armband for the game.
Photo: Reuters
ICE HOCKEY
Canadian player found dead
Canadian professional hockey player Derek Boogaard was found dead on Friday in his Minneapolis, Minnesota, apartment. He was 28. The New York Rangers announced the forward’s death on Friday night, but gave no details. Boogaard had signed a four-year, US$6.5 million deal with the Rangers in July last year and appeared in 22 games with them last season. He had a goal and an assist to go with 45 penalty minutes. One of the most feared fighters in the NHL, Boogaard missed the last 52 games of the regular season with a concussion and shoulder injury and did not play in the playoffs. The Saskatchewan native began his NHL career with Minnesota and appeared in 255 games with the Wild from 2005 to 2010.
SWIMMING
Phelps flounders in free
Switzerland’s Dominik Meichtry beat Michael Phelps and four other Olympians to win the 200m freestyle on Friday at the Charlotte UltraSwim meet. Meichtry finished with a time of 1 minute, 48.55 seconds, overtaking early leader Ryan Lochte and edging Ricky Barens, who finished second in 1 minute, 49.25 seconds. Austria’s Markus Rogan was third in 1 minute, 49.47 seconds. Phelps finished in sixth place, 1.34 seconds behind Meichtry. The race was Phelps’ first since he finished a surprising fourth in the 200m butterfly at a meet in Michigan last month, ending a winning streak in the event dating back to 2002. Phelps, who has been training intensely for the upcoming world championships in Shanghai in July, was in an outside lane after posting a slow time in the heats.
BASKETBALL
Rivers extends with Celtics
Doc Rivers has agreed to a fresh five-year deal to remain head coach of the Boston Celtics, the NBA team said on Friday. Rivers’ existing contract was set to expire at the end of this season and he had initially planned to take a break from coaching after the Celtics were eliminated from the playoffs on Wednesday. However, the 49-year-old changed his mind and Celtics president of basketball operations Danny Ainge told the team’s Web site that Rivers would return for next season. No further details of the new deal were disclosed, but local media estimate the contract extension to be worth US$35 million. Rivers, an NBA All-Star as a player with the Atlanta Hawks in 1988, led the Celtics to the 2008 NBA championship and also to last year’s Finals.
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