SOCCER
Costa Rica to attend Copa
Costa Rica have decided to accept an invitation to replace Japan at the Copa America, the Central American country’s Football Federation president Eduardo Li said on Tuesday. “We have taken the decision to take part in the Copa America,” Li, whose squad will take one of two berths for guest teams in the July 1 to July 14 tournament, told reporters. “We can go with an Olympic team, an under-23 [side] with five reinforcements basically over 23 years of age.” Japan pulled out on Monday after failing to get the release of European-based players and facing a problem with J-League clubs whose season has been extended into July following the earthquake and tsunami in March.
BASEBALL
Wang completes simulations
Taiwanese pitcher Wang Chien-ming of the Washington Nationals completed all of his seven simulation games in Florida on Tuesday, a step forward in his attempt to return to the Major League. The former New York Yankees starter, who has not pitched in the majors since 2009 because of a shoulder injury, threw five innings for the first time in the extended spring training, including seven strikes. “I felt pretty good overall today. I controlled the ball much better and did not use as many balls as last time. My sliders were also in good position,” he said in a TV interview with Taiwanese media. The right-hander threw 64 balls against the Houston Astros hitters without letting them score. His fastest ball was timed at 138.4km per hour. Wang’s next move will be to the Nationals’ minor league, Class 2A on Sunday, where he will begin a rehab assignment. He will hopefully return to the majors in late June.
GOLF
Yani Tseng paired with Hart
Top seed Choi Na-yeon of South Korea will face Scotland’s Catriona Matthew in the first round of the US$1.5 million LPGA Match-Play Championship that begins today. A random draw on Tuesday set up the pairings for the showdown at Hamilton Farm Golf Club, which concludes with semi-finals and an 18-hole final for the US$375,000 top prize on Sunday. Seedings were based upon last year’s LPGA money list rather than the current rankings, adding another twist to the bracketing, which saw the top 32 players from last year locked into place and their opponents selected in a blind draw. World No. 1 and LPGA season money leader Yani Tseng of Taiwan, the fourth seed, was paired against American Marcy Hart, the second-worst seed in the field of 64. Second-ranked and second-seeded Jiyai Shin will open against fellow South Korean Meena Lee.
MULTI-SPORT
X Games looks to expand
The X Games, a US-based multi-sport festival including such sports as skateboarding and motocross, will expand globally in 2013 with three new events to start in 2013, founder ESPN said on Tuesday. ESPN produces current events in Los Angeles and winter-sport haven Aspen, Colorado, plus another in France with partner Canal Plus. Cities will bid next year to host three other 2013 X Games to be staged outside the US. The X Games, which began in 1995, includes BMX cycling, skateboarding, motocross and rally car racing, while the Winter X Games features skiing, snowboard and snowmobile events. Since 1998, the X Games has organized smaller-level demonstration and qualifying events in Brazil, Canada, China, Dubai, France, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, Singapore, Spain, Taiwan and the Philippines.
ICE HOCKEY
Flyers’ Carcillo suspended
Philadelphia Flyers forward Daniel Carcillo has been suspended for two regular-season games for his off-ice actions during a playoff game against the Boston Bruins, the NHL said in Toronto on Tuesday. Carcillo was banned for an incident outside the officials’ locker room after the first period of Game 4 of the Eastern Conference semi-finals and a verbal confrontation with a linesman at the players’ bench ahead of the second period. The Flyers lost the May 6 encounter and were eliminated from the playoffs, so Carcillo will miss his team’s first two regular season games of the next NHL season. Carcillo had four goals and two assists in 57 games during the regular season.
ATLANTA
Clubs in selloff talks
The owners of the NBA’s Atlanta Hawks are in exclusive talks to sell the team and its arena, while also trying to peddle the NHL’s Atlanta Thrashers, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported on Tuesday. Citing unnamed sources, the newspaper said the Atlanta Spirit group has an exclusive negotiating period to sell the Hawks and their home arena to John Moores, an Internet magnate and outgoing owner of the MLB’s San Diego Padres. The Spirit is also reported to be in talks to sell the Thrashers to a Canadian group that would move the NHL club to Winnipeg, which lost its team in a move to Arizona 15 years ago. The Internet report said a deal is not imminent and not certain to be completed.
CYCLING
Greg Henderson wins stage
New Zealand’s Greg Henderson took the overall lead from British teammate Ben Swift in the Tour of California on Tuesday by capturing a windy and crash-filled second stage. Team Sky’s Henderson, who began the day 10 seconds behind stage one winner Swift, sprinted to the front in the final 500m and captured the 196.2km stage in five hours, 14 minutes, 29 seconds. With 10 seconds of bonus time for winning the stage, Henderson seized the overall lead based upon tie-breakers with Swift second and Slovakian Peter Sagan of Liquigas-Cannondale third, four seconds adrift. Henderson and Swift are teammates of reigning Tour of California champion Michael Rogers, an Australian who was unable to defend his crown after a virus kept him from properly training for the race. Argentina’s Juan Jose Haedo, a rider for Saxo-Bank, was second in the stage, with Norwegian rider and reigning world champion Thor Hushovd of Garmin-Cervelo third, both came in the same time as Henderson. Crashes in the final kilometers caused minor injuries to Tour de France veteran Jens Voigt of Germany and the Leopard-Trek team, countryman Andreas Schillinger of NetApp and American Will Dugan of Team Type One.
OLYMPICS
Torch to circumnavigate UK
Organizers say the Olympic torch will embark on a 70-day, 12,875km relay of Britain ahead of next year’s London Games. In a statement yesterday, organizers named 74 locations where 8,000 torchbearers will carry the flame after it arrives from Greece in exactly a year’s time on May 18 next year. The relay will start the following morning at the southern tip of Britain at Land’s End in Cornwall. The torch will pass through England’s major cities, the capitals of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland as well as remote outposts including the Isle of Lewis. The flame will spend the week in London before it is used to light the cauldron at the opening ceremony in the Olympic Stadium on Friday, July 27 next year.
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