BOXING
Huck topples Garay in 10
Marco Huck of Germany knocked out Hugo Hernan Garay of Argentina in the 10th round to retain his WBO cruiserweight title on Saturday in Frankfurt. Huck knocked down Garay in the first round, but then had to fight hard against the relentless Garay. The end came 1 minute, 10 seconds into the 10th when Huck caught Garay with a right to the chin, another right to the side of the head and then landed a huge left to the chin that sent Garay sprawling to the floor. The Argentine could not beat the count. Huck improved to 33-1, with 24 KOs. Garay dropped to 34-6.
Photo: AFP
BOXING
Burns dismisses Cook in first
Ricky Burns of Scotland stopped former champion Nicky Cook of England in the first round to successfully retain his WBO super featherweight title at Echo Arena in Liverpool on Saturday. Burns floored Cook in the opening seconds, including a hard right to the back that made Cook uncomfortable. A glancing blow put Cook down again and though he got to his feet, Cook was struggling. More fierce rights to the body dropped Cook and his corner threw in the towel to end the scheduled 12-rounder after only 1 minute, 33 seconds. Cook was taken out of the ring in a stretcher and to hospital for a suspected spinal injury, promoter Frank Warren said. Burns (32-2, 9 KO) was making his third defense of the title, while it was the second fight for Cook (30-3, 16 KO) since losing the same title in 2009.
SOCCER
Doping scandal hits N Korea
North Korean officials blamed traditional medicine using musk deer glands for five of their players testing positive for steroids at the women’s World Cup in soccer’s biggest doping scandal for almost two decades. FIFA president Sepp Blatter said on Saturday that after two players were caught during the tournament this month, FIFA tested the rest of the North Korea squad and found three more positive results. FIFA has already met with a North Korean delegation and heard arguments that the steroids were accidentally taken with traditional Chinese medicines based on musk deer glands to treat players who had been struck by lightning on June 8 during a training camp in North Korea. FIFA investigators, who discovered evidence of doping in the North Korean samples, found themselves in uncharted territory as such steroids had not been encountered before. Experts from the World Anti-Doping Agency were called in to confirm the breach of doping rules.
TENNIS
Japan promoted in Fed Cup
Japan earned promotion to World Group II in the Fed Cup after ace Ayumi Morita coasted to victory for an insurmountable lead over Argentina in a playoff matchup yesterday. After the hosts took a 2-0 lead on Saturday, the 23-year-old Morita whipped Aranza Salut, who replaced the out-of-form Maria Irigoyen, 6-2, 6-1 in the best-of-five contest. The fourth singles match was canceled because of a government initiative to conserve energy in Japan, while Rika Fujiwara and Kurumi Nara defeated Mailen Auroux and Maria Irigoyen 6-1, 6-3 to complete a 4-0 scoreline.
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