SOCCER
Hoffenheim draw with Mainz
TSG 1899 Hoffenheim’s new coach Markus Babbel was unable to mark his home debut with a win on Friday as FSV Mainz 05 came from behind to earn a 1-1 draw in the Bundesliga. The home side went ahead in the ninth minute when the unfortunate Nikolce Noveski deflected Boris Vukcevic’s cross into his own net for his sixth ever own goal — a Bundesliga joint record. Noveski also scored an own goal when Mainz hosted Hoffenheim earlier this season. Mohamed Zidan scored in the third consecutive game following his winter transfer from Borussia Dortmund when the Hoffenheim defense left him completely free to volley in Radoslav Zabavnik’s cross in the 29th.
Photo: EPA
BASEBALL
Redsox’s Wakefield retires
Tim Wakefield is retiring after pitching the past 17 seasons for the Boston Red Sox. The 45-year-old knuckleballer made the announcement at the team’s spring training facility on Friday. After two seasons with the Pittsburgh Pirates, the right-hander signed as a minor-league free agent in April 1995. He was 186-168 with a 4.43 ERA with the Red Sox. Only Roger Clemens and Cy Young had more wins (192) with the team. Wakefield is first in team history with 3,006 innings and 430 starts, and second in games and strikeouts. For his career, Wakefield was 200-180 with a 4.41 ERA He won two World Series championships in Boston. Wakefield was the oldest player in the majors last season and on Sept. 13, he earned his 200th win on his eighth try. It turned out to be his last victory.
SOCCER
Match canceled over fears
Yesterday’s scheduled Greek Super League match between AEK and OFI Crete was called off on Friday amid fears of violence by fans of the Athens team angry at the absence of tickets for the game. Greek General Secretary of Sports Panos Bitsaxis made the decision on police advice because financially-troubled AEK’s failure to pay state taxes meant it was not able to issue tickets for the weekend clash. Police feared that supporters would force their way into the Olympic stadium to see the match instead. AEK reportedly could not raise 200,000 euros (US$263,000) before Friday’s deadline to pay their outstanding tax bill.
SOCCER
Chinese officials sentenced
A Chinese court yesterday sentenced two top former Football Association officials to more than a decade in jail, state media said, in a graft scandal that brought the soccer league to its knees. Former deputy chief Yang Yimin and former top head referee Zhang Jianqiang were the first to learn their fate yesterday among 39 officials awaiting sentencing in the match-fixing and gambling scandal exposed more than two years ago. Yang was convicted of accepting bribes worth 1.25 million yuan (US$200,000) from about 20 clubs to fix fitness test results and sentenced to 10-and-a-half years, Xinhua news agency said. Zhang, the former director of the association’s referee committee, received a 12-year term for taking bribes worth a total of 2.73 million yuan on 24 occasions. The jail terms come after four top referees — including China’s “Golden Whistle” Lu Jun — were given up to seven-year jail terms on Thursday.
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