AS Saint-Etienne bolstered their Champions League push by coming from behind to win 2-1 at Valenciennes on Saturday and closing to within a point of third-placed LOSC Lille Metropole in Ligue 1.
Both sides were reduced to 10 men in the first half, with Valenciennes midfielder Carlos Sanchez shown a straight red card for clattering Fabien Lemoine in the fourth minute and Jean-Pascal Mignot dismissed for a last-man foul on Foued Kadir.
The hosts broke the deadlock in the 69th minute through Vincent Aboubakar, but Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang’s 11th goal of the season drew Saint-Etienne level four minutes later.
The winning goal arrived after another four-minute interval, with Bakary Sako slamming the ball into an unguarded net after Laurent Batlles’ shot came back off the base of the left-hand post.
Toulouse started the day level on points with Saint-Etienne, but they could not match their rivals’ result as they were held to a 1-1 draw by Lorient that moved them up one place to fifth.
Girondins de Bordeaux snapped a two-game losing streak by winning 2-0 at Stade Brestois 29 to draw level on points with eighth-placed Olympique de Marseille, while AS Nancy-Lorraine followed up their victory over Olympique Lyonnais with a 1-1 draw at relegation rivals OGC Nice.
Sochaux-Montbeliard began life without sacked coach Mehmed Bazdarevic by winning 3-2 at Evian Thonon Gaillard, which ended their 14-game winless run and lifted them off the foot of the table.
Following their elimination from the Champions League by Cypriot minnows APOEL in mid-week, Lyon’s bid to resurrect their faltering bid to qualify for next season’s competition took a step in the right direction by defeating visitors Lille 2-1 in Saturday’s late game.
Additional reporting by staff writer
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
Rafael Nadal on Wednesday said the upcoming French Open would be the moment to “give everything and die” on the court after his comeback from injury in Barcelona was curtailed by Alex de Minaur. The 22-time Grand Slam title winner, back playing this week after three months on the sidelines, battled well, but eventually crumbled 7-5, 6-1 against the world No. 11 from Australia in the second round. Nadal, 37, who missed virtually all of last season, is hoping to compete at the French Open next month where he is the record 14-time champion. The Spaniard said the clash with De Minaur was
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