BASEBALL
Rivera’s career in doubt
Mariano Rivera’s career is in serious jeopardy after the New York Yankees closing pitcher tore a ligament in his right knee on Thursday. Rivera, whose 608 saves are the most in Major League history, was hurt chasing a fly ball during batting practice before the Yankees’ 4-3 loss to the Kansas City Royals. By the time the game was over, he had been for an MRI scan at a hospital and said he had been diagnosed with a torn anterior cruciate ligament and torn meniscus. “I don’t know,” the 42-year-old hurler said when asked if he would be able to pitch again. “It all depends how the rehab is going to happen. From there we’ll see.” Rivera has five saves in five opportunities and is 1-1 with a 2.16 earned run average in nine games this season.
BOXING
Pros to compete in Rio: Wu
More than 50 professional boxers will compete at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics, International Boxing Association president Wu Ching-kuo said. “They will definitely be in Rio,” Wu said in London, where he was watching the final of the World Series of Boxing season between Dynamo Moscow and Milano Thunder. “Look at the Olympic program of other sports, like basketball, volleyball and handball, they have professionals and we are the only organization that doesn’t.” Launched last year, Wu’s brainchild would mean that boxers coming through the amateur ranks would not have to turn their backs on the Olympics in their prime by going down the established professional route.
SOCCER
Rooney wins best goal vote
Wayne Rooney’s stunning overhead-kick in the Manchester derby in February last year has been voted as the greatest goal in the 20 seasons of the English Premier League in a ballot of more than 300,000 fans. England striker Rooney acrobatically volleyed home Nani’s 77th-minute cross to take United eight points clear of City en route to a record 19th league title. Supporters from around the world voted in the ballot, with Rooney’s effort gaining 26 percent of the total votes cast. Dennis Bergkamp’s magnificent turn and finish against Newcastle United for Arsenal in March 2002 was the second most popular with 19 percent. Thierry Henry’s volley for Arsenal against Manchester United in 2000 was third on 15 percent.
SOCCER
Bento extends his contract
Portugal coach Paulo Bento has extended his deal until 2014, the Portuguese Football Federation announced on Thursday. Bento, who as a club coach guided Sporting to two Portuguese Cups, took over from Carlos Queiroz as coach of the Seleccao in September 2010. The former Sporting and Benfica midfielder, who won 35 caps for Portugal, is to name his 23-man squad for the Euro 2012 tournament on May 14.
SOCCER
Mourinho content with titles
Jose Mourinho has declared that he has no ambition to coach in any new countries after Real Madrid’s La Liga success gave him a haul of league titles from four different countries. Madrid secured the title with a 3-0 win at Athletic Bilbao on Wednesday, adding to the league titles that Mourinho previously won with Porto (Portugal), Chelsea (England) and Inter (Italy). “I’ve now won the titles important to me — the one in my country and the three biggest ones in Europe,” Mourinho told Portuguese television. “I don’t have any ambition to win in another country. There’s no other country that interests me.”
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