SOCCER
Coach wants Eto’o demoted
Cameroon coach Denis Lavagne wants Samuel Eto’o removed as captain when he returns from suspension later this year. Eto’o was given an eight-month ban for leading a strike in November, when Cameroon refused to play a friendly in Algeria because they had not been paid promised bonuses. In a letter to the Cameroon Football Federation, Frenchman Lavagne called for them to make a decision on the captaincy before games against Cape Verde Islands in September and October in the final round of African Cup of Nations preliminaries. “Consequently, we are requesting that a meeting be held to designate the next captain of the national team and his assistants,” Lavagne wrote in the letter released to the media in Cameroon. Lavagne, who was recently warned by the federation for being disrespectful to a government minister, was appointed last year after Cameroon fired former Spain manager Javier Clemente when they failed to reach this year’s Cup of Nations finals.
TENNIS
Tomic, Haas knocked out
Australian third seed Bernard Tomic and German veteran Tommy Haas, the eighth seed, were both knocked out of the Stuttgart clay court tournament in the second round on Thursday. Tomic went down to a 7-6 (8/6), 6-3 defeat to Brazilian clay court specialist Thomaz Bellucci, while Slovak qualifier Pavol Cervenak, the world No. 206, saw off Haas 6-4, 6-4. In the quarter-finals Cervenak is set to tackle Argentine second seed Juan Monaco, who breezed past Germany’s Tobias Kamke 6-2, 6-3.
TENNIS
Robson upsets second seed
British teenager Laura Robson upset second-seeded Roberta Vinci of Italy 6-3, 7-5 to reach the Italiacom Open quarter-finals for the best result of her career on Thursday. Robson won the Junior Wimbledon title four years ago when she was 14, but this is the furthest she has advanced in a WTA event. Robson is scheduled to meet fifth-seeded Carla Suarez Navarro of Spain, who advanced when Anna Tatishvili of Georgia retired while trailing 6-1, 3-2 because of a pulled right hamstring. Third seed Julia Georges reached the last eight when Katalin Marosi of Hungary withdrew before their match with a right-shoulder injury. Georges’ quarter-final opponent will be eighth-seeded Barbora Zahlavova Strycova of the Czech Republic, who rallied past Julia Cohen of the US 3-6, 6-3, 7-5.
TENNIS
Former champion advances
Former champion Fernando Verdasco of Spain defeated Ernests Gulbis of Latvia 6-2, 3-6, 6-1 to reach the Croatia Open quarter-finals on Thursday. Verdasco, the top seed and 2008 champ, converted five of 18 break points in the second-round victory. Verdasco is due to face either Andrey Kuznetsov of Russia or Mate Pavic of Croatia. Pavic ousted second-seeded countryman Marin Cilic. Fifth-seeded Carlos Berlocq beat fellow Argentine Marco Trungelliti 7-6, 4-6, 6-1.
TENNIS
Almagro beats Minar
Second-seeded Nicolas Almagro of Spain rallied to overcome Ivo Minar of the Czech Republic 1-6, 7-6, 6-4 on Thursday to reach the quarter-finals of the Swedish Open. Third-seeded Albert Ramos of Spain advanced by beating Kazakhstan’s Evgeny Korolev 6-3, 6-3, while sixth-seeded Grigor Dimitrov of Bulgaria ousted Portugal’s Federico Gil 6-3, 6-4. Another Spaniard, Daniel Gimeno-Traver, beat Brazil’s Alessandro Giannessi 6-4, 6-3.
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