The start of Real Betis’ match at home to Real Sociedad was delayed for about 17 minutes by a power cut, but it failed to dampen their enthusiasm as they went on to win 2-0 and take fourth place in La Liga on Saturday.
It was only two weeks ago that Rayo Vallecano’s match against visiting Real Madrid was postponed until the following day after their floodlights were sabotaged, but the problem in Seville was blamed on a general outage in the local area.
Brazilian defender Paulao headed Betis in front from a corner after 17 minutes, but there was little else to separate the sides until striker Ruben Castro nodded in a free kick in the 81st.
Photo: EPA
Betis finished with 10 men after Mario was sent off two minutes from time, but climbed to fourth with 12 points from seven games, six behind leaders Barcelona who hosted champions Real Madrid yesterday.
Getafe and Rayo both won to join promoted Valladolid on 10 points after they drew 1-1 at home to basement side Espanyol.
Getafe earned their first away win this season to go ninth with a scrappy 1-0 victory at nine-man Real Zaragoza in a game which saw three players sent off.
Zaragoza’s Ivorian midfielder Ndri Romaric was shown a straight red card for a studs-up challenge after only nine minutes, and team-mate Alvaro Gonzalez followed him down the tunnel after conceding a penalty in the 63rd.
Getafe’s Diego Castro netted from the spot, though Zaragoza goalkeeper Roberto almost saved it, and the visitors themselves finished the game with 10 men when Abdelaziz Barrada also saw red for another studs-up challenge near the end.
Rayo lived dangerously before winning 2-1 at home to promoted Deportivo Coruna to move into 10th spot.
Piti put the hosts ahead at the far post in the 18th minute and winger Jose Carlos, perhaps their best player on the day, fired in a deflected second goal soon after.
Depor pulled one back from the penalty spot before half-time and in the second period both sides put on an entertaining, if error-strewn, display which could have gone either way.
At the bottom, Espanyol’s dreadful start to the season continued when they could only draw at eighth-placed Valladolid.
They were reduced to 10 men just before the break when Victor Alvarez picked up a second yellow card, but they managed to take the lead with a Joan Verdu penalty in the 70th.
However, their luck did not last. Valladolid levelled when Oscar headed in at a corner and Espanyol were then denied a stoppage-time winner when Verdu’s effort was ruled offside.
Espanyol, racked by institutional instability after the resignation of their president during the week, have taken only two points from a possible 21 so far, leaving Argentine coach Mauricio Pochettino in a precarious position.
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