GOLF
Tseng slides to fifth
After losing her top ranking less than two months ago, Yani Tseng of Taiwan continued a slide to fifth place in the LPGA Rolex Rankings on Tuesday after finishing tied for 24th in the Kingsmill Championship. The 24-year-old Tseng, who held the No. 1 spot for 109 weeks, posted a 284 total over four rounds at the Kingsmill on Sunday as American Cristie Kerr won the title for the third time. Tseng, whose average points per tournament dropped from a peak of 18.64 in April last year to 7.69 this week, has not won an event in more than a year and she has not finished in the top 20 in her last six LPGA starts. Suzann Pettersen of Norway climbed two places to No. 3, pushing Tseng down one place and South Korea’s Choi Na-yeon to No. 4 with a points average of 8.12. South Korean Inbee Park, who took the top ranking from Stacy Lewis of the US on April 16 after winning the Kraft Nabisco Championship, is still world No. 1 with a points average of 10.19. Finishing seventh at the Kingsmill, one shot behind Lewis after shooting a final round 67, Park edged the second-ranked player with a slim lead of 1.09 points.
TENNIS
Singapore to host WTA event
Singapore was yesterday named as host of the glitzy WTA Championships in a five-year deal from this year, in a major boost for tennis in Asia. The wealthy city-state beat out rival bids from China’s Tianjin and Monterrey in Mexico for the season finale, which next year will boast a record purse of US$6.5 million. “This is the largest and most significant WTA Championships partnership in our history. It’s a record-breaker,” WTA chairwoman and CEO Stacey Allaster said. The season-ending event features the top eight women’s players and from next year, the eight leading women’s doubles pairs. It will be the region’s second biggest tennis tournament after the Australian Open.
TENNIS
Tomic’s father suspended
John Tomic, the father and coach of Australian world No. 53 Bernard Tomic, has been suspended from ATP events after an altercation with his son’s practice coach, Thomas Drouet, on a street in Spain on Saturday. “Following last week’s incident in Madrid concerning John Tomic and the ensuing investigation, Mr Tomic’s credential privileges have been suspended at all ATP tournaments until further notice,” tennis’ governing body said on Tuesday. John Tomic told a Madrid court on Monday he had acted in self-defence when he headbutted Drouet and the pair were ordered to appear at another hearing on Tuesday next week. “I don’t feel guilty, I didn’t do anything wrong,” John Tomic told reporters. His lawyer, Carmen Dieguez, told reporters that while her client did not dispute that he had caused Drouet’s injuries he had had no other choice as Drouet had grabbed him by the arms. John Tomic could be given a prison sentence of up to three years if found guilty of causing criminal injury.
ICE HOCKEY
Sabres name new coach
Ron Rolston was named head coach of the Buffalo Sabres on Tuesday, having filled the role on an interim basis after long-time coach Lindy Ruff was fired in February. Previously in charge of Buffalo’s American Hockey League affiliate, the Rochester Americans, Rolston becomes the 16th head coach for the Sabres after guiding the team to a 15-11-5 record in 31 games since replacing Ruff. Buffalo finished fourth-last in the Eastern Conference with a 21-21-6 record, missing the playoffs for the second straight year and the fourth time in six seasons.
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