John Isner led an exodus of seeded players at the rain-interrupted Topshelf Open when he crashed out 6-7 (3/7), 6-3, 6-4 to Evgeny Donskoy on Monday.
The third-seeded Isner was shown the exit along with No. 6 Marcos Baghdatis of Cyprus, No. 7 Victor Hanescu of Romania and No. 8 Daniel Gimeno-Traver of Spain.
Neither Isner nor Donskoy could break serve in the opening set that Isner edged in a tiebreak, but Donskoy hit back quickly, breaking Isner’s first service game of the second set and breaking once more in the final set to book a place in the second round of the Wimbledon warm-up.
Earlier, Baghdatis was a set down to Carlos Berlocq and trailing 2-1 in the second when rain forced the players off court. The Cypriot could not use the pause to regroup and lost 6-2, 6-4.
Hanescu lost 6-4, 6-3 to Guillermo Garcia-Lopez and Andrey Kuznetsov beat Gimeno-Traver 7-6 (7/4), 6-3.
In the women’s event, third-seeded Carla Suarez Navarro advanced with a 6-3, 6-2 win over Johanna Larsson and Lauren Davis of the US ousted Andrea Hlavackova 6-3, 6-4.
Second-seeded Dominika Cibulkova was 2-1 up in the third set against Lourdes Dominguez Lino when play was suspended by rain. The Slovak held on to take the final set to advance 6-1, 6-7 (5/7), 7-6 (7/3).
Defending champion and losing Roland Garros finalist David Ferrer was to open his campaign yesterday against Xavier Malisse and 2011 women’s tournament winner Roberta Vinci was to take on Kaia Kanepi.
A sumo star was born in Japan on Sunday when 24-year-old Takerufuji became the first wrestler in 110 years to win a top-division tournament on his debut, triumphing at the 15-day Spring Grand Sumo Tournament in Osaka despite injuring his ankle on the penultimate day. Takerufuji, whose injury had left him in a wheelchair outside the ring, shoved out the higher-ranked Gonoyama at the Edion Arena Osaka to the delight of the crowd, giving him an unassailable record of 13 wins and two losses to claim the Emperor’s Cup. “I did it just through willpower. I didn’t really know what was going
The US’ Ilia Malinin on Saturday produced six scintillating quadruple jumps, including a quadruple Axel, in the men’s free skate to capture his first figure skating world title. The 19-year-old nicknamed the “Quad god,” who is the only skater to land a quadruple Axel in competition, dazzled with an array of breathtakingly executed jumps starting with his quad Axel and including a quadruple Lutz in combination with a triple flip and a quadruple toe loop in combination with a triple toe. He added an unexpected triple-triple combination at the end to earn a world-record 227.79 in the free program for a championship
Shohei Ohtani’s interpreter is being criminally investigated by the IRS, and the attorney for his alleged bookmaker said Thursday that the ex-Los Angeles Dodgers employee placed bets on international soccer — but not baseball. The IRS confirmed Thursday that interpreter Ippei Mizuhara and Mathew Bowyer, the alleged illegal bookmaker, are under criminal investigation through the agency’s Los Angeles Field Office. IRS Criminal Investigation spokesperson Scott Villiard said he could not provide additional details. Mizuhara, 39, was fired by the Dodgers on Wednesday following reports from the Los Angeles Times and ESPN about his alleged ties to an illegal bookmaker and debts well
HSIEH MAKES QUARTERS: Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei and Elise Mertens of Belgium won in the women’s doubles and face Bethanie Mattek-Sands and Sofia Kenin of the US Top-ranked Iga Swiatek and US Open champion Coco Gauff were knocked out of the women’s singles at the Miami Open on Monday, while Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei advanced in the women’s doubles. Swiatek lost to Ekaterina Alexandrova 6-4, 6-2, hours after third seed Gauff fell in three sets to No. 23 Caroline Garcia 6-3, 1-6, 6-2. Alexandrova beat a top-ranked player for the first time and advanced to face Jessica Pegula, a 7-6 (7/1), 6-3 winner over Emma Navarro, in the quarter-finals. Alexandrova recorded her second win over Swiatek, following a 2021 victory in Melbourne. Swiatek had won their three matches since. “We played quite