Wayne Rooney returned from injury to give Manchester United manager David Moyes his first win at Old Trafford as the striker’s free-kick clinched a 2-0 victory over 10-man Crystal Palace yesterday.
Rooney had missed United’s defeat at Liverpool and England’s World Cup qualifiers against Moldova and Ukraine after suffering a gashed head in a training ground collision with teammate Phil Jones.
Wearing a black headband to protect the damaged area, Rooney marked his return to action with his first goal of the season in the 81st minute.
Robin van Persie had struck from the spot to give United the lead in first-half stoppage-time after Palace’s South African midfielder Kagisho Dikgacoi was sent off for fouling Ashley Young.
Palace protested that Dikgacoi’s challenge on Young was outside the area, but van Persie ignored the controversy to slot in the penalty.
Moyes sent on Belgian midfielder Marouane Fellaini for his United debut in the 61st minute.
With Alex Ferguson watching from the stands for the first time since his retirement, United sealed their first win in three league games — and Moyes’ first on home soil since his arrival as Ferguson’s successor — thanks to Rooney’s fine free-kick.
Later, Arsenal’s new signing Mesut Ozil was set to make his debut at Sunderland after his deadline day move from Real Madrid.
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