SOCCER
Syria strive for Asian Cup
Syria head manager Anas Makhlouf yesterday vowed that the strife-torn nation will press on with its Asian Cup qualifying campaign in a bid to lift the spirits of fans back home. Makhlouf’s side face Singapore today and need a crucial win to remain in contention to qualify for the prestigious regional tournament, which will be hosted by Australia in 2015. Syria have one point from two games so far, in a group that also includes Oman and Jordan. Makhlouf said the team, who play home ties in Tehran due to security concerns at home, sorely missed the “comfort” of playing in front of a home crowd. “But we will … try to do and play well for them because they wait [for] us and ask about us and worry about us, and it is most important thing to make a result, a good result for them,” Makhlouf said in English at a pre-match conference in Singapore. Team captain Senharib Malki said fans have been making up for their absence by sending the players notes of encouragement through social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter. “We can’t play at home and it is difficult for them to come to Tehran to watch the game. For these kind of people, we need to give everything,” said the 29-year-old forward, who plays for Turkish Super League side Kasimpasa. Syria are ranked 143 in the FIFA/Coca-Cola world rankings.
SOCCER
Ashley gets ‘upset’: Pardew
Newcastle United manager Alan Pardew has said that controversial club owner Mike Ashley can become confused and upset about the game. “Mike is a strong character who has been a success in his whole business life and is a genius in that world, but when you come to football, the logic doesn’t quite fit,” he said in an interview on Sky television. “He loves football, but he sometimes can’t understand how it works and it confuses and upsets him, and when he is upset, he does things that aren’t brilliant for the football club.” Pardew added: “That’s just Mike and he has funded the club, made sure we have no debt — other than to himself — and supported me, but unless we get a billionaire from deepest Russia, we are probably not going to be able to compete with the likes of Man United, Man City and Chelsea, which is what our fans want.” Media-shy Ashley, who made his fortune through his sports goods empire, has upset fans on a number of occasions since taking over the club in 2007. Most recently, he appointed former manager Joe Kinnear as club director, a move that saw only one player arrive at St James’ Park in the last transfer window.
FOOTBALL
Kansas fans loudest in world
Kansas City football fans were “loud and proud” of their undefeated Chiefs on Sunday, cheering the home team to victory in a display of eardrum-splitting support that scored the loudest crowd roar on record at an open-air stadium, according to league officials. A Guinness World Records official on site pegged the noise at Arrowhead Stadium in the fourth quarter at 137.5 decibels, as the Chiefs defeated the Oakland Raiders, the NFL and Chiefs officials said. The Chiefs won their sixth straight, remaining undefeated, as they took down Oakland. “Every win is a great win. When you can win with a crowd like this, it makes it even better,” Chiefs head coach Andy Reid said in a post-game news conference. “It was loud, I mean real loud. Ground-shaking loud.” The sold-out crowd shattered the stadium’s previous noise level record of 116 decibels and broke past the previous world record of 136.6 decibels set by Seattle Seahawks football fans at home, according to officials.
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