CRICKET
Johnson rested for ODI
Australia fast bowler Mitchell Johnson will be rested for Sunday’s first one-day international (ODI) against England to keep him fresh for the rest of the summer, coach Darren Lehmann said yesterday. With the five-match ODI series and next month’s tour of South Africa coming up, Australia will look to rotate a few more players from the Test side who thumped England 5-0 in the Ashes series. The 32-year-old left-arm fast bowler tormented the England batsmen with his searing pace and bounce, and picked up 37 wickets in the five-match series.
BASKETBALL
Smith fined over shoelaces
The National Basketball Association (NBA) fined New York Knicks guard J.R. Smith US$50,000 for unsportsmanlike conduct after twice tinkering with opponents’ shoelaces, the league said on Wednesday. Smith was fined after he attempted to untie the shoelace of the Detroit Pistons’ Greg Malone at the free-throw line on Tuesday. He had been warned by league officials to refrain from similar conduct after he untied the shoelace of Dallas Mavericks forward Shawn Marion during a free-throw attempt in New York’s 92-80 road win on Saturday. Smith has a history of rules infractions, including a doping violation during the offseason that landed him a five-game ban to start the current campaign. He was also fined US$25,000 in November for a “hostile” tweet directed at an opponent who questioned the NBA credentials of J.R.’s younger brother, Chris Smith, who has since been waived by the Knicks.
SOCCER
Spurs’ Defoe heads for MSL
Tottenham Hotspur striker Jermain Defoe is poised to sign for Major League Soccer side Toronto FC, British and Canadian media reported on Wednesday. The MLS club posted messages on their Web site and Twitter warning fans to expect “a bloody big deal” on Monday. British newspaper the Guardian and Canada’s Toronto Star said the 31-year-old Defoe would be loaned back to Tottenham until March 1 before the start of the MLS season on March 15. Defoe has played 55 times for England and scored 19 international goals.
SOCCER
Ostersund get Libya deal
Swedish club Ostersund are to receive more than half-a-billion kronor (US$76 million) to educate Libyan soccer players, local media reported on Wednesday. “From a Swedish perspective, it is absolutely the biggest soccer-related deal that has been signed,” Daniel Kindberg, chairman of Superettan (second-tier) side Ostersund, told Sportbladet. Kindberg said the five-year deal, funded by the Libyan state, would bring 60 Libyan players to the town from the beginning of March to the end of November, increasing to 250 players in the second year. The players are to study English, computers, sports management and sports administration, as well as play soccer. According to Sportbladet, a delegation from Libya visited the town in September last year and representatives from Ostersund are to fly next week to Libya to choose the 60 players who will take part in the first year of the program.
SOCCER
Fiorentina reach quarters
Fiorentina joined Juventus in the Italian Cup quarter-finals on Wednesday with a 2-0 home win over Chievo. Spain’s Joaquin opened the scoring in the 29th minute, with Croatia’s Ante Rebic heading in the second on the brink of half-time.
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