ENGLAND
Balotelli in bother again
Mario Balotelli’s already-troubled week took a turn for the worse on Thursday when police confirmed they are investigating a report the Liverpool striker threatened a woman said to have taken photographs of his car. Balotelli is understood to have been visiting his mother’s home in Manchester when the alleged incident took place. The woman called police to report the Italy international had approached her in “a threatening way” after he noticed her taking photographs of his Ferrari shortly after he parked the car. A spokesman for Greater Manchester Police said: “We are investigating a report of threatening behavior following an incident in Wythenshawe. Officers will be speaking to all concerned in due course.” Balotelli had already earned negative headlines on Wednesday when he angered Liverpool manager Brendan Rodgers by swapping shirts with Real Madrid defender Pepe as the pair walked down the tunnel at the end of the first half of a UEFA Champions League tie at Anfield.
PORTUGAL
Sporting lodge UEFA claim
Sporting have demanded that their UEFA Champions League clash with Schalke 04, which they lost 4-3, should either be replayed or the points shared after claiming they were victims of a series of refereeing blunders. The Portuguese club have lodged an official complaint with European governing body UEFA after a controversial last-minute penalty was awarded to the German side in Tuesday’s clash. “After what happened during the match, Sporting have decided to lodge a claim with UEFA,” the club said in a statement. They played with 10 men from the 33rd minute after Mauricio was sent off. Sporting also claim that their Argentine defender Jonathan Silva did not handle the ball which resulted in the last-minute penalty awarded by Russian referee Sergei Karasev and that the ball came off the player’s head. Sporting are bottom of Group G after three games with just one point, six behind leaders Chelsea and four back from Schalke.
SLOVAKIA
Crowd trouble halts match
A Europa League game between SK Slovan Bratislava and Czech side AC Sparta Prague was suspended for half an hour before halftime on Thursday as rival fans clashed. A dozen Sparta fans climbed a fence to attack Slovan supporters, who then retreated onto the pitch, disrupting the game in the 40th minute with the score at 0-0. A UEFA delegate decided the play would resume, but warned referees would end the game immediately if the fights continued. Sparta and Slovan faced each other many times in the Czechoslovak league before the former Czechoslovakia split into two states in 1993. When the game restarted the visitors completed a comfortable 3-0 victory.
FRANCE
Cavani gets one-match ban
Uruguay striker Edinson Cavani was handed a one-match ban on Thursday after being sent off for celebrating a goal with a rifle-shooting gesture. Cavani was booked for the celebration which followed a penalty he had scored in Paris Saint-Germain’s 3-1 league win over Racing Club de Lens last weekend and then red-carded for protesting to referee Nicolas Rainville. Cavani will sit out today’s game against Girondins de Bordeaux, but will be available for selection for the trip to Lorient the following Saturday.
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