ICE HOCKEY
Toronto fire manager, coach
The Toronto Maple Leafs have fired general manager David Nonis and interim head coach Peter Horachek, while Buffalo Sabres coach Ted Nolan was also sacked, the National Hockey League teams said on Sunday. The Maple Leafs, rated as the most valuable franchise in the NHL, have suffered their worst season in 18 years with their 30-44-8 record with 68 points their worst 82-game season record since 1996-97. Three other members of the coaching staff were also being released, Toronto said. While the team searches for a new general manager, assistant general manager Kyle Dubas and director of player personnel Mark Hunter will share the duties. Horachek was hired as an assistant coach in July last year and named interim head coach on Jan. 7. He had a 9-28-5 record. The Maple Leafs have missed the Stanley Cup playoffs nine times in the past 10 seasons. The Sabres were the worst team in the NHL this season, compiling a 23-51-8 record as they finished with just 161 goals in 82 games.
TENNIS
Klizan takes Hassan II title
Second-seeded Martin Klizan defeated Daniel Gimeno-Traver 6-2, 6-2 in the final of the Grand Prix Hassan II on Sunday to claim his third ATP tour title. Klizan made the most of his opponent’s nervous start to break immediately. The 41st-ranked Slovak then saved four break points in the fourth game and built a 5-1 lead. Gimeno-Traver, who played in his first final, dropped his serve in the third game of the second set and Klizan went up 5-2. He fended off three other break points to serve out the match. Klizan’s previous titles came in St Petersburg in 2012 and Munich last season.
TENNIS
Schmiedlova wins Katowice
Slovakia’s Anna Karolina Schmiedlova claimed her first WTA title and deprived Camila Giorgi her own milestone with a 6-4, 6-3 victory in the Katowice Open final on Sunday. Italian Giorgi had upset home favorite and top seed Agnieszka Radwanska in the semi-finals and was favorite for Sunday’s showpiece, but the third seed was unable to produce her best attacking tennis. Giorgi also fell at the final hurdle in the Polish city last year when she squandered a match point against France’s Alize Cornet. World No. 67 Schmiedlova recovered from an early break of serve to win four straight games, clinching the first set in 47 minutes. She also battled back from behind in the second set.
SOCCER
Erdogan meets team heads
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Sunday held a hugely unusual meeting with the captains of all of Turkey’s top-flight soccer teams over the situation in the game a week after a gun attack on the Fenerbahce SK team bus. Erdogan hosted all 18 captains from the Super Lig, including Emre Belozoglu of Fenerbache and Selcuk Inan of Istanbul rivals Galatasaray SK, at the Ottoman-era Yildiz Palace in Istanbul, Turkey, the presidency said in a statement. The Fenerbahce team bus last weekend was fired on in the Black Sea region, prompting the Turkish Super Lig to be suspended by one week. Fenerbahce have said they will not play again until the attack is cleared up and it is not clear when games will resume. Two men were arrested over that attack, but were released on Wednesday. It is not clear what stage the investigation is at now. Erdogan made no comment after the meeting, which was closed to the media. However, Belozoglu said Erdogan had said such meetings should be continued.
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