AS Roma on Sunday leapfrogged SS Lazio into second place in Serie A and the final automatic UEFA Champions League spot after a 2-0 win over in-form Genoa.
Seydou Doumbia’s second goal in Italy and a wonderful Alessandro Florenzl solo strike in stoppage-time secured the three points.
Italy midfielder Florenzi raced almost the length of the pitch after dispossessing Tina Costa before ramming a powerful shot past Genoa keeper Mattia Perin that sent the home support wild with delight at overtaking their hated local rivals.
Roma’s second straight win moves them up to 64 points, one ahead of Lazio, who were outplayed for large periods at Atalanta BC and could only manage a 1-1 draw.
Lazio stay four points ahead of fourth-placed SSC Napoli after Rafael Benitez’s side beat 10th-placed AC Milan 3-0 in a game that saw Milan defender Mattia de Sciglio receive the fastest red card of the Serie A season so far. De Sciglio was sent off after just 50 seconds for a clumsy foul on Marek Hamsik that gave the hosts a first-minute penalty.
Antonio di Natale overtook Roberto Baggio in the all-time scoring charts with his 206th Serie A goal, which was enough for Udinese to win 1-0 at Verona, who had both Jacopo Sala and Rafael Marquez sent off.
Genoa dropped down to seventh following their defeat at Roma and ACF Fiorentina’s 3-1 beating of lowly AC Cesena, which took place thanks to two goals in four first-half minutes from Josip Ilicic and another from Alberto Gilardino just after the hour mark.
Inter were jeered off the San Siro after a goalless draw with AC Chievo Verona that leaves them in eighth on 49 points, two behind Sampdoria.
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