TAEKWONDO
Taiwan secure six medals
Taiwan bagged a total of four gold and two bronze medals at the Canada Open in Montreal, finishing as the biggest winner in the competition. On Sunday, the last day of the three-day competition, Taiwan’s Huang Yu-jen took a gold medal in the 68kg men’s event after his Canadian rival withdrew from the match. In the 87kg men’s event, Taiwan’s Lee Yue-lin finished with a bronze medal after being defeated 2-3 by a Mexican athlete. The two medals on Sunday brought Taiwan’s total to six.
SOCCER
PSG suspend Serge Aurier
Paris Saint-Germain have suspended defender Serge Aurier after he insulted coach Laurent Blanc and many of his teammates in a live video he and a friend recorded with the online app Periscope on Saturday night. The decision to suspend the 23-year-old defender means he will not play any part in today’s Champions League last-16, first-leg match against Chelsea at the Parc des Princes. The announcement came after Ivory Coast international Aurier was reportedly excluded from training with the squad on Sunday following the appearance of the video. In it, he appeared to describe Blanc as a “faggot,” although he was not actually in shot at the time. When his friend, a former French youth international, asks him whether or not “Blanc sucks off Zlatan [Ibrahimovic],” Aurier answers: “Yes, he takes everything, even his balls.” Aurier later apologized, telling Canal Plus and beIN Sports: “What I did was really stupid and inexcusable. I apologize to the coach and the supporters.”
TENNIS
Klizan wins Rotterdam Open
Martin Klizan on Sunday pulled out another come-from-behind showpiece to win his fourth career title with a 6-7 (1/7), 6-3, 6-1 defeat of Gael Monfils in the Rotterdam Open final. The swashbuckling world No. 43 from Slovakia came into the final having saved eight match points in his previous clashes against Roberto Bautista Agut and Nicolas Mahut. Klizan becomes the first Slovak to win the Dutch event, while fifth-seeded French star Monfils now stands 5-18 in career finals. “This is the best result of my career by far. I hope I can be an inspiration to young Slovak players,” Klizan said.
TENNIS
Thiem wins Argentina Open
Austria’s Dominic Thiem on Sunday backed-up his shock semi-final win over Rafael Nadal to clinch the Argentina Open title with a 7-6 (7/2), 3-6, 7-6 (7/4) victory over Nicolas Almagro Thiem. The world No. 19 and the youngest player in the top 20 captured his fourth career title, all of which have been on clay. The 22-year-old claimed trophies on the surface at Gstaad, Umag and Nice, all last year.
GOLF
Schwartzel wins at Tshwane
Former Masters champion Charl Schwartzel on Sunday stormed to a sensational eight-shot triumph at the Tshwane Open to claim his 11th career title and second of this year. The 31-year-old South African shot a seven-under-par 63 to finish on 16-under and clinch his eighth European Tour win on home soil. Denmark’s Jeff Winther finished second on eight-under, with South Africa’s Anthony Michael another two shots further back in third. “In the first three rounds I gave myself so many chances. If I had the stroke I had today, it probably would have been my best tournament ever,” said Schwartzel, who was delighted with his putting in the final round at the Pretoria Country Club.
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