Powerful winger Sefanaia Naivalu yesterday scored a two tries to get the Melbourne Rebels home 27-22 in a closely fought Australian Super Rugby derby with Western Force in Melbourne.
The Fijian right-winger sealed the Rebels’ win when he hurtled through two tackles off a Nic Stirzaker reverse pass to plant the ball one-handed over the try line with 14 minutes left.
Naivalu scored his earlier try just after halftime to take his season tally to eight.
The Rebels outscored the Force by four tries to three and have a 6-6 record. However, they are seven points behind the ACT Brumbies and New South Wales Waratahs in the Australian conference, with little hope of forcing their way into the end-of-season playoffs.
Melbourne led 10-8 at halftime after a try from Reece Hodge, but lost back Mike Harris — a Wallabies squad member — with a hamstring injury early in the half.
Naivalu’s two tries and another by lock Lopeti Timani brought the Rebels a 27-15 lead with 14 minutes left.
However, the Force gave themselves a chance with winger Luke Morahan’s second try with eight minutes remaining, only for the Rebels to hold onto their win.
The loss was Force’s 11th of the season, putting further pressure on embattled coach Michael Foley.
The Golden Lions on Saturday won a vital away game to take charge of their South Africa conference with three rounds left in Super Rugby.
The Lions won a Super Rugby match in the Pretoria fortress of neighbors Northern Bulls for the first time with a seven-try 56-20 triumph to jump to a seven-point lead in Africa 2 heading into next month’s Test recess.
The Lions’ destruction of the Bulls completed a clean sweep this season over other leading South African sides, having beaten the Stormers at home and Coastal Sharks away.
The Stormers beat Central Cheetahs 31-24, with flyhalf Jean-Luc du Plessis kicking 16 points to raise his season tally to 88.
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
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