Radamel Falcao scored twice as AS Monaco strode to within a point of the Ligue 1 title after Sunday’s 4-0 home win over Lille OSC left them on the verge of dethroning Paris Saint-Germain.
The Colombian striker netted either side of a Bernardo Silva goal before Junior Alonso bundled into his own net as Monaco reeled off a 10th straight league victory, although PSG’s 5-0 rout of AS Saint-Etienne prevented Leonardo Jardim’s side from officially securing the title.
Falcao calmed any lingering nerves by handing Monaco the perfect start at the Stade Louis II when he headed in unmarked from Thomas Lemar’s left-wing cross after just six minutes.
Kylian Mbappe tormented the Lille defense as he wriggled past Franck Beria to set up Silva for a simple tap-in on the stroke of halftime, with the teenager teeing up Falcao for his second on 69 minutes.
Junior Alonso then turned a Lemar cross beyond Lille goalkeeper Mike Maignan late on as Monaco put their midweek UEFA Champions League semi-final defeat to Juventus behind them in convincing fashion.
Nice suffered a first home defeat of the campaign as goals from Angers SCO skipper Cheikh Ndoye and Karl Toko Ekambi secured a 2-0 victory at the Allianz Riviera, while Olympique de Marseille remain in control of their European destiny following a 1-1 draw at Girondins de Bordeaux.
Olympique Lyonnais bounced back from the pain of Thursday’s agonizing Europa League last-four exit against Ajax with a 3-1 triumph at Montpellier Herault, Alexandre Lacazette netting twice after Nabil Fekir’s opening goal.
Dijon pulled clear of the relegation playoff place with a 2-0 win over AS Nancy-Lorraine, who dropped to the foot of the table following SC Bastia’s 2-0 victory over fellow strugglers Lorient.
Caen also remain in a relegation scrap as a 1-0 home defeat to Stade Rennes left them just a point clear of the bottom three.
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