SOCCER
Fulham fires Ranieri
Claudio Ranieri was fired by Fulham on Thursday, even though owner Shad Khan said that the manager is not fully responsible for failing to lift the club out of the Premier League relegation zone. Ranieri agreed a “change was in the best interest of everyone” after Wednesday’s 2-0 loss at Southampton left Fulham 10 points from safety in next-to-last place, Khan said in a statement. Fulham has Ranieri with a caretaker manager who is almost half his age and less than two years into his coaching career. Former Fulham midfielder Scott Parker was put in charge of the team until the end of the season, with his first game tomorrow at home against Chelsea. Since being hired in November last year, Ranieri had only collected 12 points from 16 matches.
RUGBY LEAGUE
Crime rules see suspensions
A second Australian player was suspended indefinitely yesterday under tough new rules against players accused of serious crimes, while the sport’s bosses vowed a crackdown on lewd videos. Under a new regime announced on Thursday, players who are charged with serious criminal offenses would be automatically stood down. Previously, they could continue playing while they awaited the outcome of their court cases. After St George Illawarra’s Jack de Belin, who is facing sexual assault allegations, became the first to be banned, the Manly Sea Eagles’ Dylan Walker suffered the same fate yesterday after being accused of domestic violence. Cowboys forward Scott Bolton was suspended for 10 weeks and fined 5 percent of this year’s salary after he pleaded guilty in January to common assault involving a woman, while Canterbury Bulldog’s star Dylan Napa was fined 10 percent of his salary for appearing in several lewd videos. League chief Todd Greenberg warned anyone appearing in videos from now on would face much harsher punishment.
FOOTBALL
Kraft pleads not guilty
New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft has pleaded not guilty to charges of soliciting sex following a massage parlor bust in Florida, US reports said on Thursday. The 77-year-old was formally charged on Monday with two counts of soliciting prostitution. Court records showed that Kraft’s attorneys had entered a plea of not guilty to the charges, the local subsidiary of ABC television reported. Kraft is required to appear in court on March 27, reports said. The first degree misdemeanor charges against Kraft are punishable by up to one year in jail, a US$5,000 fine or community service.
GOLF
Olson nabs Singapore lead
American Amy Olson yesterday held her nerve and kept a pack at bay that includes world No. 1 Ariya Jutanugarn with a second-round three-under-par 69 to lead the HSBC Women’s World Championship by two strokes. Jutanugarn had scented the lead as the day wore on before Olson edged clear with a birdie on 16, and then the Thai’s putter let her down for a bogey five on the 18th. Taiwan’s Hsu Wei-ling carded an 80 to leave her seven-over and near the back of the pack in a share of 51st.
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