■ Basketball
Yao Ming injurs his elbow
Houston Rockets center Yao Ming was held out of the team's final preseason game with the Denver Nuggets on Thursday night due to a hyper-extended left elbow.
Yao injured the elbow early against San Antonio on Wednesday night when he got tangled up under the basket with the Spurs' Rasho Nesterovic going for a rebound. He left the game but returned to play 25 more minutes and got 13 points, 11 rebounds and three blocked shots. An MRI taken on the elbow Thursday revealed a "partial tear" of the ligament, according to team officials. They said he will be evaluated on a daily basis. Yao went through some light drills Thursday evening with a brace on the elbow.
■ Baseball
Omar Linares calls it quits
Chunichi Dragons infielder Omar Linares on Friday announced his retirement after spending three seasons with the Central League team. The 37-year-old Cuban slugger joined the Dragons in 2002 after a standout career with the Cuban national team. "I have nothing but fond memories of my time in Japan," said Linares. Linares helped the Dragons reach the Japan Series this year after hitting four homers and driving in 28 runs, but was limited to only 60 games because of injuries. He also had two homers and batted .389 in the Japan Series, which the Dragons lost in seven games to the Pacific League champion Seibu Lions. Linares played for the Cuban national team when they won the gold medal at the Barcelona and Atlanta Olympics.
■ Auto Racing
Rally driver dies at wheel
A rally driver died of a cardiac arrest and his co-driver was in serious condition with spinal and other injuries following a crash during a competition west of Sydney, emergency officials said Friday. A spokesman for NRMA Careflight, a regional helicopter rescue service, said the driver of the car died at the scene from a heart attack following the single-vehicle accident Friday morning during the East Coast Targa Rally near Bathurst, about 200km west of Sydney. An NRMA spokesman said the other man, from Victoria state, was flown to a hospital near Sydney with spinal, neck and abdominal injuries. The spokesman said the injured co-driver was trapped for some time in the wreckage until being freed by rescuers.
■ Skiing
Maier writes biography
Four-time overall World Cup ski champion Hermann Maier presented his autobiography Thursday in Salzburg's Museum of Modern Art, saying its readers will learn new things about him. The book, called The Race of My Life,contains "many previously unheard episodes and some unknown facets of my personality," Maier said in a news release. The book mainly focuses on the four-time world champion and two-time Olympic gold medallist's August 2001 motorbike crash -- which nearly cost him a leg -- and the comeback that followed. Maier recalled the tough times after the accident during an interview broadcast Thursday by Austrian state television ORF. "I was always positive that I would survive, although I was shocked that my body was in such a critical condition," Maier said.
TIGHT GAME: The Detroit Pistons, the NBA’s second-best team, barely outlasted the Washington Wizards, who fell to an NBA-worst 1-10 with their ninth consecutive loss Cade Cunningham’s triple double, Daniss Jenkins’ three-pointer at the buzzer and Javonte Green’s overtime dunk lifted Detroit past Washington 137-135 on Monday, stretching the Pistons’ win streak to seven games. In an unexpected thriller, the NBA’s second-best team barely outlasted a Wizards club that fell to an NBA-worst 1-10 with their ninth consecutive loss. “We knew how big this game was for us,” Jenkins said. “We wasn’t going to let nothing stop us from getting this W.” Cunningham made 14-of-45 shots and 16-of-18 free throws for a career-high 46 points, and added 12 rebounds, 11 assists, five steals and two
LIKE FINE WINE: Thirty-eight-year-old Djokovic won his 101st title of his career in Athens, becoming the oldest tournament winner since Ken Roswell, 44, in 1977 Elena Rybakina on Saturday clinched her biggest title since Wimbledon in 2022, defeating world No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka 6-3, 7-6 (7/0) at the WTA Finals in Riyadh. The world No. 6 put on yet another serving masterclass and was at her returning best as she became the first Kazakh and the first player representing an Asian country to lift the WTA Finals singles trophy. Having gone 3-0 in round-robin play, Rybakina earned a record US$5.235 million and would finish the year ranked No. 5 in the world. “It’s been an incredible week, I honestly didn’t expect any result, and to go so far,
EMPTY STANDS: Maccabi fans were banned from attending by police, who cited violence and hate crimes when the team played Ajax in Amsterdam last season Aston Villa beat Israeli club Maccabi Tel Aviv 2-0 on Thursday in a Europa League game played amid heightened security measures, with more than 700 police officers deployed to deal with possible protests. Morgan Rogers put through Ian Maatsen in first-half stoppage time for the defender to score from a tight angle and Villa doubled the lead on the hour with Donyell Malen hitting the bottom corner from the penalty spot. It was Villa’s third win from games in the competition. The game at Villa Park had become the center of a political debate after Maccabi fans were banned from attending, as
An amateur soccer league organized by farmers, students and factory workers in rural China has unexpectedly drawn millions of fans and inspired big cities to form their own, raising hopes China can grow talent from the ground up and finally become a global force. The nation of 1.4 billion people has about 200 million soccer fans, more than any other country, but it has failed to build world-class teams, partly due to a top-down approach where clubs pick players from a very small pool of prescreened candidates. The professional game is marred by a history of fixed matches, corruption, and dismal performances,
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