■ ATHLETICS
Thanou gets Jones' silver
Greek sprinter Ekaterina Thanou, herself no stranger to doping controversy, has been awarded the 100m silver medal won by Marion Jones at the 2001 World Championships in Edmonton after the disgraced US athlete was stripped of her medals after admitting using the banned steroid THG. Jones came second in Edmonton, but all her results since September 2000 have been expunged. Thanou was involved in a scandal on the eve of the 2004 Olympics in Athens when, together with compatriot Kostas Kenteris, she missed a drugs test. Thanou was banned for two years after missing what was her third test. But the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), the sport's world governing body, said on Monday its hands were tied when it came to the redistribution of Jones' Edmonton silver.
■ SOCCER
Capello faces prosecution
England coach Fabio Capello could be tried for false testimony and obstructing the course of justice by Rome judicial authorities, Italian media reported on Monday. Capello is being investigated in relation to the activities of Gea World, a sports agency which represented several footballers, and their dealings with Juventus during the England boss' spell at the helm of the Italian giants. On Monday morning Capello was questioned, alongside ex-Juve directors Luciano Moggi -- who was brought down over the matchfixing scandal that saw Juventus relegated to Serie B for the 2006-2007 season -- and Antonio Giraudo, by the Rome court, but all three repeatedly answered: "I can't remember." That led prosecutor Luca Palamara to warn that they risked being charged with reticence, which effectively amounts to obstructing the course of justice, and possibly false testimony, or perjury.
■ ICE HOCKEY
Watchdog clears NHL
The National Hockey League (NHL) won a legal faceoff on Monday when Canada's antitrust watchdog ruled there was nothing improper in its handling of a failed bid for the Nashville Predators. The Competition Bureau started an investigation last year when the NHL reportedly balked at an attempt by Canadian billionaire Jim Balsillie, co-chief executive of BlackBerry maker Research In Motion, to buy the Nashville team with an eye to moving the club to southern Ontario. Locating the team in Hamilton, Ontario, would have put it in direct market competition with the Toronto Maple Leafs and Buffalo Sabres, but there was no evidence the NHL blocked the move for antitrust reasons, the regulators said. "The NHL was consistently of the view that the Nashville Predators franchise should not be relocated at this time, irrespective of where the franchise would be relocated," the bureau said.
■ SOCCER
Stuttgart, automaker ink deal
Bundesliga champions VfB Stuttgart have leased their stadium name for 30 years to Mercedes Benz, the German car manufacturer confirmed on Monday. The 55-seater stadium, one of the few remaining in the German top flight that does not bear the name of a business, will be inaugurated the Mercedes-Benz-Arena during a friendly against English side Arsenal on July 30. It is currently called the Gottlieb Daimler Stadium, after the founder of German vehicle manufacturer Daimler and inventor of motor fuel. Renovated for the 2006 World Cup, plans are underway to demolish the stadium next year and replace it with a new 60,000-seater without an athletics track, which hosted the 1993 world championships.
New Taipei Kings guard Jeremy Lin on Friday was named the Taiwan Professional Basketball League’s (TPBL) Player of the Month, the first domestic player to win the award, while the Hsinchu Toplus Lioneers are to welcome their third head coach in less than a year. Lin averaged 22 points, 5.4 rebounds and 6.6 assists over five games in October and last month, helping the Kings to second in the standings with a 4-2 record as of Friday. The Kings last night defeated the Lioneers 96-78 to move level with the top-of-the-table Formosa Dreamers (5-2), while in the night game, the New Taipei
TO NO AVAIL: The Denver Nuggets’ Serbian center Nikola Jokic surpassed his 53-point performance in the 2023 Western Conference semi-finals against Phoenix The Washington Wizards withstood a 56-point explosion from Denver star Nikola Jokic to beat the Nuggets 122-113 on Saturday and snap their 16-game NBA losing streak. Jokic, who won his third NBA Most Valuable Player (MVP) award last season, posted a career scoring high — surpassing a 53-point performance in game four of the 2023 Western Conference semi-finals against Phoenix and a 50-point regular-season best against Sacramento in 2021. The Serbian big man added 16 rebounds and eight assists, but it was all to no avail as Washington, buoyed by 39 points from Jordan Poole, won for the first time
Taiwan on Wednesday finished with 15 medals at the World Taekwondo Poomsae Championships in Hong Kong, taking home four gold, five silver and six bronze medals across the age group divisions. Taiwan ranked third on the medal table after South Korea with 17 golds and the US with eight golds at the five-day competition. “Your athletes have proven themselves as the best in the world,” World Taekwondo president Choue Chung-won said at the closing ceremony of the martial art contest that was attended by a record 1,727 athletes from around the world. On the first day of the competition at the Hong Kong
Taiwan’s Lin Cheng-jing won a bronze medal in the clean and jerk in the women’s under-49 kg division at the 2024 IWF World Weightlifting Championships in Bahrain on Saturday. Lin won her first medal at a World Weightlifting Championships for lifting 107kg in the clean and jerk in her weight class, 2kg more than Rosegie Ramos of the Philippines. However, Ramos won bronze for the combined lift after topping Lin by 5kg in the snatch. Ri Song-gum of North Korea won gold in the division’s combined lift with a total of 213kg, while Xiang Linxiang of China took silver with
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