■ BASKETBAL
Aussie women beat Taiwan
Natalie Porter scored 20 points and Emma Randall added 19 yesterday as Australia beat Taiwan 100-57 in the first game of a three-game women’s basketball series. Randall added seven rebounds for the winners while Hollie Grima had 18 points. Chiang Feng-chun led Taiwan with 15 points. Beijing-bound Australia won silver medals at the last two Olympics, losing to the US in the final each time. The team was without most of its top players yesterday, including Seattle Storm center Lauren Jackson, last year’s WNBA most valuable player. “It was a very pleasing result,” said Australia head coach Jan Stirling. The second game will be played today in Terrigal.
■ATHLETICS
Man testifies in doping trial
The man who says he sold performance-enhancing drugs to the track coach whose anonymous tip sparked the largest doping scandal in sports history testified on Wednesday in San Francisco that their relationship ended because of a money dispute. Angel Guillermo Heredia, known as “Memo,” testified that he stopped selling performance enhancing drugs to Jamaican-born track coach Trevor Graham right before the 2000 Sydney Olympics because Graham and Marion Jones’ ex-husband, shot putter C.J. Hunter, did not pay him the US$25,000 to US$30,000 they owed him. “I don’t have any ledgers,” Heredia said.
■TENNIS
Bolelli wins two matches
Simon Bolelli won two matches on Wednesday, helping Italy beat Germany 2-1 at the World Team Cup. Bolelli first beat Nicolas Kiefer 7-6 (4), 7-6 (0) in the second singles match, and them teamed with Potito Starace to beat Christopher Kas and Philipp Petzshner 2-6, 6-3, 10-4 in doubles. Also in the Blue Group, Spain defeated Russia 2-1. In the Red Group, the US beat Argentina 2-1 and Sweden defeated the Czech Republic 3-0. At the World Team Cup, eight teams are split into two groups. The winner of each group will meet in tomorrow’s final.
■TENNIS
Argentina knocked out of Cup
Argentina’s dreams of successfully defending the World Team Cup ended on Wednesday when they lost a tight rubber against a resilient US team. After splitting the singles rubbers on Tuesday, the Americans wrapped up the tie 24 hours later when Wayne Odesnik and Bobby Reynolds edged past Lucas Arnold Ker and Sebastian Prieto 6-3, 6-7, 10-7. In the other group tie, Sweden swept aside the challenge of the Czech Republic 3-0. Robin Soderling and Thomas Johansson teamed up to dispatch Michal Tabara and veteran Pavel Vizner 6-4, 7-5 in the doubles. Sweden and the US will next face each other to decide which nation will advance to tomorrow’s final.
■FOOTBALL
Benson works out with team
Chicago Bears running back Cedric Benson, who is battling charges of drunk boating, worked out with his NFL teammates in Lake Forest, Illinois, on Wednesday. Benson was arrested on May 3 in Austin, Texas, and charged not only with boating while intoxicated but also with resisting arrest. The fourth-year running back has disputed those charges, saying he wasn’t drunk and didn’t resist. Benson repeated his denials on Wednesday. “It’ll be nice to get it cleared up and over with, but I don’t really spend too much time thinking about it at all,” Benson said. “I’m sticking to my story, and the truth will come out some time, whether it’ll be now or a year from now or whenever.”
■ BASEBALL
Martinez leaves to see father
New York Mets righthander Pedro Martinez on Wednesday left the team for the Dominican Republic, where his father is fighting brain cancer. The 36-year-old, who has been sidelined since early April with a left hamstring injury, had been expected to join the Mets for a bullpen session on Wednesday. But after learning his father, Pablo, experienced a medical setback, Martinez went to be with him, a Mets spokesman said. On Tuesday, Martinez told the New York Daily News that he was considering retirement after this season due to the health of his 78-year-old father. “It’s taking a toll on me and my family, my dad’s situation,” Martinez told the newspaper.
■RUGBY
Young player of year named
Danny Cipriani had cause to cheer after his weekend injury setback when he was named England’s Young Player of the Year by his fellow professionals on Wednesday. However the England and Wasps fly-half was not able to receive the Nick Duncombe Memorial Trophy personally after suffering a dislocated fracture of his right ankle in Wasps’ 21-10 Premiership semi-final victory against Bath. Cipriani, who will miss the Premiership final against Leicester and England’s two-Test New Zealand tour next month, faces a lengthy rehabilitation as he tries to return to action before the end of the year.
■RUNNING
Doping decision shelved
France’s 1,500m bronze medalist in the 2005 world athletics championships Bouchra Ghezielle will have to wait till next week to find out her punishment for doping, the French athletics federation (FFA) said at her hearing on Wednesday. The 29-year-old had tested positive for banned blood-booster EPO after a random test where she lives and the FFA could ban her for up to six years if they decide to hand out the maximum punishment under French law.
■SKI JUMPING
Official responds to petition
Trying to add women’s ski jumping into the 2010 Winter Olympics would be difficult since the Games schedule is set long in advance, a member of the Vancouver organizing committee (VANOC) said on Wednesday. A group of women ski jumpers plan to sue for inclusion of their sport at the Vancouver Games. But Cathy Priestner Allinger, VANOC’s executive vice president of sport and Games operations, said even if the suit were successful, accommodating another sport at this late date would be a logistical challenge. “Our schedule gets finalized in August this year by the IOC, so at that it becomes that much more difficult for us to make adjustments,” Priestner Allinger said.
■SOCCER
Dispute threatens match
A dispute over stadium fees could force the cancelation of a soldout soccer match between Trinidad and England. Trinidad and Tobago Football Federation special adviser Jack Warner, a FIFA vice president, claims a fee of 10 percent of the gate — or US$24,000 — that is being demanded by the government for the June 1 match at Port-of-Spain’s Hasely Crawford Stadium is substantially more than initially agreed. Federation’s general secretary Richard Groden said on Wednesday that the new conditions proposed by the ministry “could lead to a possible cancelation of the game.” Trinidad Sports Minister Gary Hunt said federation officials knew the original agreement could change. Officials were told that the government was considering an increase in stadium fees, Hunt said.
Taiwanese badminton player Lin Chun-yi had to settle for silver in the men’s singles at the Orleans Masters in France on Sunday after losing in the final to his French opponent. The 25-year-old Lin, ranked world No. 14, lost to Alex Lanier 13-21, 18-21 in a match that lasted 42 minutes at the Palais des Sports arena. It was the first time that the two players were facing each other in their professional careers. In the opener, Lin was slow to warm up, which gave the 20-year-old Lanier an opportunity to take an early lead with seven consecutive points. Despite
Paris Saint-Germain on Tuesday held their nerve to beat Liverpool 4-1 on penalties and reach the UEFA Champions League quarter-finals after their tie finished one-apiece on aggregate, while Bayern Munich saw off Bayer 04 Leverkusen to complete a 5-0 win over both legs. Lamine Yamal and Raphinha fired Barcelona into the next round as the Catalans bested SL Benfica 3-1, and Inter booked a last-eight meeting with Bayern by seeing off Feyenoord 2-1. At Anfield, Ousmane Dembele netted the only goal of the night as PSG bounced back from Liverpool’s late winner last week to force the tie to extra-time and penalties. Maligned
Taiwan’s Lin Chun-yi on Wednesday inflicted a first-round defeat on former badminton world No. 1 Viktor Axelsen at the All England Open. Lin came out of top after a back-and-forth first game before Axelsen dominated the second, but the Dane was not able to keep that form in the decider as Lin reeled off six points in a row on the way to a 21-19, 13-21, 21-11 victory. “If I don’t play my best, everyone can win against me,” said Axelsen, the world No. 4. “Today’s opponent played a fantastic game; it was disappointing, but that is how it is.” “I just tried
Two-time Indian Wells champion Iga Swiatek on Thursday avenged her shock Paris Olympics loss to Zheng Qinwen with a 6-3, 6-3 win over the Chinese eighth seed, setting up a semi-final against 17-year-old Russian Mirra Andreeva in the California desert. In the men’s singles, Spain’s Carlos Alcaraz put on a show with his acrobatic shotmaking under the lights to close out the day’s action, overcoming a 4-1 second-set deficit to defeat Francisco Cerundolo 6-3, 7-6 (7/4), while Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei crashed out of the women’s doubles. Swiatek, one of the gold medal favorites when she lost to eventual champion Zheng in the
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