Werder Bremen suffered their second defeat of the season when they lost 3-2 at Hannover 96 on Sunday thanks to a Mohammed Abdellaoue hat-trick to stay three points behind leaders Bayern Munich.
In the only other match played on Sunday, Schalke 04’s Klaas-Jan Huntelaar scored twice in their 2-1 win at Hamburg SV to lift them to fourth on 15 points, four behind Bayern.
Second-placed Werder had scorer Marko Arnautovic sent off in the 78th minute for stepping on Sergio Pinto.
Photo: EPA
Bremen were quickly a goal down when Norwegian Abdellaoue converted a third-minute penalty.
The 25-year-old forward added another goal in the 38th minute, before Austrian Arnautovic pulled one back on the stroke of halftime when he rifled in a low shot.
Hannover, who also won their Europa League match against Vorskla Poltava in Ukraine last week, responded on the hour with Abdellaoue completing his hat-trick and scoring his sixth league goal of the season when he tapped in a cross from close range.
Claudio Pizarro, who had hit the post in the 48th minute, thundered in a volley with seven minutes left to give his 10-man team some hope, but they failed to find the equalizer.
Schalke, with new coach Huub Stevens on the bench, took a 13th-minute lead when Huntelaar wrong-footed Hamburg goalkeeper Jaroslav Drobny with a header.
The hosts battled back when Croat Mladen Petric fired in from the left for the equalizer.
Spaniard Raul came close for Schalke early in the second half, but Huntelaar was on target in the 73rd minute.
Transgender athletes are to have an ally in the White House next week, as they seek to participate as their identified gender in high school and college sports — although state legislatures, the US Congress and the courts are all expected to have their say this year, too. Attorneys on both sides say they expect US president-elect Joe Biden’s Department of Education to switch sides in two key legal battles — one in Connecticut, the other in Idaho — that could go a long way in determining whether transgender athletes are treated by the sex on their birth certificates or by
Fickle winds produced farcical scenes yesterday on day two of the America’s Cup challenger series in Auckland, as the so-called “flying” yachts spent almost as much time in the water as above it. “I’m not sure today is a really accurate read because it’s so puffy, it’s shifty,” British sailing legend Ben Ainslie said after his Ineos Team UK maintained their perfect start to the Prada Cup series with a third straight win. The series would determine which of the 23m yachts — which fly above the water balanced on hi-tech foil arms — would challenge defending champion Team New Zealand for
DOUBLE VISION: The men’s duo of Lee Yang and Wang Chi-lin downed the South Korean pairing of Choi Sol-gyu and Seo Seung-jae to secure their place in the final Taiwan’s Tai Tzu-ying yesterday easily defeated Mia Blichfeldt in her women’s singles match to advance to the finals of the Yonex Thailand Open in Bangkok, while Chou Tien-chen crashed out of the tournament. Tai quickly ousted world No. 18 Blicheldt, of Denmark, in 34 minutes, winning 21-8, 23-21. The world No. 1 today must overcome Olympic champion Carolina Marin of Spain, who took down An Se-young of South Korea yesterday 21-18, 21-16. In men’s singles, Taiwan’s Chou fell to Hong Kong’s Angus Ng Ka Long after a tough 66 minutes of play. While Chou, the world No. 2, bested Ng in the first set,
DOUBLES VICTORY: The men’s doubles pairing of Taiwanese Lee Yang and Wang Chi-lin downed Malaysians Ong Yew Sin and Teo Ee Yi, and face South Koreans today Men’s badminton world No. 2 Chou Tien-chen yesterday marched into the semi-finals of the Thailand Open, defeating younger opponent Lee Zii-jia 21-17, 21-15 after a rally, while Tai Tzu-ying had no trouble getting past her Canadian opponent in the women’s singles. The top male Taiwanese credited calm and focus in securing his win after briefly falling behind against his 22-year-old Malaysian opponent. “I think I had more patience against him and I won most of the long rallies,” the 31-year-old Chou said of Lee. “He wanted to attack [too much] and maybe he lost some focus,” Chou said. In today’s semi-finals, second-seeded Chou faces
RSS