Sat, Aug 03, 2013 page18

• SPORTS BRIEFS

  • Agencies
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  SOCCER

  Doncaster sign pop star

  Doncaster Rovers made the most unlikely signing of the season on Thursday when they agreed a deal for One Direction pop star Louis Tomlinson. Doncaster-born Tomlinson is more well known for his exploits with the chart-topping British band, who shot to fame after appearing on the television talent show The X Factor in 2010, but the 21-year-old, who once worked at the club as a hospitality waiter and is a Rovers season-ticket holder, will get the chance to fulfill a boyhood dream after signing for the English Championship club as a non-contract player in aid of Bluebell Wood Children’s Hospice in Sheffield. Tomlinson, who has been issued with the No. 28 shirt for the 2013-2014 season, said: “This has always been a childhood dream for me. I feel very honored to have been asked to sign for Rovers, and being able to help both the club and the amazing charity Bluebell Wood is what it’s all about.”

  CRICKET

  The Don’s bat up for grabs

  A cricket bat used by Australian great Donald Bradman and signed by his 1948 “Invincible” team is expected to fetch up to A$20,000 (US$17,900) at auction this month, an auctioneer said yesterday. Charles Leski, whose company is selling the item, said Bradman used the Sykes bat to score 115 in his final first-class innings at home before the team traveled to England in 1948. The Invincibles went on to become — and remain — the only Australia side to go through an entire Ashes tour unbeaten. The item, which spent 20 years on display at the Western Australian Cricket Association from 1984, will be auctioned on Aug. 15 in Melbourne, Australia. “Few items of cricketing memorabilia overshadow those belonging to Sir Donald Bradman,” Leski said. “Of these, his bats are among the most prized possessions because they were his ultimate stock in trade.” The legendary Australia batsman, who died aged 92 in 2001, played his last match in England in 1948 and retired with a yet-to-be-topped Test batting average of 99.94, despite scoring a duck in his final innings.

  RUGBY UNION

  Lions tour generated A$150m

  The Wallabies may have lost the series, but Australia did very well financially out of the recent tour by the British and Irish Lions, a tourism industry body said yesterday. The Australian Bureau of Statistics said the five-week tour generated an estimated A$150 million (US$134 million) for the economy. The bureau’s overseas arrivals and departures figures show international arrivals rose by 7 percent in June. Australia’s peak national industry body Tourism and Transport Forum (TTF) said the month’s figures showed the impact of major events on the economy.

  TENNIS

  Haase rallies to make semis

  Two-time defending champion Robin Haase reached the semi-finals of the Bet-at-Home Cup in Kitzbuehel, Austria, on Thursday by rallying to beat third seed Fernando Verdasco 4-6, 6-4, 6-3. Haase, who came off his third career final in Gstaad the previous weekend, broke the Spaniard at 5-4 in the second set and came back from a break down in the third. After winning in 2011 and last year, the Dutchman is now 12-0 at the event. He next plays eighth seed Marcel Granollers of Spain, who beat Leonardo Mayer of Argentina 6-3, 6-1 to reach his first semi-final. Second seed Juan Monaco defeated Daniel Gimeno-Traver of Spain 6-2, 3-6, 6-4. Monaco next faces either Albert Montanes of Spain or Austrian teenager Dominic Thiem.

  DEAFLYMPICS

  Chen wins silver

  Taiwanese pole vault athlete Chen Chung-yu won a silver medal and set a new national record on Thursday at this year’s Summer Deaflympics in Bulgaria. Chen cleared the bar at 4.8m in the men’s final of the competition, recording a personal best and the highest jump by a Taiwanese competitor in the special event. In women’s bowling, Taiwan also won a silver medal, while South Korea took gold. Meanwhile, karate athlete Lu Chin-feng bagged a silver medal for Taiwan in the men’s 75kg-84kg category, while his teammate Chiu Yi-hao took bronze in the under-75kg category. Wen Chih-hsuan and Yang Jung-tsung of Taiwan also won bronze in the men’s table tennis doubles. Taiwan’s national team has so far bagged 17 medals — two gold, seven silver and eight bronze — at the world Games for the deaf.

  CYCLING

  Hushovd takes fifth stage

  Norway’s Thor Hushovd powered to a sprint victory on the 160.5km fifth stage of the Tour de Pologne from Nowy Targ to Zakopane on Thursday. The 2010 world champion emerged triumphant ahead of Frenchman Matthieu Ladagnous and Italy’s Luka Mezgec in a cagey uphill sprint to earn his second victory in three days, while BMC triumphed for a third straight stage. Euskaltel-Euskadi rider Jon Izaguirre moved into the overall lead, 1 second in front of Poland’s Rafal Majka, after the Spaniard collected a 10-second time bonus for topping the stage’s attractivity classification. Sky Pro Cycling’s Colombian rider Sergio Henao, who is being helped by last year’s Tour de France winner Bradley Wiggins on his return to racing after injury and illness, is 5 seconds adrift in third. Yesterday’s penultimate stage was to see riders tackle a 192km route around Bukovina.

  TENNIS

  Player out on default

  Russia’s Olga Puchkova was defaulted from her match at the Citi Open on Thursday after hitting a line judge in the knee with a ball after losing a point. Puchkova was forced to forfeit against Paula Ormaechea of Argentina while trailing 3-6, 6-3, 4-1 in their second-round match. Puchkova said in a statement released by the tournament that she was “sincerely sorry” that she “accidentally” hit the official. “I wasn’t looking where the tennis ball would go,” Puchkova said, adding that she apologized to the line judge. WTA supervisor Melanie Tabb said even though Puchkova insisted it was an accident, the rules still required her to be kicked out of the tournament. “I 100 percent believe her that that’s true — that she didn’t mean to do it. She wasn’t even looking in that direction ... She was just hitting the ball in frustration after she lost a point,” Tabb said. “It’s not just the intention” that matters, Tabb added. “It’s the result of her action. And she did hit the line [judge]. And he was bruised on his knee from the ball, because it was hit very hard.”

  CRICKET

  Pakistan to face Sri Lanka

  Pakistan are to play three Tests, five one-day internationals and two Twenty20s against Sri Lanka in the United Arab Emirates later this year. The Pakistan Cricket Board has been forced to organize its home series away — mainly in the UAE — because of security concerns of foreign teams to travel to Pakistan for the past four years. Sri Lanka was the last Test playing country to tour Pakistan in 2009, but was attacked by gunmen that left six police officials and a van driver dead.
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