BASEBALL
Taiwan win junior series
Taiwan won the Junior League World Series championship in Taylor, Michigan, on Saturday, beating a Texas US baseball team 9-1. The series, which started on Aug. 9, brought together eight teams and Taiwan, who won first place in an international group with five wins and no losses. Texas won first place in the US pool. Taiwan starting pitcher Gu Lin Ruei-yang gave up only four hits and one run during the first six innings. The team is made up of players from Chungshan Junior High School in Greater Taichung. Gu Lin was replaced by Lin Yen-an, who allowed Texas only one hit and no runs. Taiwan had 15 hits during the game and led Texas 6-1 after five innings, later adding another three runs. It was Taiwan’s second championship in a row and 20th since 1972 at the Junior League World Series.
SOCCER
Dortmund thrash Kickers
Henrikh Mkhitaryan and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang were on target on Saturday as Borussia Dortmund beat the SV Stuttgarter Kickers 4-1 in the DFB Pokal. Mkhitaryan opened the scoring in the 30th minute of the first-round tie against their third-tier hosts, with Aubameyang grabbing a brace with 55th and 78th minute goals before new signing Adrian Ramos added the fourth, one minute from time. Dortmund were boosted by the return of Marco Reus, 10 weeks after an ankle injury which ruled him out of the FIFA World Cup, and Neven Subotic, who played his first game in nine months after suffering right-knee ligament damage. Bayer 04 Leverkusen reached the second round on Friday with Stefan Kiessling scoring five times in a 6-0 rout of fifth division Alemania Waldalgesheim. There were also wins for Borussia Moenchengladbach, Hertha BSC, Hannover 96 and Cologne, but VfB Stuttgart and FSV Mainz 05 both suffered early exits.
SWIMMING
Russia win Euro golds
Svetlana Kolesnichenko helped Russia to their first gold medals at the European swimming championship by contributing to wins in both the duet and team free synchronized finals on Saturday. “It is really thrilling to have the chance to win two gold medals on one day. This has never happened to me before,” said Kolesnichenko, who paired up with Daria Korobova to win the duet and then Vlada Chigireva for the team victory. Ukraine’s Lolita Ananasova and Anna Voloshyna took silver in the duet, just beating Spanish pair Ona Carbonell and Paula Klamburg. The positions were repeated in the team final, with Ananasova and Olena Grechykhina claiming silver for Ukraine, while Clara Basiana Canellas and Alba Cabello Rodilla got the bronze for Spain. The Netherlands team of Ferry Weertman, Marcel Schouten and Sharon van Rouwendaal won gold in the open water team 5km swimming event, ahead of Greece and Germany.
GOLF
Sutherland hits rare 59
The US’ Kevin Sutherland became the first player to shoot a 59 on the Champions Tour with a sizzling display of shotmaking in Saturday’s third round of the Dick’s Sporting Goods Open in Endicott, New York. He became the first player on the over-50 circuit to break 60, despite a bogey on his final hole, the par-four 18th, where he missed a seven-foot putt that would have earned him a 58. The 50-year-old Sutherland notched one eagle and 12 birdies to go with his closing bogey for a 13-under-par round that gave him the clubhouse lead. Only six players have shot 59 on the PGA Tour, the last by the US’ Jim Furyk during last year’s BMW Championship.
SS Lazio on Monday fired the far-right sympathizer who handles their eagle mascot after he posted online a series of videos and pictures of his erect penis. Falconer Juan Bernabe, who has been present at Lazio home matches with Olimpia the eagle since the 2010-2011 season, posted the footage on social media after having surgery on Saturday to implant a penile prosthesis to improve his sexual performance. Lazio said that they had “terminated, with immediate effect” their relationship with Bernabe “due to the seriousness of his conduct,” adding that they were “shocked” by the images. The Serie A club added that Bernabe’s dismissal
Doping fears prevented former US Open champion Emma Raducanu from treating insect bites on the eve of the Australian Open, she said, with players increasingly wary about ingesting contaminated substances. The British player was speaking in the wake of high-profile doping cases involving Iga Swiatak and Jannik Sinner. “I would say all of us are probably quite sensitive to what we take on board, what we use,” the 22-year-old said, recalling an incident on Friday. “I got really badly bitten by, I don’t know what, like ants, mosquitoes, something. I’m allergic, I guess,” she added. The bites “flared up and swelled up really a
TWO IN A WEEK: Despite an undefeated start to the year playing alongside Jiang Xinyu of China, Wu Fang-hsien is to play the Australian Open with a Russian partner Taiwan’s Wu Fang-hsien yesterday triumphed at the Hobart International, winning the women’s doubles title at the US$275,094 outdoor hard-court tournament, while McCartney Kessler lifted the trophy in the women’s singles. Fourth-ranked Wu and partner Jiang Xinyu of China took 1 hour, 15 minutes to defeat Romania’s Monica Niculescu and Fanny Stollar of Hungary, 6-1, 7-6 (8/6) at the Hobart International Tennis Centre, their second title in a week. Wu and Jiang on Sunday won the women’s doubles title at the ASB Classic in Auckland, beating Serbia’s Aleksandra Krunic and Sabrina Santamaria of the US. Their winning ways continued in Australia as they stretched
Dubbed a “motorway for cyclists” where avid amateurs can chase Tadej Pogacar up mountains teeming with the highest concentration of professional cyclists per square kilometer in the world, Spain’s Costa Blanca has forged a new reputation for itself in the past few years. Long known as the ideal summer destination for those in search of sun, sea and sand, the stretch of coast between Valencia and Alicante now has a winter vocation too. During the season break in December and January, the region experiences an invasion of cyclists. Star names such as three-time Tour de France winner Pogacar, Remco Evenepoel and Julian Alaphilippe
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