TENNIS
Team World rallies
Kevin Anderson took down Novak Djokovic for a second straight night as Team World rallied to win the final two matches and reel Team Europe’s lead back to 7-5 after the second day of the Laver Cup in Chicago on Saturday. The South African led the charge by blasting 17 aces past the Serbian world No. 3 in a 7-6 (7/5), 5-7, 10-6 victory that shifted the momentum after the World side had lost the opening two matches of the day to fall 7-1 behind. “We’ve had some really close matches haven’t gone our way and I really wanted to put us back in there,” Anderson told reporters. “It’s not easy playing one of the best players of all time, but what an amazing atmosphere. I felt I played a great match — beating Novak on any stage is great and here in Chicago makes it extra special.”
RUGBY LEAGUE
Roosters reach final
The Sydney Roosters beat South Sydney 12-4 to advance to their second National Rugby League grand final in five years. The Roostersface the Melbourne Storm, who kept alive their chance of defending their title with a 22-6 win over Cronulla on Friday. Veteran Billy Slater, who scored two first-half tries for the Storm, might not be available for the grand final after he was charged with an illegal shoulder hit on Cronulla’s Sosaia Feki. It means Slater, who plans to retire after the grand final, would miss one match even with an early guilty plea. Storm management say they are confident they will beat the charge at a disciplinary hearing this week.
BOXING
Confident Joshua wins
World heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua is still eyeing a showdown with Deontay Wilder, but said he would fight anyone who comes his way after a technical knockout victory over Alexander Povetkin on Saturday. The 28-year-old Briton, who holds the WBA, IBF, WBO and IBO belts, has been in talks about a fight with WBC title holder Wilder, which would give him a shot at becoming the undisputed heavyweight champion of the world. However, negotiations broke down and before Joshua’s bout on Saturday, the American announced a fight with Britain’s Tyson Fury in the US on Dec. 1. With Joshua locked in to stage another fight at London’s Wembley Stadium on April 13 next year, Wilder’s December bout casts doubt on who might provide the opposition. Joshua, full of confidence after his devastating seventh round stoppage of the fierce-hitting veteran Russian which took him to 22 fights unbeaten, said Wilder was still his preferred choice. “Yes [want to face Wilder], we’ve been negotiating with their team since the [Carlos] Takam fight ... but if Wilder’s not serious, there’s other people out there,” he said.
PARA GAMES
Koreas to share flag
South Korea and North Korea have agreed to march under a neutral Korean Peninsula flag and form unified teams for some sports at the upcoming Asian Para Games. “This is the first time the two countries have paraded together and competed together at a para-sport event,” Asian Paralympic Committee chairman Majid Rashed said in a statement yesterday. About 100 athletes from South Korea and 20 from North Korea are to compete at the multi-sport event in the Indonesian capital, Jakarta, from Oct. 6 to Oct. 13.
INJURY TURMOIL: Despite stunning French Open champions Paolini and Errani to advance, Chan was forced to pull out after her partner’s tearful women’s singles defeat Last year’s mixed doubles champions Hsieh Su-wei of Taiwan and Poland’s Jan Zielinski on Monday crashed out of the quarter-finals at Wimbledon, leaving the Taiwanese star focused on pursuing a fifth women’s doubles title in London, while a partner injury forced compatriot Chan Hao-ching to give up on her doubles campaign. Hsieh and Zielinksi, who last year also won the Australia Open title, narrowly lost their opening set 7-6 (9/7), before Britain’s Joe Salisbury and Brazil’s Luisa Stefani stunned the former champions 6-3 at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club. The Taiwanese-Polish duo had been dominant in the first two
‘SU-PENKO’: Hsieh and Ostapenko face a rematch against their Australian Open final opponents, the same duo Hsieh played in last year’s Wimbledon semi-finals Taiwanese women’s doubles star Hsieh Su-wei and Latvian partner Jelena Ostapenko on Wednesday survived a near upset to the unseeded duo of Sorana Cirstea of Romania and Russia’s Anna Kalinskaya, setting up a semi-final showdown against last year’s winners. Despite losing a hard-fought opening set 7-6 (7/4) on a tiebreak, the fourth seeds turned up the heat, losing just five games in the final two sets to handily put down Cirstea and Kalinskaya 6-3, 6-2. Nicknamed “Su-Penko,” the pair are next to face top seeds Katerina Siniakova of the Czech Republic and Taylor Townsend of the US in a reversal of last
The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) has overturned French Olympic fencer Ysaora Thibus’ four-year suspension for doping, ruling that her positive test for a banned substance was caused by kissing her then-boyfriend, American fencer Race Imboden. Thibus, a silver medalist in team foil at the Tokyo Games, had tested positive for ostarine, a prohibited muscle-building substance, during a competition in Paris in January last year. However, CAS concluded there was no intentional wrongdoing, finding it scientifically plausible that repeated kissing over several days with Olympic medalist Imboden — who was taking ostarine at the time — led to accidental contamination. The court
Switzerland’s Riola Xhemaili on Thursday scored a last-gasp goal to salvage a dramatic 1-1 draw with Finland that sent the joyous hosts through to the quarter-finals at Euro 2025, and heartbroken Finland home. Switzerland, who needed only a draw to advance based on goal-difference, finished second in Group A behind Norway to go through to the knockout round for the first time and are to face the winners of Group B, which would be world champions Spain as things stand. “I think we set ourselves a goal on the pitch, to write history, to go into the knockout stages, which we’ve never
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