BASKETBALL
Lin out with foot injury
Jeremy Lin yesterday did not play in the New Taipei Kings’ 94-83 victory over the Kaohsiung 17LIVE Steelers due to a lingering foot injury. The P.League+ team on Saturday said he would also miss the team’s two other regular season games next month before the Lunar New Year holiday or their East Asia Super League (EASL) match against the Seoul SK Knights on Wednesday in the South Korean capital. Lin wrote on Instagram that an MRI scan showed he had a plantar fascia injury. “I know the best thing I can do right now is to fully recover. I’ll give my 100% during this rehab process and do my best to fully trust God with the timeline and surrender to the results.” This would be the first time the 35-year-old veteran would be sidelined for an EASL game this season.
CYCLING
Pithie claims 1st Tour win
New Zealand’s Laurence Pithie yesterday powered home to nudge out Eritrea’s Natnael Tesfatsion in a split finish to claim his first World Tour victory in the Cadel Evans Great Ocean Road Race in Geelong, Australia. The Groupama-FDJ rider lunged at the finish line to pip Tesfatsion (Lidl-Trek) by a half-wheel in the tightest finish in the eighth running of the 176km race along the southern coastline of Victoria. Pithie had to wait for the photo-finish confirmation before he could celebrate his first World Tour victory with his teammates.
SOCCER
Xavi says he is quitting
Barcelona coach Xavi Hernandez on Saturday said he would quit his “cruel and unpleasant” job at the end of the season after his struggling team were beaten 5-3 by Villarreal in La Liga. “On June 30, I will leave the club, it’s a decision I have taken with the president, with the staff,” Xavi told reporters. Champions Barcelona, third in the top flight, are 10 points behind leaders Real Madrid with their title defense virtually over. “The feeling of being Barca coach is cruel, unpleasant, it feels like people lack respect for you a lot of the time,” Xavi said. “It’s terrible on a mental health level, your morale ... to the point where you think there is no sense in continuing.” After elimination in the Copa del Rey by Athletic Bilbao this week and a thrashing by Madrid in the Spanish Super Cup final earlier in January, Xavi said he made the decision for the good of the club. “I’ve thought about the club ... and above all the players,” he said. “I have the feeling that I am doing the right thing, that I am acting with common sense.”
GOLF
Frenchman bags PGA win
Matthieu Pavon on Saturday became the first player to win a PGA Tour event under the French flag since World War II when he made an eight-foot putt on No. 18 at Torrey Pines South for a dramatic birdie and a one-shot victory in the Farmers Insurance Open. He raised his arms in celebration and shouted before hugging caddie Mark Sherwood after the putt rolled in as the municipal gem high above the Pacific Ocean glowed under the late-afternoon sun. Pavon glowed, too. He said he almost quit golf 10 years ago because of the yips. “It is big for our country,” the 31-year-old PGA Tour rookie said. “I hope it will inspire a lot of people, because coming from an amateur player which is 800 in the world to a PGA Tour winner is pretty big.”
RECORD DEFEAT: The Shanghai-based ‘Oriental Sports Daily’ said the drubbing was so disastrous, and taste so bitter, that all that is left is ‘numbness’ Chinese soccer fans and media rounded on the national team yesterday after they experienced fresh humiliation in a 7-0 thrashing to rivals Japan in their opening Group C match in the third phase of Asian qualifying for the 2026 World Cup. The humiliation in Saitama on Thursday against Asia’s top-ranked team was China’s worst defeat in World Cup qualifying and only a goal short of their record 8-0 loss to Brazil in 2012. Chinese President Xi Jinping once said he wanted China to host and even win the World Cup one day, but that ambition looked further away than ever after a
Taiwanese badminton superstar Lee Yang broke down in tears after publicly retiring from the sport on Sunday. The two-time Olympic gold medalist held a retirement ceremony at the Taipei Arena after the final matches of the Taipei Open. Accompanied by friends, family and former badminton partners, Lee burst into tears while watching a video celebrating key moments in his professional sporting career that also featured messages from international players such as Malaysia’s Teo Ee Yi, Hong Kong’s Tang Chun-man, and Indonesia’s Mohammad Ahsan and Hendra Setiawan. “I hope that in the future when the world thinks about me, they will
Former Formosa Dreamers player Ilkan Karaman was killed in a traffic accident in Datca, Turkey, Turkish media reported yesterday. He was 34. The former Turkish national team player was reportedly hit by a car, the driver of which was allegedly drunk, while he was standing on a sidewalk, Turkish newspaper Sozcu reported. Karaman and his friends were on their way to the beach town of Dalaman to go scuba diving when they stopped at a gas station to buy gasoline, it reported. Karaman was hit by the car while waiting on a sidewalk as his friends were buying gasoline, it
ANKLE PROBLEM: Taiwan’s Ye Hong-wei and Lee Chia-hsin had a disappointing end to their tournament after an injury forced them out of their mixed doubles semi-final Taiwanese badminton ace Tai Tzu-ying on Friday was knocked out in the women’s singles quarter-finals at her last Taipei Open. The world No. 3 lost 21-18, 16-21, 22-24 to Putri Kusuma Wardani of Indonesia in a match that stretched 68 minutes at the Taipei Arena. Despite her higher ranking, Tai said she was not too sad about the loss, given her struggle with a lingering knee injury. “Wins and losses are just part of the game. Actually, I think I’m going to lose every single match considering my condition now,” said the five-time champion of the Super 300 event, who has announced plans
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