CRICKET
Teen cricketer dies after hit
Australian cricket was rocked yesterday by the death of a teenage player hit by a ball during training at his Melbourne club. Ben Austin, 17, was struck high in the neck by a ball delivered by a teammate while batting in the nets at Ferntree Gully Cricket Club on Tuesday, governing body Cricket Victoria (CV) said. He was rushed to hospital and put on life support, but died on Wednesday, his club said. CV head of cricket Nick Cummins told Australian media that Austin had been wearing a helmet, but not a neck protector. “This tragedy has taken Ben from us, but we find some comfort that he was doing something he did for so many summers — going down to the nets with mates to play cricket,” Austin’s family said in a statement. Players from both teams wore black arm bands for the Women’s World Cup semi-final yesterday between Australia and hosts India.
Photo: AFP
TENNIS
Taiwanese advances in HK
Taiwan’s Liang En-shuo and Chinese partner Feng Shuo yesterday survived China’s Wang Xiyu and You Xiaodi 6-1, 4-6, 10-5 in their women’s quarter-final at the Prudential Hong Kong Tennis Open on hard court. They are next to face the winners of the quarter-final between the Chinese duo of Jiang Xinyu and Wang Yafan and Hong Kongers Cody Wong and Eudice Chong. Wong and Chong on Wednesday advanced after defeating top seeds Wu Fang-hsien of Taiwan and Eri Hozumi of Japan 4-6, 6-3, 10-5. On Monday, Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Filipina Alexandra Eala were eliminated 3-6, 6-1, 10-7 by Russian Kamilla Rakhimova and Belarusian Aliaksandra Sasnovich.
DARTS
Late Littler misses event
World champion Luke Littler on Wednesday was ruled out of a Players Championship event after getting stuck in traffic and missing the registration deadline. The world No. 2 Briton had been due to appear at the tournament in Wigan, England, near his hometown of Warrington. Instead, the 18-year-old posted a photograph on Instagram from the passenger seat of a car with another vehicle in front. “Back to bed it is. Wonder who they are gonna call up,” he said in the caption. The deadline was 11am and media reported the post was made at 11:06am.
ICE HOCKEY
Marchand out to help friend
Brad Marchand is stepping away from the Florida Panthers to help a friend whose daughter died of cancer last week. Marchand on Wednesday night served as a guest coach for the under-18 March and Mill Co Hunters in his hometown of Halifax, Nova Scotia, in place of friend J.P. MacCallum. Marchand is a co-owner of the team. The game was a fundraiser for the family after the loss of 10-year-old Selah Panacci-MacCallum and included a raffle for an autographed Marchand jersey. “Please join us in celebrating an amazing night at the rink made possible by the ongoing giving nature of a 10-year-old girl that loved the game with all her [heart],” Marchand wrote on Instagram. Marchand missed Florida’s game on Tuesday night against the Anaheim Ducks. Coach Paul Maurice expects him to be available when the back-to-back defending Stanley Cup champions face the Dallas Stars tomorrow.
ANFIELD BLUES: Kylian Mbappe arrived at Anfield on a run of 21 goals in 17 games, but he managed just three attempts in the match, none of them hitting the target Kylian Mbappe has been nearly unstoppable this season, but he hit a roadblock in their UEFA Champions League match at Anfield on Tuesday. For the second year running, the Real Madrid forward had a night to forget at Merseyside as Liverpool won 1-0. Mbappe looked a shadow of the player who has been tearing defenses apart all season. “We were lacking that threat in the final third,” said Madrid coach Xabi Alonso, without naming Mbappe individually. The FIFA World Cup winner for France rarely looked capable of finding a breakthrough against a Liverpool team who have been so defensively fragile for much of the
LOCAL SUCCESS: In the doubles, Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei and Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia defeated Italians Sara Errani and Jasmine Paolini in straight sets Elena Rybakina on Monday punched her ticket to the WTA Finals last four with an impressive 3-6, 6-1, 6-0 victory over second seed Iga Swiatek in round-robin play in Riyadh. After cruising past Amanda Anisimova in her opener on Saturday, Rybakina claimed her second win of the week to guarantee herself top spot in the Serena Williams Group. Anisimova on Monday rallied back from a set and a break down to triumph 4-6, 6-3, 6-2 in her all-American battle with seventh seed Madison Keys, who has been eliminated from the competition. “Madi was playing so well, it was quite a battle out there,”
For almost 30 minutes, Vitomir Maricic did not take a breath. Face down in a pool, surrounded by anxious onlookers, the Croatian freediver fought spasming pain to redefine what doctors thought was possible. When he finally surfaced, he had smashed the previous Guinness World Record for the longest breath-hold underwater by nearly five minutes. However, even with the help of pure oxygen before the attempt, it had pushed him to the limit. “Everything was difficult, just overwhelming,” Maricic, 40, told reporters, reflecting on the record-breaking day on June 14. “When I dive, I completely disconnect from everything, as if I’m not even there.
An amateur soccer league organized by farmers, students and factory workers in rural China has unexpectedly drawn millions of fans and inspired big cities to form their own, raising hopes China can grow talent from the ground up and finally become a global force. The nation of 1.4 billion people has about 200 million soccer fans, more than any other country, but it has failed to build world-class teams, partly due to a top-down approach where clubs pick players from a very small pool of prescreened candidates. The professional game is marred by a history of fixed matches, corruption, and dismal performances,
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