Taiwan’s No. 1 female tennis player, Chan Yung-jan (詹詠然), lost to Belgium’s Yanina Wickmayer in straight sets in the second round of the Hansol Korean Open in Seoul yesterday.
Wickmayer, 18, took the first set 6-3 before claiming victory over the No. 8 seed by winning the second set on a tie-break 7-6(2).
Chan, 19, has yet to beat the Belgian No.1, having also lost to her in Taoyuan last year.
PHOTO: EPA
Wickmayer is enjoying a good year with a 37-18 record in singles matches, which has boosted her raking from 175 at the end of last year to 68 today.
In other matches in Seoul, third seed Kaia Kanepi of Estonia breezed past qualifier Anastasia Pivovarova of Russia 6-1, 6-1. She will meet Wickmayer in the quarter-finals.
Russian No. 1 seed Maria Kirilenko beat Lucie Safarova of the Czech Republic 6-3, 6-3, while fifth seed Pauline Parmentier of France defeated Canada’s Stephanie Dubois 6-3, 6-2.
In the quarter-finals of the doubles competition Taiwan’s Chan Chin-wei (詹謹瑋) and Natalie Grandin of South Africa pulled off a surprise win by downing No. 2 seeds Ekaterina Makarova of Russia and Shahar Peer of Israel in three sets.
Shin Oebori coaches the Fukagawa Hawks youth baseball team in Tokyo, and he is very aware how Los Angeles Dodgers superstar Shohei Ohtani touches his players. “With Ohtani, the kids think everything is possible,” Oebori said, wrapping up practice yesterday on an all-dirt field set alongside a local Buddhist temple, below an elevated highway, and in the shadow of tall apartment blocks in central Tokyo. “Nothing is impossible with him. A dream is not a dream,” Oebori said, stepping out of the fenced practice field that keeps balls from landing on the temple grounds. None of the players hitting sponge-soft baseball has reached
CRICKET Azhar’s 59 leads Stallions Aashir Azhar’s blazing half-century guided the Taipei Stallions to victory over Taipei Super 11 in the Taiwan Premier League’s Group A at the Yingfeng Cricket Ground in Taipei yesterday. The Stallions were 102-3 and into the 12th over of 20 when Azhar came to the crease. He hit seven sixes and two fours in the 25 deliveries he faced to push his side to 171-5. Gokul Kumar was the star with the ball for Super 11, taking 3-17. In the reply, Deepak Vishnu outscored Azhar with 77 from 50 balls, but nobody else got past 20 as
‘GLOBAL PRESSURE’: LA’s Dave Roberts said that it was difficult to appreciate the ‘pressure on a global scale’ his starter was under ‘pitching for his country’ The Los Angeles Dodgers shelled out US$1 billion for Japanese talent in the off-season and it is paying off in the MLB playoffs. Yoshinobu Yamamoto on Friday outdueled Yu Darvish in a historic post-season matchup of Japanese-born starters, while the Dodgers got home runs from Kike Hernandez and Teoscar Hernandez to beat the San Diego Padres 2-0 and advance to the National League Championship Series. “It’s pretty sweet,” a smiling Freddie Freeman said. Yamamoto allowed two hits over five innings for the win, getting pulled after 63 pitches in a decisive Game 5 between heated NL West rivals who were meeting in a
MAKING HISTORY: The Dodgers pitchers have now tied the post-season record of 33 consecutive scoreless innings set by the Baltimore Orioles in the 1996 World Series Los Angeles pitcher Jack Flaherty on Sunday dominated over seven scoreless innings as the Dodgers shut out the New York Mets 9-0 in Game 1 of the National League Championship Series. Mookie Betts delivered a three-run double. Max Muncy drove in two runs and Japanese superstar Shohei Ohtani singled in a run and electrified the Dodger Stadium crowd with a hit that threatened to clear the outfield wall, but it was more stellar pitching, backed by lockdown defense and a disciplined performance at the plate, that propelled the Dodgers to victory to start the best-of-seven series. “It’s a lot of fun,” Flaherty