■SOCCER
Romario plans to sue Vasco
Romario is planning to sue Vasco da Gama for US$16.4 million he says the club owes him in payments, local media reported on Tuesday. The debt stems from image rights and other payments the club allegedly failed to pay the veteran striker, who retired this year after his contract with Vasco expired. Vasco officials acknowledged the debt last year and said they were paying the player, but Romario’s lawyers told the O Globo newspaper that the club stopped paying the installments in August. Vasco officials claimed they stopped the payments because the club was short on money. Romario alleges that the team’s new sponsorship deals have put the club in position to make the payments again. Both parties said they were willing to reach an agreement, but Romario’s lawyer Norval Valerio said the player would sue the club early next year if the club doesn’t resume the installments. Vasco, four-time national champions, were relegated to the second division of the Brazilian league after a dismal campaign this year. Romario began his career with Vasco in 1985. Considered one of the top Brazilian strikers of all time, Romario led Brazil to their fourth World Cup title in 1994, when he was named FIFA player of the year.
■FORMULA ONE
Karthikeyan pans Mallya
India’s first Formula One driver Narain Karthikeyan said he was never interested in joining Force India and criticized team co-owner Vijay Mallya for saying no Indian was good enough to drive in F1. “I spent a frustrating time with Jordan, where I had a car that just could not perform. I have no desire to be with another pedestrian team that’s low on performance and loud on talk,” Karthikeyan told the Hindustan Times newspaper yesterday. Indian billionaire Mallya bought into the Spyker team last year and renamed it Force India. He told the newspaper recently that neither Karthikeyan nor the country’s next hope, Karun Chandhok, were good enough for his team. Force India failed to score a point in its first season and confirmed this month that Italian Giancarlo Fisichella and German Adrian Sutil will race for them again next year.
■SOCCER
Spain launches 2018 bid
The Spanish Football Federation (RFEF) plans to submit a joint bid with Portugal to host the 2018 World Cup. “The board have finalized today the formal tender for Spain’s candidature to organize the 2018 World Cup to be held jointly with Portugal,” the RFEF said in a statement on Tuesday. The winning bid will be announced in December 2010. European champions Spain and Portugal declared their interest in hosting the tournament after FIFA said it would welcome bids for both the 2018 and 2022 World Cups. FIFA president Sepp Blatter said Spain, alone or with Portugal, were strong candidates for 2018, as were England and the Netherlands with Belgium. Australia, China, Mexico and Russia have also expressed interest.
■SWIMMING
Pellegrini diagnosed
Italy’s 200m freestyle Olympic champion Federica Pellegrini said she had been diagnosed with a form of asthma, which caused her to hyperventilate during a race at the Italian winter championships last month. “I gave a big sigh of relief today as I did a test in Verona and I’ve finally found out what my problem is,” the 20-year-old told the ANSA news agency. “I have bronchial spasms, basically I suffer from asthma. There’s no problem about being unfit for competition.”
Bayer 04 Leverkusen go into today’s match at TSG 1899 Hoffenheim stung from their first league defeat in 16 months. Leverkusen were beaten 3-2 at home by RB Leipzig before the international break, the first loss since May last year for the reigning league and cup champions. While any defeat, particularly against a likely title rival, would have disappointed coach Xabi Alonso, the way in which it happened would be most concerning. Just as they did in the Supercup against VfB Stuttgart and in the league opener to Borussia Moenchengladbach, Leverkusen scored first, but were pegged back. However, while Leverkusen rallied late to
If all goes well when the biggest marathon field ever gathered in Australia races 42km through the streets of Sydney on Sunday, World Marathon Majors (WMM) will soon add a seventh race to the elite series. The Sydney Marathon is to become the first race since Tokyo in 2013 to join long-established majors in New York, London, Boston, Berlin and Chicago if it passes the WMM assessment criteria for the second straight year. “We’re really excited for Sunday to arrive,” race director Wayne Larden told a news conference in Sydney yesterday. “We’re prepared, we’re ready. All of our plans look good on
The lights dimmed and the crowd hushed as Karoline Kristensen entered for her performance. However, this was no ordinary Dutch theater: The temperature was 80°C and the audience naked apart from a towel. Dressed in a swimsuit and to the tune of emotional music, the 21-year-old Kristensen started her routine, performed inside a large sauna, with a bed of hot rocks in the middle. For a week this month, a group of wellness practitioners, called “sauna masters,” are gathering at a picturesque health resort in the Netherlands to compete in this year’s Aufguss world sauna championships. The practice takes its name from a
When details from a scientific experiment that could have helped clear Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva landed at the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), the leader of the organization’s reaction was unequivocal: “We have to stop that urgently,” he wrote. No mention of the test ever became public and Valieva’s defense at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) went on without it. What effect the information could have had on Valieva’s case is unclear, but without it, the skater, then 15 years old, was eventually disqualified from the 2022 Winter Olympics after testing positive for a banned heart medication that would later