■ FRANCE
Rennes stay in sixth place
Goals from Carlos Bocanegra and Jimmy Briand earned Rennes a 2-0 victory over Auxerre in Ligue 1 on Sunday to keep them firmly in the race for a European spot. Bocanegra headed in a cross from Mickael Pagis in the ninth minute and Briand tucked home another cross from Pagis in the 36th minute to keep Rennes in sixth place. Araujo Ilan struck twice to lead St Etienne to a 2-1 comeback victory over Nantes. The Brazilian striker converted a penalty in the 11th minute after Guillaume Moullec handled the ball and then picked his spot from 27m to fire into the top corner in the 30th minute. Croatia forward Ivan Klasnic had given Nantes a sixth minute lead, nodding in a free-kick from Frederic Da Rocha and teammate Yohann Poulard nearly equalized for Nantes in the 80th minute with a header that struck the crossbar. St Etienne moved out of the relegation zone with the win. Last-place Le Havre came back from a goal down to beat fellow relegation battlers Sochaux 2-1.
■ PORTUGAL
Benfica stay behind Porto
Pablo Aimar and Costas Katsouranis scored on Sunday to help Benfica beat Naval 2-1 and hold on to second place. Aimar set Benfica on the way to their first away win for three months by firing home in the third minute after the Naval defense failed to clear a free-kick by Jose Antonio Reyes. Naval equalized in the 53rd minute through substitute Marcelinho’s angled shot, only for Katsouranis to head home following another Reyes free-kick in the 74th minute. Benfica, aiming to win the title for the first time since 2005, trail defending champions Porto by two points. Also on Sunday it was Amadora 2, Braga 2; Academica 1, Trofense 0; and Guimaraes 3, Belenenses 1.
■ GREECE
Violence overshadows draw
League leaders Olympiakos played out a goalless draw at PAOK Thessaloniki on Sunday in a match that was overshadowed by violent clashes between fans and police. Seven riot police and five PAOK fans were injured in clashes that flared outside the stadium both before and after the game. Supporters threw rocks, bottles and firebombs at police, who responded with tear gas. PAOK fans had been angered by what they claimed was bad refereeing in a Greek Cup game between the two sides last Wednesday. Also on Sunday, it was Thrasivoulos 1, Ergotelis 3; OFI 0, Levadiakos 2; Panserraikos 1, AEK 5; and Xanthi 1, Panthrakikos 0.
■ BRAZIL
Ronaldo grabs equalizer
Brazilian striker Ronaldo scored his first goal for Corinthians on Sunday having played for the first time in more than a year last week following a serious knee injury. The 32-year-old World Cup winner and three-time FIFA World Player of the Year came on after an hour in the 1-1 draw against Sao Paulo. Ronaldo headed home in the second minute of injury-time for the equalizer to send the supporters into frenzied celebrations.
■ RUSSIA
CSKA edge Rubin Kazan
CSKA Moscow edged Rubin Kazan 2-1 in extra-time to lift the Russian Super Cup on Sunday, Tomas Necid’s late volley securing victory in the traditional curtain-raiser for the league season. Lithuanian defender Deividas Semberas slotted home a rebound to give CSKA the lead in the 43rd minute at the Luzhniki Stadium, before Roman Sharanov equalized for the league champions after an hour. The teams remained locked in a stalemate until second-half substitute Necid scored the winning goal in the 113th minute.
North Korea’s FIFA Under-17 Women’s World Cup-winning team on Saturday received a heroes’ welcome back in the capital, Pyongyang, with hundreds of people on the streets to celebrate their success. They had defeated Spain on penalties after a 1-1 draw in the U17 World Cup final in the Dominican Republic on Nov. 3. It was the second global title in two months for secretive North Korea — largely closed off to the outside world; they also lifted the FIFA U20 Women’s World Cup in September. Officials and players’ families gathered at Pyongyang International Airport to wave flowers and North Korea flags as the
Taiwan’s top table tennis player Lin Yun-ju made his debut in the US professional table tennis scene by taking on a new role as a team’s co-owner. On Wednesday, Major League Table Tennis (MLTT), founded in September last year, announced on its official Web site that Lin had become part of the ownership group of the Princeton Revolution, one of the league’s eight teams. MLTT chief executive officer Flint Lane described Lin’s investment as “another great milestone for table tennis in America,” saying that the league’s “commitment to growth and innovation is drawing attention from the best in the sport, and we’re
Coco Gauff of the US on Friday defeated top-ranked Aryna Sabalenka 7-6 (7/4), 6-3 to set up a showdown with Olympic champion Zheng Qinwen in the final of the WTA Finals, while in the doubles, Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching was eliminated. Gauff generated six break points to Belarusian Sabalenka’s four and built on early momentum in the opening set’s tiebreak that she carried through to the second set. She is the youngest player at 20 to make the final at the WTA Finals since Denmark’s Caroline Wozniacki in 2010. Zheng earlier defeated Wimbledon champion Barbora Krejcikova of the Czech Republic 6-3, 7-5 to book
For King Faisal, a 20-year-old winger from Ghana, the invitation to move to Brazil to play soccer “was a dream.” “I believed when I came here, it would help me change the life of my family and many other people,” he said in Sao Paulo. For the past year and a half, he has been playing on the under-20s squad for Sao Paulo FC, one of South America’s most prominent clubs. He and a small number of other Africans are tearing across pitches in a country known as the biggest producer and exporter of soccer stars in the world, from Pele to Neymar. For
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