PORTUGAL
Porto claim the league title
Porto won the league title after Benfica drew 2-2 at Rio Ave on Sunday. Porto hold a six-point lead over Benfica with two games to play, but they successfully defended their title due to a better head-to-head advantage over their closest rivals. Porto, who won 2-0 at Maritimo on Saturday, secured the title for the sixth time in seven seasons. Rio Ave opened the scoring through Christian Atsu, before Manuel Agudo and Oscar Cardozo put Benfica ahead by halftime. Yazalde Gomes’ 50th-minute equalizer earned the hosts a draw. “Mathematically we lost the championship today since we have no more chances, but the only thing that matters is our game,” Benfica coach Jorge Jesus said.
PORTUGAL
Leiria scrape together team
Premier League club Uniao Leiria took to the pitch with only eight players for their match against Feirense on Sunday after 16 squad members submitted collective resignation letters over delays in salary payments. The professional players’ union said on Saturday that the resignations meant the match would not take place, but Leiria managed to scrape together a team. Eight stern-faced Leiria players lined up in formation for the pre-match photograph and they then resisted bravely on the pitch until just before the halftime whistle, when they conceded the first goal. Feirense went on to win the match 4-0. Leiria president Joao Bartolomeu said in a post-match press conference that Malian midfielder Keita, who was expected to take part in the match, stole a suitcase of money from the club just before the match.
SWITZERLAND
Basel acknowledge title win
Basel, having twice refused to accept the Swiss title in the past week, finally recognized themselves as champions on Sunday after a 3-1 win over Lausanne Sport. Both Basel and the Swiss League agreed on their respective Web sites that the team were champions for the third time in a row and the sixth in the past nine seasons. The confusion over whether or not Basel had won the title capped a chaotic season marred by court battles, hooliganism and financial problems, which led to Neuchatel Xamax being kicked out of the league and Servette Geneva filing for bankruptcy. Basel took an unassailable 16-point lead over Luzern the previous weekend, but they would not accept the title because their rivals could theoretically have won two points from a case they had taken to the Court of Arbitration for Sport. On Saturday, Luzern drew 2-2 with Grasshoppers, meaning they could no longer catch Basel even if they won the case. However, Basel again refused to celebrate on the grounds that Sion could still catch them should they win an appeal against the decision to deduct 36 points for fielding ineligible players. The confusion ended on Sunday when Basel’s win over Lausanne meant they could not be caught, even if Sion won back their 36 points.
SERBIA
Partizan secure 24th title
Partizan Belgrade secured their 24th league title and their fifth in a row with Sunday’s 4-0 win at Borac Cacak, finally giving coach Avram Grant success after the Israeli suffered a series of setbacks in England. The result gave Partizan an unassailable 12-point lead over traditional city rivals Red Star, who they meet at home on Saturday. Midfielder Sasa Markovic sent Partizan on their way with a long-range effort in the first half, before Bulgaria defender Ivan Ivanov and a late brace from Senegalese striker Lamine Diarra sealed matters.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier