TENNIS
Nadal to return to Queen’s
Rafael Nadal will start his bid to win a third Wimbledon title by returning to the grass-court tournament at Queen’s Club later this year. Nadal, a 14-time Grand Slam champion, has reached the Wimbledon final in each of the five years he played at Queen’s, but UK tax laws forced the world No. 3 to turn his back on the west London event. The 28-year-old Spaniard had instead prepared for Wimbledon by playing in Germany at the Gerry Weber Open in Halle in recent years. Since his last visit to Queen’s in 2011, Nadal has failed to get past the fourth round at the All England Club and the former world No. 1, who last won Wimbledon in 2010, has decided to return after a three-year absence.
RUGBY UNION
Ugo Monye plans to retire
Harlequins’ former England and British and Irish Lions wing Ugo Monye plans to retire at the end of the season, he announced on the English Premiership club’s Web site on Monday. “It is a decision that I have been thinking about for a long time, and one that I haven’t taken lightly,” said Monye, who has spent his entire playing career at Quins, making 237 appearances. “I have had an unbelievable 13 years at Quins, and look back on my career with no regrets.” Monye, 31, won 14 England caps between 2008 and 2012, and played in two Tests on the Lions’ 2009 tour of South Africa, scoring one try in the third-Test victory in Johannesburg. He added: “I can honestly say that the one thing I am most proud of is that I have been a one-club man in a game that is ever-changing, and I am excited to be staying on at the club after my retirement in a different capacity.”
BASEBALL
Dodgers’ Ryu placed on DL
Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Ryu Hyun-jin, a South Korean left-hander, is scheduled to begin the upcoming Major League Baseball season on the disabled list, team manager Don Mattingly said. Ryu, who turns 28 today, went 14-7 with a 3.38 earned-run average last season. However, he has a nagging left shoulder injury that prompted the Dodgers to send him home from pre-season training in Arizona to be examined by a doctor. Mattingly said a cortisone injection, treatment that helped ease shoulder stiffness last season, was delivered last week, but Ryu was barely able to lob a ball on Sunday.
SOCCER
Lucarelli banned over insult
Crisis-hit Parma have yet another problem. Captain Alessandro Lucarelli has been banned for three matches for insulting the referee. The incident occurred when Lucarelli was sent off in Sunday’s 2-0 loss at home to Torino. Parma were declared bankrupt by an Italian court last week with debts of more than 200 million euros (US$219.7 million), and the club’s new owner and president, Giampietro Manenti, was arrested on charges of money laundering and embezzlement. Players have not been paid all season and Parma sit last in Serie A.
RUGBY UNION
Manu to move to Edinburgh
Highlanders cocaptain Nasi Manu is to leave the Super 15 competition at the end of the season to join Edinburgh, the New Zealand club said yesterday. The Highlanders said Manu had signed a two-year contract with the Scottish club, but remained focused on this year’s Super 15 campaign. Manu should find conditions familiar in Scotland — the Highlanders home city Dunedin has a similar climate and is known as “the Edinburgh of the south.”
Robinson Cano spent 17 seasons playing in the MLB in front of all kinds of baseball fans, but he said there is something special about his stint with the Mexican Baseball League’s Diablos Rojos. He is not alone. The league last week opened its 100th season, aiming to keep an impressive growth in attendance that began after the national team’s surprise run at the 2023 World Baseball Classic, and is already surpassing some first-division soccer clubs. After finishing third in the 2023 tournament, many casual fans, some of them soccer enthusiasts disappointed after Mexico were eliminated in the first round in the 2022
Noelvi Marte on Sunday had seven RBIs and hit his first career grand slam with a drive off infielder Jorge Mateo, while Austin Wynn had a career-high six RBIs as the Cincinnati Reds scored their most runs in 26 years in a 24-2 rout of the Baltimore Orioles. Marte finished with five hits, including his eighth-inning homer off Mateo. Wynn hit a three-run homer in the ninth off catcher Gary Sanchez. Cincinnati scored its most runs since a 24-12 win against the Colorado Rockies on May 19, 1999, and finished with 25 hits. Baltimore allowed its most runs since a 30-3 loss to
Arne Slot has denied that Darwin Nunez was dropped from Liverpool’s win against West Ham because of a training-ground row with a member of his coaching staff. The Liverpool head coach on Sunday last week said that Nunez was absent from the 2-1 victory at Anfield, having felt unwell during training the day before, although the striker sat behind the substitutes throughout the game. Speculation has been rife that the Uruguay international, whom Slot criticized for his work rate against Wolves and Aston Villa in February, was left out for disciplinary reasons. Asked on Friday to clarify the situation, Slot said: “He
CUNNINGHAM CONNECTS: In the Eastern Conference, the Pistons snapped their record 15-game playoff losing streak by beating the Knicks to level their series at 1-1 Kawhi Leonard on Monday scored 39 points on 15-of-19 shooting as the Los Angeles Clippers evened their first-round NBA Playoffs series against the Nuggets with a 105-102 win in Denver. “It feels like he didn’t miss a shot,” James Harden said. “His shot-making ability is elite.” Good thing, too, because his teammates were a combined 26 of 66 for a 39 percent clip. “I made shots tonight,” Leonard said. “I just keep playing, try to stay in the zone no matter if I’m making or missing shots.” The fifth-seeded Clippers needed every bit of his brilliance to snatch the homecourt advantage in the series
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