BOXING
Taiwanese wins gold
Shen Shin-ai on Friday scored a points victory over Sila Bibolsynkyzy in the women’s light flyweight division (48kg) final to win Taiwan’s first gold at the Asian Youth and Junior Boxing Championships in Kazakhstan. The southpaw Shen won two out of three rounds, conceding only the final round to her opponent. Shen had already made history by becoming the first Taiwanese boxer to reach a final at the junior championships by defeating Palak Ajay Zambare of India in the semi-finals. Shen’s success might be the result of her participation in other sports, said Peng Chun-ming, director-general of Taiwan’s national boxing association. Peng told reporters that Shen practiced wushu when she was an elementary-school student and it was not until she was about to graduate that she started boxing. She even played badminton when she was in junior-high school due to the lack of boxing facilities, Peng added.
Photo: CNA
TENNIS
Sabalenka beats Rybakina
World No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka defeated Elena Rybakina 6-2, 3-6, 6-3 in a rain-disrupted group match on Friday to book a semi-final clash with Iga Swiatek at the WTA Finals. The Belarusian, who finished second in her group behind unbeaten American Jessica Pegula, kept her bid for the year-end number one ranking on track with a victory that took two days to complete. She had won the first set, but was trailing in the second when play was halted on Thursday after multiple rain delays. Swiatek downed sixth-seeded Ons Jabeur 6-1, 6-2 to finish top of her group with a perfect 3-0 record. US Open champion Coco Gauff closed out group play with a 5-7, 7-6 (7/4), 6-3 victory over Wimbledon winner Marketa Vondrousova and advanced to the semi-finals — her place secured after Swiatek’s win.
TENNIS
Djokovic reaches last four
Novak Djokovic on Friday edged out Holger Rune at the Paris Masters to reach the last four, while Stefanos Tsitsipas set up a meeting with Grigor Dimitrov. Djokovic missed a match point in the second set, but eventually claimed a 7-5, 6-7 (3/7), 6-4 win over Denmark’s Rune in the quarter-finals at Bercy Arena. Djokovic faces Andrey Rublev for a place in the final after the Russian defeated Alex de Minaur 4-6, 6-3, 6-1. “It was quite a similar match to last year’s final, it was anybody’s game in every set,” said Djokovic, referring to the match the two played last year, which the Serbian lost. “I played an awful tie-break in the second set, probably the worst one this year, but again credit to him for staying mentally tough and playing solid. We have similar games. Move well, defend well and all-round players.” The 36-year-old claimed his second career victory against Rune, who is now working with Djokovic’s former coach Boris Becker, after suffering two successive defeats by the world No. 7.
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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