Category: SPORTS

Multiple Grand Slam winners Serena Williams and Svetlana Kuznetsova are set to resume their 16-year rivalry after being drawn Saturday to face each other in the first round of next week’s Auckland WTA Classic. Tournament top seed Williams, 38, and Kuznetsova, 34, are in a competitive half of the draw in which the veterans are competing against the rising stars of tennis, including American teen sensations Amanda Anisimova and Coco Gauff as well as 22-year-old Latvian Jelena Ostapenko. Williams leads Kuznetsova 10-3 in their head-to-heads dating back to 2004 and…

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Smoke haze could come into play as New Zealand look to salvage some pride from their miserable tour of Australia in the third and final Test in Sydney this week.With bushfires raging across New South Wales state, day two of the match on Saturday shapes up as the biggest challenge with temperatures forecast to soar and smoggy conditions expected.The issue of smoke is a difficult one for officials, who currently rely on a mix of air quality guidelines from the International Cricket Council, state governments and the Australian Institute of…

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New Zealand have turned to Will Somerville for his experience of playing in Sydney as they look to avoid a whitewash in the third and final Test against Australia. Off-spinner Somerville, who was raised in Australia and played Sheffield Shield for New South Wales, will replace injured pace bowler Trent Boult for the Test starting in Sydney on Friday. Coach Gary Stead said the inclusion of the lanky 1.93 metre (6ft 4in) Somerville was a nod to the expected conditions at the Sydney Cricket Ground. “There’s no secret the SCG…

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The second edition of the Hockey India (HI) Coaching Education Pathway will be conducted in February-March next year, the national federation said on Sunday.The program, which is an integral part of the International Hockey Federation (FIH) Academy, will see Level ‘Basic’ and Level ‘1’ coaching courses being conducted across four zones — south, west, north and east in February 2020, while the HI Level ‘2’ Coaching Course will take place in March.A simplified education structure, the HI Coaching Education Pathway, consists of a combination of web-based modules and face-to-face interactive…

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Six-time world champion M C Mary Kom (51kg category) defeated Nikhat Zareen in an intense trial bout here on Saturday to make the Indian team for next year’s Olympic qualifiers in China. In a bout which had very few clear punches, Mary Kom prevailed 9-1 to make the squad, but tension was palpable inside the boxing hall owing to the bitter row triggered by Zareen’s public demand for a trial. Words were exchanged between the boxers during the bout and outside the ring, a few representatives from Zareen’s home state…

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India under-19 team produced an impressive all-round performance to begin its tour of South Africa with a comfortable nine-wicket win in the first Youth ODI at the Buffalo Park here. Batting first, South Africa Under-19 team folded for 187 in 48.3 overs. In reply, India dished out a solid batting display to overhaul the target, scoring 190 for 1 in 42.3 overs on Thursday to take 1-0 lead in the series. South Africa’s decision to bat fist backfired as their batsmen failed to convert the starts into big scores with…

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Sri Lanka might have lost the series but signed off satisfied with safety and security measures in Pakistan after the country’s first home test series in 10 years.Captain Dimuth Karunaratne called the security for the two-test series “200 percent” and promised to return.The series held major significance for a host nation deprived of all forms of international cricket for almost a decade.Pakistan had been forced to play its home series outside the country, mostly in the United Arab Emirates, since 2009, when the bus carrying the Sri Lankan team was…

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West Indies head coach Phil Simmons feels his team’s “best show” may not be enough to beat India in the series-decider here on Sunday but the outcome of the game won’t “influence” the direction the Caribbean outfit has taken under his guidance.Simmons, a former player, was reappointed as West Indies coach in October.West Indies showed a lot of promise to go one-up in Chennai but the home team bounced back strongly to post a mammoth 387/5 en route to a series-levelling 107-run victory in Visakhapatnman.”I think all the guys know…

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BCCI President Sourav Ganguly on Friday said that a Cricket Advisory Committee (CAC) will be formed in the next couple of days to announce the new selection panel on a three-year tenure. Ganguly said the CAC will be appointed only for one meeting to decide the selectors as the appointment of the men’s head coach has already been done by the previous panel led by former captain Kapil Dev. “The CAC will be appointed in a couple of days. It will only be for one meeting to appoint the selectors…

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