As we prepare to cruise into the New Year, Rediff.com gives you a glance back, through photos, into all the sporting moments that made the last 12 months memorable.
Novak Djokovic will meet Andy Murray in the final of the Australian Open. The Serb beat defending champion Stanislas Wawrinka 7-6(1), 3-6, 6-4, 4-6, 6-0 in the semi-final on Friday.
Maria Sharapova has admitted that she failed a drug test at the Australian Open this year. The Russian star has confessed that she tested positive for Mildronate/Meldonium, a medicine she has been taking for 10 years owing to health issues, and the same is included in the fresh list of banned substances.
Veteran Mahesh Bhupathi went out of the mixed doubles competition following a first-round loss.
Australia's wicketkeeper-batsman Brad Haddin said his team is quite comfortable playing a hard-nosed brand of cricket and would not be affected by the furore caused by David Warner's latest code-of-conduct offence.
Legendary South African batsman Barry Richards feels Virat Kohli is a few notches above his contemporaries in the Indian team but still has some way to go before one can compare him with the iconic Sachin Tendulkar.
Australia will miss George Bailey in the next tri-series match against England as the skipper was on Monday handed a one-match suspension.
Describing India's clinical win over arch-rivals Pakistan, in their World Cup campaign opener, as one of the biggest in his career, India batsman Virat Kohli said he was happy to have played his part in the "amazing" victory.
Just into his second Test as India captain, Virat Kohli has come under severe criticism for his tactics from Australian batting greats Ian Chappell and Michael Clarke for the way he shuffled his bowlers during the ongoing fourth and final cricket Test.
After Nick Kyrgios, another Aussie involved in verbal volley as tempers flare in Ohio.
Veteran skipper Charlotte Edwards and young Sarah Taylor batted sensibly to chase down a paltry total and help England women beat South Africa by nine wickets to enter the final of the ICC Women's World T20 in Mirpur.
Sachin Tendulkar cautioned the Indian cricket team to guard against complacency ahead of its World Cup game against South Africa, saying the Proteas are a far better fielding unit than Pakistan.
India captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni retired from Test cricket immediate effect and Virat Kohli will lead the team in the fourth Test against Australia in Sydney starting on January 6.
Misbah-ul-Haq has stressed on the need for Pakistan and India to revive their bilateral cricket ties .
Justin Langer was the foundation rock upon which Australia erected towering piles of runs during a golden era of success.
Australian media has heaped praise on off-spinner Nathan Lyon, whose seven-wicket haul helped his team post a thrilling win against India on the final day of the first Test in Adelaide.
Australia's David Warner, on Friday, completed 1000 runs in 2014 en route his century in the second innings of the first cricket Test against India in Adelaide, becoming the first opener to achieve the feat since England skipper Alastair Cook in 2012.
Rohit Sharma is delighted to win theMan of the Series award for his whopping 441 runs in the just-concluded One-day International series against Australia but the stylish right-hander rued the fact that his team 'could not capture crucial moments', which led to their 1-4 defeat.
India can seek motivation from the fact that they can claim the top spot in the ICC Twenty20 International rankings if they make a clean sweep in the three-match series that begins on January 26.
Backing Shaun Tait's surprise return to the Australian T20 squad for the three-match series against India, former pacer Jason Gillespie said the tearaway speedster will cause a lot of damage on Indian tracks if he makes the squad for the World T20 starting March 8.
Indian captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni, on Sunday, hit out at his fielders for conceding easy boundaries at crucial junctures as Australia took an unassailable 3-0 lead in the five-match ODI series with a three-wicket win in Melbourne.
Commonwealth Games: The event Photographs
Former India captain and CAB president, Sourav Ganguly, is working overtime to get everything in order at Eden Gardens, which is set to host the country's first pink-ball multi-day cricket match under lights. With drone flying over him under the dazzling Eden floodlights, the iconic lefthander was seen shooting promotional with the pink Kookaburra. "Eden Gardens will hold the first day-night (four-day) match in India. It has given us many moments to celebrate, now it's getting ready to host yet another moment to remember," Ganguly said in the promotional. Later talking to media, Ganguly, who is also the BCCI technical committee chairman, said, "Pink ball is the future... This will be the ultimate form of Test cricket. What will be the use of doing something which will have little interest left."
The Indian women's table tennis team won gold
- 'At no point did we back off. If at any stage that we had in mind that we might play for a draw, we would have lost by 150 runs' - 'I was playing positive and going by my instincts'
Lack of strategic thinking behind Pakistan's loss in World Cup.
Day 4 in the first Test was dominated by Australian performances. First, spinner Nathan Lyon bagged his sixth five-wicket haul as India were dismissed for 444 in the first innings. Then, opener David Warner continued in his sublime form and struck his second century of the match as the home side put up 290 for five in their second innings, an overall lead of 363 runs. Here are images from Friday's play at the Adelaide Oval.
"If you have played cricket then you have grown up watching these legends. It's a wonderful thing to have happened and they will help us in many ways," Kohli said.
The situation of Russian tennis star Maria Sharapova is "bad" after she tested positive for the banned substance meldonium and she may never play again, R-Sport news agency quoted Shamil Tarpishchev, the president of the Russian Tennis Federation, as saying.
Despite her poor recent track record against her sister Serena, Venus Williams will not just be "hanging out" in her first Grand Slam final in nine years at the Australian Open on Saturday.
Veteran Indian tennis star Leander Paes and his Swiss partner Martina Hingis sailed into the quarter-finals of the mixed doubles event at the Australian Open with straight sets win over Australian duo Matt Reid and Casey Dellacqua, in Melbourne on Monday.
Kevin Rudd staged a comeback on Wednesday after he ousted Prime Minister Julia Gillard as head of Australia's ruling Labor Party in a leadership ballot, three years after he was deposed by her in party coup.
In order to raise the dwindling number of spectators in the stadium, the Board of Control for Cricket in India last week said it is all set to host its first-ever day/night cricket Test with the pink ball against New Zealand in October.
Indian tennis ace Sania Mirza stormed into the mixed doubles semifinals besides reaching the doubles quarterfinals, but compatriot Leander Paes exited the US Open with unexpected defeats in both his events.
Amit Mishra has been on roll for sometime now. Starting from the Asia Cup game against Pakistan, where he just gave 28 runs and picked up two wickets from his 10 overs.
Virat Kohli is expected to captain India in all formats at some point but before that happens, the star batsmen must start taking more responsibility towards his team, former India spin great Erapalli Prasanna said.
Govt unlikely to allow Indo-Pak cricket in Dubai
India will issue multi-city short-term visas to Pakistani cricket fans willing to watch their team play during the forthcoming World Twenty20 tournament, including a high-voltage rescheduled match against the hosts in Kolkata.
South Africa coach Russell Domingo has vowed his side won't play "fancy" cricket in their search for an elusive ICC trophy as they depart for the World Twenty20 in India on Thursday in confident mood. South Africa head to the tournament ranked as the third best team in the 20-over format and on the back of recent series wins in Bangladesh and, crucially, India. Domingo believes they will be able to quickly put behind them the 2-1 home loss to Australia, confirmed on Wednesday with a six-wicket loss in Cape Town, which he didn't think diminished from an excellent 14 months for his side in the shortest format. "We are all pretty chilled. I don't think there is a weight of expectation around our team or any of the teams because of the nature of the competition," he told reporters. "You can't get too fancy, you can't get too funky. There is no magic wand to wave. The sides that do the basics really well in high-pressure games, they usually come out on top."
'That's something that you don't see very often because the wounds of the war are still fresh and we are very happy with the way these people showed their support. They fully deserve to have this event'
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