Robbie Keane scored twice to help Tottenham Hotspur claim a 3-0 victory over Hull City in the final of the Premier League's Asia Trophy on Friday.
Dark horse Croatia take on spirited Nigeria in a World Cup opener on Saturday that could leave one side fighting for their tournament lives in the Group of Death.
Happy Women's Day to all the beautiful ladies out there!
A summary of sports events and sports persons, who made news on Thursday.
Arsenal named a strong side captained by Mesut Ozil while Real had Bale on the bench and Eden Hazard, wearing the number 50 shirt, starting alongside fellow new signing Luka Jovic in attack.
La Liga leaders Barcelona won a tight and tense 'Clasico' 1-0 at Real Madrid on Saturday, beating their great rivals at their Bernabeu home for the second time in four days and moving a staggering 12 points clear of them in the standings.
French Open champions Leander Paes and Lukas Dlouhy fell at the first hurdle in the men's doubles at Wimbledon, losing to James Blake and Mardy Fish on Thursday. The third seeded pair, who was losing semi-finalists at the championships last year, were handed a 6-4, 6-4, 6-3 drubbing by the unseeded Americans.
Drawn against each other in the opening round of the clay-court championships, Paes will team up with Russia's Nadia Petrova, while Bhupathi will partner China's Jie Zhang.
Leander Paes and Lucas Dlouhy staged a magnificent recovery to beat South Africa's Wesley Moodie and Belgium's Dick Norman and win the men's doubles title at the French Open in Paris on Saturday. The third seeded Indo-Czech pair turned in a solid display after losing the first set to emerge 3-6, 6-3, 6-2 winners over their unseeded opponents in the final that lasted a hundred minutes.
England defender John Stones has been ruled out of their final two Euro 2016 qualifiers through injury, the FA said in a statement.
Leander Paes kept the Indian challenge alive at the French Open. Partnering Lukas Dlouhy, he advanced to the men's doubles semi-finals on Monday after a thwarting a late challenge from fifth seeds Bruno Soares of Brazil and Kevin Ullyett of Zimbabwe. The Indo-Czech duo won 6-2, 7-6(5) to set up a meeting with either top seeds Daniel Nestor of Canada/Nenad Zimonjic of Serbia or Russians Igor Kunitsyn/Dmitry Tursunov in the semi-finals.
Leander Paes and Lukas Dlouhy edged past the local pair of Julien Benneteau and Nicolas Mahut 7-6 (3), 6-3 to enter the men's doubles quarterfinals at the French Open on Saturday.
A tired and weakened Germany got their Asian Tour got off to a lacklustre start when they were held to a 1-1 draw by a young China team in an international friendly on Friday. Showing the clear effects of a gruelling season, Germany needed an equaliser from Lukas Podolski to cancel out Hao Junmin's opener and avoid an embarrassing defeat to the Chinese, who are 95 places below them in the FIFA rankings.
Sania Mirza and Mahesh Bhupathi moved through to the Australian Open mixed doubles final after a comfortable 6-4, 6-1 win over the Czech Republic's Iveta Benesova and Lukas Dlouhy in Melbourne on Friday.
Mahesh Bhupathi and Mark Knowles thrashed Lukasz Kubot and Oliver Marach 6-3, 6-1 to enter the final of the men's doubles at the Australian Open in Melbourne on Thursday. They meet second seeded Americans Bob and Mike Bryan, who beat the fourth seed pair of Leander Paes/Lukas Dlouhy 6-3, 6-3 in the other semi-final.
Leander Paes and his Czech partner Lukas Dlouhy sailed into the second round of the French Open men's doubles with a straight-sets win over locals Sebastien de Chaunac and Benoit Paire in Paris on Wednesday night. The third seeds won 6-1, 6-3 and set up a clash with another unseeded duo, James Cerretani and Sergiy Stakhovsky. The Ukrainian-American pair defeated Spaniards Nicolas Almagro and Ivan Navarro 6-2, 4-6, 6-2 in another first round match.
Indian players had a brilliant day at the Australian Open amid soaring temperatures, Leander Paes advancing to the men's doubles semi-finals and Mahesh Bhupathi and Sania Mirza also making the last-four stage in the mixed doubles in Melbourne on Wednesday. Paes and Czech partner Lukas Dlouhy, seeded fourth, beat unseeded Italians Simone Bolelli and Andreas Seppi 6-1, 7-6(5), while Sania and Bhupathi beat Canadians Aleksandra Wozniak and Daniel Nestor 3-6, 6-4, 10-5.
Real Madrid suffered a shock 1-0 home defeat to Real Betis on Wednesday as an inspired performance from their former goalkeeper Antonio Adan and a stoppage-time winner from Antonio Sanabria stunned the Liga champions.
Leander Paes and his partner Lukas Dlouhy entered the quarterfinals of the euro 2,750,000 Monte-Carlo Rolex Masters in Monaco, defeating unseeded Spaniard duo of Albert Montanes and Tommy Robredo in a match tie-breaker.
Fourth seeds Leander Paes and Lukas Dlouhy crashed out of the Miami Masters after a shocking straight sets defeat at the hands of the unseeded Czech-Slovak pair of Frantisek Cermak and Michal Mertinak in the men's doubles second round. The Indo-Czech combine went down 3-6, 3-6 in the just over an hour. In a match that was surprisingly lop-sided, the fourth seeds were left to rue missed opportunities, as they frittered away three break-points in the first set itself.
Leander Paes and Lukas Dlouhy made a spectacular start to their campaign in the US $4,500,000 Miami Masters, storming into the doubles pre-quarter-finals after a crushing 6-2, 6-2 victory over Fernando Gonzalez and Juan Monaco. In the women's event, Sania Mirza and Chinese Taipei's Chia-Jung Chuang earned a hard-fought 6-4, 7-5 win over the Czech combination of Iveta Benesova and Barbora Strycova Zahlavova to advance to the pre-quarter-finals.
India's top ranked player Somdev Devvarman and number two Prakash Amritraj have been awarded wildcards for the men's singles main draw at the $ 450,000 ATP Chennai Open to be held at the SDAT, Nungambakkam Stadium, from January 5-11 next year.
Cristiano Ronaldo netted a first-half penalty as injury-depleted Real Madrid recovered from their derby defeat by Atletico Madrid at the weekend with a 3-1 win at Levante on Wednesday.
Rohan Bopanna and his Pakistani partner Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi entered the final of the men's doubles event of Sydney International tennis with a comfortable straight-set win over Lukas Rosol and Joao Sousa in Sydney.
Cristiano Ronaldo was awarded the Ballon d'Or for world player of the year on Thursday for a joint-record fifth time, going level with eternal rival and Barcelona forward Lionel Messi as the player to have won the prize the most times.
The Indian challenge at the BNP Paribas Open ended after Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi lost their respective second-round doubles matches at the US $4.5 million tennis tournament in Indian Wells. The twin losses rounded off a disappointing Indian campaign at the hard-court event, where Sania Mirza couldn't go past the second round in women's singles and crashed out of doubles in the first round itself.
The FIFA World Cup at Russia saw a variety of celebrations -- from the weird to some fancy dance moves -- Rediff.com has got it all covered here...
Leander Paes advanced in men's doubles but it was curtains for Sania Mirza who crashed out of the women's singles event after a straight-set loss to 12th seed Italian Flavia Pennetta in the second round of the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells.
India's Mahesh Bhupathi and his partner Mark Knowles of the Bahamas defeated South African duo Wesley Moodie and Jeff Coetzee 6-2, 6-3 in their first group league match of the season-ending Masters Cup in Shanghai on Sunday.
Leander Paes and Lukas Dlouhy beat Marcos Baghdatis and Olivier Rochus 6-2, 7-6 in the first round of the Gerry Weber Open.
Here is a look at some of the key head-to-head duels which could prove decisive.
Jezreel Pannikot reveals life lessons the stars of the 2018 World Cup taught us.
IMAGES from the Champions League matches played on Wednesday.
They will take on Nathalie Dechy of France and Andy Ram of Israel, who shocked the seventh seeded Spanish combination of Anabel Medina Garrigues and Tommy Robredo 7-6 (9-7), 6-4 in the other semi-final.
Moments after winning the US Open men's doubles trophy, his 10th Grand Slam title, Indian ace Leander Paes said he wasn't sure if he would be able to play the final as he was carrying a sore shoulder.
Leander Paes and Lukas Dlouhy recovered from a set down to beat third seeds Mahesh Bhupathi and Mark Knowles in a thrilling final and win the men's doubles title at the US Open on Sunday. The third seeded Indo-Czech pair shrugged off a sluggish start to score a 3-6, 6-3, 6-2 victory and claim their second Grand Slam title of the year, having won the French Open in June.
There is something about the bright lights and the razzmatazz of Flushing Meadows that brings out the 'A Game' in Leander Paes.
Leander Paes and Lukas Dlouhy avenged the defeat they suffered in last year's final by beating Bob and Mike Bryan in the men's doubles semi-finals at the US Open on Wednesday. The fourth seeded Indo-Czech pair, which lost to the Bryans brothers 6-7(5), 6-7(10) in the title round last year, overcame a late charge by the No 1 seeds to emerge 6-4, 3-6, 7-6(8-6) in a 111-minute encounter on Arthur Ashe court.
Leander Paes and his Czech partner Lukas Dlouhy had little trouble in making the third round of the men's doubles at the Australian Open in Melbourne on Friday. The fourth seeds beat the unseeded Italian-Croat pairing of Fabio Fognini and Ivan Ljubcic 6-3, 6-4 in a second round match.
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