Victoria Azarenka's quest for her third successive Australian Open title took a little while to get going before she finally overcame a feisty Johanna Larsson 7-6, 6-2 in their first round match at Melbourne Park on Tuesday.
Taiwan held off a spirited Thailand to win the Asian Hopman Cup mixed team event on Sunday and earn a place in next month's tournament proper in Perth.
The Indian chess team totalled nine points, to finish behind China (11) and ahead of Vietnam (8), in the team event at the second Asian Indoor Games in Macau.
The 17th seed has been in no-nonsense mood so far in Melbourne, moving through the rounds with the minimum of fanfare, but faces her biggest test against the German.
Defending champion H S Prannoy eked out a thrilling win over China's Qiao Bin to advance to the quarterfinals of the $120,000 Swiss Grand Prix Gold badminton tournament, in Basel on Thursday.
Petra Kvitova takes on Naomi Osaka in Saturday's Australian Open final with one of them set to emerge as a fresh champion at Melbourne Park as well as the new world number one.
Tara Iyer advanced to the quarterfinals while the rest of the Indians crashed out of the Asian Tennis Championships.
Top shuttlers Saina Nehwal and P V Sindhu and national champion K Srikanth continued their rampaging run with contrasting victories to reach the semi-finals of the $120,000 Syed Modi International India Grand Prix Gold tournament in Lucknow.
India's tennis ace Sania Mirza and Cara Black showed nerves of steel as they saved three match points in the Super Tie Break against Kveta Peschke and Katarina Srebotnik to cruise into the summit clash of the WTA year-end finals, in Singapore on Saturday.
Twice Shanghai Masters champion Roger Federer was far from his best against Spain's Roberto Bautista Agut but did enough to reach the quarter-finals with a 6-3, 2-6, 6-4 win on Thursday.
Defending champions China easily beat hosts Indonesia 3-0 to win its sixth straight Uber Cup title on Saturday.
Star shuttler Kidambi Srikanth was disappointed after being called for a series of what he termed "ridiculous" service faults during his pre-quarterfinal match against China's Huang Yuxiang at the All England Championship.
World number one Taufik Hidayat of Indonesia and Malaysia's Lee Chong Wei will be the main attractions at the USD 150,000 Yonex Sunrise India Open.
The Bangalore lad shocked world No 12 Shoji Sato of Japan in a quarter-final match at the Yonex-Sunrise Asian Badminton Championship.
In what seems to be a mouth-watering clash for Indian tennis fans, Rohan Bopanna set up a semi-final clash with veteran Leander Paes after the two players won their respective mixed doubles matches on Day 8 of the US Open in New York, on Monday.
Sania Mirza and her Zimbabwean partner Cara Black lost to top seeds Hsieh Su-Wei of Taiwan and Peng Shuai of China in straight sets in the women's doubles final of the BNP Paribas Open, a Premier WTA tournament, at Indian Wells.
Sonal Phadke beat Punam Reddy in the final qualifying round to make it to the main draw in the ITF women's tournament in Mumbai.
India's campaign at the All England Badminton Championships came to a disappointing end with Saina Nehwal, B Sai Praneeth, Kidambi Srikanth and Sameer Verma all exiting from the tournament in Birmingham on Friday.
The Indian ace and Italy's Mara Santangelo got the better of Neha and Shikha Uberoi 6-3, 6-1 at the Bangalore Open.
Sania Mirza and Jie Zheng moved into the semi-finals of the women's doubles with a straight sets win over Su-Wei Hsieh and Shuai Peng.
The third seeds beat the Chinese-Uzbek pair of Meng Yuan and Varvara Lepchenko in the quarter-finals of the Cincinnati Open.
However, there will be no bilateral meetings between Swaraj, Sitharaman with their Pakistani counterparts.
Indonesian Taufik Hidayat pulled off one of the shocks of the Asian Games badminton competition, beating world number two Lee Chong Wei in the men's singles final.
Hsieh and Chuang Chia-jung produced a masterly display in the deciding doubles to overcome Sania Mirza and Shikha Uberoi and clinch the gold.
Yang Wei grabbed his eighth gold to join Li Ning as the most successful gymnast in Asian Games history.
Xu Kun snared gold in the men's individual and team 50 metre pistol events, as China's golden shooting spree continued at the Asian Games on Tuesday.
Indian shuttlers continued their impressive show with top stars P V Sindhu, Saina Nehwal and Kidambi Srikanth progressing to the semifinals of their respective events in the 21st Commonwealth Games' badminton competition, in Gold Coast, on Friday.
Legendary Prakash Padukone was revered as the world number one player during his hey days before the modern day computerised ranking system was introduced.
A model train, on show at the Sixth Shanghai International Industry Fair, attracted many professional visitors.
I need funds to play more international tournaments, says National Champion Sourabh Verma
Five-time World champion Viswanathan Anand played out an easy draw with black against local star Anish Giri but slipped to joint second spot after the sixth round of Tata Steel Chess tournament, in Wijk Aan Zee, on Saturday.
A summary of Friday's play at Wimbledon.
Grandmaster and former national champion B Adhiban beat Brazilian Grandmaster Alexander Fier in the second round and advance to the third round of the chess World Cup in Tromso, Norway, on Thursday
Serena Williams expects her sister Venus to be back at Melbourne Park next year for a 17th crack at winning the Australian Open, the American world number one said.
World champion Viktor Axelsen of Denmark and Chinese Taipei's No 1 shuttler Tai Tzu Ying will be up for grabs when the high-profile Players' Auction for the lucrative Premier Badminton League gets underway in Hyderabad on Monday.
Star Indian shuttler Saina Nehwal entered the second round of women's singles with a comfortable victory but P V Sindhu suffered an upset defeat in the opening round to crash out of the US $750,000 Australian Open Super Series badminton tournament in Sydney on Wednesday. In men's singles, India's Kidambi Srikanth and Sameer Verma made the second round with contrasting victories, but it was curtains for qualifier R M V Gurusaidutt as he failed to cross the first round hurdle. Saina, who had won the Australian Open title in 2014, hardly broke a sweat in her opening round game as she outplayed Joy Lai of Australia with a dominating 21-10 21-14 win in just 29 minutes. The seventh seeded Indian will clash with Malaysia's Jin Wei Goh in the second round. However, World No. 10 Sindhu was stunned by South Korea's Kim Hyo Min, ranked 40th in the world, 15-21 19-21 after a 55-minute battle.
Summary of sports events and persons who made news on Thursday
Qiang Wei, the head of Beijing Olympic Security Co-ordination Group, said the 2008 Olympics security budget would be unveiled shortly
The Underwater Photography Guide has announced the winners of their 8th annual Ocean Art Underwater Photography Competition: a selection that runs the gamut between beautiful, eye popping and, in the case of the Conservation category winner, tragic and unnerving. This year's contest attracted "thousands" of entries from 78 countries across the world.
© 2026 Rediff.com - Advertise with us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy - Sitemap - Feedback - About us - Terms of use - Grievances