Summary of sports events and persons who made news on Wednesday
Indian challenge ended at the Hong Kong Open World Tour Super 500 tournament after Kidambi Srikanth and Sameer Verma lost their respective men's singles quarterfinal matches on Friday.
Local youngster Prasanna Rao, an International Master, surprisingly held top seed Aleksandrov Aleksey of Belarus to a draw in the fourth round of the 4th Mayor's Cup International Chess Tournament on Sunday.
The Indian pair of Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi bowed out of the Barclays ATP World Tour Finals after losing to eighth-seeded Poles Mariusz Fyrstenberg and Marcin Matkowski via the super tie-break in the semi-finals in London on Saturday. Fyrstenberg and Matkowski needed an hour and 39 minutes to prevail over the fourth seeds and three-time former finalists 6-4, 4-6, 10-6 and reach their 31st tour-level doubles final.
Konta, Sharapova fall at Rogers Cup in Toronto
The Italian federation (FIGC) is determined to complete the season and its president Gabriele Gravina has been presenting new ideas on an almost daily basis of how that can be done. Meanwhile, Turkmenistan in Central Asia is set to resume its soccer season with spectators at the weekend, making it only the second country in the world to let fans attend matches as the new coronavirus shuts down almost all of world football.
Sania Mirza won her third WTA doubles title of the season, and 12th overall, when she and Yaroslava Shvedova pipped Olga Govortsova of Belarus and Alla Kudryavtseva of Russia in the final of the Citi Open at College Park on Sunday. Defending their top billing, the Indo-Kazakh pair overcame the second seeds 6-3, 6-3 after an hour and five minutes' struggle.
Maps showing density of hospital beds and doctors per 10,000 population across the world.
Fourth seed Vera Zvonareva bundled Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova out of the Pan Pacific Open with a 7-6, 6-0 victory on Friday to book a place in the Tokyo finals. The Russian faces Agnieszka Radwanska for the title on Saturday after the Pole beat Victoria Azarenka of Belarus 6-3, 4-6, 6-2 under a setting sun in the second semi-final.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) said it had disqualified weightlifting gold medallists Cao Lei (75kg), Chen Xiexia (48 kg) and Liu Chunhong (69kg) from the Beijing Games after they tested positive for prohibited substances.
The sole member of the Yaroslavl Lokomotiv ice hockey team to survive last week's air crash in western Russia died of his injuries on Monday, the medical centre that treated him said.
Sania Mirza earned the opportunity to win her third WTA doubles title of the season as she and Yaroslava Shvedova breezed into final of the Citi Open after handing a humiliating 6-0, 6-1 defeat to Shahar Peer and Sloan Stephens.
A summary of Tuesday's qualification matches next year's FIFA World Cup.
Serena Williams may have been second best at the French Open on Saturday but the American has moved ahead of fellow tennis player Maria Sharapova to top the women's earnings list in sports, according to Forbes Magazine. Williams ended the Russian's 11-year reign as the world number one women's money earner in sports by hauling in $28.9 million in combined prize money and off-field earnings over the past 12 months, the magazine said on Monday. Sharapova, who lost some sponsorship money after announcing she had tested positive for the recently banned substance meldonium at the Australian Open in January and is provisionally suspended, holds second spot at $21.9 million.
The India-Pakistan tennis duo of Rohan Bopanna and Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi advanced to the semi-finals of the Monte Carlo ATP Masters tournament, shocking second seeds Daniel Nestor and Max Mirnyi in the quarter-finals on Friday.
Former Arsenal star Alexander Hleb says he made a mistake by leaving the Emirates to join Barcelona in 2008, and expressed regret at turning his back on managerial 'great' Arsene Wenger.
Professional soccer leagues around Europe are gearing up for a return to action following the novel coronavirus stoppage, but some are more advanced than others.
Top seed Caroline Wozniacki advanced to the semi-finals in Indian Wells on Thursday when her opponent Victoria Azarenka of Belarus retired because of a hip injury when trailing 3-0.
Germany all but secured a place at the Euro 2012 finals with a 3-1 win in Azerbaijan while Zlatan Ibrahimovic got a hat-trick as Sweden demolished Finland 5-0 to provide an unexpected spark to the end of the European season.
Max Mirnyi of Belarus and Canadian Daniel Nestor beat surprise south American pairing Eduardo Schwank and Colombian Juan Sebastian Cabal 7-6, 3-6, 6-4 to win the French Open doubles title Saturday.
IMAGES from Day 6 of the matches played at the US Open at Flushing Meadows on Saturday.
Rohan Bopanna and Aisam-ul-haq Qureshi began their ATP World Tour Finals campaign with a defeat against Daniel Nestor and Max Mirnyi, albeit after a good fight in a group B match, in London on Sunday.
Wins deciding set shootout after premature celebration. The Briton, who overcame dual Grand Slam semi-finalist Ekaterina Makarova, thought she had won the first round match after reaching seven points in the third set tiebreak and celebrated accordingly.
Victoria Azarenka displayed the kind of form that could lead her to a hat-trick of Australian Open titles later this month by brushing aside German fourth seed Angelique Kerber 6-3, 6-1 in the Brisbane International final on Saturday.
At 1:23 am on April 26, 1986, operators in the control room of Reactor number 4 at the Chernobyl nuclear power facility botched a routine safety test, resulting in an explosion, and a fire that burned for 10 days.
Leander Paes and Lukas Dlouhy overcame two rain interruptions and a strong challenge from Swede Johan Brunstrom and Jean-Julien Rojer of the Netherlands Antilles 6-3, 6-7 (8-6), 7-5 to enter the second round of the men's doubles match at the French Open in Paris on Thursday.
According to the Demographic Yearbook -- a statistics collection put out by the United Nations -- there are five divorces per every 1,000 marriages in the country, reports the New York Daily News.
European heavyweights France, England and Italy get the chance to put their disappointing World Cups behind them on Friday as they kick off their Euro 2012 qualifying campaigns on a night for fresh starts.
Second seed Angelique Kerber advanced to the fourth round of the Miami Open when Dutch qualifier Kiki Bertens was forced to retire in the third set on Sunday.
Former European champions Red Star Belgrade, Ajax Amsterdam and Celtic all made it comfortably through to the third qualifying round of the Champions League on Wednesday after surviving away legs.
Following is a list of Serena Williams' 23 grand slam singles titles after the American surpassed Steffi Graf's professional era record with victory at the Australian Open on Saturday:
Photos from the Euro 2016 qualifying matches played on Sunday.
The 2021 men's and women's U-17 European Championships have been cancelled due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, UEFA said on Friday.
In June, a deadly cyber worm called the 'Stuxnet' was discovered in Belarus, and experts worldwide realised that it had the capabilities of a missile, which could destroy a factory or even a nuclear plant.
Top seed Caroline Wozniacki out-muscled Victoria Azarenka of Belarus 6-2, 6-7, 6-4 to reach the final of the Pan Pacific Open on Friday.
Mahesh Bhupathi and Max Mirnyi cruised into the second round of the French Open men's doubles after a straight sets victory over Jurgen Melzer and Philipp Petzschner in Paris on Wednesday.
France have no option but to fight back straight away after starting their Euro 2012 soccer qualifying campaign in humiliating fashion, defender Bacary Sagna said.
India's Sania Mirza bowed out of the US Open with a second round defeat at the hands of Russia's Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova on Wednesday. The Russian, seeded 20th, won 6-2, 6-4 and faces Argentine Gisela Dulko in the third round on Friday.
Third seeds Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi earned a shot at their third title of the season as they set up the summit-clash of the ATP Aegon Championships against Mike and Bob Bryan in London.
Victoria Azarenka remained on course for a third straight Australian Open title with a thumping 6-1, 6-0 victory over Yvonne Meusburger in exactly an hour on Saturday.