The Malaysian Insider :: Sports
The Malaysian Insider :: Sports |
| Bale bids teammates goodbye as Real deal looms Posted: 03 Aug 2013 02:45 AM PDT Tottenham take on Monaco today without Gareth Bale (pic), who misses the pre-season friendly through injury ahead of a likely defining week for his forecast world record transfer to Real Madrid. The Wales superstar bid "an emotional farewell" to his teammates in London yesterday, autographing their shirts before they left for Monte Carlo, according to a report in The Sun. The Spurs forward sits out today's match, and may also miss Wales' friendly against Ireland in Cardiff on Aug 14, with a minor hamstring problem. As Bale works on his fitness, Tottenham chairman Daniel Levy will sit down for his first face-to-face talks with his Real Madrid counterpart Florentino Perez in Miami next week, possibly on Wednesday, The Times suggested. Real are in Florida where Levy has a holiday home for a pre-season warm-up. They are keen to see Bale at the Bernabeu ahead of their opening league game against Real Betis on Aug 18. The 24-year-old is set to become the most expensive player of all time, an honour currently held by Cristiano Ronaldo who moved from Manchester United to Real for 94 million euros (about RM390 million) in 2009. Levy is reportedly holding out for a transfer fee in excess of £105 million (about RM500 million) while Real are looking to strike a deal at around £85 million with a makeweight, possibly Fabio Coentrao, thrown in. Yesterday, Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger claimed Bale's proposed mega transfer made a mockery of UEFA's Financial Fair Play rules. "It makes a joke of it. It's quite amazing that in the year where the Financial Fair Play comes in, the football world has gone completely crazy," the Frenchman said. "You wonder what kind of impact and effect it has on the football world. It looks like it has made everybody worse than before." - AFP, August 3, 2013 |
| Stosur, Razzano advance with upset wins Posted: 02 Aug 2013 10:22 PM PDT Fifth-seeded Australian Stosur ousted second-seeded Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland 7-5, 2-6, 6-3. French wild card Razzano continued her remarkable run at the US$795,707 (RM2.6 million) US Open tuneup with a 6-7 (6/8), 7-5, 7-6 (10/8) triumph over third-seeded Czech Petra Kvitova. Razzano, who has also beaten two-time Grand Slam champion Svetlana Kuznetsova and eighth-seeded Spaniard Carla Suarez Navarro this week, saved two match points in the third-set tiebreaker en route to the victory. The three-hour, 35-minute match was the second-longest on the WTA Tour this year, behind Bethanie Mattek-Sands' three-hour, 42-minute victory over Anastasia Rodionova on the clay courts of Charleston in April. Razzano took a 5-3 lead in the third set, but let three match points slip away. Kvitova, a former Wimbledon champion, served for the match at 6-5, but Razzano broke her to force the decisive tiebreaker. Kvitova rolled to a 5-2 lead, but Razzano rallied and sealed it on her fifth match point. "I think I was nervous," Razzano said. "I am human. You know you are not too far from the win and you must take your emotions out of it. I tried to stay positive and never imagine I could lose." Stosur recovered from an early break in the third set to down 2011 Carlsbad winner Radwanska and reach her first semifinal of the season. "I'm obviously very happy with today's win," Stosur said. "To come to a tournament where you weren't expecting to play and decide at the last minute after being given a wild card, it's fantastic to have really made the most of that opportunity and now be in the semis." Top-seeded Victoria Azarenka of Belarus completed a bad day for the Radwanska family when she ousted Agnieszka's unseeded sister, Urszula, 6-1, 6-2. Azarenka next faces seventh-seeded Ana Ivanovic of Serbia who beat fourth-seeded Roberta Vinci 6-1, 6-7 (1/7), 6-2. In doubles, number three seeds Raquel Kops-Jones and Abigail Spears rallied from a 6-4, 3-0 deficit to beat Daniela Hantuchova and Martina Hingis 4-6, 7-5 10/3. Their victory ended Swiss great Hingis' first tournament since returning to action after six years away from the game. Hingis, now 32, won five Grand Slam singles titles and nine in doubles and was ranked number one in the world for a total of 209 weeks before she retired for the first time at the age of 22 in 2003. She launched a comeback in 2005 only to retire again in November of 2007, but says her experience playing World Team Tennis inspired her to attempt a comeback to the WTA that so far she plans to limit to doubles. - AFP, August 3, 2013. |
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