Selectors and International show jumpers set to meet again

Sports Digest

EQUESTRIAN SPORT: Show jumping's selectors are to meet with the international riders twice next month in a bid to prevent the a recurrence of the stalemate that saw Jessica Kurten and Harry Marshall refusing to ride on the Irish team in the final Samsung Super League rounds, writes Grania Willis.

Show Jumping Association of Ireland (SJAI) chairman Charles Hanley has called a meeting for October 10th to bring the selectors and riders together to discuss future selection procedures and the riders will get a further chance to air their views when the Show Jumpers Club (SJC) hosts a second meeting on October 25.

The SJC meeting is a follow-up to its August 30th Dublin meeting when all the Super League riders met with SJAI and Equestrian Federation of Ireland representatives in a bid to try and broker a deal that would bring Kurten and Marshall back onto the team for the Super League.

Although negotiations broke down, leaving the squad without Kurten and Marshall's services for the Super League final in Barcelona, Team Ireland's joint-fourth place meant they avoided relegation to the second division for next season.

MOTOR SPORT: Nico Rosberg, son of former Formula One world champion Keke, won the inaugural GP2 championship with a victory in Bahrain yesterday. The series, using identical Renault-powered cars, supports Formula One at European grands prix with the final round held at Bahrain's Sakhir circuit.

Germany-born Rosberg could now graduate to Williams, the Formula One team with whom his Finnish father won the 1982 world championship. Williams are looking for a replacement for Briton Jenson Button, who has bought out his contract to stay at BAR, and Rosberg, whose French-based ART team are run by Nicolas Todt, son of the Ferrari boss, is high on their list of candidates.

BOXING: The management of the French under-19 team in Dublin for a two-day quadrangular junior international involving Ireland, Germany and a second-string Ireland have rejected a round-robin format whereby they would have to box twice on the same day, writes Pat Roche. In order to avoid a major dispute between the associations, the IABA agreed to change the format from round robin to open draw starting tonight.

Fortunately the switch will not deny the National Stadium fans the plum face-off at bantam between Irish senior champion David Oliver Joyce of Athy and European silver medallist Amine Boumerdaci of France. Meanwhile, two late changes on the team to face the US see Ulster feather Bennie Harkin and Portlaoise welter Oisín Kelly replacing Eric Donovan and Roy Sheehan.

MOTOR CYCLING: Valentino Rossi served notice that a fifth successive world title was not enough to fulfil his ambitions by setting a record pace in yesterday's practice sessions for the Qatar Grand Prix. The Italian Yamaha rider, who clinched the world championship in Malaysia at the weekend, clocked 1:58.714 in the afternoon session to beat the previous best time of 1:58.988. Rossi, who has won nine of the 13 races so far this season, showed no signs of his professed dislike of the Losail track, one of the three active circuits where he has yet to win a race.