Sport Digest

Snooker: Northern Ireland's Joe Swail was on the verge of defeat before he stormed back from a 4-2 deficit to edge past world number 85 Barry Hawlins 5-4 to secure a place in the semi-finals of the £600,000 sterling LG Cup at Preston Guild Hall last night.

Hawkins, the tournament surprise package, had never progressed further than the last 64 of a world ranking event, but the 22 year old from Beckenham looked good to continue his giant-killing exploits for most of the contest.

Composed breaks of 72, 57, 95, and 41 put Hawkins in pole position to cause another major upset following earlier victories over Thailand's James Wattana, ex- British Open Champion Fergal O'Brien from Dublin and Hong Kong's Marco Fu.

Swail, though, refused to surrender. Runs of 98 and 81 brought him back on level terms at 4-4 before he recovered from 43-0 adrift to snatch a dramatic decider on the brown.

In the other quarter final, Ronnie O'Sullivan's attempt to knock out Peter Ebdon with an outrageous shot backfired.

O'Sullivan was surprisingly beaten 5-4, and admitted " I wanted to get Peter's chin on the floor. Instead it ended up being mine."

Equestrian Sport: The Irish sport horse studbook is in second place after dressage at the world young horse championships in Le Lion d'Angers, France, a mere 7.4 adrift of the host nation's Selle Francais breed, reports Grania Willis. Scores from the top three horses from each of the six studbooks represented have been added together to get the team results, with the leader in the six-year-old class - Bonny C (Virginie Caulier) - joining forces with Wee Hot Toddy (Becky George) and McGuigan (Jeanette Brakewell) to produce the Irish placing.

Becky George and Wee Hot Toddy, winners of the Discovery class at Scarvagh last year, are best of the Irish in 24th place overall in the CCI class, 13 slots ahead of Sally Corscadden with Stephanie von Schilcher's Blarney champion Young Man. The other two Irish runners in the three-day event - Karen Hennessy (The Tourist) and Stuart Crawford (Cloughinney) are further down the rankings in 52nd and 58th.

Golf: Kaname Yokoo is the surprise halfway leader in the National Car Rental Classic at Disneyworld.

Yokoo shot a second round seven under par 65 for a two round total of 131 and a one shot lead over Jerry Smith who added a second 66. Davis Love 111 is tied for third place with Jose Coceras after rounds of 66 and 65 respectively. Tournament favourite Tiger Woods is five shots back on 136 after a second round of 67.

Hockey: As a result of beating Chile 3-2 in their penultimate match yesterday, the Ireland under-21s will meet old rivals Scotland today in the 13th/14th place play-off in the Junior World Cup in Hobart, Tasmania. India and Argentina beat Germany and England, respectively, to reach the final.

The Chileans, who had lost 4-1 to Ireland earlier in the tournament, led 1-0 at the interval before David Eakins equalised from a drag flick. Chile again went in front but Ireland roused themselves for John Hobbs to finish off a fine run by Michael Harte and then Jonathan Quigley forced a ninth penalty corner for Eakins to sink the winner.

IRELAND (v Chile) - N Slane; I Allen, J Brennan, K Burns, D Eakins (capt), A Giles, J Hobbs, J Jermyn, A Kershaw, S Nicholson, J Quigley. Subs: M Harte, S Irvine, P McConnell, P Smith.