Sports Digest

A round-up of today's other stories in brief

Windies show fight in their follow on

CRICKET: India need seven more wickets to beat the West Indies in the second Test in Kolkata after the tourists were forced to follow on.

The Windies were dismissed for 153 in their first innings yesterday morning to trail by 478 runs, but at least put up a better show second time around to reach 195 for three at the stumps.

However, that still left them trailing by 283 runs with two days remaining and needing an heroic rearguard action to avoid defeat.

The tourists reached tea on 116 for one thanks to Adrian Barath (62 not out) and Kirk Edwards (43no).

However, Barath was dismissed straight after the interval without a run being added to the total, caught by VVS Laxman off the bowling of Ishant Sharma.

Edwards and Darren Bravo added 45 for the third wicket before Edwards (60) was trapped lbw by Sharma, but Bravo (38no) and Shivnarine Chanderpaul (21no) survived until the close.

Niland given added motivation

TENNIS: Conor Niland must avoid defeat today in the second round of the Salzburg Open in Austria to avoid sliding 73 places in the singles world rankings.

World No 209 Niland, who picked up seven ranking points for his 6-1 6-0 first round win over Spain’s Ivan Navarro, needs to overcome Germany’s 269-ranked Peter Gojowczyk to stay in the top 200.

Munich native Gojowczyk defeated former world No 45 Mischa Zverev in the first round, a player who edged Niland in three sets in Germany two weeks ago.

Elsewhere, number 12 seed Daniel Glancy bowed out 6-4 4-6 6-3 against German sixth seed Daniel Uhlig in the ITF Men’s Futures event at Roznov pod Radhostem in the Czech Republic.

Kenyan athletics chief slams award

ATHLETICS: Kenya’s athletics chief has slammed the handing of the womens IAAF Athlete of the Year award to Australia’s Sally Pearson at the weekend, saying Vivian Cheruiyot deserved to win.

Cheruiyot triumphed at the World Cross Country Championships as well as the 5,000m and 10,000m at the World Championships, where Pearson claimed gold in 100m hurdles.

“How can they say Sally beat Vivian by 30 votes in online voting? This is not beauty pageantry where winners are decided by their looks and how they cat walk,” said Athletics Kenya Chairman Isaiah Kiplagat.

“Vivian won three major world titles this year, which beats Pearson’s one title in Daegu. This process must change because it should be based on how one performs on the track.”

Kiplagat said the voting format gave athletes from developed countries an unfair advantage.

Players file lawsuit against the NBA

BASKETBALL: The fate of the National Basketball Association (NBA) season remained in limbo yesterday after players filed a lawsuit against the game’s governing body and another two weeks of competition were scrapped.

As expected, players filed a class action lawsuit against the NBA, setting the stage for a complicated legal battle to resolve their bitter labour dispute.

The court action came as the NBA formally notified teams that all regular season games through to December 15th had been cancelled, extending the delay to six weeks after the first month of games was already lost. The season was supposed to start on November 1st.

The moves came a day after players rejected a contract offer that included plans for a shortened season, saying the terms were unacceptable and they wanted to pursue legal action.

Ecclestone admits United States GP is in jeopardy

MOTOR SPORT: Formula One supremo Bernie Ecclestone has admitted that the United States Grand Prix is on the brink of being axed from next year’s calendar.

Ecclestone revealed the contract with Tavo Hellmund’s Full Throttle Productions for next November’s race in Austin, Texas was recently cancelled after he was found to be in breach. This has left Ecclestone negotiating with track developers, Circuit of The Americas (COTA), who halted work on construction on Tuesday.

“We’ve done everything we bloody well can do to make this race happen,” said Ecclestone. “We had an agreement with Full Throttle Productions. Everything was signed and sealed, but we kept putting things off, but nothing ever happened. Then these other people (COTA) came on the scene, but they haven’t got a contract. We are looking for security for money they are going to have to pay us.”