Sports Digest

A roundup of the day's other sports stories in brief:

Personal best, but McAllister trails

ATHLETICS: Joe McAllister found himself some ways back at the IAAF World Half-Marathon Championship in Birmingham yesterday, but still knocked almost a minute off his best time. The 29-year-old from Belfast clocked 64 minutes 57 seconds, which was well inside his 65:51 when winning the Irish title a few years ago.

That effort was still only enough for 54th position in a typically top-class field. The gold medal was again won by Zersenay Tadese of Eritrea in 59:35, a course record, with Bernard Kipyeha of Kenya taking second.

The sole Irish representative in the women's event, Catriona Jennings finished 56th in 1:20.47, some 14 minutes behind the winner, Mary Jepkosquei Keitany of Kenya.

Djokovic makes best of rain delay

TENNIS: Second seed Novak Djokovic was rejuvenated by a rain break and came back on court to beat Croatian Marin Cilic 6-2 7-6 and win his third title of the season at the China Open yesterday.

French Open champion Svetlana Kuznetsova managed to avoid the rain and dealt swiftly with Agnieszka Radwanska 6-2 6-4 to claim a second China Open title in the first year as one of the WTA's "crown jewel" events.

Dempsey's loses US motor series 

MOTOR SPORT: Peter Dempsey's attempt to claim the Star Mazda Motor Racing series in the US ended in disappointment at the weekend when the Ashbourne driver failed to finish the final round in Laguna Seca in California.

After securing another championship point by capturing pole position on Saturday morning, all Dempsey had to do was finish seventh or better and he would be crowned champion.

Winner of five races during the season, the 23-year-old was outmanoeuvred at the start by JDC team-mates, Adam Christodoulou and Alex Ardoin, who slipped by into first and second places.

Dempsey was then hit from behind by Joel Miller entering the corkscrew turn, spinning the Irish racer off-course and dropping him to last place.

The failure to win the championship means that Dempsey missed out on a €70,000 bonus and a fully funded drive in the American Formula Atlantic series in 2010 worth in the region of €500,000.

Pembroke in last-16 in EHL

HOCKEY: Pembroke can reflect on a successful weekend's work in Barcelona despite a 6-1 thrashing by Dutch masters HC Rotterdam yesterday as they advanced to the last 16 of the EuroHockey League.

The Dutch side's 6-0 annihilation of Scottish champions Kelburne on Saturday meant, in the wake of Pembroke's 4-2 win over the same opposition, the sole relevance of the final group game was to decide who qualified in top position.

It served to show the stratospheric difference between the elite in Europe and the club that swept the board here last season.

On home turf, Three Rock Rovers continued their perfect start to the season when Garry Ringwood sealed their third win from the penalty spot in a 1-0 result against Fingal.

Watson wins at Weston Park

EQUESTRIAN: Carlow's Sam Watson won his first ever three-day event when landing the two-star class at Weston Park, England yesterday on the eight-year-old Puissance gelding Hoyo, writes Margie McLoone.

Watson (23) led from the outset and competed on his dressage score of 44 penalties. At the three-star Dutch event in Boekolo, Ireland's Camilla Speirs, Michael Ryan, Aoife Sisk and Elizabeth Power finished fourth in the team competition.

Taylor comes up trumps

DARTS: Phil Taylor came from 2-0 down to beat old rival Raymond van Barneveld in the final of Skybet World Grand Prix in Dublin last night.

Reigning champion Taylor started slowly and kept fluffing his doubles as his old rival opened up an early lead.

But the Englishman fought back to win five successive sets, before eventually prevailing 6-3 for the ninth Grand Prix title of his extraordinarily successful career.

Duddy records his eighth straight win

BOXING: Middleweight John Duddy recorded his eighth win on the trot at Madison Square Garden on Saturday to put himself in line for a world title eliminator with Julio Cesar Chavez.

Duddy (30), earned a unanimous (80-73, 79-73, 79-73) decision over Mexican puncher Jorge "Michi" Munoz to rack up the 27th victory of his career.

Chavez's promoter Bob Arum was at ringside to watch Duddy punch out a 80-73, 79-73, 79-73 points verdict over Munoz in eight rounds.

Except for the opening round, when he ended up with a bloody nose after being tagged with a series of sharp jabs, Duddy was always in charge of the fight, landing some telling blows of his own in the fifth.

Demons get off to the right start

BASKETBALL: UCC Demons got their Nivea For Men's SuperLeague title defence off to a winning start with a 79-69 victory over newcomers Moycullen, while a rejuvenated Belfast Star beat UCD/Marian.

On Saturday, Killester continued their 100 per cent start to the season 94-84 at the expense of Neptune.

UL Eagles recorded their second success in a row, this time at home to Hoops on a thumping 92-60 scoreline.

Historic third title for Cavan's Brady

HANDBALL: Cavan's Paul Brady pulled out a dramatic, tie-break victory against Texan Allan Garner in the World Championships Open final in Portland, Oregon, to become the first player to win three consecutive titles.

An emotional Brady said, "I just can't express what I'm feeling. There are a lot of emotions, but I'm hugely relieved to have come through that and it will take a while for it to sink in."

Roche consigned to minor places

CYCLING: Irish road race champion Nicolas Roche finished 50th and 68th in the Giro dell'Emilia and GP Beghelli over the weekend, writes Shane Stokes.

The Ag2r La Mondiale rider was five minutes and 43 seconds behind the winner Robert Gesink in the first event, and just one minute 56 seconds behind Francisco José Ventoso (Carmiooro - A-Style) in the second.

Meanwhile defending champion Philippe Gilbert (Silence Lotto) made it two wins in a row in the prestigious Paris-Tours event yesterday.

The Belgian jumped with 300 metres to go and outsprinted compatriot Tom Boonen (Quick Step) and Borut Bozic (Vancansoleil) at the end of the 230 kilometre race.