Sunday, November 1, 2020Rabia l 15, 1442 AH

SPORTGULF TIMES

All Blacks rout Wallabies to retain theBledisloe Cup

Bumrah, Boult propel MIto big win over Delhi

CRICKETCRICKET | Page 4 RUGBY | Page 7

FOOTBALL

Jota strikes again as Liverpool go top of EPLPage 2

HE Sheikh Joaan bin Hamad al-Thani, President of Qatar Olympic Committee (C), poses with the Al Arabi team after they won the Amir Cup volleyball tournament yesterday at the Qatar Volleyball Association (QVA) Hall. Al Arabi defeated Police 3-2 (17-25, 25-23, 25-23, 17-25, 23-21) in the final to win the prestigious trophy. Picture on right shows Al Arabi players and off icials celebrating their success.

Al Arabi win Amir Cup volleyball

By Sports ReporterDoha

Qatar’s motorsport fraternity was mourning the death of veteran rally driver

Sheikh Hamad bin Eid al-Tha-ni who passed away yester-day while following the action in the Qatar National Baja at Dukhan.

HE Sheikh Joaan bin Ha-mad al-Thani, President of Qatar Olympic Com-mittee, condoled Sheikh Hamad bin Eid’s passing. “It is with great sorrow and sadness that we received the news of the death of Sheikh Hamad bin Eid Al Thani, may God have mercy on him,” HE Sheikh Joaan tweeted.

The Qatar Motor and Mo-torcycle Federation (QMMF) released a statement saying the death took place after his with-drawal as a participant from the fourth round of the pres-tigious national event.

“Sheikh Hamad started the fi rst stage of the race but de-cided to withdraw from the competition and returned to the maintenance area. His con-dition was very normal,” the QMMF stated.

“Sheikh Hamad accompa-

nied one of his friends in his private car to watch the rest of the stages of the race but he fell unconscious. His friend informed the local organising committee and returned him to the rally headquarters immedi-ately,” the statement added.

The QMMF statement pointed out that “the medi-cal team assigned to the Qatar National Baja quickly dealt with the case and gave him re-lief at the rally headquarters in Dukhan before moving him to the Cuban Hospital, where he passed away.”

“The QMMF mourns Sheikh Hamad, one of the most prom-inent Qatari rally drivers, and extends its deepest condolenc-es to the family of the deceased and motorsport enthusiasts in Qatar,” the statement added.

Sheikh Hamad bin Eid was one of the most prominent rally drivers in Qatar and the Gulf region, having won many local and international titles, most notably the World Cup of Saharan Rally Champion-ship in the Cross Country (T2) category.

He had also won the Middle East Rally Championship in 1993 and Qatar Rally Champi-onship in 1997. Sheikh Hamad bin Eid was also the winner of Dubai Desert Challenge.

Qatar’s veteran rally driver Sheikh Hamad bin Eid passes away

LOSS

Al Sadd set up title clash with Al ArabiBy Sahan BidappaDoha

Al Sadd came back from a goal down to outplay Al Duhail 4-1 and reach their 26th Amir Cup

fi nal at the Abdullah bin Khalifa Stadium yesterday. It was sweet revenge for Al Sadd, who had lost to Al Duhail by a similar margin in the fi nal of the prestigious championship last year.

That defeat was a bitter pill to swallow for Xavi Hernandez, who was playing his fi nal game in an Al Sadd jersey in Qatar at the inauguration of Al Janoub Stadium. But since then Xavi in his capacity as coach has ensured that Al Sadd won all their four matches against Al Duhail.

In the fi nal, Al Sadd take on Al Arabi, who beat Al Markhiya on Friday.

It was a game of two halves yesterday with Al Duhail domi-nating the fi rst, only to be out-played by Al Sadd in the second. Edmilson had put Al Duhail ahead in the 10th minute after an error from Al Sadd goalkeeper Meshaal Barshem.

Al Duhail, after a disciplined defensive show in the fi rst half, completely lost the plot in the second. After Ramin Rezaeian’s goal was ruled out for handball, Boualem Khouki equalised for Al Sadd with a wonderful header in the 58th minute.

Guilherme Santos Torres dou-bled the advantage in the 64th minute, while substitute Bagh-dad Boundejah made it 3-0 in the 77th minute. Rodrigo Tabata then completed Al Duhail’s mis-ery in the 88th minute with a strike from the half-line after goalkeeper Khalifa Abubakar was way off the goalpost.

“We feel very happy after this deserved victory,” said Xavi, who was involved in a heated exchange with Al Duhail coach Sabri Lamouchi on the touch-

line. “We were better than Duhail since the beginning of the match. We conceded an early goal, but we kept pressing ahead and en-joyed greater possession. We controlled the match through-out. I am delighted that we have beaten Duhail for the fourth time in a row,” the Al Sadd coach added

Lamouchi said Al Sadd were superior on the night. “We have a lot to work on and improve. Al Sadd were clearly the better team. They have better individ-ual players and they were good physically too,” he said.

While Xavi was upbeat after the match, he was furious with his defensive line as they came under Al Duhail attack. The hosts could have had two goals inside eight minutes, with Rezaeian’s free-kick fl ying just wide off the post, while Sultan al-Brake’s shot hit the side netting.

Al Sadd’s tactic of playing from the back was fraught with danger and Meshaal’s wrong pass allowed Duhail an opening. The

Sadd goalkeeper’s intended pass to Woo-young Jung was quickly intercepted by Mohamed Mun-tari, who then passed it on to

Edmilson. The midfi elder’s fi rst shot was blocked by Meshaal but the rebound was quickly latched on to by Edmilson, who cel-ebrated with a gesture towards the dugout after Lamouchi had left him out in the last couple of matches.

Al Sadd did manage to create a couple of chances, but Lamouchi had set up his defenders perfect-ly, which did not allow any space for Akram Afi f.

Xavi introduced Bounedjah, who had recovered from an in-jury, in the 51st minute to replace Yousuf Abdurisag but it was the drama at the Al Duhail end which proved the turning point.

The hosts thought they had gone 2-0 up in the 54th minute when Rezaeian found the net after a pass from Edmilson. But the goal was overruled after a VAR review, which revealed that the ball had touched Edmilson’s hand from a rebound.

Al Sadd made the most of that lucky break. In the 58th minute, defender Khoukhi made it 1-1, rising highest to head home an Afi f cross. Six minutes later, Afi f took advantage of clumsy clear-ance from al-Brake, and passed to Torres who side-footed the ball beyond the onrushing Abu-bakar.

With the lead having slipped away, Lamouchi substituted Ed-milson and Muntari – two of his potent attacking threats and that played into Al Sadd’s hand.

Bounedjah, playing as a lone striker upfront, netted Al Sadd’s third goal in the 77th minute, dribbling into the box and scor-ing with a low shot that went past two Al Duhail defenders and their keeper.

In the 88th minute, substitute Rodrigo Tabata made it 4-1 with a shot from near the halfway line, with Abubakar having advanced outside the penalty box. Duhail would end the game with nine men after Dudu and Ali Afi f were sent off in stoppage time.

FOOTBALL/ AMIR CUP

Al Duhail, after a disciplined defensive show in the first half, completely lost the plot in the second

Sheikh Hamad bin Eid al-Thani.

The expression on Almoez Ali’s face says it all as Al Sadd’s Guilherme Santos Torres (C) celebrates his goal with Rodrigo Tabata during the Amir Cup semi-final yesterday. PICTURES: Noushad Thekkayil

Baghdad Bounedjah of Al Sadd celebrates his goal.

FOOTBALL2 Gulf Times

Sunday, November 1, 2020

Jota caps Liverpool fi ghtback as Man City, Chelsea win

PREMIER LEAGUE

AFPLondon

Diogo Jota capped Liverpool’s dramatic fi ghtback as the Pre-mier League champions beat West Ham 2-1 to move three

points clear at the top, while Manches-ter City and Chelsea both won to keep in touch with the leaders yesterday.

Jurgen Klopp’s side were rocked by Pablo Fornals’ early strike at Anfi eld as the West Ham midfi elder punished a poor header from Joe Gomez in the 10th minute. The Reds drew level in the 42nd minute when Mohamed Salah was fouled by Arthur Masuaku and the Egyptian stepped up to convert the penalty for his eighth goal of the season.

Liverpool thought they had claimed the lead with just over 10 minutes re-maining when substitute Jota turned in a loose ball. Jota had pounced after Lu-kasz Fabianski saved Sadio Mane’s shot but after a lengthy delay that saw referee Kevin Friend make use of the pitchside monitor, the goal was ruled out for a foul by the Senegal winger.

With time running out, Jota ensured he would still fi nish as Liverpool’s hero.

In the 85th minute, the Portugal forward ran onto Xherdan Shaqiri’s pass to score his third goal since joining from Wolves in September.

It was Liverpool’s fourth successive victory since infl uential defender Vir-gil van Dijk was sidelined for several months with a serious knee injury suf-fered against Everton. Despite their de-fensive issues this term, Liverpool have opened up a three-point lead over second placed Everton, with their Merseyside rivals in action at Newcastle today. Title rivals City have yet to hit the free-scoring form of Pep Guardiola’s side at their best, as for the third consecutive league game they were held to a solitary goal. But Kyle Walker’s long-range strike against his former club was good enough to earn a 1-0 win at goal-shy Sheffi eld United.

A fourth win in fi ve games in all com-petition edges City up to eighth, fi ve points behind Liverpool. And there was another boost for City after the game as Guardiola ruled out a return to Barcelona despite interest from presidential candi-dates at the Catalan giants to bring the club’s most successful ever coach back to the Camp Nou. “I said many times, my period as a manager in Barcelona is over,” said Guardiola, whose contract at the

Etihad expires at the end of the season. “I am incredibly happy here, still I have the desire to do well and this is the most im-portant thing.”

On the fi eld, there were plenty of posi-tives for City as the newly-formed cen-tre-back pairing of Aymeric Laporte and Ruben Dias played their part in a second consecutive clean sheet.

However, without injured strikers Sergio Aguero and Gabriel Jesus, City struggled to turn their dominance into goals. “We played really well,” added Guardiola.”We struggled to score goals for the chances we created, 16 shots, eight on target, is a lot against this team.”

Instead, Walker was the unlikely match-winner with his fi rst goal for a year in his 100th Premier League appear-ance for City. Chelsea are also fi nding their form after a slow start to the season as Frank Lampard’s men ran out 3-0 win-ners at Burnley to stretch their unbeaten run to nine games. Hakim Ziyech was handed his fi rst Premier League start af-ter scoring in a 4-0 Champions League win away to Krasnodar in midweek and the Moroccan’s shot wrong-footed Nick Pope to open the fl oodgates for the visi-tors on 26 minutes.

Kurt Zouma’s bullet header then dou-

bled Chelsea’s advantage from Mason Mount’s corner just after the hour mark. Timo Werner was due to be rested until an injury in the warm-up to Christian Pulisic forced the German international into Lampard’s line-up.

And Werner rounded off an excellent second-half performance from the Blues with a fi ne fi nish from Ziyech’s pass. Af-ter much criticism of his side’s defend-ing, Lampard will be equally delighted at a fourth straight clean sheet as Chelsea moved up to fourth place.

PREMIER LEAGUE RESULTS

Burnley 0 Chelsea 3 (Ziyech 26, Zouma 63, Werner 70); Liverpool 2 (Salah 42-pen, jota 85) West Ham 1 (Fornals 10); Sheff ield United 0 Manchester City 1 (Walker 28)

Today: (GMT time) Aston Villa v South-ampton (1200), Newcastle v Everton (1400), Manchester United v Arsenal (1630), Tottenham v Brighton (1915)

Tomorrow: Fulham v West Brom (1730), Leeds v Leicester (2000)

Played Friday: Wolves 2 (Ait Nouri 18, Podence 27) Crystal Palace 0

It was Liverpool’s fourth successive win since van Dijk was sidelined for several months

Inter angered by VAR aft er Parma draw, Atalanta move second

‘It’s over’, Guardiola rules out return as Barcelona bossAFPSheff ield, United Kingdom

Pep Guardiola ruled out ever taking charge of Barcelona for a second spell as the Manchester

City boss insisted he retains the “desire” to succeed in England. Guardiola is the most decorated coach in Barca’s glorious history after winning 14 trophies in four years in charge between 2008 and 2012.

Josep Maria Bartomeu fi nally bowed to pressure to resign as president of the Catalan giants this week, with one of the lead-ing candidates to take over, Vic-tor Font, saying he wants to bring legends like Guardiola and his former players Xavi and Carles Puyol back to work for the club.

“I said many times, my period as a manager in Barcelona is over. I think in life there is once you have to do things,” Guardiola said after City’s 1-0 win over Shef-fi eld United yesterday. “There are incredible people who can be in charge, now for example (Bar-celona coach) Ronald Koeman is an excellent manager. It is over.”

A boyhood Barca fan, Guar-diola also enjoyed an illustrious playing career at the Camp Nou and still holds season tickets as a supporter. “I will come back to my seats to see my club to watch a game. I am incredibly happy here, still I have the desire to do well and this is the most impor-tant thing. Now there will be elections in Barcelona. Hopefully they can choose the right board to maintain this incredible club Barcelona in the highest level.”

Guardiola is already into the longest managerial spell of his career with this his fi fth season at City. His side still look a long way off the heights they reached in winning back-to-back Pre-mier League titles between 2017 and 2019, but they are slowly getting up to speed after a start to the campaign disrupted by in-juries, coronavirus cases and just a two-week long pre-season.

Kyle Walker’s long-range ef-fort against his former club was enough to secure City’s fourth

win in fi ve games in all compe-titions as they move up to sev-enth in the Premier League, just two points off the top. Without a natural striker due to injuries to Sergio Aguero and Gabriel Je-sus, City struggled to turn their dominance into goals at Bramall Lane. “We played really well,” added Guardiola .”We struggled to score goals for the chances we created, 16 shots, eight on target, is a lot against this team.”

Aaron Ramsdale was busy in the Blades’ goal as he twice de-nied Ferran Torres from close range, while he unconvincingly parried Rodrigo’s long-range ef-fort behind. Walker fi nally broke the deadlock from similar range on 28 minutes as his shot arrowed low past Ramsdale’s right-hand, but there was a muted celebra-tion from the England interna-tional against his boyhood club. “My mum and dad live here, so if I’d celebrated I’d have got a lot of stick,” said Walker. “I’m a Shef-fi eld United fan, so I couldn’t celebrate.”

Kevin De Bruyne fl ashed a shot wide following another at-tacking burst from Walker early in the second-half before Ram-sdale produced his best save of the game from Riyad Mahrez’s free-kick. However, City’s fail-ure to kill off the game gave Chris Wilder’s men chances to snatch an unlikely point. John Lunds-tram had the best chance for the hosts when he side-footed Sand-er Berge’s low cross over. But Sheffi eld United have still scored just three goals in seven games to start the season and remain sec-ond bottom on just one point.

SERIE A

SPOTLIGHT

Milan: Cristiano Ronaldo has returned a second negative coronavirus test but will not start today’s game against Spezia, Juventus coach Andrea Pirlo said on the eve of the match. “

The negative result of the second swab has also arrived, so today Cristiano Ronaldo will be called up to the team,” said Pirlo. “He is fine and has been training individually this morn-ing. I don’t think he will start from the beginning, we will see how it goes tomorrow.”

The five-time Ballon d’Or winner has missed four games for Juventus including the midweek Champions League

defeat against Barcelona. But the 35-year-old will travel with the team to Cesena on the Adriatic coast, where Ligurian club Spezia are playing their home games as their Stadio Picco is modernised for their first season in the top flight.

Juventus are fifth in Serie A having drawn three games of five including 1-1 against pro-moted Crotone, and are four points behind leaders AC Milan.

Ronaldo has been named alongside fellow strikers Paulo Dybala and Alvaro Morata. Defender Leonardo Bonucci is expected to play after a slight thigh problem, but Giorgio Chiellini will not.

Ronaldo set for return on Juventus bench against Spezia

AFPMilan

Inter Milan came back from two goals down to draw 2-2 with Parma yesterday but were left furious by a contentious VAR decision, while

Atalanta beat bottom club Crotone to move second in Serie A.

Antonio Conte’s Inter have dropped points in three of their fi rst six league games this season and could slip fi ve points behind city rivals and leaders AC Milan, who visit Udinese today.

Inter had a strong penalty appeal when Botond Balogh hauled down Ivan Perisic in the second half, with Conte skipping his press conference, appar-ently in protest at the decision. “It is our duty also to protest at the referee-ing decisions. This is our only venue for protesting, as we have no other way of making our voices heard,” said sporting director Beppe Marotta.

“We realise VAR only intervenes with a clear and obvious error, but today there was a clear and obvious penalty. So either the referee pays closer atten-tion or VAR must be used. If VAR is only partially used, then that damages eve-ryone and creates a sense of inequality. After six games, it is only right to make this comment.”

Gian Piero Gasperini’s Atalanta, who

drew 2-2 with Ajax in the Champions League in midweek, sit one point be-hind AC Milan. Inter dominated the fi rst half at the San Siro, but Perisic volleyed off target and Achraf Hakimi nodded over from close range when he should have done better.

Parma made their hosts pay in the fi rst minute after the break, as Gerv-inho powered home his fi rst goal of the season. The home side were giv-en a mountain to climb just after the hour mark when Roberto Inglese slid the ball through for Gervinho to score his second. Inter were desperate to try and keep pace with AC Milan and got themselves back into the game less than two minutes later thanks to Marcelo Brozovic’s defl ected strike. Andrea Ranocchia almost levelled shortly af-terwards, but saw his header saved at point-blank range by Parma goalkeeper Luigi Sepe. Ivan Perisic headed in Ale-ksandar Kolarov’s free-kick in the sec-ond minute of injury time, but it was too late for Inter to fi nd a winner.

Luis Muriel scored twice as Atalanta bounced back from successive losses in Serie A with a 2-1 win at Crotone ear-lier. Atalanta conceded seven goals in back-to-back defeats by Napoli and Sampdoria.

They were not at their fl uent best yesterday, but did enough to edge out Crotone, who remain without a league

win this season.Gasperini said he had tough deci-

sions to make ahead of next week’s crucial Champions League group-stage

game against Liverpool, after Hans Hateboer and Cristian Romero were both substituted at Crotone with mus-cle problems.

“Serie A and the Champions League are two very diff erent tournaments and I don’t want to choose between them,” he said. “We’ll have to wait until to-

morrow to see, (defender Rafael) Toloi also had a heavy knock to his knee, so we’ll see who we can recover and who we can’t.”

Muriel, who scored 18 Serie A goals last term despite only starting 10 matches, grabbed a 26th-minute open-er by collecting Ruslan Malinovsky’s pass and drilling a low shot into the net. Papu Gomez wasted an excellent chance to double the lead, but Co-lombian forward Muriel did slot in his second goal seven minutes before half-time.

Nwankwo Simy gave the hosts hope before the break, but their frustra-tions boiled over in the second half and coach Giovanni Stroppa was sent to the stands after receiving two yellow cards in a matter of minutes.

SERIE A RESULTS

Crotone 1 (Tochukwu Nwankwo 40) Atalanta 2 (Muriel 26, 38); Inter Milan 2 (Brozovic 64, Perisic 90+2) Parma 2 (Gervinho 46, 62)

Playing today (all times GMT): Udinese v AC Milan (1130), Spezia v Juventus, Torino v Lazio (both 1400), Napoli v Sassuolo, Roma v Fiorentina (both 1700), Sampdoria v Genoa (1945)

Tomorrow: Hellas Verona v Benevento (1945)

Liverpool’s Diogo Jota (centre) celebrates after scoring against West Ham in the Premier League at Anfield in Liverpool, north west England, yesterday. (AFP)

Inter Milan’s Ivan Perisic scores against Parma in the Serie A in Milan yesterday. (Reuters)

FOOTBALL3Gulf Times

Sunday, November 1, 2020

Mueller equals Kahn’s record as Bayern Munich go top

BUNDESLIGA

AFPBerlin

European champions Bayern Munich went top of the Bun-desliga as Thomas Mueller equalled Oliver Kahn’s record

for most league wins in the famous shirt in yesterday’s 2-1 victory at Co-logne. Mueller, 31, converted an early penalty to put the visitors on the way to a success which saw him match the tally of legendary goalkeeper Kahn on 260 league wins.

Robert Lewandowski, who scored 10 goals in the opening fi ve league games, was rested ahead of Bayern’s midweek Champions League match at Salzburg and next Saturday’s top-of-the-table Bundesliga clash at second-placed Dortmund. “(We were) too nonchalant up front, even though the passion was there,” said Mueller despite the reign-ing champions’ win. Serge Gnabry, who scored Bayern’s second goal, admit-ted: “We let the opponent back into the game, it wasn’t our best performance.”

An early header by Gnabry led to Cologne defender Marius Wolf giving away the 13th-minute penalty which Mueller scored. Gnabry added the sec-ond on the stroke of half-time when he rolled the ball into the net to fi nish a counter-attack. However, Cologne improved in the second half and sub-stitute midfi elder Dominick Drexler pulled back a late goal.

Later, RB Leipzig, who started the weekend top of the table, blew the chance to reclaim fi rst place after losing 1-0 at Borussia Moenchengladbach. The away defeat capped a week to forget for Julian Nagelsmann’s Leipzig follow-ing their 5-0 thumping at Manchester United in the Champions League.

Leipzig forwards Yussuf Poulsen and Dani Olmo both wasted chances while Gladbach had a goal by Alassane Plea ruled off side. Austrian winger Hannes Wolf, 21, who is on loan from Leipzig this season, sealed the win with his

fi rst Bundesliga goal on 60 minutes be-fore Plea hit the post. The result leaves Leipzig third and Gladbach fourth.

Earlier Dortmund climbed to sec-ond, despite resting striker Erling Braut Haaland, as defender Mats Hum-

mels scored both goals in a 2-0 win at Arminia Bielefeld. Hummels picked up a late thigh injury while making a tackle. However, Dortmund forward Julian Brandt backed Hummels to be fi t for their Champions League match

at Club Brugge on Wednesday, say-ing: “He’ll make it — he heals quick.” Dortmund took the lead when England winger Jadon Sancho curled in a corner which bounced off Hummels and rolled over the line on 53 minutes. Hum-

mels grabbed his second with a header from a Marco Reus cross 19 minutes from time. Augsburg climbed to fi fth as winger Andre Hahn scored two late goals in a 3-1 home win against bottom side Mainz. Swiss winger Ruben Vargas

gave Augsburg the lead with a superb bicycle kick just before half-time.

Mainz sub Karim Onisiwo equalised on the hour mark, but Augsburg took advantage of tired legs as Germany winger Hahn netted twice in the fi nal 10 minutes. Werder Bremen coach Florian Kohfeldt picked up a point on his third anniversary in the job with a 1-1 draw at Eintracht Frankfurt. US striker Josh Sargent swept his shot home early in the second half to give Bremen the lead.

Frankfurt’s Japan midfi elder Daichi Kamada had a fi rst-half goal ruled out when VAR spotted Andre Silva was off side. However, the Portugal inter-national made amends when he buried Kamada’s cross into the Bremen net for the equaliser on 65 minutes. Schalke, second from bottom, have gone 22 league games without a win after being held to a 1-1 draw at home to Stuttgart on Friday.

A fi rst-half header by Schalke’s teen-age defender Malick Thiaw was can-celled out by a leveller from Argentin-ian forward Nicolas Gonzalez for the visitors. Schalke are edging towards the unwanted record of Tasmania Berlin, who now play in Germany’s fi fth tier, who went 31 Bundesliga matches with-out victory in 1965/66.

BUNDESLIGA RESULTS

Eintracht Frankfurt 1 (Silva 65) Wer-der Bremen 1 (Sargent 51); Cologne 1 (Drexler 82) Bayern Munich 2 (Muel-ler 13-pen, Gnabry 45+1); Augsburg 3 (Vargas 40, Hahn 80, 90+1) Mainz 05 1 (Onisiwo 64); Arminia Bielefeld 0 Borussia Dortmund 2 (Hummels 53, 71); Borussia Moenchengladbach 1 (Wolf 60) RB Leipzig 0

Playing today: Freiburg v Bayer Leverkusen (1430), Hertha Berlin v VfL Wolfsburg (1700)

Playing tomorrow: Hoff enheim v Union Berlin (1930)

Played Friday: Schalke 1 (Thiaw 30) Stuttgart 1 (Gonzalez 56-pen)

RB Leipzig blew the chance to reclaim first place in Bundesliga after losing 1-0 at Borussia Moenchengladbach

Hazard stunner gives revived Real win over Huesca

Rennes return to winning ways ahead of trip to Chelsea

LA LIGA

LIGUE 1

AFPMadrid

Eden Hazard scored his fi rst goal for Real Madrid in over a year and his team appeared to turn a cor-ner as they beat newly-promoted

Huesca 4-1 in La Liga yesterday. Hazard has had a terrible time with in-

juries since joining Madrid for 100mn eu-ros ($113mn) from Chelsea in 2019 but the Belgian will hope his stunning strike from distance at the Alfredo di Stefano can kick-start his career in Spain. “I’m happy with his performance,” said Zidane. “The other day he played 20 minutes, now a little more. It’s step by step.”

Karim Benzema and the excellent Fede Valverde made the win secure before Huesca scored through David Ferreiro, only for Benzema to add his second and Madrid’s fourth in injury-time. Zinedine Zidane’s side jump above Real Sociedad to the top of the table to cap an encourag-ing week, which began with a Clasico win over Barcelona at Camp Nou and fi nishes with them moving nine points clear of the Catalans, who were playing away at Alaves late last night.

In between, Madrid came too close for comfort to another damaging defeat in the Champions League but two late goals salvaged a draw at Borussia Moncheng-ladbach that in the end felt like a win. Huesca, who are yet to win this season, might feel the scoreline was harsh after they squandered early chances.

Madrid will hope the dip that put Zi-dane under pressure earlier this month is over. Zidane will have been particu-larly delighted with Hazard, whose goal was his fi rst for Madrid since he scored against Granada in October last year, and his second overall in La Liga.

Ankle surgery kept Hazard out for the

majority of last season and he was not fi t for the start of this one, with Madrid only describing his latest setback as a “muscle injury”. But he made his fi rst appearance off the bench in the Champions League in midweek and, against Huesca, marked his fi rst start with a brilliant goal in the fi rst half. “We know the quality that Eden has,” Zidane said. “He scored a good goal and we needed it in the fi rst half, because after his fi rst goal the game was diff erent.”

Until then, Huesca had been the better team but Hazard’s strike turned the con-test in the 40th minute, when he received the ball on the half-turn and swerved a superb shot into the corner from 30 yards

out. Benzema made it two, chesting down Lucas Vazquez’s cross at the back post and driving in, before Valverde struck a sweet half-volley into the corner. Ferreiro gave Huesca brief hope with 16 minutes left but Madrid were never overly trou-bled and Benzema rounded off the win in injury-time, converting a smart header back from Rodrygo.

JOAO FELIX TAKES CENTRE STAGE AS ATLETICO DOWN OSASUNA

Later, Atletico Madrid forward Joao Felix scored two goals and was in the thick of the action as his side beat Osasuna 3-1 away for a third consecutive La Liga vic-

tory. The Portugal striker missed an open goal in the early stages of the game before giving his side the lead at the end of the fi rst half from the penalty spot but then squandered a spot-kick at the start of the second period, hitting the post.

The 126-million-euro ($147mn) player soon made amends by getting Atleti’s second, blasting into the top corner to complete a sensational counterattack and score for the fourth time in two games af-ter his double in Tuesday’s 3-2 Champi-ons League win over RB Salzburg.

Osasuna did manage to strike back with a header from substitute Ante Bu-dimir with 10 minutes to go but Atleti soaked up the pressure well and clinched the points with a late strike from Lucas Torreira, who superbly controlled a cross from Kieran Trippier on his thigh before smashing into the roof of the net.

The victory took unbeaten Atletico up to third in the standings on 14 points, two behind leaders Real Madrid. Also yesterday, Athletic Bilbao came from be-hind to beat Sevilla 2-1 at home with two late goals, infl icting a third consecutive league defeat on Julen Lopetegui’s side.

LA LIGA RESULTS

Real Madrid 4 (Hazard 40, Benzema 45, 90, Valverde 54) SD Huesca 1 (Ferreiro 74); Athletic Bilbao 2 (Muniain 76, Sancet 86) Sevilla 1 (En-Nesyri 9); Osasuna 1 (Bu-dimir 80) Atletico Madrid 3 (Felix 43-pen, 69, Torreira 89)

Playing today (GMT): Real Betis v Elche (1300), Celta Vigo v Real Sociedad (1500), Granada v Levante (1730), Valen-cia v Getafe (2000)

Tomorrow: Villarreal v Real Valladolid (2000)

Played Friday: Eibar 0 Cadiz 2 (Negredo 36, Salvador Sanchez Ponce 39)

AFPParis

Rennes got back on track by com-ing from behind to beat Brest 2-1 in Ligue 1 yesterday as they prepare to go to Chelsea in the

Champions League in midweek.Defensive duo Damien Da Silva and

Nayef Aguerd got the goals for Rennes after Franck Honorat had given the visi-tors the lead at Roazhon Park in a Brittany derby played behind closed doors.

The result allows Julien Stephan’s team to move level on 18 points with leaders and reigning champions Paris Saint-Germain, and also Lille, at the top of the Ligue 1 table. Rennes are third on goal dif-ference having played a game more, with

PSG in action late last night at Nantes and Lille hosting Lyon today.

A third-place fi nish in the last, cur-tailed French season allowed Rennes to qualify for the Champions League for the fi rst time, but they have taken just one point from their fi rst two group games, a 1-1 draw at home to Russians Krasnodar being followed by a 1-0 loss away to Se-villa in midweek.

LIGUE 1 RESULTS

Rennes 2 (Da Silva 65, Aguerd 69) Brest 1 (Honorat 56)

Today: Saint-Etienne v Montpellier (1200 GMT), Angers v Nice, Dijon v Lorient, Nimes v Metz, Reims v Strasbourg (all 1400 GMT), Monaco v Bordeaux (1600 GMT), Lille v Lyon (2000 GMT)

Postponed: Marseille v Lens

London: Elite Sport will continue to be allowed behind closed doors despite a new month-long lockdown being imposed across England by UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson yesterday. The strict series of measures reintroduced to try and curb rising coronavirus infection rates will begin from Thursday, November 5 and last until December 2.

Pubs and restaurants will shut unless serving takeaway food, while all leisure and entertainment venues and non-essential shops will close. However, Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden confirmed that elite sport will continue to enjoy an exemption to play behind closed doors. “Travel to a place of work will be permitted,” he tweeted. “This includes (but not exhaustive) elite sport played behind closed doors.”

The 2019/20 Premier League season was suspended for three months between March and June during the first UK lockdown to bring the virus under control. Rugby, tennis and horse racing are among the other sports that will benefit from high-profile events being allowed to continue behind closed doors.

The ATP Tour finals are due to be played in London’s O2 from November 15-22. Ruby’s Autumn Nations Cup will see the countries that normally compete in the Six Nations joined by Georgia and Fiji for a four-week tournament from November 13 that will replace the normal November interna-tionals.

ENTIRE LAZIO SQUAD IN QUARANTINE AFTER

COVID-19 POSITIVESRome: Lazio, already deprived of several players, announced yesterday that it had put its entire squad in quarantine after positive coronavirus tests. Lazio fielded a depleted team in Brugge in the Champions League on Wednesday and drew 1-1 without last season’s top European scorer Ciro Im-mobile and midfielders Luis

Alberto, Manuel Lazzari, Lucas Leiva and Djavan Anderson.

The club said in a statement that it had conducted a further round of tests on Friday. “Some members of the team group tested positive,” it said without giving any names. It is the first time Lazio has explicitly confirmed cases of Covid-19 in its squad after talking about “doubtful” tests during the week, even though it omitted players from its squad.

“The whole team will repeat today’s checks in order to identify the players that can be used in tomorrow’s match between Turin and Lazio,” the club said. “The positive results were placed in isolation at home while the team will observe a period of quarantine under active supervision by the medical staff .”

Lazio are 12th in the Italian Championship and travel to Petersburg to play Zenit in the Champions League on Wednesday.

SWANSEA MOVE SECOND AS BOURNEMOUTH FALTER

Swansea moved into second place in the Championship with a 2-0 win against Blackburn, while fellow promotion chasers Bournemouth had to settle for a draw against Derby With leaders Reading losing at Coventry on Friday, Swansea moved within four points of the surprise pace-setters.

Goals in each half from Ben Cabango and Andre Ayew saw the south Wales club climb above Bournemouth. An 81st-minute Rodrigo Riquelme equaliser earned the Cherries a 1-1 draw after Graeme Shinnie put Derby ahead in the first half.

Riquelme's leveller preserved the English Foot-ball League's last remaining unbeaten run. Teemu Pukki netted a first-half double to lead Norwich to a deserved 3-1 vic-tory over Bristol City at Ashton Gate. Middlesbrough moved into the play-off positions after Marvin Johnson's 81st-minute strike secured a 1-0 win over Nottingham Forest.

Elite sport in England exempt from fresh lockdown

Bayern Munich’s German forward Thomas Mueller scores during the Bundesliga match against Cologne yesterday. (AFP)

Real Madrid’s Eden Hazard (right) vies for the ball with Huesca’s Pablo Maff eo during the La Liga match in Valdebebas, northeastern Madrid, yesterday. (AFP)

SPORT

Gulf Times Sunday, November 1, 20204

AFPMiami

Americans Wyndham Clark and Ryan Armour battled through brisk winds to share a one-stroke lead in Friday’s

darkness-halted second round of the US PGA Bermuda Championship.

Clark, never better than fi fth in a PGA event, fi red a three-under par 68 while Armour shot 70 to leave both on eight-under 134 after 36 holes at Port Royal Golf Course in Southampton.

“I did what I could out there. To get it under par was big,” Armour said.

“I can’t stress how diffi cult it really was out there. It’s physically tiring and then mentally... you’re just trying to keep yourself in the fi ght.”

Kramer Hickok was third on 135 with fellow Americans Ollie Schnied-erjans and Doc Redman on 136. A pack of six on 137 included England’s Luke Donald. Five players remained on the course when darkness halted

play, none threatening the fi ve lead-ers as they prepared to fi nish the round yesterday. World number 183 Clark started on the 10th hole, made an early birdie at 11 and added back-to-back birdies at the par-3 16th and par-5 17th.

Clark, 26, eagled the par-5 second for the second day in a row but bogeys at the par-5 seventh and par-3 eighth left him sharing the lead.

“I’m overall pretty pleased with how I played,” Clark said. “I’ve hit it pretty good.

“I played the par-5s pretty solid, I’m making the putts that I need to make and I was really just patient out there. It was really tough and I didn’t have any blemishes until the end, so I felt pretty good.”

World 217 Armour, 44, took his only PGA crown at the 2017 Sander-son Farms Championship.

Armour opened with a birdie and added back-to-back birdies at the fourth and fi fth, but followed with bogeys at the par-5 seventh, par-4 11th and par-3 13th. Only a birdie at

the par-5 17th let him share the lead. “I enjoy the challenge of it,” said Ar-mour. “Today was really hard. We couldn’t judge the distance very well and we had some balls going sideways out there. It just get up in the wind and it would go 20 yards further left or right than you wanted.”

Thailand’s Kiradech Aphibarnrat fi red a bogey-free 66 to join the pack on 137.

“Especially with this condition, I would say this is the best round for me for the whole season,” he said. “I’ve been struggling a little bit from the beginning of the year. Hopefully today is the turning point.”

Fred Funk, playing alongside son Taylor at age 64, chipped in for birdie at the par-4 ninth to shoot 72, be-coming only the fourth player his age or older since 1970 to make a PGA cut, joining US compatriots Jack Nicklaus, Sam Snead and Tom Watson.

“It feels good to know you can do it,” the elder Funk said. “Not many guys even have an opportunity. It means a lot, but the biggest thing was

playing with Taylor. The bonus was making the cut.”

Taylor missed the cut after fi nish-ing at 12-over.

Leading scores after darkness-halted second round (Par-71, USA unless noted)134-Ryan Armour 64-70, Wyndham Clark 66-68135-Kramer Hickok 67-68136-Ollie Schniederjans 66-70, Doc Redman 65-71137-Denny McCarthy 70-67, Luke Donald (ENG) 69-68, Roger Sloan (CAN) 67-70, Kiradech Aphibarnrat (THA) 71-66, Scott Piercy 67-70, Peter Malnati 63-74138-Emiliano Grillo (ARG) 66-72, Brian Gay 70-68, Brice Garnett 68-70, Pad-raig Harrington (IRL) 67-71, Anirban Lahiri (IND) 68-70, Doug Ghim 64-74139-Beau Hossler 71-68, Troy Merritt 69-70, Chesson Hadley 68-71, Mark Anderson 69-70, Matt Jones (AUS) 68-71, Peter Uihlein 72-67, Michael Gligic (CAN) 68-71WD-Henrik Stenson (SWE) 69.

Clark and Armour defy winds to share leadGOLF

Bumrah and Boult propel Mumbai to big win over Delhi

AFPDubai

Paceman Jasprit Bum-rah yesterday moved to the top of the bowling chart in the Indian Pre-

mier League as Mumbai Indians infl icted another blow to Delhi Capitals’ dwindling campaign with a nine-wicket win.

Bumrah and fellow fast bowler Trent Boult claimed three wick-ets each to restrict Delhi to 110 for nine, a total table-toppers Mumbai achieved in 14.2 overs in Dubai.

Ishan Kishan smashed an un-beaten 72 off 47 balls to be named

man of the match as Mumbai, who have already qualifi ed for the play-off s, ensured a top-two fi nish in the league stage.

Third-placed Delhi are strug-gling to stay in the fi nal four after their fourth straight loss.

Mumbai’s stand-in-skipper Kieron Pollard praised his fast bowlers for the big win.

“Boult was exceptional. That’s his strength, bowling with the new ball. He’s consistently given us good starts,” said Pollard.

“Bumrah, I kept delaying him, on this track with his angles. He’s jumping to bowl in the pow-erplays, but again I saw today getting those early wickets, and with the spinners getting grip,

kept him for the middle overs.”Bumrah, who came into bowl

second change, returned fi gures of 3-17 to go level with Delhi quick Kagiso Rabada on 23 wick-ets in the Twenty20 tournament but the Indian bowler has a bet-ter average and economy rate.

Boult led the bowling charge with fi gures of 3-21 including the key wicket of in-form Delhi opener Shikhar Dhawan for nought off the third ball of the innings.

Kishan took on the Delhi bowling including South Afri-can pacemen Rabada and Anrich Nortje. The left-hand batsman hit eight fours and three sixes.

“It wasn’t as easy as it looked.

In the fi rst few overs it wasn’t coming on. I was just playing ac-cording to the ball and waiting for the loose balls. (The strength) credit goes to my mom for the food,” said Ishan Kishan:

:I was just working on keeping my shape when I tried to slog, and I think helped. I worked re-ally hard on these shots. My coach said teams will come up with plans against you, because you don’t hit that much through the off side. This time I’ve been playing more, as you know my strength is on the leg side. There’s always banter when Pant is keeping and when I’m keep-ing. It was fun, he was saying something as he always does.”

Delhi skipper Shreyas Iyer still hopes for the best in his team’s fi nal league game on Monday against Royal Challengers Ban-galore who play Sunrisers Hy-derabad later in the evening.

“We’ll have to be fearless and keep things simple. It’s an im-portant game for us, do-or-die depending on how they play today,” said Iyer. “Not thinking much about the future, trying to stay in the present.”

BRIEF SCORESDelhi Capitals 110 for 9 (Iyer 25, Pant 21, Bumrah 3-17, Boult 3-21) lost to Mumbai Indians 111 for 1 (Kishan 72*, Nortje 1-25) beat by nine wickets.

CRICKET

‘Boult was exceptional. That’s his strength, bowling with the new ball’

IANS/GloFansSharjah

All-rounder Jason Holder yesterday pulled a stumbling Sunrisers Hydera-

bad (SRH) over the line against Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) in the Indian Premier League (IPL), and took them closer to the playoff s with the fi ve-wicket verdict.

With this win, SRH jumped from seventh place to fourth on the points table. Now, as many as four teams - SRH (net run rate +0.555), Kings XI Pun-jab (-0.133), Rajasthan Royals (-0.377), and Kolkata Knight Riders (-0.467) - are locked at 12 points each.

They all have one match left to play, and their fi nal posi-tions could be determined by the net run rate.

Mumbai Indians are at the top of the table with 18 points while RCB and Delhi Capitals are placed second and third with 14 points each. The top four teams qualify for the play-off s.

Chasing RCB’s 120 for seven wickets in 20 overs, Holder smashed 26 off 10 balls to take his team to a fi ve-wicket win with just under six overs to spare at the Sharjah Cricket Stadium. SRH fi nished at 121 for fi ve wickets in14.1 overs.

In the crucial contest on Saturday, SRH opted to fi eld on winning the toss and rode some impressive bowling ef-fort to restrict a star-studded RCB to a moderate total. In re-turn, SRH suff ered few hiccups but somehow managed to fi nd their way o victory.

Chasing the target, SRH lost skipper David Warner (8) cheaply with just 10 runs on

board as Washington Sundar (1/21) drew the fi rst blood.

Wriddhiman Saha (39) and Manish Pandey (26) then re-paired the early damage as their side raced away to the 50-run mark in 5.2 overs.

Yuzvendra Chahal (2/19) ap-plied brakes on the developing partnership when he account-ed for the wicket of Pandey in the seventh over.

SRH then lost Saha and Kane Williamson (8) within another 27 runs with their scorecard reading 87/4 in 12.1 overs.

Holder (26 not out) and Abhishek Sharma (8) then stitched a 27-run stand for the fi fth wicket. But just when SRH were seven runs away from crossing the line, Nav-deep Saini stuck to send back Sharma in the 14th over.

Holder smacked Chahal for a maximum over long-on fence to steer his side home with 35 balls to spare.

Earlier, some quality bowl-ing saw RCB being restricted to 120/7 wickets in the allotted 20 overs as Sandeep Sharma (2/20) and Jason Holder (2/27) starred for SRH. Apart from the duo, Shahbaz Nadeem, Rashid Khan and T Natarajan bagged a wicket apiece.

Put into bat, RCB batters failed to convert the start. It was the collective eff ort by AB de Villiers (24), Josh Philippe (32), Washington Sundar (21) and Gurkeerat Singh (15 not out) as RCB somehow limped to a moderate total.

BRIEF SCORESRCB 120/7 wkts in 20 overs (Josh Philippe 32, AB de Villiers 24; Sandeep Sharma 2/20) lost to SRH 121/5 in 14.1 overs (Wriddhiman Saha 39, Jason Holder 26; Yuzvendra Chahal 2/19) by five wickets

All-rounder Holder takes SRH to win, closer to playoff s

IPL

Mumbai Indians players celebrate the wicket of Prithvi Shaw of Delhi Capitals during match 51 in Dubai yesterday. (Sportzpics for BCCI)

Gayle fi ned for fl inging bat aft er missing centuryWest Indies batsman Chris Gayle has been fined for throwing his bat in frustration after missing out on a record-extending seventh IPL century by one run.The 41-year-old, who became the first batsman in Twenty20 history

to hit 1,000 sixes during his 99 innings for King’s XI Punjab, was fined 10 percent of his match fee for a “code of conduct” violation, said an Indian Premier League statement. “Mr Gayle admitted to the Level 1 off ence 2.2 of the IPL’s

Code of Conduct and accepted the sanction,” it added. The state-ment did not give details of his action, but throwing bats and other equipment normally comes under this off ence. The left-hander was bowled in the final over by Ra-

jasthan Royals’ Jofra Archer after his 66-ball blitz that included eight sixes. Gayle then flung his bat, which hit the ground and bounced away. He appeared to apologise to the umpire before walking off . Punjab went down by seven

wickets to the Royals and must win their final game on Sunday to stand a chance of reaching the IPL playoff s. Gayle has scored three half-centuries in six innings this year for Punjab, who are fourth in the eight-team table.

Ryan Armour of the United States plays his shot from the first tee during the second round of the Bermuda Championship at Port Royal Golf Course in Southampton, Bermuda. (Getty Images/AFP)

Sandeep Sharma (right) of Sunrisers Hyderabad celebrates after tak-ing the wicket of Devdutt Padikkal of Royal Challengers Bangalore in the Indian Premier League match. (Sportzpics for BCCI)

Vikings look for season split against Green Bay Packers

ReutersLos Angeles

Minnesota Vikings quarterback Kirk Cousins acknowl-edges his appre-

ciation for teammates who have publicly lent their support de-spite his early-season struggles, which include an NFL high-ty-ing 10 interceptions.

Still, Cousins feels such ex-pressions are a bit premature. At 1-5, the Vikings may be reeling, but they’re nonetheless rested, coming off their bye week and primed to seize an opportunity to begin a turnaround with Sun-day’s visit to the NFC North-leading Green Bay Packers.

“We know what we’re capa-ble of,” Cousins said. “We know what we can do when we’re at our best, and I think we’ve

shown that with explosive plays and moving the football and get-ting a lot of guys involved, both running the ball and throwing the ball. So, we know we can get back to that. What we have to do is do it consistently.”

Green Bay (5-1) can attest to overcoming adversity. After ab-sorbing a lopsided 38-10 loss at Tampa Bay in Week 6, their fi rst defeat of the season, the Packers responded with last week’s 35-20 win at Houston.

Aaron Rodgers steered the Green Bay attack, completing 23-of-34 passes for 283 yards and four touchdowns, including two to Davante Adams, who fi n-ished with 13 receptions for 196 yards.

“I think he’s done a great job of throwing on rhythm and throw-ing with anticipation,” Pack-ers coach Matt LaFleur said of Rodgers. “I think his balance in

the pocket is really good. I think when stuff isn’t there, he does a great job of making off -schedule plays.”

The Vikings expect run-ning back Dalvin Cook to return against the Packers.

Cook was listed as question-able after being a full participant in practice on Friday. He has not played since suff ering a groin in-jury in the third quarter of a one-point loss at Seattle in Week 5.

Cook has rushed for 489 yards and seven touchdowns in fi ve games, including two scores in a Week 1 home loss to the Packers. His presence in the Minnesota backfi eld was among the rea-sons LaFleur stressed his team couldn’t overlook the Vikings.

“I don’t care what the record says, this is a damn good foot-ball team,” LaFleur said of the Vikings. “If you don’t get pre-pared each and every week in

this league, you’re going to get whipped.” The Vikings have dealt with a banged-up defense.

The team placed starting cor-nerback Cameron Dantzler and linebacker Todd Davis on the reserve/Covid-19 list and cor-nerback Mike Hughes on injured reserve.

Additionally, Zimmer con-fi rmed that defensive end Dan-ielle Hunter had successful, season-ending neck surgery Tuesday. Hunter was injured during a non-padded practice in August and had sought a second opinion on the injury. He hasn’t played in 2020.

In Hunter’s absence, the Vi-kings have employed a rotation including Ifeadi Odenigbo, Jalyn Holmes and Jordan Brailford at defensive end.

The Packers will play without running back Aaron Jones for the second straight game. Jones was

ruled out with a calf injury on Friday. Cornerback Kevin King (quadricep) also was ruled out for the Minnesota game on Fri-day.

Off ensive tackle David Ba-khtiari (chest), kicker Mason Crosby (calf/back), running back Tyler Ervin (wrist), safe-ties Raven Greene (oblique) and Darnell Savage (quadricep), defensive lineman Tyler Lan-caster (shoulder) and tight end John Lovett (knee) were listed as questionable.

Minnesota ranks 30th in the NFL with a minus-7 turnover margin. At plus-2, Green Bay is tied for ninth.

Green Bay defeated Minne-sota 43-34 at US Bank Stadium to open the season. The Packers have won three successive regu-lar season meetings against the Vikings and lead the all-time se-ries 62-53-3.

NFL

‘I don’t care what the record says, this is a damn good football team’

Minnesota Vikings quarterback Kirk Cousins scrambles in the fourth quarter against the Tennessee Titans at US Bank Stadium in Minneapolis. (USA TODAY Sports)

SPORT5Gulf Times

Sunday, November 1, 2020

Former Astros manager Hinch hired by Detroit aft er suspensionReutersLos Angeles

The Detroit Tigers named AJ Hinch as the 39th manager in franchise history on Friday, just days after his one-year

suspension ended for his role in the Houston Astros’ sign-stealing scan-dal.

Hinch, 46, agreed to terms on a multi-year contract with the Tigers and replaces Ron Gardenhire, who re-tired in mid-September.

“I’d like to thank (owner) Chris Ili-tch and (general manager) Al Avila for giving me a chance and the opportu-nity to get back in the dugout to lead this historic ballclub,” Hinch said in a press release.

“The last year was the most dif-fi cult of my life. It gave me time to refl ect, which was such a big part of this process. Everything that has tran-spired over the past year, personally and professionally, has put so much in perspective for me, and re-enforced how important it is to do things with integrity and honesty.”

Hinch led the Astros to a World Se-ries championship in 2017 and anoth-er World Series berth in 2019, but he was fi red by the club in January after

Major League Baseball’s investigation into sign-stealing allegations.

MLB ruled that the Astros illegally stole signs in 2017, and it issued one-year bans for Hinch and general man-ager Jeff Luhnow. The club terminated both shortly after the punishments were announced.

The Tigers weren’t dissuaded from talking to Hinch despite the stain on his resume.

“Coming into this managerial search we already knew that A.J.’s di-verse baseball acumen, knowledge of analytics and passion for the game were second to none,” Avila said. “However, we also knew there were some important conversations to have about AJ’s time in Houston. Through-out that dialogue he was clearly re-morseful and used that time to refl ect on the situation, and we believe he will emerge as a better leader because of it.”

Added Ilitch: “Throughout the in-terview process it was clear that AJ had learned from his situation in re-cent months, and it has changed him in profound ways. Quite frankly, it’s exactly what we wanted and needed to hear.”

Hinch produced a 481-329 record in fi ve years leading the Astros after compiling an 89-123 mark in part of

two seasons as the Arizona Diamond-backs’ manager (2009-10). Between the two managerial gigs, he worked in the San Diego Padres’ front offi ce.

A catcher during a playing career that saw him compete for the Oakland A’s, the Kansas City Royals, Detroit and the Philadelphia Phillies from 1998-2004, Hinch served as minor league operations manager and direc-tor of player development for the Dia-mondbacks prior to his fi rst manage-rial job.

The Tigers fi nished in last place in the American League Central in 2020 with a 23-35 record. They have not been to the playoff s since 2014.

“My feelings towards baseball are the same that so many Detroiters have for this team,” Hinch said. “Through thick and thin you always care about it and rely on it to be there as a part of your life, and I’m so proud to play a role in growing that tradition here with the Tigers.

“Having a talented young core of players, dedicated leadership group and passionate fan base was exactly what I was looking for in a team, and it’s clear we have that here in Detroit. It’s time to start playing winning baseball, and I am confi dent this or-ganisation is positioned to make that happen.”

MLB

Pro Football Hall of Fame cornerbackAdderley dies at 81

ReutersLos Angeles

Pro Football Hall of Fame cornerback Herb Adderley, who played in four of the fi rst six

Super Bowls, passed away Friday at the age of 81. The Pro Football Hall of Fame an-nounced Adderley’s passing, but did not divulge a cause of death.

Adderley returned an inter-ception 60 yards for a touch-down in the fourth quarter to help the Green Bay Packers post a 33-14 victory over the then-Oakland Raiders in Su-per Bowl II.

“The entire Pro Football Hall of Fame family mourns the passing of Herb Adderley,” Pro Football Hall of Fame Presi-dent and CEO David Baker said. “He was a great player and an even greater man. Herb left an indelible mark on the Game and was respected tre-mendously by players and per-sonnel across the league.”

A fi ve-time Pro Bowl selec-tion, Adderley was selected by the Packers with a fi rst-round pick in the 1961 NFL Draft out of Michigan State. Although he began his career at running back, Adderley was shuffl ed to cornerback by coach Vince Lombardi after Green Bay’s Hank Gremminger was injured during a Thanksgiving Day game against Detroit.

Adderley played for the Packers in both Super Bowls

I and II and suited up for the club through 1969.

“The Green Bay Packers Family was saddened today to hear of Herb Adderley’s pass-ing,” Packers President/CEO Mark Murphy said. “Herb was one of the greatest defensive backs to ever play the game. Few players can match his sta-tistics with 48 interceptions and seven pick-sixes. He was a tremendous all-around ath-lete, as evidenced by the fact that he was All-City in Phila-delphia in football, basketball and baseball, played halfback and defensive back at Michi-gan State and was an outstand-ing kick returner in the NFL.

“He was instrumental in the great success of the Lombardi teams and was the only player to play in four of the fi rst six Super Bowls, and was a key member of six NFL champi-onship teams. “We extend our deepest condolences to Herb’s family and friends.”

Adderley later was traded to the Dallas Cowboys, with whom he played in Super Bowls V and VI. He elected to retire after the Cowboys traded him to the Rams in the sum-mer of 1973. He was chosen to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1980. “Our thoughts and prayers are with Herb’s wife, Brenda, and their entire fam-ily. We will forever keep his legacy alive to serve as inspi-ration for future generations,” Baker said. “The Hall of Fame fl ag will be fl own at half-staff in Herb’s memory.”

LOSS

In this file photo taken on October 20, 2017, AJ Hinch of the Houston Astros celebrates in the locker room after defeating the New York Yankees by a score of 4-0 to win Game Seven of the American League Championship Series at Minute Maid Park in Houston, Texas. (AFP)

Nets add D’Antoni to Nash’s staff Steve Nash and Mike D’Antoni are putting the band back together in Brooklyn.The Nets on Friday hired D’Antoni as an assistant coach to Nash, who won two Most Valuable Player awards while playing point guard for D’Antoni’s Phoenix Suns in the mid-2000s.Brooklyn also named Ime Udoka as an assistant coach and added former Suns for-ward Amar’e Stoudemire as a player development assistant to Nash’s staff , which already includes associate head coach Jacque Vaughn.“We’ve assembled an experi-enced staff of high-character individuals with varied backgrounds, both on and off the court, that will help create a solid foundation for me and our players,” Nash said in a press release. “When I set out to build this staff , I wanted to put together a committed group that would connect with our players and help put them in the best posi-tion to succeed as a team. With coaching and playing experience at the highest level and a deep background in player development, I’m confident that we’ve put the right people in place to lead us forward.” The Nets gave Nash his first head coaching

job on Sept. 3. Ten days later, D’Antoni stepped down after four seasons as head coach of the Houston Rockets.Nash, 46, played four seasons for D’Antoni in Phoenix (2004-05 to 2007-08), operating a fast-paced of-fense that led to back-to-back MVP awards, two 60-win campaigns and four playoff berths. Nash also played the last two seasons of his Hall of Fame career for D’Antoni with the Los Angeles Lakers in 2012-13 and 2013-14.D’Antoni, 69, owns a 672-527 (.560) record in 16 seasons as a head coach with the Denver Nuggets (1998-99), Suns (2003-08), New York Knicks (2008-12), Lakers (2012-14) and Rockets. He was named the NBA Coach of the Year in 2004-05 and 2016-17.Udoka, 43, was an assistant coach with the Philadelphia 76ers last season after spend-ing the previous seven sea-sons on San Antonio Spurs coach Gregg Popovich’s staff .Stoudemire, 37, was a six-time All-Star who played along-side Nash in Phoenix for six seasons (2004-10). He last played in the NBA in 2015-16. He scored 15,994 points in 846 games with the Suns, New York Knicks, Dallas Mav-ericks and Miami Heat.

SPORT

Gulf Times Sunday, November 1, 20206

Gaudu climbs to victory on 11th stage, Roglic keeps leadAFPLa Farrapona, Espagne

Frenchman David Gaudu won the 11th stage of the Vuelta a Espana yester-day on the slopes of La

Farrapona as Primoz Roglic fi n-ished in a group with his main rivals to retain the overall lead.

Gaudu, who rides for Groupa-ma, pulled away from Spaniard Marc Soler of Movistar in the fi -nal metres.

The two were the survivors of a long breakaway on a mountain-ous ride from Villaviciosa. Soler jumped to sixth in the stand-ings which Slovenian Roglic of Jumbo-Visma tops, although he remains tied on time with Ecua-dorian Richard Carapaz of Ineos.

It was Gaudu’s fi rst stage win in a major tour.

“At the beginning I wasn’t feeling too good,” he said. “But in the end I won on a big day like this.”

The 24 year-old Breton es-caped the peloton on the second climb of the day, the Alto de la Colladona, and caught a large breakaway group on the descent.

The group had been reduced to fi ve by the fourth and fi nal climb. Gaudu was the only man able to go with Soler, winner of the sec-ond stage, when the Spaniard attacked with 5 kilometres to go.

Soler could not shake Gaudu who was able to launch a late charge which the Spaniard did not have the energy to match.

“When Soler attacked me he was quite quickly down back onto his saddle,” said Gaudu. “So I just waited and waited until the last 500 metres and I went for it and 75 metres from the line I knew he was dropped.”

Gaudu is the designated lead-er of French team Groupama-FDJ which has had a disastrous time since racing resumed after the coronavirus interruption.

Their Vuelta started badly when their best-known rider Thibaut Pinot threw in the towel before the third stage.

“For a few days I’ve not had good legs. The team was com-plaining. We weren’t having a good race. We didn’t have a good Tour de France,” Gaudu ex-plained. “Then Thibaut had to quit.”

The start of yesterday’s stage was delayed after Team Ineos led a protest against a decision by stewards the previous day that

put Roglic in the overall lead.On Friday, after Roglic burst

clear in the fi nal stretch, the stewards declared that the fi rst eight fi nishers had created a large enough gap that every member of the peloton would not be awarded the same time.

That meant Ineos man Cara-paz lost three seconds, enough with a winning bonus, to put Roglic in the lead. Several other riders in the top ten also lost time, including fourth-placed Hugh Carthy whose Education First team lodged a protest.

Ineos complained they had been ‘stung’. Their senior rider Chris Froome, who has won seven grand tours including the Vuelta twice, led the protest at the start at Villaviciosa. Other teams joined in and the whole peloton waited before setting off .

Today’s route remains in the mountains with a 109.4km ride starting in La Pola Llaviana and ending on the notoriously tough climb up the Angliru.

CYCLING

‘At the beginning I wasn’t feeling too good. But in the end I won on a big day like this’

AFPVienna

Lucy loser Lorenzo Son-ego of Italy followed up his shock win over world number one No-

vak Djokovic by beating Brit-ain’s Dan Evans to reach the Vienna ATP fi nal yesterday.

Sonego had condemned Djokovic to his heaviest best-of-three-set loss in the quar-ter-fi nals where the 17-time major winner claimed just three games.

The world number 42, who described that as “the best victory of my life”, saw off Evans 6-3, 6-4 and will face red-hot Russian Andrey Ru-blev in today’s fi nal.

“I’m really happy. After yes-terday it was not easy playing against Evans because he has a good talent,” said Sonego.

“He has a good backhand and it was not easy. But today I won and I am so happy.”

Sonego, 25, had initially lost in the fi nal round of qualifying in the Austrian capital to Aljaz Bedene six days ago, but en-tered the draw as a lucky loser when Diego Schwartzman withdrew. World number eight Rublev made the fi nal when South Africa’s Kevin Anderson retired with a leg injury at 6-4, 4-1 down.

Rublev, chasing a fi fth title of this truncated season, has won 18 of his past 19 matches.

“I came here thinking that I have nothing to lose. I already

did a really great season, so I came here to enjoy, to do my best, to fi ght for every point, every match, and now here I am in the fi nal,” said the 23-year-old.

“I want to keep thinking in the same way and we’ll see what’s going to happen tomor-row.”

Rublev, the fi fth seed, elimi-nated defending champion Dominic Thiem in the quarter-fi nals on Friday and has not dropped a set this week.

He has also yet to drop serve.

MILLMAN TO FACE MANNARINO IN FINAL

John Millman reached his third ATP Tour fi nal when he came back from a set down to beat Frances Tiafoe 3-6, 6-4, 6-4 at the Astana Open in Nur-Sultan yesterday.

The 31-year-old Australian, ranked 45 in the world, will face Adrian Mannarino in to-day’s fi nal after the Frenchman saved four of fi ve break points to beat Emil Ruusuvuori 7-5, 6-2.

“It is so hard to make fi nals in ATP events,” said Millman. “It has been a really unexpect-ed surprise.

“Adrian Mannarino is an es-tablished Top 100 player. He is very comfortable on these courts. He is a lefty, so tough to break down.”

Millman is attempting to capture his fi rst tour-level tro-phy after runner-up fi nishes in Budapest in 2018 and Tokyo last year.

Djokovic-conqueror Sonego into fi nal

TENNIS

Team Groupama-FDJ rider France’s David Gaudu celebrates as he crosses the finish-line of the 11th stage of the 2020 La Vuelta cycling tour of Spain, a 170km race from Villaviciosa to Alto de La Farrapona, yesterday. (AFP)

Halep tests positive for Covid-19

Simona Halep tested positive for the novel coronavirus and is recovering well from her mild symptoms. “Hi everyone, I wanted to let you know that I tested positive for Covid-19,” the 29-year-old Romanian said on Twitter yesterday. “I am self-isolating at home and am recovering well from mild symptoms. «I feel good... we will get through this together.” The former world number one did not travel to New York for this year›s U.S. Open Grand

Slam due to health concerns over the pandemic. Halep, who won the French Open in 2018 and is the reigning Wim-bledon champion, made the trip to Paris for the claycourt Grand Slam but went down to eventual champion Iga Swiatek in the fourth round at Roland Garros this month. The Women›s WTA Tour has a tournament scheduled in Austria from Nov 9 but Halep had said her 2020 season was over following her French Open defeat.

Maryam Ahmed al-Semaitt put on an impressive show on her mount dark bay gelding Rythm to win the Medium Level Test 1A dressage competition of the 2nd Longines Hathab Tour held at the Qatar Equestrian Federation’s Indoor Arena yesterday. Maryam tallied 70.893 and 68.036 cumulative points in the A and B category for a total score of 69.464 to also win the top prize of QR4,200. Jassim al-Jaham al-Kuwari on Monopoly took the runner-up spot with a total score of 64.821points. Hamad bin Abdulrahman al-Attiyah, President of Qatar Equestrian Federation and Asian Equestrian Federation, honoured the podium finishers of the dressage events.

MARYAM, ASMAA SHINE IN SECOND ROUND OF HATHAB DRESSAGE

In the dressage Prelim (Level 2) event, Asmaa Yasser Mohamed excelled on Quatro Junior, a dark chestnut, to claim the top prize of QR2,750. Asmaa scored 72.361 points (73.611 & 71.111) and finished ahead of Jassim al-Jaham al-Kuwari on Sandro Girl. Al-Kuwari tallied a total score of 70.278pts and was awarded QR2,000.

Italy’s Lorenzo Sonego returns the ball to Britain’s Daniel Evans (not pictured) during their semi-final match at the ATP tennis tournament in Vienna yesterday. (AFP)

No ceremony but plenty of buzz around 2021 Tour routeThe pomp may be missing but the punch will be there when Tour de France organisers reveal the course for the 2021 edition of the race today. Normally, the presentation masquerades as a cer-emony with the great and the good of the cycling world among 4,000 people gathering in Paris for a glitzy show designed to make as big a splash as possible. This year, inevitably, it will be diff erent. Corona-virus, which caused a delay to the 2020 edition which only ended in Paris on September 20, has already pulled the plug on the show and this week the presentation was pushed back from Thursday to Sunday. But it will happen. Live on national television in the early evening on Sunday and simulcasting to cycling fans around the world, tour director Christian Prudhomme will unveil the 2021 course. It wasn’t easy as certain creases in the map had to be ironed out, although the site of the ‘Grand Depart’, the biggest headache, was switched from Copenhagen in July. “We finished it in mid-October,” course director Thierry Gouvenou told AFP. “We were dependent on the establishment of municipal teams after the elec-tions (end of June). It was tense. We did a third of the course before the start of the 2020 Tour (end

of August), we rushed after the finish for the last two-thirds. But all the stages have been approved.”The Tour was scheduled to open with three stages in Denmark. After the postponement of football’s European Championship, in which Copenhagen is hosting four matches, and the Tokyo Olympics until 2021, the Danish capital decided in July that it could no longer handle the ‘Grand Depart’.“We had to find another ‘Grand Depart’ and change a week of the Tour de France,” Prud-homme recently told AFP. And that starting point is Brest and, according to local press, four days in Britanny, seen by many as the cradle of French cy-cling having produced the likes of Louison Bobet and Bernard Hinault. According to local politicians talking to the regional media, the race will head swiftly for the Alps, take in the iconic Mont Ven-toux and several Pyrenean stages including An-dorra, Col du Portet and Luz-Ardiden before a time trial near Libourne and Saint-Emilion, through the Bordeaux vineyards. Prudhomme, though, has been careful not to give away too much of the course in advance. “There is no dogma”, he says while adding that the only reality is “to vary as much as possible”. For the full story, cycling fans will just have to tune in today.

RUGBY7

All Blacks keep Bledisloe Cup with 43-5 Wallabies rout

Foster hails patient All Blacks

England beat Italy to keep title hopes alive

They accomplished their mission in Sydney by their biggest ever winning margin against the Wallabies, with one match of the series to go next week

REPORT

BOTTOMLINE

SPOTLIGHT

Gulf Times Sunday, November 1, 2020

AFPSydney

A ruthless All Blacks retained the Bledis-loe Cup for an 18th straight year in record-

breaking style yesterday, blitzing a young Australian team 43-5 to reinforce their trans-Tasman dominance.

After winning 27-7 in Auck-land, which followed a tense 16-16 draw in Wellington, they accomplished their mission in Sydney by their biggest ever winning margin against the Wallabies, with one match of the series to go next week.

Richie Mo’unga bagged 23 points to ensure bragging rights went to New Zealand coach Ian Foster, who like his opposite number Dave Rennie is in charge for his fi rst Bledisloe Cup tour-nament.

“It’s more than a relief, it’s exciting. It’s a lot of feelings but I’m just really proud of the group and excited about what’s ahead,” said All Blacks captain Sam Cane, adding that the team would celebrate with “a few fi zzies”. While the match was the third Bledisloe fi xture, it was also the fi rst of the Tri Nations also featuring Argentina — re-branded from the Rugby Cham-pionship after world champions South Africa pulled out.

In front of just 25,000 fans at a wet ANZ Stadium, below

the 38,000 allowed under coro-navirus rules, the All Blacks overwhelmed the Wallabies in a breathtaking fi rst half that saw two yellow cards, four tries and two disallowed tries.

A ragged Australia was fortu-nate to only be down 26-0 at the break and there was no way back for Rennie’s men despite lifting their game in the second stanza.

While the Wallabies cut down on missed tackles, New Zealand were physically too strong and

again exposed the frailties of their defensive wall.

And they badly missed the calming presence of experi-enced backs Matt To’omua and James O’Connor, who were both out with injuries.

The opening 10 minutes was action-packed with Filipo Dau-gunu yellow-carded for tackling All Blacks dangerman Caleb Clarke in the air.

Australia paid the price with New Zealand prop Karl

Tu’inukuafe powering over for his maiden Test try on four min-utes.

Jordie Barrett joined Daugunu on the sidelines for elbowing Wallabies fullback Dane Hay-lett-Petty in the face, before All Blacks hooker Dane Coles had a try disallowed on review for a knock on.

The Wallabies were des-perately defending and only a top-class tackle from Marika Koroibete on the line prevented

Clarke stretching New Zealand’s lead.

But the All Blacks were red-hot and Mo’unga scored a bril-liant individual try, beating three players, to pile more pres-sure on. He then bagged an-other, sprinting almost half the length of the fi eld after a Beau-den Barrett chip, before Coles fi nally got the try he deserved after a superb rolling maul from the forwards allowed him to dot down in the corner.

Australia looked dejected stomping off at half-time but Rennie’s pep talk appeared to work and they were far more disciplined at the start of the second period.

And in a hopeful sign for the future, 20-year-old debutant Noah Lolesio romped over for a try a minute after the restart following a barnstorming run from Jordan Petaia, who is also 20. The game slowed down with conditions heavy and after sev-eral botched Australian attacks, man-of-the match Mo’unga booted a penalty and Reiko Io-ane darted over for their fi fth try.

Jordie Barrett rubbed salt in their wounds with another try as the clock ticked down.

It was the fi rst time since 2009 the All Blacks had wrapped up the Bledisloe series on Australian soil and proved sweet revenge for their last game in Australia, when they were whalloped 47-26 in Perth.

ReutersRome

A below-par England beat Italy 34-5 in Rome to put themselves in prime position to win

the Six Nations championship but they must wait until the end of the France v Ireland to discov-er if they have done enough.

England, who began the day 23 points behind Ireland on points diff erence and two ahead of France, are now six ahead of the Irish and will hope they don’t manage a bonus-point win over the French that would give them the title whatever the score.

It was a day to remember for England scrumhalf Ben Youngs, who marked his 100th appear-ance with two smart individual tries and the man of the match award.

“I’m obviously very proud but the most important thing for me was to play my part in this team,” Youngs told ITV. “It’s a nice milestone.

“We always felt like it was go-ing to be a grinding down proc-ess, we knew if we stuck to it we’d get there in the end.”

England did stutter for long periods, securing the all-impor-tant bonus point only 13 minutes from time.

England made the ideal start when fl yhalf Owen Farrell broke clear and sent Youngs over to mark his 100th cap with the fi rst try after fi ve minutes.

But absent England fans ex-pecting the fl oodgates to open were to be disappointed as they not only failed to add anything

more than a Farrell penalty but spent much of the half on the de-fensive.

Number eight Jake Polledri burst through for an excellent Italian try and the hosts came close to another as England reeled after a yellow card for debutant lock Jonny Hill.

England constantly kicked away possession and Italy looked the more cohesive side.

Youngs was the man of the moment again a minute after the restart, however, dummying twice to sneak through for his second try with Italy down to 14 with Polledri in the sin-bin.

England were fi nally playing with more patience and a rolling maul sent Jamie George over to mark his 50th cap with a try and fl anker Tom Curry slipped down the blindside to get the all-im-portant fourth after 67 minutes.

Henry Slade chased down a Farrell grubber kick for England’s fi fth try - completing a good few weeks for the centre, who scored in Exeter’s European and Pre-miership fi nal successes.

It also, possibly crucially, meant Ireland would need to win by seven points in Paris, assum-ing they don’t get a bonus point.

“It is a tough game tonight. We’ve done our job really and we will wait and see,” Farrell said.

“We started the game well, obviously a large chunk of that fi rst half where we didn’t manage to get our hands on the ball and manage to put our game on the fi eld,” he added.

“But that is what international rugby is like. We talked at halft-ime, came out and did a job in the second half.”

ReutersSydney

New Zealand coach Ian Foster got another re-minder of just how high expectations are

for the All Blacks after his team’s record victory over Australia in the opening match of the Tri-Nations yesterday..

Despite the clinical win and ensuring the Bledisloe Cup would remain on the eastern shores of the Tasman Sea for an 18th straight year, the fi rst ques-tion he faced in his news confer-ence was about areas that need-

ed improvement.“Rather than talk about any

areas of concern, I thought the thing that worked well for us was our game management,” the 55-year-old pivoted with the deftness of the fl yhalf he was during his playing days.

“I thought you saw a patient All Black performance in the fi rst half. Sometimes we are guilty of overplaying situations but in the wet conditions, that’s the area I’m most proud of.”

Pulling the strings for the All Blacks at fl yhalf in the 43-5 vic-tory was Richie Mo’unga, who was an easy choice for Man of the Match after scoring two

tries and kicking 13 points from the tee. Foster was quick to pay credit to the other players in the backline and said it had been particularly pleasing to see Beauden Barrett slotting into the playmaker role from fullback when the opportunity arose.

“I thought Richie, that was probably one of the best game management games I’ve seen him play for us for a while and Beauden’s a class player whether at 10 or 15,” Foster said.

“The fact is that we’ve got two good options there which is very exciting.” Foster was delighted that the All Blacks had been able to secure the Bledisloe Cup

on Australian soil for the fi rst time since 2009 against a Wal-labies side they had developed a healthy respect for over three tests this month.

“I think for us to play that well over here is something to be pretty proud of,” he said.

“The only reason you enjoy trophies like this is that you’ve got fear factor for the opposi-tion.

“I know that’s a tough re-sult for them but I thought they showed a lot of determination and energy. (Enough) to show there’s something building there that will ensure the next fi xtures against them will be as tough.”

New Zealand’ players celebrate winning the Bledisloe Cup after beating Australia in Sydney yesterday.

New Zealand’s Jordie Barrett dives to score a try against Australia in Sydney yesterday.

AFPLlanelli, United Kingdom

Scotland fi nally ended their long wait for a win against Wales on Welsh soil with a 14-10 success

in their Six Nations Champion-ship fi nale at Llanelli yesterday

Victory saw the Scots spoil Wales captain Alun Wyn Jones’ landmark feat as the home skip-per became rugby union’s most-capped player with his 149th Test appearance.

This was Scotland’s fi rst win on Welsh soil since 2002 and also meant they they had won three successive championship matches for the fi rst time in 24 years.

By contrast, the result was reigning Six Nations champions Wales’ fi fth successive defeat in all Tests under coach Wayne Pi-vac.

Scotland went ahead through an early Finn Russell penalty be-fore Wales hit back through Rhys Carre’s converted try, a Scotland penalty cutting the hosts’ lead to 7-6 at half-time.

But Scotland replacement hooker Stuart McInally’s try just after the hour mark put Scotland into a 11-7 lead.

Although Leigh Halfpenny cut the visitors’ lead to 11-10, Scot-land captain Stuart Hogg put the result beyond doubt when he landed a penalty with the last kick of the game after fl anker Jamie Ritchie won a turnover.

Scotland end long wait for win in Wales

UPSET

Wales’ lock Alun Wyn Jones (R) shakes hand with Scotland’s flanker Hamish Watson (2nd R) during their 2020 Six Nations rugby union match at the Parc y Scarlets stadium in Llanelli, south Wales yesterday.

Italy’s lock Marco Lazzaroni (L) catches the ball in a line out next to England’s flanker Tom Curry during their Six Nations rugby union match in Rome yesterday.

Sunday, November 1, 2020

GULF TIMES SPORT

Bottas snatches pole from Hamilton

AFPImola, Italy

Valtteri Bottas said he had “the shakes” after snatching pole position for today’s Emilia Ro-

magna Grand Prix from his Mer-cedes teammate Lewis Hamilton with a dramatic late lap in quali-fying at Imola yesterday.

The Finn, who is 77 points adrift of series leader and six-time champion Hamilton with fi ve races remaining in this year’s title, grabbed the prime grid po-sition by a tenth of a second.

Hamilton, who was fastest in the only practice in the morning, had been on top through most of the qualifying session and took provisional pole on his fi rst run in Q3 before Bottas beat him in the fi nal seconds.

Max Verstappen was third for Red Bull ahead of his former team-mate Pierre Gasly of Alpha Tauri, Daniel Ricciardo of Re-nault and Alex Albon in the sec-ond Red Bull.

Charles Leclerc took seventh for Ferrari with Daniil Kvyat eighth in the second Alpha Tauri ahead of the two McLarens of Lando Norris and Carlos Sainz.

Bottas’s success brought him his fourth pole of the season and his 15th career pole as the Mercedes team claimed another front row lockout ahead of the race in which they can claim an unprecedented seventh consec-utive constructors’ champion-ship.

They need only one car to fi n-ish in the top four to seal that record success.

“It’s never easy to get pole position, but I really enjoyed it around this track,” said Bottas.

“I knew I had to improve on my last lap, so I found those little gains — and I had the shakes af-ter the fi nal run, which is always a good sign!”

Hamilton praised his team-mate.

“Valtteri did a great job and it

was a pretty poor lap from my-self, but you can’t always get it right. This track is unbelievable, but I’m pretty certain it will be a boring race tomorrow — just a train after Turn One.”

Verstappen said: “It was tricky, but P3 is not bad really — though I expected to be a bit closer to the Mercedes.”

Having been limited to only 90 minutes’ practice, several teams struggled to deliver a consistent lap, Ricciardo securing his pas-sage to Q2 with seconds remain-ing.

Among those out in Q2 was Kimi Raikkonen, 41, the only man in the fi eld to have raced be-fore at the circuit. He qualifi ed 18th for his record-increasing 325th race just days after agree-ing to stay with Alfa Romeo next year.

As he dropped out, George Russell of Williams, who was also confi rmed for 2021 ahead of the race, maintained his im-pressive ‘Mr Saturday’ form by squeezing into Q2 for the eighth time this year.

At the top, Hamilton’s best lap was deleted for overstepping the track at Turn Nine thus giving Bottas top spot in Q1.

The Finn and the defending champion, along with both Fer-raris, headed out on medium tyres for Q2 as Red Bull faced trouble — Verstappen’s power unit suff ering electrical prob-lems that left his mechanics working against the clock to en-sure he could take part.

The Dutchman’s team-mate Alex Albon, under pressure to retain his seat next year, spun

at Turn 15, fl at-spotting his tyres, and also had to repair to the pits.

He was 11th with less than three minutes to go when Ver-stappen, armed with new spark plugs, re-joined the fray.

With no time to spare, on a single run on mediums, he grabbed his passage to the top-ten shootout in sixth while Al-bon, on softs, took fourth.

Farag hopes to keep winning momentum in Qatar Classic

SQUASH FORMULA 1

ABDULLAH MOHAMED AL-TAMIMI WILL BE LEADING THE HOME CHARGE

By Sports ReporterDoha

Ali Farag’s victory in the Egyptian Open on October 17 was an extra special one as it

ensured he would start the Qa-tar Classic as the world’s top-ranked squash player.

The 28-year-old Egyptian has gained a lot of confi dence from winning on his home turf and is eager to make an impres-sion in the Doha tournament starting today at the Khalifa Tennis and Squash Complex.

“I am starting to enjoy myself again on court. I am fi nding my-self, I am fi nding my character, fi nding my gameplan!,” Farag tweeted after winning the fi rst Platinum title of the 2020-21 season in Egypt.

The man Farag deposed in the Egyptian fi nal was the three-time champion Mohamed El Shorbagy, who is also in fi ne form this year and is keen to stop his compatriot’s momen-tum.

El Shorbagy won the Man-chester Open on September 22, after 192 days of recess due to the coronavirus pandemic. His Manchester title was the 42nd PSA title of his career, mov-ing him to fi fth on the all-time squash win list.

But in the event of Farag’s failure to reach the semi-fi nals in Doha coupled with title suc-cess for El Shorbagy, the lat-ter will become the World No 1 again in December.

El Shorbagy was seeded to play World Junior Champion Mostafa Asal in round two, but Asal has withdrawn. El Shor-bagy is likely to face 2018 run-ner-up Simon Rosner in the last eight. Meanwhile, Farag must negotiate a draw that could see him line up against the likes of Englishman Declan James, Pe-ru’s World No 6 Diego Elias and the 2017 fi nalist Tarek Momen.

Rosner, who won a bronze at the 2019-20 World Champion-ships held in the Qatari capital praised the excellent arrange-ments during the tournament.

“Qatar Classic is always a great tournament. Very pleas-ant to be in Qatar as people are looking so much after you,” said the 32-year-old German.

“I’m gonna be 33 on Novem-ber 5. So hopefully I’m still in the tournament. I might have another 2-3 years. Then I will see what my future will be like. I have last 2-3 years on the Tour.

“I wouldn’t say, kind of hungry

enough anymore. I am trying to enjoy my game. I’m not looking at the points or rankings. I want to give off the best,” said Rosner.

Forty-six players includ-ing the world’s top-eight are featuring at the prestigious

tournament, one of the signa-ture events on PSA Tour, which carries a total prize purse of $175.000 cash prize.

World No 5 Paul Coll and 2011 champion Gregory Gaultier (wildcard) are also in the fray.

Qatar’s most successful player and World No 27 Abdul-lah Mohamed al-Tamimi will be leading the home charge along-side Syed Azlan Amjad (a wild-card entrant) and Abdulrahman al-Maliki.

Last year, two Qataris made it into the second round of the 2019 Men’s World Champion-ships in Doha.

Al-Tamimi overturned the seedings to topple French-man Gregoire Marche, while wildcard Amjad also made it to the next round after Iker Pa-jares was forced to concede the match for an opponent inflict-ed injury. Al-Tamimi reached the Round of 16, narrowly losing to eventual champion Momen. Al-Tamimi will meet England’s Patrick Rooney in round one.

After picking up some rank-ing points this year, Amjad has inched his way up and is in the process of moving into the dou-ble-digit ranking list.

“Hopefully I will reach un-der-100 by end of the year,” said Amjad, who will play fi rst round against Mohamed El Shorbagy today morning.

The tournament, a PSA Plati-num event, will abide by strict Covid-19 protocols with rela-tion to health and safety, inter-national travel policies and so-cial distancing guidelines.

The proceedings begin at 11am today.

Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas (L) celebrates with teammate LewisHamilton after qualifying in pole position.

Al Sadd, Al Arabi to clash in Amir Cup fi nalBy Sports ReporterDoha

Omar Saad nailed two free-throws with just 10 seconds remaining to help Al Sadd reach

the fi nal of the Amir Cup with a thrilling 78-77 victory over Al Wakrah at the Al Gharafa Sports Club yesterday.

Al Wakrah, on a high since winning the Qatar Cup for the fi rst time last month, led for al-most 32 minutes of the match but were left ruing their luck after Al Sadd produced a gal-lant comeback in the fi nal few minutes to steal victory from the jaws of defeat.

Al Wakrah led 66-54 going into the fi nal quarter before Al Sadd came up with an explosive performance which saw them score a whopping 24 points.

With Al Wakrah leading 77-76 and the clock ticking away, Ah-mad al-Darwish committed a foul resulting in two free-throws

for Al Sadd. Omar Saad scored off both and Al Sadd held on to their slender lead to earn a title clash with Al Arabi, who ac-counted for Al Ahli 80-74 in the second semi-fi nal.

Vladimir Dasic was the top scorer for Al Sadd with 22 points, while Babacar Dieng and Kon-stantinos Vasileiadis had 17 and 16 respectively.

Omar Saad scored only 10 points but fi ve of them came in the crucial fi nal two minutes of the game. For Al Wakrah, Julius V Coles was the top scorer with 23 while Abdelrehman Abdel-haleem had 18.

In the second semi-fi nal, Sam-my Monroe was the star as Al Ara-bi led for 39.48 minutes to edge out neighbours Al Ahli. Monroe also provided seven assists and was ably supported by Ater Majok who scored 21 points as Al Arabi led throughout the match. For Al Ahli, Rohndell Goodwin top scored with 26 while Ndoye Sey-dou had 17.The fi nal will be played on Wednesday.

BASKETBALL

Al Sadd (in black) and Al Wakrah players vying for the ball during their Amir Cup basketball semi-final at the Al Gharafa Sports Club yesterday. PICTURES: Shemeer Rasheed Action from Al Arabi-Al Ahli semi-final.

File photo of Ali Farag (left) of Egypt in action against Saurav Ghoshal of India during their Qatar Classic match on October 31, 2018.

Abdullah al-Tamimi (right) will be leading Qatar’s charge.