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Wednesday November 1, 2017

RONNIE O’SULLIVAN suffered a 6-1 defeat to an inspired world number 53 Yan Bingtao in the fi rst round of the International Championship in Daqing, Northeast China’s Heilongjiang Province, on Monday.

The early exit comes just one week after O’Sullivan claimed the English Open with a 9-2 victory over fellow Englishman Kyren Wilson in a one-sided fi nal in Barnsley.

“If Yan plays like that he’ll be very diffi cult to beat in this tournament. If he can play like that consistently he’ll win a lot of tournaments. He has a good tem-perament and he carries himself well,” said O’Sullivan.

“He has presence around the table — to be a champion you need to portray that image. All the great players won tourna-ments when they were 17 or 18 so if he’s going to be a great player then he’ll win one soon.”

There was another huge shock later on the opening day of the tournament when home favor-ite and world number two Ding Junhui was bundled out of the event after suffering a 6-4 defeat to world number 62 Oliver Lines, who went through to the last 32 with high breaks of 78 and 71.

Yan had needed a 6-5 victory over Wang Yuchen to book his fi rst-round date with O’Sullivan, and the Chinese 17-year-old could hardly have imagined a more perfect showing against the fi ve-time world champion.

“My opponent is a great player,” said Yan. “I played Ronnie once before and lost but it was a decent match so that gave me the feeling that I would have a chance if I played well today. I performed better than I thought I would.

“I think I can beat anyone, but I need to be calm and mature. I learned a lot from my fi rst year as a pro, and I need to be in control and to be consistent. I might beat a top 16 player and then lose the next match playing like a differ-ent person.”

Breaks of 68 and 89 handed Yan a 2-0 lead, before O’Sullivan responded with a 111, in what turned out to be the only century of the match. Further breaks of 91, 52 and 73 were enough to hand Yan a 5-1 lead, and he duly dispatched O’Sullivan in the next frame with the Chigwell man scor-ing only fi ve points in the closing four frames. (SD-Agencies)

O’Sullivan stunned

FIFA is exploring expanding the Club World Cup to 24 teams from June 2021, a member of the ruling council said Monday.

The revamped tournament could open with three groups of eight teams and be played over 18 days. The proposals to enlarge the existing annual Club World Cup were outlined during a meeting in India last week but disclosed only Monday by FIFA Council member Reinhard Grindel.

FIFA did not respond to requests for comment. FIFA President Gianni Infantino, who has previously fl oated plans for a 32-team Club World Cup, said last week that a review of international club, youth, and women’s competitions would report to the next council meet-ing, in March.

But Grindel, who is also presi-dent of the German soccer fed-eration, is already resisting plans to expand the Club World Cup.

“The players need rest and time for recuperation in June,” Grindel wrote on his Facebook page. “FIFA should focus on

the competitions for national teams.”

The Club World Cup is a little-watched seven-team event staged annually in December featuring the champions of FIFA’s six continental confed-erations, plus the host nation’s league winner.

The European and South American champions, who typi-cally meet in the fi nal, have only two games because they enter in the semifi nals.

European fans have shown little interest in a competition that also clashes with their domestic leagues.

Grindel said enlarging the Club World Cup “implies” the Confederations Cup would be scrapped. That eight-team tour-nament is staged a year before the World Cup, with Grindel’s Germany winning this year’s edition in July in Russia.

One possible host of a Club World Cup in 2021 is China. Chinese retailer Alibaba E-Auto signed as the Club World Cup title sponsor through 2022.

(SD-Agencies)

FIFA exec says 24-team Club World Cup from 2021 mulled

Ronnie O’Sullivan

INTER Milan overcame relega-tion-threatened Hellas Verona by a hard-fought 2-1 Monday that extended its unbeaten start to Serie A.

Ivan Perisic scored the winner midway through the second half less than 10 minutes after Giampaolo Pazzini equalized with a penalty.

Borja Valero opened the scor-ing for Inter in the fi rst half.

Inter moved back into second place, two points behind Napoli and one ahead of six-time defending champion Juventus and Lazio.

Verona dropped to next to last with only one win in 11 matches.

Showing continuity under new coach Luciano Spalletti, Inter became the fi rst side in the Italian league to use the same starting 11 in fi ve different matches this season.

Borja Valero, a crafty Spanish playmaker signed from Fioren-tina, broke the deadlock in the 36th, redirecting a cross from Antonio Candreva as two defend-ers drifted toward Mauro Icardi and left him unmarked.

Pazzini’s equalizer came with

Inter extends unbeaten start

the help of the video assistant referee.

The referee ruled to play on after contact between Inter goalkeeper Samir Handanovic and Alessio Cerci but once he checked video he saw that Handanovic fouled the Verona winger.

Pazzini was brought on for the penalty and scored with his fi rst touch, a precise and low shot to the left corner. (SD-Agencies)

Inter Milan’s Ivan Perisic celebrates scoring their second goal against Hellas Verona in Verona on Monday.

SD-Agencies

STEPHEN CURRY and the Golden State Warriors had looked a tad vulnerable to start the new season.

They had a 4-3 record and blew a 14-point second half lead at home to the Detroit Pistons on Sunday.

One day later, the team played more like the defending cham-pions, using a stifl ing defense to blow out the Los Angeles Clippers 141-113. It was Golden State’s 11th consecutive win over Los Angeles.

“That looked like us,” Warriors coach Steve Kerr said.

The Warriors got a terrifi c all-around game from Curry, who scored 31 points, hit seven of his 11 3-point attempts and added six assists and fi ve rebounds.

The Clippers (4-2) were the last team in the NBA to lose a game, but dropped their second straight despite 19 points from Danilo Gallinari and 17 from Lou Williams.

The last time the Clippers defeated the Warriors was Christmas Day in 2014.

“I don’t think they get enough credit defensively. It’s amazing,” said Clippers coach Doc Rivers. “Whenever we talk about Golden State, we only talk about their offense. And I think their defense is what sets them apart.”

Though the Clippers try to run their offense through Blake Griffi n, the power forward was quickly doubled whenever he touched the ball down low and struggled to get his shot off.

He fi nished with 16 points on four of 10 shooting.

“They came pretty early,” Grif-fi n said. “Some teams wait for the fi rst dribble, some teams wait

Curry, Warriors blow past Clippers

until you have a foot outside the lane. They doubled pretty early and pretty consistently through-out the game.”

The Warriors had 37 assists on the night to 12 turnovers. They outrebounded Los Ange-les 46-35 and outshot them, if only 89-86.

“Our whole thing is, if we get more fi eld goal attempts than our opponent, there’s a chance we’re going to win,” Kerr said. “But we haven’t been doing that. We came in averaging nine fewer attempts.”

In addition to Curry, the War-riors got 19 points and seven rebounds from Kevin Durant, 16 points and nine rebounds from Draymond Green and 15 points and six assists from Klay Thompson.

“Our defensive effort really got us to where we wanted to be,” Curry said.

“The coach gave us a challenge before the game to just try and win the possession and fi eld-goal game. Throughout the course of the game, that was the key. We played Warriors basketball and

now we have to sustain it.”Clippers had entered game

holding opponents to a league-low 92.4 points per game and a 40.4 fi eld goal percentage shoot-ing (second).

On Monday, however, it was the Golden State defense that dominated.

While the Warriors were shooting 58.4 percent from the fi eld, they were holding the Clip-pers to 45.3 percent.

“Defensively, they had a fi eld day,” Rivers said.

(SD-Agencies)

Golden State Warriors guard Stephen Curry (R) moves to the basket against Los Angeles Clippers forward Blake Griffi n during the fi rst half at Staples Center in Los Angeles on Monday. SD-Agencies