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Thursday June 21, 2018

CHINESE sprinter Xie Zhenye dashed to a 9.97-second win-ning mark in the men’s 100-meter event at the Meeting de Montreuil in Paris on Tuesday, cutting 0.07s off his personal best while breaking the national record by 0.02s.

The 24-year-old Xie, the 200m gold medalist at the 2010 Youth Olympics and a two-time 60m fourth-place fi n-isher at the IAAF World Indoor Championships, outraced Akani Simbine of South Africa to notch his landmark victory. Simbine fi nished second in 10.04s.

Xie’s previous career best was achieved last year at the Chinese National Games when he regis-tered a winning time of 10.04s. He also beat the national record of 9.99s, set by the country’s star sprinter Su Bingtian at the Eugene leg of the 2015 Diamond League, and has become the second Chinese to dip under the 10-second barrier.

Xie also set the 200m national record last month in Japan. Now he has both the 100m and 200m national record to his name.

(Xinhua)

TWO wins, eight goals and almost certainly a place in the knockout stage for fi rst time since the Soviet era.

Russia is enjoying quite the party at its own World Cup — and not even the highly anticipated return of Mohamed Salah could slow it down Tuesday.

Confounding grim pre-tour-nament predictions, the host nation earned a second straight emphatic victory to start the group stage by beating Egypt 3-1. Having already routed Saudi Arabia 5-0, Russia is likely to be celebrating a spot in the round of 16 and few could have seen that happening so soon.

“It’s a group of solidarity and cohesion,” said Russia coach Stanislav Cherchesov, who whipped up the crowd by waving his arms in delight on the fi eld after the fi nal whistle. “You men-tion diffi culties, problems. We don’t like these words. We don’t have this in our vocabulary. We had some issues and we dealt with it.”

With a string of pre-tourna-ment injuries that ravaged the defense and a run of seven winless games heading into the tournament, the Russians started the World Cup as the lowest-ranked team at the tour-nament at No. 70, but they aren’t playing like it.

Three goals in a 15-minute span early in the second half did the damage against Egypt, with Ahmed Fathi poking the

ball into his own net — the fi fth own-goal of the tournament — to put Russia ahead in the 47th minute. Denis Cheryshev, with his third goal of the World Cup, and striker Artyom Dzyuba then scored in quick succession before Salah won and converted a consolation penalty in his fi rst game back after 3 1/2 weeks out with a shoulder injury.

Salah needed to produce the type of performance he delivered nearly every week for Liverpool this season, when he scored 44 goals in 51 games, but it was clear from the start that he was staying out of anything too physi-cal on his return from damaged ligaments in his left shoulder sustained in the Champions League fi nal.

Aside from his goal, Salah was quiet in his fi rst ever match at a World Cup, much to the dismay of the Egypt fans in the stadium who roared every time their star player’s face fl ashed up on the big screen and when his name was announced before kickoff. Not to mention the 90 million Egyptians back home.

“I was told by the medical staff that he was fi t, feeling good,” Egypt coach Hector Cuper said. “He couldn’t prepare with us in the training camp, he had to train alone. Maybe that meant his total physical ability was reduced.”

Egypt’s fi rst World Cup in 28 years could be over in barely fi ve days, while Russia’s place in the round of 16 will be assured if

Russia on brink of last 16 after winDENIS CHERYSHEV had been the odd man out in Russia’s team. Now he’s the breakout star, tied with Cris-tiano Ronaldo as the World Cup’s top scorer.

R a i s e d in Spain at the Real M a d r i d academy, he has used his slick technique and tactical awareness to score three goals as Russia won its fi rst two games at its home World Cup.

Not bad for a man who, before the tournament, had played only 33 minutes under Russia’s current coach and hadn’t started an international game since 2015. “Thank God that I could score three goals in two games, but my aim is just to help the team,” said Cheryshev, who plays as a winger for Villarreal.

Cheryshev is one of only two players in Russia’s squad who play for foreign clubs — the other is third-choice goalkeeper Vladimir Gabu-lov — and for a long time, it seemed like national team coaches overlooked him. He grew up outside the Russian system at Real Madrid, where his father was a youth coach.

(SD-Agencies)

Breakout star: Cheryshev

Uruguay wins or draws against the Saudis in a later match.

Those two scenarios would also eliminate Egypt.

The match between Russia and Uruguay in Samara on

Monday is likely to determine which teams fi nish in fi rst and second place in Group A, with Spain and Portugal likely lying in wait in the round of 16.

(SD-Agencies)

SENEGAL became the fi rst African team to win at this year’s World Cup, defeating Poland, 2-1, Tuesday on a fi rst-half own goal and a controversial second-half strike by Mbaye Niang.

Senegal, back in the tourna-ment for the fi rst time since 2002, went ahead in the 37th minute when Thiago Cionek’s

attempted block of Idrissa Gueye’s shot wrong-footed goal-keeper Wojciech Szczesny.

Niang, who had returned to the fi eld from treatment, later beat Szczesny to a backpass and had an open net when he doubled the lead in the 60th.

Grzegorz Krychowiak, whose backpass led to Senegal’s second

goal, headed in a free kick in the 86th minute to end Poland’s streak of fi ve straight scoreless World Cup openers. Both teams’ stars, Senegal’s Sadio Mane and Poland’s Robert Lewandowski, rarely threatened in debuts.

Senegal is tied for the group lead with Japan, which upset Colombia, 2-1, earlier. Senegal

will play Japan Sunday, when Poland meets Colombia.

Egypt, Morocco, Nigeria, and Tunisia have been outscored, 6-1, as African teams started 0-4.

Poland kept up its track record of dismal World Cup starts. It has four losses and three draws since beating Argentina in 1974.

(SD-Agencies)

COLOMBIA’S 2018 World Cup got off to just about the worst possible start Tuesday in a 2-1 loss to Japan.

The Colombians, widely considered Group H favorites, were a goal down and a man down after just fi ve minutes in their opener. Midfi elder Carlos Sanchez was shown the second-quickest red card in World Cup history for what referee Damir Skomina ruled a deliberate handball on a goalbound shot in the penalty area.

There was some confusion about why the incident justifi ed a red card. FIFA and soccer’s global legislative body have moved to avoid “double jeop-ardy” situations — penalizing a single foul with both a red card and a likely goal against. A recent rule change exempts players who make attempts to legally play the ball.

But a deliberate handball

doesn’t qualify, and therefore can warrant both a penalty and a red card. The laws of the game specify that “denying the oppos-ing team a goal or an obvious goal-scoring opportunity by deliberately handling the ball” is a red card offense.

So Sanchez’s right arm move-ment sent Japan to the spot. Shinji Kagawa stepped up, sent David Ospina the wrong way, and slotted home the penalty. Colombia was in a hole.

To make matters worse, Colombia was also without its best player, James Rodriguez, due to a calf injury. But another playmaking left-footed mid-fi elder stepped up in James’ absence.

Juan Quintero snuck a free kick under the jumping Japanese wall to equalize seven minutes before halftime.

Japanese players fumed about the foul call that led to the free

Xie becomes China’s fastest man

Xie Zhenye

Japan stuns Colombia

Denis Cheryshev

Senegal defeats Poland for fi rst African win at this World Cup

kick, and they probably had a point.

But fouls leading to free kicks outside the box aren’t reviewable by VAR. So Colombia went into halftime level and in the ascen-dance.

James then entered the game with a half-hour to go, and Los Cafeteros, even a man down,

seemed like the more likely winners.

Eighty-fi ve minutes of 10-on-11 soccer proved to be too much to overcome, however. Yuya Osako’s second-half header gave Japan a 2-1 victory.

The South Americans now face an uphill climb into the knockout rounds. (SD-Agencies)

Japan’s Yuya Osako (No. 15) celebrates scoring their second goal with teammates in Saransk, Russia, on Tuesday. SD-Agencies

Egypt’s Mohamed Salah (R) in action with Russia’s Denis Cheryshev during their match in Saint Petersburg, Russia, on Tuesday. SD-Agencies