Category: Athletic

 

Major league baseball pitcher Cristian Javier and the Houston Astros bullpen combined on just the second no-hitter in World Series history, silencing a booming lineup and boisterous ballpark as the Astros defeated the Philadelphia Phillies 5-0 Wednesday night to even the matchup at two games each.

The only previous no-hitter in the World Series was a perfect game by Don Larsen of the New York Yankees against the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1956.

Javier and three relief pitchers weren’t perfect, but they were close. Plus, they’d done this before: Javier, the starter in a combined no-hitter against the New York Yankees in June, was pulled with a no-hitter in progress after 97 pitches this time.

Bryan Abreu, Rafael Montero and Ryan Pressly each followed with a hitless inning, ensuring this year’s championship will be decided this weekend back at Minute Maid Park.

The quartet of pitchers posed with catcher Christian Vazquez near the visiting dugout moments after the game, each putting a hand on the game ball for a photo.

Game 5 is on Thursday night in Philly. Astros ace Justin Verlander will again chase that elusive first World Series win when he faces Noah Syndergaard.

They can only hope to pitch as well as Javier.

By the time the 25-year-old righty from the Dominican Republic exited, the only hit maker on the Philadelphia side who showed up on the scoreboard was rocker Bruce Springsteen, pictured surrounded by Phillies fans.

And a few innings later, as fans started leaving Citizens Bank Park, there actually were boos for postseason star Bryce Harper and the Phillies. First lady Jill Biden, a noted Phillies fan, was among those in the crowd of 45,693 who had little to shout about.

Alex Bregman delivered the hit Houston desperately needed, a two-run double in a five-run fifth inning, and that was plenty for the Astros.

Completely in charge, Javier struck out nine, walked two and hardly allowed any loud contact. He tamed a club that had been 6-0 at home this postseason while hitting 17 home runs, including a Series record-tying five in a 7-0 romp in Game 3.

Very still on the mound, Javier carved his own quiet spot in the middle of the Phillies’ storm. Backing off onto the grass, straightening his hat, rubbing the ball, taking deep breaths, he proceeded at his own pace.

Next year, Javier won’t be able to work quite this way. Major League Baseball is instituting a pitch clock _ 15 seconds to throw with the bases empty, 20 with someone on base _ and Javier often surpassed those limits on this evening, drawing boos from a crowd eager for action.

Anyhow, it worked at the start.

When Javier held the Phillies scoreless through the first three innings, it was no small feat. No visiting pitcher had done that during the postseason in this bouncing ballpark.

In Javier’s last start, he shut out the Yankees on one hit in 5 1/3 innings in the Bronx during the AL Championship Series.

This performance by Javier came a year after Atlanta’s Ian Anderson was taken out after pitching five hitless innings against Houston.

 

 

Source: Voice of America

BAKU, The Formula 1 Azerbaijan Grand Prix 2022 continues, Trend reports.

The third practice session will take place at 15:00-16:00 (GMT+4) on June 11. The qualifying races are scheduled to be held at 18:00-19:00 (GMT+4).

The six kilometer-long Baku track has three high-speed sections, 20 turns, and top speed of 360 kilometers per hour. As many as 10 teams are competing in the races.

The first Formula One Grand Prix held in Azerbaijan was the 2016 European Grand Prix, which took place at the Baku City Circuit.

A year later, in 2017, the same venue hosted the first Azerbaijan Grand Prix. The race was one of five races to be held on a street circuit during the 2017 Formula One season, along with the Singapore, Monaco, Australian and Canadian Grands Prix. The first Azerbaijan Grand Prix winner was Daniel Ricciardo of Red Bull.

Source: Trend News Agency

BAKU, The families of Azerbaijani martyrs and the country’s veterans of the second Karabakh war are among the honored guests of the Formula 1 Azerbaijan Grand Prix, taking place in Baku, after a two-year hiatus, Trend reports.

The Formula 1 Azerbaijan Grand Prix is being held on June 10-12, with some 30,000 people watching the races live in Baku.

In total, 10 teams are competing in the races.

On June 10 two practice sessions were held as part of the grandiose racing event.

The first Formula One Grand Prix held in Azerbaijan was the 2016 European Grand Prix, which took place at the Baku City Circuit.

A year later, in 2017, the same venue hosted the first Azerbaijan Grand Prix. The race was one of five races to be held on a street circuit during the 2017 Formula One season, along with the Singapore, Monaco, Australian and Canadian Grands Prix. The first Azerbaijan Grand Prix winner was Daniel Ricciardo of Red Bull.

Source: Trend News Agency

NAIROBI — Kenya’s Rift Valley town of Iten is popular as a training base for long distance runners.

However, the town has recently seen the killing of two elite female runners — Agnes Tirop in October and Damaris Mutua earlier this month. That’s raising concerns about violence against women in Kenya’s sports.

An August 2021 report by Equality Now, a human rights organization that works to protect and promote the rights of women and girls worldwide, shows that over 40% of women in Kenya are likely to face gender-based violence in their lifetimes.

Some of that violence is perpetrated by the womens’ partners.

Wairimu Munyinyi is the executive director of the Coalition on Violence Against Women.

She said female athletes, even prominent ones, are not immune to attacks.

“There is an assumption that athletes who have an international exposure have a lot of money at their disposal,” Munyinyi said. “That has made them targets of violence in the past.”

Munyinyi said all women need to be educated about the risk of gender-based violence.

“As a country we still need to better equip our women and girls with the awareness and ability to stay out of toxic relationships that are potentially harmful to them,” Munyinyi said.

Mutua and Tirop were among Kenya’s top distance runners. In 2010, Mutua won a bronze medal at the inaugural Youth Olympic Games in Singapore. Tirop won a bronze medal in the 5,000 meters at the Tokyo Olympics last year.

Detectives said Thursday that a post-mortem report found Mutua was strangled to death.

Andolo Munga, director of criminal investigations in Keiyo North, where the crime was allegedly committed, said that samples were taken “from the stomach content which will reveal if there were some chemicals administered to the body.”

Police named Mutua’s Ethiopian boyfriend as a suspect in the case and are conducting a search for him.

Source: Voice of America

Tickets for the Formula 1 Singapore Grand Prix 2022 will be on sale to the public from April 13 at 10am by race promoter Singapore GP Pte Ltd.

After a two-year hiatus, Singapore GP said, Asia’s biggest motorsport and entertainment extravaganza is back on track at the Marina Bay Street Circuit from Sept 30 to Oct 2.

In its website Monday, Singapore GP said the tickets can select from a variety of three-day grandstand offerings (S$298 to S$1,288) and combination packages (S$698 to S$1,088).

It will enable them to experience the exciting race action and off-track entertainment from different parts of the Circuit Park over the race weekend, it added.

It noted that hospitality suites will provide a new level of comfort as well as viewing opportunities with a slew of enhancements lined-up for this year.

Patrons, Singapore GP said, can choose to network or host guests at the exclusive Formula 1 Paddock Club, Sky Suite, Twenty3, The Green Room, and Lounge@Turn 3.

Meanwhile, a full entertainment line-up for the Formula 1 Singapore Grand Prix 2022 will be released in the coming weeks, it said.

Singapore GP said it is working with the Singapore government to ensure the event adheres to prevailing safe management measures.

Tickets can be purchased via the official website www.singaporegp.sg, the Singapore GP Ticketing Hotline +65 6229 7777 or via authorised ticketing partners.

With the competition heating up between Red Bull Racing’s Max Verstappen and Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc this season, fans at the home of Formula 1 night racing will be in for a treat, said the promoter.

It added that fans will also get to see Alfa Romeo’s Zhou Guanyu, Alpha Tauri’s Yuki Tsunoda, Haas’ Mick Schumacher, and Williams’ Nicholas Latifi racing on the streets of Singapore for the very first time.

The 5.063km long track will host the 17th round of the Formula 1 championship.

Source: NAM News Network

The European Union plans to take the unprecedented step of funding weapons purchases for Ukraine, EU officials said on Feb. 27 as the bloc announced a raft of new sanctions in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The EU’s plan to fund weapons purchases will use millions of euros to help buy air-defense systems, anti-tank weapons, ammunition and other military equipment for Ukraine’s armed forces. It would also supply things like fuel, protective gear, helmets and first-aid kits.

“For the first time ever, the European Union will finance the purchase and delivery of weapons and other equipment to a country that is under attack,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said of the weapons purchases, calling it a “watershed moment.”

Von der Leyen expects the measure to be endorsed by EU leaders along with other significant moves — a ban on pro-Kremlin media outlets RT and Sputnik, the closure of EU airspace to Russian planes, and sanctions against Belarus.

She said RT and Sputnik are part of the “Kremlin’s media machine,” and the EU is “developing tools to ban their toxic and harmful disinformation in Europe,” von der Leyen said.

They will “no longer be able to spread their lies to justify Putin’s war and to sow division in our union,” von der Leyen said.

The closure of the EU’s airspace comes after many individual European countries along with Britain and Canada announced they would ban Russian planes. The EU airspace ban will prohibit flights into or over the EU by “every Russian plane — and that includes the private jets of oligarchs,” von der Leyen said.

The EU also will hit Russian ally Belarus with sanctions for facilitating the invasion. The regime of Belarusian strongman Alyaksandr Lukashenka had been “complicit in the vicious attack against Ukraine,” von der Leyen said.

New restrictive measures will hit Belarus’s most important sectors, including tobacco, wood, cement, iron and steel.

The measures come on top of EU sanctions announced Feb. 26, including cutting some Russian banks from the SWIFT interbank messaging network, banning all transactions with Russia’s central bank, and added restrictions on Russian oligarchs.

The measures also follow Germany’s decision to commit 100 billion euros ($113 billion) to a special armed forces fund and to keep its defense spending above 2% of GDP from now on.

Source: Voice of America

Chinese tennis player Peng Shuai is again denying that she had accused a former Communist Party official of sexually assaulting her in a social media post late last year.

L’Equipe, a French daily sports newspaper, published an interview it conducted with Peng in its Monday edition.

“I never said anyone had sexually assaulted me in any way,” Peng is quoted in the interview after she is asked directly if she actually wrote the post on her account on China’s Weibo social media platform.

In the November 2 post, Peng, a former Olympian who won titles at Wimbledon and the French Open, said former Vice Premier Zhang Gaoli coerced her into sex before it evolved into an on-off consensual relationship. Her post was quickly deleted and she vanished from public view for several days. She eventually appeared at a tennis event and spoke by video with Thomas Bach, president of the International Olympic Committee president, during which she said she was safe.

Her public absence sparked concern among some of the world’s top tennis players, including Naomi Osaka, Serena Williams, Billie Jean King and Novak Djokovic, and the Women’s Tennis Association suspended all of its sponsored tournaments in mainland China and Hong Kong.

Peng told L’Equipe the initial post had caused a huge “misunderstanding” and that she did not want it to attract any more attention, and insisted that she had deleted it herself “because I wanted to.” She also explained that her “disappearance” was simply due to her being unable to respond “to so many messages.” Peng said her personal life since the controversy surfaced had been uneventful, and stressed that her private life and personal problems should not be mixed with sports and politics.

Peng also told the newspaper she was retiring from tennis.

She also said she had dinner with IOC President Bach Saturday, which the IOC confirmed in a separate statement Monday.

Bach told the Reuters news agency when asked about Peng’s interview that any communication “is up to her, it is her life, it is her story.”

The newspaper said it submitted the questions to Peng in advance and conducted the interview in Chinese. Wang Kang, the chief of staff of the Chinese Olympic Committee, accompanied Peng during the interview and translated her answers for the reporter.

WTA Chairman and CEO Steve Simon called for an open investigation into Peng’s initial accusations after a Chinese state-run media outlet released a statement it said was an email Peng had sent to Simon in which she denied the allegations and insisted she was not missing or unsafe, but just “resting at home.”

Peng issued a similar denial back in December during a virtual interview that was posted on the website of the Singapore-based Chinese-language newspaper Lianhe Zaobao.

Source: Voice of America