Harrington for Open in Ireland
Padraig Harrington called for the British Open to return to his native Ireland after becoming the first Irishman for 60 years to win a major. The 35-year-old Dubliner clinched one of the most exciting Opens in recent years, beating Spaniard Sergio Garcia in a play-off. Nothing would give him greater pleasure than contesting the Open in Ireland, he told Reuters on Sunday.
Bopanna-Qureshi triumph
Third-seeded pair of Rohan Bopanna and Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi clinched a hard-fought doubles title at the USD 25,000 ATP Challenger in Manchester, England, reports PTI from New Delhi.
The Indo-Pak team defeated Jesse Huta Galung of the Netherlands and Michael Ryderstedt of Sweden 4-6, 6-3, 10-5 in the final of the grasscourt event on Sunday.
This is Bopanna’s second doubles title in the Challenger Series this year, the previous being at Dublin, Ireland, with Adam Feeney earlier this month while for Qureshi, it is his maiden Challenger title.
Sipaeya fails to make main draw
Sunil Kumar Sipaeya went down figthing to second seeded Santiago Giraldo 2-6, 6-4, 4-6 in the second round of qualifying action in the men’s singles event of the $525,000 Indianapolis Open at the Indianapolis Tennis Center, reports UNI from New Delhi.
Sipaeya had scored an impressive 6-2, 4-6, 6-3 victory over Troy Hahn of the United States in the first round. Indian’s Mahesh Bhupati will partner Paul Hanley of Australia in the main draw of the doubles.
India down   Agueda
Skipper Baichung Bhutia scored two second half goals to lead India to a convincing 3-0 victory over Portuguese third division side Recreativo Agueda in their second game of the tour of Portugal, reports UNI from New Delhi.
India led 1-0 at the break through  Manjit Singh’s goal in the 27th minute and then Bhutia added two more in the 63rd and 86th minutes, in the match played at Lisbon on Sunday.
India had drawn 1-1 with second division side Odivelas FC in their first game and will now take on another third division side AC Marinhense on July 26.
Indian team for Asian meet
The Indian team to participate in the 24th FIBA Asian Basketball Championship Cup at Tokushima (Japan) from July 28 to August 5 will leave from New Delhi on July 25, reports UNI.
India are placed in Group ‘C’ with Qatar, Kazakhstan and Indonesia. Karnataka Basketball Association secretary K Govindraj will be the chef de mission and manager.
Team: Sanjay Raj, Sambaji Kadam, Roshan, Rizyauddin, Muralikrishna, Jayram, Shivakumar, Dilwar Singh, Lokesh Yadav, Trideep Rai, Anoop, Jagadeep. Chief coach: Aleksandar Bucan. Coach: Mohinder Singh Rathore. Chef de mission-cum-manager: K Govindaraj.
Sania climbs to 35th spot
Sania Mirza’s fine run at Cincinnati propelled her three places up to 35th in the WTA’s latest singles rankings issued on Monday, reports PTI from New Delhi.
The Indian star made her first semi-final appearance at Cincinnati but went down fighting against top seed Anna Chakvetadze of Russia, who moved one place up to be at seventh spot after the title win. In the doubles rankings, Sania gained two places to climb to 36th.
India down Bangladesh
India recorded their second straight win in the under-19 triangular limited-over series in Sri Lanka by outclassing Bangladesh by 97 runs at Colombo’s Sara stadium, reports PTI from Mumbai.
Having comprehensively beaten hosts Lanka in their opening tie, India continued their good work by piling on 226 for seven after being put in to bat by Bangladesh and then restricting their rivals to 129 for five in a match cut to 40-overs-a-side on Sunday.
Brief scores: India: 226/7 in 40 overs (Manish Pandey 47, Tanmay Srivastava 56, Ravindra Jadeja 43 n.o., Pradeep Sangwan 32; R Hussain 2-42) bt Bangladesh: 129/5 in 40 overs (M Hasan 37 n.o.; Aman Preet Singh 2-25).