Sporting briefs

Totti: Roma captain Francesco Totti looks on track to achieve his aim of recovering from a thigh muscle injury by the end of January after the club said that he returned to training yesterday. Italian media reported that the forward ran a few laps of the pitch with his personal fitness trainer. When Totti suffered the injury last month it was feared that he risked missing Roma's Champions League last-16 first-leg match at Arsenal on Feb. 24.

McAvennie: Former Scotland international footballer Frank McAvennie was given a suspended four-month jail sentence yesterday after admitting fighting outside a bar on the Isle of Man. McAvennie, 49, who played as a striker for Celtic and West Ham and appeared five times for Scotland, had headbutted a man outside a wine bar in the island's capital Douglas last July.

Africa Award: The African Footballer of the Year announcement has been postponed to Feb. 10 in Lagos. The CAF, who had already set two previous dates for the winner, most recently scheduled the annual awards function for Dakar on Jan. 23. They said the change was an attempt to secure the presence of all five nominated players led by former winner Didier Drogba of the Ivory Coast.

Japan: Japan coach Takeshi Okada has issued a ban on three of his players from attending their "coming-of-age" ceremony yesterday. Okada refused to release the trio from training for the traditional ceremony for those who have reached 20 - the mark of adulthood in Japan and a day observed with a national holiday. Cerezo Osaka's Takashi Inui and Shinji Kagawa and Oita Trinita midfielder Mu Kanazaki have all been told they cannot leave Japan's training camp in Kyushu.

In China: Li Weifeng, whose suspension last year prompted the withdrawal of Wuhan from the Chinese Super League (CSL), is set to join South Korea's Suwon Blue Wings on loan. The 30-year-old defender's eight-match ban for rough play in October resulted in thousands of fans marching through Wuhan in protest and his club pulling out of the CSL.

In England: League One - MK Dons vs Colchester 1-1; Oldham vs Hartlepool 2-1.

In Italy: Serie B - Pisa vs Rimini 1-3. Serie C1 (A) - Lecco vs Pro Patria pp.

MFA Div. Three: Sirens vs Fgura 2-1; Żejtun vs Pembroke 3-2.

Tennis: Former world no.1 Marat Safin has withdrawn from the invitational Kooyong Classic with a shoulder injury, organisers said. Safin was replaced in the eight-man field for the Melbourne contest by Croatia's Ivan Ljubicic. Roger Federer, who missed last year's event due to what later transpired to be glandular fever, headlines the field.

Rugby: A player from Tonga died of a heart attack after collapsing during a game in France. Feao Latu, 28, playing in the back row for visiting side Perigueux, collapsed suddenly 17 minutes into the regional league game and was taken to hospital where doctors failed to revive him, the club said.

Basketball: The Boston Celtics found a cure for their recent woes in holding off the Toronto Raptors 94-88 behind the hot shooting of Ray Allen. The Celtics guard hit his initial six three-pointers, spurring the Atlantic Division leaders to their first win in five games. He finished with 36 points, making eight of 10 shots behind the arc.

Formula One: Ferrari have all but ruled out supplying engines to whoever takes over Honda, team boss Stefano Domenicali said. "The chance of us supplying engines to Honda is close to zero," Domenicali told reporters. Ferrari had said earlier this month that they would be prepared to supply engines to any new owners but no deal was in place.

Six Nations: Prop Andrea Lo Cicero has been left out of Italy's pre-Six Nations training camp in Rome at the end of this month. Lo Cicero, who has 78 caps and has taken part in all of the Azzurri's Six Nations campaigns up to now, was omitted along with hooker Carlo Festuccia.

Snooker: Ronnie O'Sullivan, playing with a new cue after snapping his old model last week, edged a 6-5 win over Joe Perry at the Masters. Though O'Sullivan was lucky to survive, Perry missing an easy pink when poised to win 6-4, he is surely the only player who could win a match against a top-class opponent when playing with a cue which he had barely even practised with. "I'd only played with it for an hour," he said.