Snooker: Shanghai Masters champion Mark Selby crashed out in the first round after he lost 5-1 to Jamie Cope yesterday. It was the world no.1’s second opening-round exit in a row. Cope won the opening frame before Selby levelled with a break of 49. Cope then tcleared from green to black to take the third frame and added the fourth after potting a final black. The fifth frame saw Selby miss a long yellow with Cope taking advan-tage to clear up and sealed the win with a 71 in the next.
Tennis: Top seed Caroline Wozniacki eased into the second round of the KDB Korea Open as she saw off Arantxa Rus in straight sets in Seoul. Wozniacki needed a little over an hour to beat Rus 6-1 6-2. Wozniacki will now face French qualifier Caroline Garcia in the second round.
Rugby Union: Controversial Australian flyhalf Quade Cooper was yesterday ruled out of the remainder of the southern hemisphere Rugby Championship with damage to his recently reconstructed knee. Rugby officials said Cooper, 24, would miss Australia’s final fixtures against Argentina and the Springboks after scans revealed a “small chip of arti-cular cartilage in his right knee which will need to be attended to.” Cooper had reconstructive surgery to the troubled knee after a season-ending injury at last year’s Rugby World Cup in New Zealand.
Cycling: Welsh rider Elinor Barker yesterday won the women’s junior time-trial gold at the world road championships in The Nether-lands. Barker, the silver medallist last year and European pursuit champion this summer, finished 35 seconds ahead of Denmark’s Cecilie Ludwig with Dutch rider Demi Di Jong third at 1min 03sec after the 15.6km race. The 18-year-old becomes the first British rider to win gold in this event since former Olympic champion Nicole Cooke in 2001.
Cricket: Hosts Sri Lanka thrashed Zimbabwe by 82 runs in the opening match of the World Twenty20 at Mahinda Rajapaksa Stadium in Hambantota yesterday. Ajantha Mendis recorded the best ever intern-ational Twenty20 figures of 6-8 as Zimbabwe were shot out for 100 in 17.3 overs, after Kumara Sangakkara (44) and Jeevan Mendis (43 not out) had anchored Sri Lanka’s 182-4 in 20 overs.
Badminton: China has withdrawn all its players from this week’s Japan Open, the Badminton World Federation said yesterday, amid worsening ties between Beijing and Tokyo over a territorial row. The Japan Open began yesterday and ends on Sunday with the BWF re-drawing the men’s singles, women’s singles and men’s doubles ties. China and Japan are involved in an escalating territorial dispute over the Diaoyu islands, a small island chain in the East China Sea.