[attach id=536932 size="medium"]Shawn Barber... no doping violation.[/attach]
Doping: Canadian world champion pole vaulter Shawn Barber was at the Rio Olympics despite earlier testing positive for cocaine but the decision to allow him to compete was the right one, Athletics Canada said. The Sport Dispute Resolution Centre of Canada’s ruling was released yesterday and said Barber inadvertently ingested the banned substance during a sexual en-counter the night before the Canadian trials in July with a woman who had taken cocaine. Barber had faced a four-year ban but the Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport ruled him to be at no fault or negligence for an anti-doping rule violation.
Athletics: Russian high jumper Anna Chicherova was officially stripped of her 2008 Beijing Olympics bronze medal after she tested positive for banned substances in re-tests of samples, the International Olympic Committee said. Chicherova, who won gold in the high jump at the 2012 Olympics, is among several athletes to have been stripped of their Olympic medals following re-tests of samples from the 2008 and 2012 Olympics. Fellow Russian Elena Slesa-renko, a gold medallist at the 2004 Athens Games, finished fourth in the competition in China.
Golf: Jason Day has been forced to withdraw from the World Cup of Golf and Australian Open next month due to a lingering back injury, the world number one has said. Day had been scheduled to play the Australian Open at the Royal Sydney Golf Club from Nov. 17-20, then partner world number six Adam Scott in the World Cup tournament at Melbourne’s Kingston Heath from Nov. 23-27. Day and Scott won the last World Cup event in 2013, which was also held in Melbourne, with Day clinching the individual title, but the 28-year-old was told to rest completely until next season after tearing a ligament in his back.
Rugby Union: England should avoid intense training sessions following club games as it risks the welfare of the players, Premiership Rugby said. England’s players were involved in an intensive three-day training camp in Brighton earlier this week with Eddie Jones, which resulted in Anthony Watson and Sam Jones being injured and in doubt for next month’s test matches against South Africa, Fiji, Argentina and Australia. “In the interests of player welfare, Premiership Rugby believes that England should not be doing full training sessions straight after a Premiership weekend,” a statement said.
Snooker: In form potters Judd Trump and Mark Selby will go head to head in the semi-finals of the European Masters in Romania. Both recorded superb 4-0 wins yesterday to set up a clash this afternoon, with first to six frames to go through to tomorrow’s final to contest the €75,000 top prize at the new world ranking event. Trump whitewashed Scotland’s John Higgins to reach his first semi-final of the season. World champion Selby saw off Alfie Burden with top runs of 84, 136 and 102.
Other QFs: O’Sullivan bt Davis 4-1; Robertson bt McGill 4-2.