Golf: Luke Donald, the PGA Championship winner in 2011 and 2012, missed the cut after returning a level-par 72 for a six-over total of 150 at Wentworth on Friday. The real damage was done in the opening round when the world no.6 collapsed to a six-over 78 in cold, damp conditions at the European Tour’s flagship event. The weather was no better for the second round and Donald suffered an early blow when he took a double-bogey five at the second. Donald said the eight-degree temperatures and the 15-mph winds were a factor in his performance but also acknowledged that he had played poorly.
Basket, NBA: Indiana Pacers threw open the NBA Eastern Conference finals on Friday, upsetting Miami Heat with a 97-93 victory to level the best-of-seven series at 1-1. LeBron James scored 36 points for Miami but gave up two crucial turnovers down the stretch that cost the Heat, while Roy Hibbert top-scored for the Pacers with 29 points and Paul George added 22 and produced some outstanding defensive work. “That was a heck of a basketball game wasn’t it?” said Pacers head coach Frank Vogel, whose team never looked intimidated in either of the opening games on the defending champions’ home court.
Cricket: Mumbai Police apprehended a key official of the Indian Premier League’s (IPL) Chennai franchise late on Friday in connection with a spot-fixing scandal that has also led to the arrest of three cricketers. Former India test bowler Shanthakumaran Sreesanth and two other local cricketers were arrested last week on suspicion of taking money to concede a fixed number of runs and police have intensified investigations to discover the extent of the scandal. Gurunath Meiyap-pan, son-in-law of Indian cricket board (BCCI) president N Srinivasan, was arrested after being quizzed for hours by Mumbai Police probing illegal betting on the Twenty20 league.
Australian rules: A teenage girl’s abusive slur aimed at Australian Rules Football player Adam Goodes has jolted the state of Victoria into establishing programmes that will educate children on racism. The 33-year-old Sydney Swans player, who is of Indigenous Australian heritage, was called an “ape” by the 13-year-old spectator at Friday’s AFL game against Collingwood at the MCG in Melbourne. Goodes told a news conference he was “gutted” by the remark but added that the girl, who was escorted out of the stadium following the incident, had called him to apologise. Victorian premier Denis Napthine said he was disgusted by the incident which he termed as “totally unacceptable”.
Cycling: Giro d’Italia leader Vincenzo Nibali rode through a snowstorm to claim his second stage win in the race yesterday to stand on the verge of overall victory with one stage remaining. The Italian broke away with 2.5 kilometres to go on the race’s last summit finish at Tre Cime di Lavaredo, overtaking earlier breakaways to finish with around 17 seconds advantage over Colombian Fabio Duarte. Rigoberto Uran, also of Colombia, was third. With one stage to go, Nibali leads overall by around 4 minutes and 43 seconds on Uran, with Cadel Evans, of Australia, who suffered badly in the final kilometres of the snow-blasted final climb, dropping to third on general classification.