Johansson: UEFA president Lennart Johansson has quit as chairman of Swedish side AIK along with the entire board following the club's relegation. The nine-man board took the decision to go after a meeting on Sunday. The club was relegated in November. AIK has been in decline in recent years. The team won the last of their 10 league championships in 1998. Johansson said one of the reasons for the club's problems was that he could not devote enough time to the job.
Roy Keane: Manchester United captain Roy Keane has hinted that he could delay his retirement just days after insisting he would quit the sport at the end of next season. The 33-year-old Ireland midfielder said yesterday he had discussed his future with United manager Alex Ferguson and his coaching staff over the weekend. "If this time next year my body is holding up and my hip is okay, and the knee, and Alex Ferguson and Carlos Queiroz and Micky Phelan probably feel I can still contribute to the team, then who knows," Keane told the BBC yesterday.
Ref Banned: The referee approached by Robert Hoyzer, the official at the centre of Germany's match-fixing scandal, has been removed from future fixtures, the German football association (DFB) confirmed yesterday. Torsten Koop, who has been in charge of Bundesliga matches since 1996, told the DFB last Thursday that Hoyzer tried to recruit him at a referees' meeting in January and that he had dismissed the approach. The ruling body decided that Koop's failure to come forward soon enough meant he should be taken off future matches, though he remains on the DFB's list of approved referees.
Ranieri: Valencia president Juan Bautista Soler has said he will not discuss the future of coach Claudio Ranieri until the end of the season. The champions' 2-1 home defeat by Deportivo on Saturday extended their winless run to five games and left them fourth in the Primera Liga table, 16 points behind leaders Barcelona. "In principle the coach's job is not under threat. I have said that on June 30 we will evaluate the season as a whole and take any decisions then, in the best interests of the club," Soler said.
French Cup: Draw for the French Cup third round (Roman numbers denote division of non-Ligue 1 clubs): Albi (IV) vs Sochaux; Nimes (III) vs Nice; Sedan (II) vs Quevilly (IV); Stade Rennes vs Monaco; Lille vs Grenoble (II); Boulogne-sur-Mer (IV) vs Nantes; AJ Auxerre vs PSG; Clermont Foot (II) vs Lyon. Matches to be played on March 1 and 2.
Robinho: Santos forward Robinho scored twice and set up the other goal as his side thumped big-spending Corinthians 3-0 in the Paulista championship on Sunday. The match had been billed as a personal battle between Robinho and Argentina forward Carlos Tevez, signed by Corinthians for a South American record fee of $18 million in December.
In Italy: Serie B - Treviso vs Ascoli 1-1.
¤ England's defeat by France combined with Ireland's victory over Scotland at the weekend has seen the world champions slip to sixth in the world rugby rankings, their lowest position since the system was introduced in 2003. England were the top-ranked team when the International Rugby Board started issuing official rankings in October 2003 and confirmed their status a month later by winning the World Cup in Australia. Since then, though, they have lost eight of their 13 games.
Leading IRB rankings: 1. New Zealand; 2. Australia; 3. S. Africa; 4. France; 5. Ireland; 6. England; 7. Wales; 8. Argentina; 9. Fiji; 10. Scotland.
¤ Ian Thorpe will skip this year's world swimming championships in Montreal in an attempt to peak for the 2008 Beijing Olympics, his coach Tracey Menzies said yesterday. Menzies said Thorpe wanted to take a year off competition to avoid burn-out. Thorpe, 22, has been in the Australian senior team since he was 14 but took a long break after last year's Athens Olympics where he won four medals, including gold in the 200 and 400 metres freestyle.
¤ Former world number one Kim Clijsters makes her tennis comeback from a serious wrist injury at the Antwerp Diamond Games this week. Clijsters last played in early October when she retired in the second set of a match against Russia's Elena Bovina. That tournament in Belgium had been her first for five months. Clijsters, 21, will play Croatia's Jelena Kostanic in the first round of the $585,000 Antwerp tournament today, her first on-court appearance since splitting from fiance Lleyton Hewitt.
¤ World number three Andy Roddick successfully defended his San Jose Open tennis title by destroying unseeded Frenchman Cyril Saulnier 6-0 6-4 in the final on Sunday. The top-seeded American never faced a break point as he controlled the match with his mighty serving, huge forehand and aggressive returns.