Barca bemused by Ronnie blow

Barcelona remain in
the dark over Ronaldinho’s ‘medical problems’ after a scan revealed the
Brazilian has not suffered a specific injury.

 
Ronaldinho missed Barcelona’s 2-2 draw with Almeria on Sunday
and the playmaker only trained for six minutes on Monday before limping
off.

 
Barcelona manager Frank Rijkaard has announced the player is
injured, but scans have revealed no muscle or tendon damage [...]

Fergie focused on task in hand

Sir Alex Ferguson insists that he has not let his thoughts drift towards a showdown with Liverpool on Grand Slam Sunday.
The league leaders must first face struggling Bolton at Old Trafford on Wednesday, live on Sky Sports 1, and the Red Devils boss is currently focusing all of his attention on the Trotters.
The weekend fixture [...]

Chelsea deny Grant reports

Chelsea have rejected newspaper reports that manager Avram Grant has received death threats.
The Sun claimed that ‘a package containing vile racist threats and a suspect white powder’ had been sent to the club’s training ground on Monday.
The reports suggest it was the second time that Grant had been targeted following claims of a similar incident [...]

Van Persie demands silverware

Robin van Persie has urged his Arsenal team-mates not to throw away their hard work so far this season.
The Gunners have slipped off the top of the Premier League table after a run of four successive draws.
However, they have progressed to the quarter-finals of the UEFA Champions League and van Persie believes they are still [...]

Kumble keen on Kirsten

India captain Anil Kumble says Gary Kirsten will be a great help as their new coach when he takes up his role for the series against his own nation South Africa.
The Proteas play three Tests in India and former South Africa batsman Kirsten will be able to use his knowledge of his own country to [...]

Ganguly eyes Sachin success

 
Former India captain Sourav Ganguly wants to emulate the recent one-day success of team-mate Sachin Tendulkar and prove his worth in the shorter form of the game.
Tendulkar inspired India to a brilliant Commonwealth Bank Series win in Australia, scintillating knocks of 117 and 91 in the opening two clashes of the best-of-three final ensured success [...]

Duo in for India

 
India have included MS Dhoni and Harbhajan Singh in their 14-man squad for the first two Tests against South Africa, but young paceman Ishant Sharma has missed out.
India take on the Proteas in the opening Test in Chennai on March 26, and they have given two of their more experienced stars every chance to prove [...]

ICC select Patel for top job

South Africa’s Imtiaz Patel will take over as the International Cricket Council’s (ICC) new chief executive in the summer.
Malcolm Speed is set to step down from the post in June and Patel has beaten off competition from former India cricket chief Inderjit Singh Bindra to replace the Australian.
“There was an absolute consensus on his choice,” [...]

Hamilton – Best win yet

Lewis Hamilton has hailed his victory in the season-opening Australian Grand Prix as the best of his career so far.
Starting from pole position, the 23-year-old McLaren-Mercedes driver led the race from start to finish, taking the chequered flag some 5.4 seconds ahead of BMW Sauber driver Nick Heidfeld.
The victory was the fifth in a F1 [...]

Alonso not getting carried away

Fernando Alonso
is refusing to get carried away by his fourth-place finish in the
Australian Grand Prix, the Renault returnee readily conceding that he
benefitted from the chaos around him in Melbourne.

 
Fifteen of the 22 starters in Albert Park eventually retired
from Sunday’s season-opener, with the double world champion one of the
main beneficiaries as he came through from [...]