Controversies drive Sania out of Indian courts

Posted on January 21, 2012 by admin

It is indeed unfortunate that India is still not the country conducive enough for a rising young sports star. I am talking about our rising tennis sensation Sania Mirza. At a press conference yesterday, the 21-year old announced her decision to opt out of next month’s WTA Bangalore Open. She also said that she has decided not to play in India this year, owing to never ending controversies from religious extremists. Sania said, I am not playing in Bangalore Open. I have been advised by my manager not to play because a lot has been happening in the past few months…Every time I have played in India, there has been some kind of problem. So we just thought it was better not to play this time… It (withdrawing from the Bangalore Open) is not an extreme reaction. The controversies have been going on for a long time. It is not easy to deal with such stuff… Just before the Australian Open last month, she was in a controversy when pictures showed her bare feet resting near the Indian flag. After this the current world no. 29 had even thought of quitting the game for ever. Such continuous rows and protests against her attire, ad campaigns and style sense indeed have dissuaded her to stay focussed in the career and eventually, this has hampered her game. She has always been distracted from tennis on account of these extremist statements challenging her faith and patriotism. Her mixed doubles partner, Mahesh Bhupathi was quoted saying, She has really been pained by all that has happened in the last few months. It is really unfortunate. We want that she should have the right frame of mind when playing in tournaments. It is indeed a shame for people of India, to witness such a terrible and nonsensical religious uprising, every time she steps on the tennis court wearing mini skirt or sleeveless top. When will these people grow up? When will they realize that she is playing for India? People should be concerned about how she plays the game and not about the length of her skirt! I mean I find these extremist opinions even in this generation so ridiculous. The management of such popular sporting events cannot stitch clothes depending on the player’s religion. It is regrettable that the first ever female tennis player from India, who has won numerous accolades for her country on account of her tennis talent, has backed out from playing in India. I doubt, whether this decision will have any sensible impact on the unlimited demands of the ultra-nationalists. Source:

2 year suspension for tennis star Hingis

Posted on January 20, 2012 by admin

Martina Hingis has been banned for 2 years after she was found testing positive for cocaine in a dope test, conducted during the 2007 Wimbledon championship. The Swiss star had appealed against the dope charges, but the International Tennis Federation (ITF) has discarded her appeal. It has declared a ban to be effective from 1 October, 2007. Hingis, who has won WTA singles title 43 times in her entire career, had just revived her game in 2006 after a gap of three years. The tennis superstar had tested positive during the customary urine test performed after she lost to Laura Granville at the third round of the tournament. The five-time Grand Slam winner had previously defended herself persistently by saying that she was 100% innocent. She asserted her innocence by proclaiming that her hair test, which can prove whether a person has consumed cocaine or not), was negative. The 27 year old former world number one not only retired from international sports after the doping revelation, she also had to surrender her ranking points and prize money both from the then ongoing Wimbledon series and any succeeding contests. In the month of November, 2007, her spokesperson Mario Widmer told BBC Sports, She will be fighting this, of course. You can be clear about that. Later, ITF issued a statement that said, Following a two-day hearing in December 2007, an independent anti-doping tribunal found that a sample provided by Ms Hingis on 29 June 2007 at the Wimbledon Championships had tested positive for a metabolite of cocaine…The tribunal rejected the suggestion made on behalf of Ms Hingis that there were doubts about the identity and/or integrity of the sample attributed to her…The tribunal also rejected Ms Hingis’s plea of no (or no significant) fault or negligence, on the basis that no mitigation was possible as it had not been shown how the cocaine entered her system. It is expected that millions of her fans across the globe will be deeply disheartened by the news of her suspension term.

Olympic champion Gatlin’s dope-ban shortened by 4 years

Posted on January 19, 2012 by admin

It is reported that Justin Gatlin’s 8-year-long suspension on charges of doping, has been cut down to only 4 years. The 100m Olympic champ from America was banned in 2006, when he tested positive for testosterone at the low-level relay race held at Kansas in the month of April 2006. He was the winner of 100m title at the Athens Olympic in 2004 and won the world 100m and 200 m titles in 2005. Initially, Gatlin was supposed to be given a lifelong ban! Then he willingly came forward to assist the United States Anti-Doping Agency’s (Usada) anti-doping crusade and he was sentenced to 8-year-ban. After the 25-year-old appealed again against the length of suspension last summer, Usada revealed that an arbitration board had voted 2-1 in favor of the 4-year suspension. According to The Washington Post reports, two among the three members of the arbitration panel suggested that they could not give less than a 4-year ban because of the another positive dope-test of Gatlin in 2001. Even after the reduction of his suspension term, the champion racer will not be able to compete again before 24th May, 2010. It is expected that he will be appealing again to further cut down the 4-year term even though this is the minimum sanction as per 2006 recommendations of the worldwide governing body IAAF. Neither Gatlin nor his solicitor has yet made any comment on the recent judgment or whether they will again appeal against this verdict to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (Cas). Gatlin has not participated in any competition after he won the 100m race at the 2006 US national championships held in June. Gatlin, who was the strongest contender and the defending champion at Beijing Olympic, confessed that he had tested positive for doping, had claimed that he never consumed those banned compounds deliberately. His mother has told the media that her son is still optimistic about starting to race again in future. She said, There is no doubt about that…We will be talking to his lawyer. I think everybody is blindsided by this decision. When Gatlin tested positive for doping at Kansas in 2006, it was his 2nd drug test in which he failed. He first failed a drug test in the 2001 USA Junior Championships when amphetamines were found in his samples. But then, the reason for this failed test was reportedly caused by a medicine that he had been consuming for almost 10 years to tackle his attention-deficit disorder. As per the World Anti-Doping Agency (Wada) code, he was supposed to be punished with a lifetime suspension after 2 failed tests. On Tuesday, Usada chief executive officer Travis Tygart said, Mr Gatlin should be commended for his decision to cooperate with authorities following his positive test…However, these efforts do not completely remove his responsibility for his second doping offence…Given his cooperation and the circumstances relating to Mr Gatlin’s first offence, the four-year penalty issued by the arbitration panel is a fair and just outcome. How far Gatlin truly executes his promise to campaign against anti-doping after his 4-year sanction is over, is a contentious issue.

IAAF slaps two-year ban on Marion Jones

Posted on January 19, 2012 by admin

Sprinter Marion Jones has been slapped a two-year ban by the world governing body of athletics, IAAF (International Association of Athletics Federation), for doping. She has also been stripped of her Olympic and world championship titles and all her other results have been annulled. All relay teammates of Jones ( from the 2000 Sydney Olympics) have also been disqualified and stripped of their medals. Jones has also been told to return prize money, estimated at $700,000. According to IAAF spokesperson Nick Davies, Jones can compete only after she has paid back the stated amount of prize money. Therefore, though Jones has actually retired, she remains officially suspended till 7 October 2009. She would also have to give a 12 months’ notice to the IAAF if she wanted to compete again following the ban. Jones won the 200 meter world title in 2001 and had claimed the gold medals in the 100 meter, 200 meter and the 1600 meter relay in the Sydney Olympics. She also won the bronze medals in the 400 meter relay and long jump in 2001. Jones had admitted that she had taken the designer steroid ‘the clear’ during the period September 2000 to July 2001. She retired last month after pleading guilty to federal investigators in 2003. She has returned her Olympic medals ( five), and has also agreed to forfeit all her results dating to 1 September 2000. However, IAAF and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) are yet to take a stand on altering the record books and revising the awarded medals. It is up to the IOC ( which has the authority over Olympic medals) to decide whether Greek sprinter Katerina Thanou would be upgraded to the 100 meter Olympic gold medal. Thanou and Kostas Kenteris (Thanou’s fellow Greek runner) had failed to show up for a drug test in 2004, stating that they had been injured in a motorcycle accident and both pulled out of the Athens Olympics, 2004. Both were later awarded two-year bans. Jacques Rogge, the president of the IOC, has stated that only ‘clean’ athletes will be moved up in medal positions. There would be no automatic upgrades, and hence, keeping the 100 meter winner’s spot vacant remains a possibility. source

Debt Consolidation: Athletes who went broke

Posted on January 18, 2012 by admin

Anyone can get over their head or make bad financial decisions. Even athletes, who earn millions of dollars a year, can find themselves in a financial mess; so it is no wonder that regular people find themselves drowning in debt. Bad financial decisions can empty your bank account and freeze your assets. Of the 25 richest athletes who have gone broke several have been victims of overwhelming debt and bad financial decisions. Dick “Nightrain” Lane, Latrell Sprewell, Mushin Muhammad, Scottie Pippin, Kenny Anderson, John Arne Riis, Darren McCarty, Dorothy Hamill, Rollie Fingers, Deuce McAllister, the later Johnny Unitas, Jack Clark, Scott Eyre and Raghib “Rocket” Johnson fell victim to bad debt, bad financial decisions and poor money management. One of the things that may have saved these athletes from losing everything is debt consolidation. A good debt consolidation counselor can help you to consolidate your bills into one monthly payment that is usually much lower than your combined payments for your current bills. Many debt consolidation services offer financial counseling to help you to learn how to manage your money and stay out of debt. Credit card companies want to keep you in debt. They encourage you to pay the minimum on your credit cards each month. If you take a look at your statement, you will see that the majority of your minimum payment goes toward interest while your principle goes down very little. The more you owe, the higher your interest charges. It is a viscous cycle. But it is a cycle you can break. The athletes who have gone broke after earning millions of dollars a year had to learn the hard way about managing their money. You don’t have to; you can take advantage of a reputable debt consolidation service and save yourself from bankruptcy and bad credit.

Betting Tips for Basketball Fans

Posted on January 17, 2012 by admin

With so many basketball games being played, both preseason and playoffs, it’s hard to decide what sort of strategy to use, which game to bet on and when. Sports betting is never really easy unless you know all the tips and tricks to make sure you win big this basket ball season. So this is a short list of tips that may help you out during March Madness. Be careful how you manage your money, you need to do it wisely because there are so many games and so many seasons that betting on every game will lose you a lot of money. Also, constantly betting on teams that always seem to lose but you think might win the next one, or the next, is a tragic mistake. You need to draw up a budget of how much you are going to spend and stick to that budget. Keep an eye on all the trends with regard to how many games a team plays and where. For example, if a team plays at one particular venue a few times in a row you can see how well they performed there so you know how to bid next time they play there again or how to bid when they play consecutive games. You might want to keep an eye on how teams from one area play in another or how they play in games that are back to back. Watch out for all the constant injuries or injuries that tend to play up during games. If a player happens to get an injury but is still sent out to play, those injuries may prevent him from playing the best that he can and this can affect the whole team and the way they play. Players don’t freely announce their injuries though because they don’t want to give away their weak spots to their opponents, the best way to find out who has what injury and how bad it is to look up information on the Internet and follow local papers who write about a particular team.

What Scholarships Out There Are Available for Student Athletes?

Posted on January 16, 2012 by admin

An athletic scholarship could be your ticket to a free college education and a future career in sports. However, finding one could be tougher than you think, unless you are extraordinarily gifted in a sport that is highly competitive and in-demand. Academically, you must be able to show that you also have the intellectual aptitude that would make you worthy of a scholarship. There are three major organizations that offer scholarship opportunities for student athletes. The most illustrious of these is NCAA, which has 1,000 member colleges and universities under its umbrella. These schools have the biggest and most competitive athletic programs in the U.S., and they attract the most talented athletes in the country. Another collegiate organization that also extends some athletic scholarships albeit much fewer is NAIA. To date, NAIA has only about 300 member colleges and their athletic programs are not as well-funded as those in universities and colleges under NCAA. Nevertheless, if you are a student athlete who is looking for ways to get to college you should always keep your options open even to the possibility of attending a less renowned college. Perhaps you consider your skill level in your chosen sport below par with the best athletes in your category then you have a much better chance of landing a scholarship with a NAIA school than with NCAA. You could also try with NJCAA, but they offer athletic scholarships for two-year courses. If your scholarship applications with NCAA and NAIA have been turned down, an NJCAA scholarship should be your next logical target. A scholarship with any NJCAA college can give you an excellent preparation should you decide to continue with another college for a four-year course. Now the next question is: what does an athletic scholarship cover? Just like most scholarships, a student athlete can either be awarded with a full scholarship that would defray the costs of tuition, books and even room and board or a partial scholarship that will pay only for some of the expenses. The rest would have to be shouldered by the student. Even with a partial scholarship, a student athlete may find it impossible to support himself to school. Getting a payday loan may be necessary so you can make ends meet and supplement the partial scholarship that you’ve been awarded with.

What are some injuries in sports that require emergency cash loans?

Posted on January 15, 2012 by admin

For every sports team, sports injuries are a major concern. When a successful player gets injured, the whole team suffers. To cite an example, when Argentina was playing against Germany, and Diego Maradona suffered a knee injury, the Argentinean team got a major setback. The same can be said of soccer stars like Edson Arantes do Nascimento Pele (Brazil), and Franz Beckenbauer (Germany). The problem is that sport injuries are a part and parcel of all types of sports. Sprained ankles, knee injury and wrist injury are some of the common sport injuries. Different sports attract different types of injuries. For example, in boxing, injury of the nose and eyes is common. Similarly, in tennis, wrist fracture, or ligament-pull happens every now and then. Snow sports like skiing and ice-hockey are dangerous too. Rodeo is yet another sport that is extremely dangerous. While minor injuries can be taken care of with basic treatment, advanced injuries like broken bones, back injury, and knee injury can be expensive in terms of treatment. Precautionary measures like wearing proper pads and joint guards can reduce the possibility of an injury. However, at times, sportsmen get injured to such an extent that it costs the team thousands of dollars in treatment, and hospital bills. This is where emergency cash loans can help sports teams and players. Baseball injuries like shoulder injury, sprained wrist, dislocated or broken fingers, hyper-extended knee, sore elbow, pulled hamstring, and bruises may also attract a lot of money in terms of treatment. Sportsmen, therefore, should educate themselves about emergency loans. Difficulties do not announce their arrival. That is why it is wise to prepare in advance. Hundreds of soccer players, tennis players, swimmers, baseball stars, and boxers suffer with injuries every year. Emergency cash loans can help such people get proper treatment, and recuperate quickly to bring name and fame to their country.

Sports Book Betting Can Spice Up the NBA Playoffs

Posted on January 14, 2012 by admin

Few things are more enjoyable thank kicking back with a beer after a hard day of work and watching the game on a high definition television. You can see every play, break away and slam-dunk in full high def glory. HDTV brings the game home like sitting courtside. Yet, you don’t have to deal with any of the problems associated with going to the game. You don’t have to deal with parking, pushing through the crowds and you won’t find yourself stuck next to a big, loud, sweaty person unless you invite them over. In addition, you can watch the game with all of your friends without spending hundreds of dollars like you would at the arena. You get all the benefits of the court with none of the hassle. One can throw down some cash on the game to increase the tension. Most sports book websites include a wide range of bets. The money line tells you how much you win on a hundred dollars. A positive number means you win that amount. A negative amount means you must bet that amount to win a hundred dollars. The point spread either adds or subtracts from that team’s final score. Therefore, a +7 for the Phoenix Suns means that even if the Suns lose, if they lose by less than 7 you’ll either tie or win on your bet. Finally, if you’re not sure who will win, you can bet on the score. They give you a score and then you can bet on the final score as either higher or lower. Of course, most of the betting ratios are set to 100 dollars, but there’s nothing that prevents you from putting down 10 dollars or 20 dollars. Even a small amount is going to increase the elation of victory or the sharp agony of defeat

Hamilton inches close to the World Title

Posted on January 1, 2012 by admin

Hamilton opens a 12-point championship lead with a supremely composed performance in the most testing of conditions on the podium at Fuji Speedway. His victory in the treacherous, torrential conditions recalled Formula One great Ayrton Senna’s first win in 1985 at Portugal, also claimed on the wet. Ere the race only one question Hamilton had yet to answer was how would he cope with damp conditions, in which the slippery track and all but zero visibility provide arguably the greatest challenge to an F1 driver. Indisputably, Hamilton has answered that, too. A crash at 26 laps to go, team-mate Alonso’s spell of a two-year reign as world champion is certainly posed to threat by a man, as a rookie. Apparently, Lewis is now showered with a bliss to wrap up the title in China, which he will do if he outscores the Spaniard. Last season saw Schumacher’s retirement with seven titles and 91 wins assuming the records would never be surpassed. But just a year later, it appears that such dashes may not be so invincible, as records are set to be broken. Let’s wait and watch till next Sunday, to see the youngest ever Formula One world champion and the first driver ever to triumph in his debut season. Image Courtesy