A red rose in her hair, the furious Carmen storms onto a sports pitch to interrupt her two paramours who erupt in bursts of pirouettes and graceful leaps around several footballs. It's Bizet's classic opera but the beautiful, fiery gypsy Carmen is torn between team captain Escamillo and star player Jose as the ballet is given a football twist ahead of South Africa's World Cup in July next year. "It's basically Carmen. We built the ballet around the love triangle," said director, Dirk Badenhorst. "In the original story, it was a matador and a (soldier). In our story, it's the captain of the team ...
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Indian captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni won the toss and elected to bat in the crucial sixth one-day international against Australia here on Sunday. India, who trail 2-3 in the seven-match series, need a win to draw level with the world champions ahead of the final game in Mumbai on Wednesday. Australia: Ricky Ponting (capt), Graham Manou, Shane Watson, Michael Hussey, Shaun Marsh, Cameron White, Adam Voges, Clint McKay, Nathan Hauritz, Doug Bollinger, Mitchell Johnson. India: Mahendra Singh Dhoni (capt), Sachin Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Yuvraj Singh, Suresh Raina, Ravindra Jadeja, Harbhajan Singh, Ashish Nehra, Praveen Kumar, Munaf Patel. Umpires: Sanjay Hazare (IND) and ...
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Tout Puissant Mazembe of Democratic Republic of Congo bridged a 41-year gap on Saturday by regaining the African Champions League title. But it was a close call before a sell-out 35,000 crowd in Lubumbashi with Mazembe defeating Heartland of Nigeria 1-0 to collect the record 1.5 million dollars first prize on away goals. It was the first time in the 44-year history of the premier African Football Confederation club competition that the away-goal rule was needed to decide the outcome of a final. Heartland took a 2-1 lead into the second leg of the final and held out for 74 minutes before Victor Ezuruike ...
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Tout Puissant Mazembe of Democratic Republic of Congo bridged a 41-year gap Saturday by regaining the African Champions League title. But it was a close call before a sell-out 35,000 crowd in Lubumbashi with Mazembe defeating Heartland of Nigeria 1-0 to collect the record 1.5 million dollars first prize on away goals. Heartland took a 2-1 lead into the second leg of the final and held out for 74 minutes before Victor Ezuruike conceded an own goal to bring the trophy back to copper-rich southern Congo. Mazembe won the fledgling African championship in 1967 and 1968 and this year they budgeted five million dollars ...
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Democratic Republic of Congo club Tout Puissant Mazembe have gone into hiding ahead of the African Champions League final in Lubumbashi Saturday. And there was no sign of Nigerian opponents Heartland either in the southern Congolese mining city ahead of the second leg that will decide who scoops a record 1.5-million-dollar first prize. Heartland hold a 2-1 advantage from the first encounter last weekend, but Mazembe are expected to overcome the deficit and raise a trophy they last held 41 years ago. Mazembe prepared for the first leg in Zimbabwe and returned to Harare after losing in Nigeria to continue training under French coach ...
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Arsene Wenger is convinced his latest Arsenal team is as exciting as the Invincibles of six years ago who last won the Premier League title for the Londoners. Arsenal swept aside Wolves 4-1 to move into second place ahead of Manchester United's visit to leaders Chelsea, but Frenchman Wenger insists his side can maintain a genuine challenge throughout the season. Despite being well below their best at Molineux on Saturday, Arsenal still managed to take their tally to 55 goals for the season so far, with an incredible average of three goals per match. This stage last season Arsenal's challenge was effectively over at ...
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Manchester City manager Mark Hughes insists he has no fears about his meeting with the club's owner in Abu Dhabi this week despite his team's disappointing 3-3 home draw with Burnley. City fly to the Middle East on Sunday to play a friendly with the UAE national team on Thursday and Hughes will have talks with Sheikh Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan. After a run of only one victory in six Premier League games, the last five of them draws, the potential appears to be there for some awkward questions from the man who invested 200 million pounds in new talent over the summer. ...
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Egypt's Amr Shabana won a fourth World Open title on Saturday defeating compatriot and defending champion Ramy Ashour 11-8, 11-5, 11-5. An angry Ashour was in tears at the end as his countryman equalled the achievement of Geoff Hunt, the great Australian, win winning four world crowns. Only Jahangir Khan and Jansher Khan, the legendary Pakistanis who dominated the sport in the 1980s and early 1990s, have won more than Shabana - but despite its historical context the final never quite lived up to expectations. Two of the most gifted players of their era did not produced their absolute best, and instead it was ...
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Belgian tennis player Xavier Malisse said Friday he was considering retiring as he did not have the money to appeal his one-year ban for missing a drugs test. Malisse and compatriot Yanina Wickmayer, the US Open semi-finalist, were both suspended by the Flemish Doping Tribunal (VDT) on Thursday for failing to comply with doping regulations. But 95th-ranked Malisse, who has earned over 3.5 million dollars in his career, said that he did not have the money to appeal his suspension to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS). "A procedure before CAS is very costly and lasts a very long time," said the 29-year-old, ...
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England manager Martin Johnson has insisted England have learnt from last year's defeat by Australia and won't give away so many 'soft' penalties against the Wallabies at Twickenham here on Saturday. Indiscipline cost England dear 12 months ago with fly-half Matt Giteau, set to play again this weekend, kicking Australia to a 28-14 Cook Cup win. It was a prelude of things to come, with the intital stages of World Cup winning captain Johnson's time in charge of England blighted by 10 players being sin-binned in a mere four matches. But despite being hit by injuries, Johnson - who has brought in leading English ...
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