Daily News Channel
The Orlando Magic toppled the Cleveland Cavaliers on Saturday night to claim a spot in the NBA finals championship series for the first time in 14 years. The Magic’s 103-90 home win in Game 6 of the Eastern Conference finals earned the team a trip to Los Angeles to face the Lakers. Orlando made it to the title round in 1995, one year before Shaquille O’Neal left for Los Angeles.
In the sprawling residential suburb of Huilongguan, northwest of downtown Beijing, the neighborhood soccer league is in the middle of its championship game. The audience, most of them the wives and children of the players, shout encouragement as two teams of men of all ages and sizes dressed in bright yellow and red run across the grass pitch on a college campus.
Former Manchester United star Roy Keane has made a surprise return to management at second-flight Ipswich just four months after walking away from Premier League Sunderland. Keane’s appointment at the East Anglian club was confirmed on Thursday and he told their official Web site itfc.co.uk that he was targeting promotion “at the earliest opportunity.” The 37-year-old Keane has been out of work since resigning last December with Sunderland in the relegation zone. “I truly believe that I am joining a club that has the potential, ambition and infrastructure to once again be a Premier League side,” he said “The club’s owner (Marcus Evans) and chief executive (Simon Clegg) impressed upon me their total focus on achieving this quest at the earliest opportunity and I can’t wait to get started.” Keane succeeds Jim Magilton, who was sacked after Ipswich failed to make the play-offs in the Championship, meaning they will be heading for their eighth straight season in the second-tier.
South Africa will stage the 2009 Indian Premier League after officials decided to move the Twenty20 tournament to a neutral venue because of security fears. England was the alternative choice for the highly-lucrative event, but IPL chairman Lalit Modi confirmed South Africa as hosts at a press conference on Tuesday
Next month’s Indian Premier League cricket tournament will be played outside India because of election security concerns, sport officials said Sunday.
Manchester United central defender Nemanja Vidic will be suspended for their next two Premier League matches after his sending off against Liverpool on Saturday. The Football Association (FA) confirmed Vidic’s ban on Monday after he was dismissed during United’s 4-1 home defeat to Liverpool, which throws open the English title race
An English football club is being forced to close a stand at its 25,000-seat stadium to cut costs, in what could be the first of many similar moves at other clubs, a sports business expert predicts. The affected club, Darlington F.C., is currently in seventh place in League Two, however, it slumped into administration last week following problems attracting crowds to the home matches.
Nine passengers were killed when a bus plunged about 2,300 feet (700 meters) into a ravine in Nepal on Sunday, police said. After the final ended in a goalless stalemate after regulation and extra time, United kept their nerve to win on penalties 4-1. After Ryan Giggs scored with the first kick for United, goalkeeper Ben Foster saved Jamie O’Hara’s opening effort for Tottenham to put Harry Redknapp’s men on the backfoot.
Manchester United stayed on course for an unprecedented clean sweep of major trophies this season with a penalty shootout victory over Tottenham Hotspur to win the English League Cup at Wembley on Sunday.
A contractor working for U.S.-led coalition forces died Saturday in the southern Afghan province of Uruzgan after a roadside bomb exploded during a combat reconnaissance patrol, U.S. forces in Afghanistan said