Drawing to win

* Jan Oblak saved a late penalty to boost Atletico Madrid’s stuttering La Liga title challenge as Luis Suarez’s header proved enough for a nervy 1-0 win over Alaves on Sunday.

* Chelsea beat Sheffield United 2-0 on Sunday thanks to an own goal by Oliver Norwood and winger Hakim Ziyech’s late strike to reach the FA Cup semi-finals for the fourth time in five seasons.

* Arsenal came from 3-0 down to claim a 3-3 draw at West Ham on Sunday (Mar 21), but a share of the points from a thrilling encounter did little for either side’s hopes of a top-four Premier League finish.

* Tottenham Hotspur emerged from the gloom of the past week to claim a morale-boosting 2-0 victory at Aston Villa and climb to sixth place in the Premier League on Sunday.

* Leicester City’s Kelechi Iheanacho scored two poacher’s goals as they beat Manchester United 3-1 in their FA Cup quarter-final on Sunday to set up a last-four clash against Southampton.

* Ole Gunnar Solskjaer defended his decision to field a weakened team as Manchester United crashed out of the FA Cup with a 3-1 quarter-final defeat at Leicester on Sunday (Mar 21).

* Kylian Mbappe became the youngest player to score 100 goals in Ligue 1 when his double powered Paris St Germain to a 4-2 win at Olympique Lyonnais and to the top of the standings on Sunday.

* Lille’s hopes of a first Ligue 1 title in a decade suffered a major blow as the leaders slumped to a shock 2-1 home defeat at the hands of struggling Nimes on Sunday (Mar 21).

* Atalanta bounced back after their Champions League last 16 exit to Real Madrid with a 2-0 win at Hellas Verona on Sunday (Mar 21) to consolidate fourth place in Serie A.

* Dries Mertens scored his 99th and 100th Serie A goals for Napoli to secure a 2-0 win away to top-four rivals AS Roma on Sunday.

* Zlatan Ibrahimovic marked his return to the AC Milan starting line-up with a goal in a thrilling 3-2 win at Fiorentina on Sunday (Mar 21), narrowing the gap to Serie A leaders Inter to six points.

* World number seven Alexander Zverev recovered from an uncertain start to beat Stefanos Tsitsipas 6-4 7-6 (3) in a thrilling Mexican Open final in Acapulco on Saturday (Mar 20) and land his 14th ATP title.

* Benevento dented Juventus’ Serie A title hopes on Sunday as Adolfo Gaich’s second-half strike sealed a shock 1-0 victory in Turin and ended the relegation battlers’ 11-match winless run.

* Hertha Berlin boosted their hopes of avoiding relegation from the Bundesliga after an impressive 3-0 home win over sixth-placed Bayer Leverkusen on Sunday (Mar 21).

* Gemma Evans scored a second-half equaliser to earn Bristol City a 1-1 draw against Tottenham Hotspur in the Women’s Super League on Sunday and another valuable point in their battle against relegation.

* Malaysia’s Lee Zii Jia claimed his first All England Open on Sunday (Mar 21) as he outlasted Danish second seed Viktor Axelsen 30-29, 20-22, 21-9. Lee edged a marathon opening set that went all the way to the maximum 59 points.

* Serena Williams became the latest high-profile player to pull out of the Miami Open on Sunday (Mar 21), saying she was withdrawing in order to concentrate on her recovery from recent oral surgery.

Pham Thi Minh Hue and Le Tuyet Quynh Anh received a prize of US$1,000 for a project entitled “Novel Bacteriophage Lysin: A Solution for Antibiotic Resistant Staphylococcus aureus Infection in Vietnam”.

Their project had already won the first prize in Vietnam’s national science and engineering contest for high school students for the 2017-2018 academic year.

Another project by two Vietnamese students, Le Ha Khoa and Nguyen Phuong Nam, was given an honorary mention by the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

The two students from the Nguyen Hue High School for Gifted Students in Hanoi works on the concentration of urine neurotransmitters of dopaminergic and serotonergic system and the relationship to behavioural disorders in patients with online game addiction.

Intel ISEF 2018 was held in Pittsburgh from May 13 to 18, drawing 1,401 projects by 1,793 students from 79 countries and territories. This year, Vietnam sent eight projects to the fair.

Goretzka and Havertz fired the Germans into a 2-0 lead inside the opening seven minutes before Gundogan sealed victory with a sizzling low shot from 25 metres in the 56th.

* Striker Jonas Wind created a goal for Martin Braithwaite and scored another himself to get Denmark off to a good start in their World Cup qualifying campaign as they cruised to a 2-0 win away to Israel in Group F on Thursday.

* England kicked off their World Cup qualifying campaign with a 5-0 thrashing of San Marino on Thursday (Mar 25) as Dominic Calvert-Lewin scored twice and Ollie Watkins marked his debut with a goal.

* Italy made a comfortable start to the 2022 World Cup qualifying campaign by beating Northern Ireland 2-0 in Group C on Thursday. First-half goals from Domenico Berardi and Ciro Immobile settled Italy’s nerves as they look to banish the disappointment of failing to qualify for the 2018 World Cup.

* Spain were left frustrated after they were held to a 1-1 draw by Greece in their opening 2022 World Cup qualifying Group B fixture on Thursday.

* Robert Lewandowski struck a thunderous 83rd-minute equaliser as Poland fought back to earn a 3-3 draw with Hungary in a pulsating World Cup Group I qualifier at the Puskas Arena on Thursday.

* Scotland twice came from behind to snatch a 2-2 draw with Austria in their opening 2022 World Cup qualifying Group F tie on Thursday.

* Tajikistan handed bottom side Mongolia a 3-0 defeat in Dushanbe on Thursday as the second round of Asia’s World Cup qualifying campaign resumed on Thursday after an almost 18-month pause.

* Three-times Grand Slam champion Stan Wawrinka faces a few weeks on the sidelines after having an operation on his left foot for a niggling problem, the Swiss said on Thursday.

* First half goals from debutant Miki Yamane and Daichi Kamada set Japan up for a comfortable 3-0 friendly win over great rivals the Republic of Korea at Yokohama International Stadium on Thursday (Mar 25) evening.

* The 2021-22 Premier League season will begin on Aug 14 and end on May 22 following an agreement with shareholders, the English top-flight said in a statement on Thursday (Mar 25). The final match round of the campaign will take place on May 22, 2022 when all games will kick off simultaneously, it added.

* Bilbao is set to be named as the starting point for the 2023 Tour de France, local media reported on Thursday. Bilbao-based El Correo newspaper reported that the city will host the first two stages of cycling’s most prestigious race, including the Grand Depart, in two years’ time.

* World No.1 Ash Barty faced down a match point against qualifier Kristina Kucova at the Miami Open on Thursday before clawing her way back for a 6-3 4-6 7-5 victory in the Australian’s first match outside her home country in more than a year.

* France midfielder N’Golo Kante will return to Chelsea after sustaining a hamstring injury on international duty, the country’s soccer federation (FFF) said. The 29-year-old felt some discomfort towards the end of France’s 1-1 draw with Ukraine in Wednesday’s 2022 World Cup qualifier.

Lazio’s Italian midfielder Marco Parolo celebrates (2nd R) scores the 2-1 goal with his head during the UEFA Champions League Last-16, second leg football match FC Bayern Munich v Lazio in Munich, southern Germany on March 17, 2021.(CHRISTOF STACHE / AFP)

The draw also pitted Premier League leaders Manchester City against Borussia Dortmund, with Chelsea playing Porto in the other tie.

Hansi Flick’s Bayern side defeated PSG 1-0 behind closed doors in Lisbon last August to win their sixth European Cup and remain the team to beat, having won 18 and drawn one of their 19 games in the Champions League since the beginning of last season.

The first leg is set to be played in Germany on April 7, with the return in Paris on April 13.

“The draw is of course a difficult one, and surprises exist, but we’re going to play against the team that is the best on the continent at the moment,” said PSG coach Mauricio Pochettino, who was appointed in January and oversaw a 5-2 aggregate win over Barcelona in the last 16.

“We’re optimistic,” the Argentine told PSG’s official website.

The meeting of Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool and Zinedine Zidane’s Real is another re-run of a recent final, with the Spaniards beating the Reds 3-1 in Kiev in 2018 to win the last of their record 13 titles to date.

Liverpool then won the trophy for the sixth time in Madrid in 2019 but their Premier League title defence this season has unravelled, with the Anfield club sixth in the table having lost nine times in 17 games in 2021.

Klopp’s side are due to be away in the first leg on April 6, but it remains to be seen where that match will be played.

– Travel headaches? –

Atletico Madrid’s home leg against Chelsea in the last 16 was moved to Bucharest due to restrictions imposed on travel to Spain by British authorities in the pandemic.

The winner between Liverpool and Real will go onto a semi-final against either Chelsea or Porto, throwing up the possibility of an all-English last-four tie. Liverpool beat Chelsea in the semi-finals in 2005 and in 2007.

Real have often struggled this season too but they may be optimistic about their prospects in the wake of the draw.

“I think they would have signed for that, in fact with two hands,” ex-Madrid player, coach and sporting director Jorge Valdano told Spanish TV channel Movistar Plus. “Liverpool are not what they were last year.”

Real coach Zinedine Zidane said of Liverpool: “We know them, physically they demand a lot from you.”

Unbeaten in 13 games since the appointment of Thomas Tuchel as coach, Chelsea will be expected to get the better of Portuguese champions Porto, who ousted Juventus and Cristiano Ronaldo in the last 16.

However, that tie could also be relocated given travel restrictions between the UK and Portugal which prompted both legs of the recent Europa League clash between Arsenal and Benfica to be played at neutral venues.

“I’m happy we play an international game, not against an English team, because the Champions League is about that and I always prefer to play teams from other countries,” said Tuchel.

“Clearly many people will maybe now make us favourites but you can ask in Turin their opinion about whether it helps you to be favourites,” referring to the Juventus defeat.

Meanwhile City will be strong favourites against Dortmund, with the winner of that tie going through to a semi-final against Bayern or PSG.

The prolific Erling Braut Haaland will be Dortmund’s main threat, with City boss Pep Guardiola saying: “The numbers speak for themselves, he’s one of the best strikers in the world right now, at his age.”

Travel restrictions between the UK and Germany could also have an impact on that tie.

Both legs of City’s last-16 tie against Borussia Moenchengladbach were played in Budapest, as was Liverpool’s tie against RB Leipzig.

This season’s semi-finals are due to be played in late April and early May, with the final on May 29 in Istanbul.

AFP

The result left the Germans top of the group on six points from two games ahead of Armenia on goal difference before their next match at home to North Macedonia on Wednesday.

* Ryan Fraser struck a second-half equaliser for Scotland to again came from behind to draw a second successive World Cup qualifier as they held Israel to a 1-1 draw in Tel Aviv on Sunday.

* South Africa suffered a major embarrassment on Sunday as a 2-0 defeat by Sudan in Khartoum saw the hosts clinch a place at the Africa Cup of Nations finals at the visitors’ expense with first-half goals from Saifeldin Maki and Mohamed Abdel Rahman. Sudan qualified for only the third time in 23 attempts, finishing second in Group C behind Ghana, who won 3-1 at home to Sao Tome e Principe at the same time.

* Spain striker Dani Olmo snatched a 2-1 win away to Georgia in their World Cup qualifier on Sunday with a stoppage-time strike from outside the area to kick-start his side’s efforts to qualify for Qatar 2022 after a sluggish start. Spain host Kosovo on Wednesday, while Georgia visit Greece.

* Denmark turned on the style as they thrashed hapless Moldova 8-0 in their World Cup qualifier on Sunday to top Group F, with Kasper Dolberg and Mikkel Damsgaard both scoring twice against the nation ranked 177th in the world.

* Italy top Group C with maximum points after Andrea Belotti and Manuel Locatelli secured a 2-0 win over Bulgaria in Sofia. The Azzurri are ahead of Switzerland on goal difference after Xherdan Shaqiri’s second minute strike was enough for a 1-0 win over Lithuania in St Gallen.

* Yamaha’s Maverick Vinales overcame a slow start to win the season-opening Qatar Grand Prix on Sunday in an exhilarating race where defending world champion Joan Mir lost out on a podium on the final lap to Johann Zarco and Francesco Bagnaia.

* Harry Kane scored his first England goal since 2019 to lead his side to a comfortable 2-0 win against Albania in a World Cup qualifier on Sunday to top Group I. They top the standings with six points from two games ahead of their home clash with most-likely group rivals Poland at Wembley on Wednesday.

* Seven-times Formula One world champion Lewis Hamilton won the season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix for Mercedes on Sunday after an epic, knife-edge thriller with Red Bull’s Max Verstappen over the final laps. Verstappen, who passed the Briton with four laps to go only to have to hand back the lead for exceeding track limits, finished a mere 0.745 seconds behind after starting on pole position. Hamilton’s team mate Valtteri Bottas was third, 37.383 seconds behind after a slow stop.

* A match official for the CONCACAF men’s Olympic qualifying tournament in Guadalajara, Mexico, has tested positive for COVID-19, the governing body for soccer in North and Central America and the Caribbean said on Sunday. The positive COVID-19 case came from the latest round of testing of the entire group of referees at the tournament and the individual is isolating and complying with CONCACAF protocols and regulations imposed by local authorities.

* Ousmane Dembele inspired France to a 2-0 victory over Kazakhstan on Sunday in their second match in World Cup qualifying Group D to mark a successful return to the world champions’ team. Four days after being held 1-1 by Ukraine at the Stade de France, the French built their win in the first half with Sergiy Maliy’s own goal adding to Dembele’s opener before Kylian Mbappe missed a second-half penalty

* Stephanie Frappart reached another milestone on Saturday when she became the first female referee to take charge of a men’s World Cup qualifier during the Netherlands’ 2-0 win over Latvia in Amsterdam. Earlier in December, Frenchwoman Frappart became the first female official to take charge of a men’s Champions League match when Italian champions Juventus defeated Ukrainian club Dynamo Kyiv 3-0 in the group stage in Turin.