Sports Summary

D-Day for three Olympic sports

MEXICO CITY, (AFP) - Three Olympic sports had 48 hours to save themselves from being cast into a sporting wilderness when the 114th IOC Congress opened here on Thursday.

Three months ago the IOC programme commission headed by Italy's Franco Carraro produced a bombshell report that recommended that softball, baseball and modern pentathlon being thrown out of the 2008 Games in Beijing, China.

The three international sports federations were stunned by the damning report.

"The conclusions were plain and simply wrong. The whole report was flawed but we were left fight for our Olympic life," said International Softball Federation president Don Porter here on Tuesday, 25 November

On Friday, 29th November the 120-odd IOC members at the Congress voted on the expulsion of the three sports.

Italian Football Federation president Franco Carraro

French put their shirt on Davis success

PARIS, (AFP) - France are putting their shirt on Davis Cup success ahead of this weekend's final with French sports clothing firm Lacoste honouring the legendary "Musketeers" of the 1930s who put their country on the tennis map.

The white shirt created for the occasion bears the silhouettes of Jean Borotra, Jacques Brugnon, Henri Cochet and Rene Lacoste to mark their participation in six straight Davis Cup wins from 1927 to 1932.

The final will be held in the French capital for the first time since 1932 with France, bidding for their tenth title, having held their last three home finals in Lyon, Grenoble and Nice.

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