Sports

London, June 23: Three-time world footballer of the year Lionel Messi told The Times on Saturday that he will retire from football the day he feels he is no longer having fun. The 24-year-old Argentinian - who scored 73 goals in 60 games for Barcelona last season, breaking the European club record of 67 goals set by Bayern Munich's Gerd Mueller in 1972-73 - hinted that for him the fun was going

Known as a person of few words whose cricketing bat does all the talking, Sachin Tendulkar today said that he would not indulge in shouting in the Rajya Sabha as he would make his point across in a polite way. Tendulkar, who recently took oath as a Rajya Sabha member, said that he would express his views politely and not indulge in shouting to make his point, a practice adopted by many

London, June 23: Former Pakistan leg-spinner Danish Kaneria was given a life ban from English cricket on Friday for his involvement in the Mervyn Westfield spot-fixing case, the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) said. Westfield was given a five-year ban, although he will be able to play club cricket in the final two years of his suspension. In a statement an ECB disciplinary panel said: "We

Yuvraj Singh is renowned for his fighting spirit when the chips are down. He waged many successful battles and guided the Men in Blue to several scintillating victories and lifted his team-mates’ morale. Yuvi, who is back after undergoing chemotherapy for a rare tumour, is now on a mission to make a comeback into the Indian team. His target is to play at the Twenty20 World Cup, starting in Sri

Warsaw, June 22: Cristiano Ronaldo was the hero as Portugal beat an ultra-defensive Czech Republic 1-0 at the National Stadium on Thursday in their quarterfinal to qualify for the Euro 2012 semifinals. Ronaldo headed home a cross from Joao Moutinho 11 minutes from the end to set up a possible semifinal against either world champions Spain or France. It was just reward after another starring

New Delhi, June 21: The embattled All India Tennis Association (AITA) today claimed to have worked out a compromise formula to resolve the selection crisis for the Olympics by deciding to send two men's doubles teams for the event, pairing Leander Paes with a lower-ranked Vishnu Vardhan. Giving the decision, which it itself termed "unfair" on world number 7 Paes, AITA has allowed Mahesh Bhupathi

Paris, June 21: Euro 2012 has been nothing if not entertaining, with plenty of goals, thrills and spills and assorted controversies from racism to goals not being given that should have been -- with Greece adding the surprise factor. With the quarter-final line-up now known, the football fan might feel entitled to ask a nagging question: "Will the best team win?" If this season in general has been

The recent comment by Haroon Lorgat, Chief Executive of the International Cricket Council (ICC), that it would not incorporate the Indian Premier League (IPL) into the Future Tours Programme as this would open the door to similar demands by cricket leagues in other countries is perplexing. The advent of T20 is changing the structure of cricket worldwide. The T20 game, earlier dismissed as a format

The Olympic tennis team selection continued to be an unsolved puzzle on Wednesday with the All India Tennis Association (AITA) failing to persuade the feuding players to change their stand and Leander Paes threatening a Games' boycott if he were to be paired with a lower-ranked player. The team will now be announced by Thursday afternoon, which is also the last day of sending the entries to the

Dubai, June 20: Recuperating from what he describes as a shock that only a cancer patient can understand, Indian cricketer Yuvraj Singh says he hopes to be back in action for the World Twenty20 Championships in September even though it would be a "big challenge" for him. "Playing for India is going to be a huge challenge for me because the body has been under a lot of shock which nobody can