SPIELBERG (AUSTRIA), June 21:
Nico Rosberg celebrated his 30th birthday with a third win in four races on Sunday when he beat Mercedes team-mate and series leader Lewis Hamilton to triumph in an incident-filled Austrian Grand Prix.
The German driver, who left his twenties behind on Saturday, repeated his 2014 success when he came home a comfortable 3.8 seconds clear of the defending world champion and reduced his lead from 17 points to 10.
After eight of this year’s 19 races, Briton Hamilton, who picked up a five seconds penalty in the race, has 169 and Rosberg, who won last year’s Austrian event, 159. It was Rosberg’s third win of the season and the 11th of his career.
Brazilian Felipe Massa came third, 17 seconds adrift of the two Mercedes men, six-tenths of a second ahead of four- time champion Sebastian Vettel of Ferrari, Finn Valtteri Bottas in the second Williams and German Nico Hulkenberg, who one week after winning in the Le Mans 24 Hours race, finished sixth for Force India.
Venezuelan Pastor Maldonado was seventh for Lotus ahead of Dutch teenager Max Verstappen of Toro Rosso, Mexican Sergio Perez in the second Force India and Australian Daniel Ricciardo, who picked up a point for Red Bull, after starting down the grid.
The race began with drama as Rosberg sped into a first corner lead and almost immediately a spectacular collision between two-time champion Fernando Alonso and 2007 champion Kimi Raikkonen caused the race to be halted with the introduction of a safety car.
Alonso’s car landed on top of Raikkonen’s car. Both drivers were unhurt and walked away, shaken but not injured.
It was another hugely disappointing day for the struggling McLaren-Honda team. On top of Alonso’s first lap crash, Briton Jenson Button had to make an early retirement in the other car with engine problems.
In dry and mild conditions in the Styrian Alps, Rosberg made a perfect start as the lights went out, drawing alongside pole-sitter Hamilton to take the lead at the first corner.
The world champion attempted to re-gain the lead at the next two turns, but Rosberg defended adroitly while, behind them, a serious collision involving Raikkonen and Alonso caused the race to be stopped and run behind the safety car until the debris was cleared.
Alonso’s McLaren Honda appeared to crash into Raikkonen’s Ferrari from the rear and rose to land on top of the Finn’s car as they skewed into the barriers. Both men were unhurt and walked clear from the debris.
Button saw the crash. He said: “It looked like Kimi tried to get on the power, went one way, tried to correct and went the other way… A horrible accident. I’m glad they are OK. A pity for us, as it’ll make the test a lot trickier next week.”
Briton Will Stevens of Manor Marussia also retired with an oil leak on the opening lap and, after the hiatus for the safety car, when the racing resumed, the rest of the field trod delicately to avoid more mayhem.
At the front, Rosberg managed a comfortable 2.8 seconds lead ahead of Hamilton with Vettel third, but more than six seconds adrift, ahead of Massa and Hulkenberg. By lap 30, as the two Mercedes men began lapping the field, they were more than 12 seconds clear of Vettel’s Ferrari and in a race of their own.
Button, fighting his dejection, made a wry observation on his retirement and McLaren’s woes. “I don’t know what’s worse: doing the whole race 30 seconds behind the back of the field or stopping on lap two.
“It’s a pity, reliability-wise. We haven’t broken anything, but there was something wrong and it could’ve gone that way so that’s why we stopped.” Alonso’s car, which was running with an updated package, was “now in the bin”, said Button. (PTI)

HALLE (GERMANY), June 21:

Rohan Bopanna and Florin Mergea ended runners-up at the ATP Gerry Weber Open following a surprise straight set defeat at the hands of Raven Klaasen and Rajeev Ram, here today.
The second-seeded Indo-Romanian pair lost the summit clash 6-7(5) 2-6 against the unseeded American-South African team in one hour and 12 minutes.
Bopanna and Mergea had come into the event after wining the Mercedes Cup in Stuttgart, last week.
They had advantage, following an early break but lost the momentum as well as their grip over the contest as the match progressed. They could not force a Match tie-breaker as they were outplayed in the second set.
They won 300 ranking points each and shared 50,880 as prize money for their effort. (PTI)

ANTWERP (BELGIUM), June 21:
World and Olympic champions The Netherlands and world No 2 Australia posted contrasting victories in the women’s hockey World League Semifinals, here today.
World Cup holders The Netherlands were made to work hard for their 2-1 victory by the robust South Korean defence, while Australia thrashed Poland 9-0.
The Dutch women clinched their second successive win in Pool -A due to a defensive error by South Korean defender Oh Sun-soon in the last quarter.
Oh’s clearance was intercepted by Ginella Zerbo, who darted into the scoring zone and sent a fine ball for Maria Vershoor to score the match-winner in the 47th minute.
The Dutch had taken the initial lead in the fifth minute when Eva de Goede shot into a open goal to finish off a risk counter-attack.
The Dutch lead did not last long as Park Seun-ga converted a penalty corner for South Korea four minutes later. Four goals by Jodie Kenny spurred World Cup silver medallists Australia, while five other players made one entry each on the score-sheet.
Starting with Australia’s first goal in the ninth minute, Kenny converted three penalty corners and then duly slotted in a penalty stroke for her four-goal feat. (PTI)

HARARE, June 21:

A cloud of uncertainty prevailed over India’s forthcoming tour of Zimbabwe next month with the country’s cricket Board saying that the series could be postponed to next year if the ongoing issues between the BCCI and broadcaster Ten Sports are not resolved on time.
Zimbabwe Cricket said in a press release that it was hopeful of going ahead with India’s tour of the country next month and it was in constant contact with both the BCCI and Ten Sports to resolve the issues before the series.
India are scheduled to play three ODIs and two T20 Internationals in Zimbabwe from July 10.
“There have been reports that an issue over Zimbabwe Cricket’s broadcasting partner is threatening the forthcoming India tour to Zimbabwe. The position is that ZC is in constant contact with both the BCCI and Ten Sports, over issues which should be resolved before the tour,” the ZC release said.
“If the matters take too long to resolve, ZC and the BCCI might mutually agree to push the tour to next year,” ZC chairman Wilson Manase said in the release.
ZC said Manase and CEO Wilfred Mukondiwa will discuss these issues with their BCCI counterparts on the sidelines of the ICC Annual Conference, which will be held in Bridgetown, Barbados, from June 22 to 26.
The release also said that ZC was yet to approach the local immigration authorities for the facilitation of visas because the memorandum of understanding of the tour was still being worked out between the two Boards.
“Cricket is a national sport and ZC enjoys a cordial relationship with all relevant government offices so the acquisition of visas is not an issue. The substantive issues are what we will discuss in Barbados,” Manase said. (PTI)