The Shoreham- based heavyweight was due to fight in a 12-round title bout at Brighton’s Metropole Hotel on 26 January.. Football

Tulio and Donizete, the Brazilian forwards, have turned down multi-million dollar offers from unspecified Japanese clubs and renewed their contracts with Botafogo. The Swede has a one-shot lead over the American Martha Nause. The Britons, Laura Davies and Alison Nicholas, were five shots off the lead.. Ice hockey

Basingstoke have been fined pounds 1,000 for failing to travel to their British League Premier division game at Sheffield on 30 December because of bad weather.
NHL: Boston 7 Anaheim 2; San Jose 2 New Jersey 1; St Louis 4 Philadelphia 4 (ot); Washington 6 Ottawa 1; NY Islanders 4 Toronto 3..

68 W Levi, S Verplank, M O’Meara, G Morgan, S Pate, S Murphy, D Pohl, C Strange, L Roberts, M Brooks, R Black, B Bryant, O Uresti. 69 C Byrum, B Estes, R Fehr, L Janzen, R Tway, M Hulbert, P Blackmar, B Kamm, P Mickelson, W Austin, D Duval, M Bradley, L Parsons (Aus), D Toms.n Liselotte Neumann shot a five-under-par 67 in the opening round of the Tournament of Champions in Orlando, the first event of the LPGA season. After Kite was named captain late last year, Nelson, winner of three major titles – the US PGA twice and a US Open – set himself a goal to make the team as a player.The three-times Ryder Cup player plans to enter as many as 23 events this year to give himself a better chance of accumulating qualifying points.While Nelson made a sound start, Phil Mickelson, the defending champion, had a respectable 69 at Starr Pass, which played on average two strokes harder than Tucson National.NORTEL TUCSON OPEN (Arizona) Leading first-round scores (US unless stated): 65 L Nelson 66 D Pruitt, T Herron 67 J Morse, J Edwards, E Zerman (It). He plundered the National course for eight birdies on the way to a seven-under-par 65 in ideal conditions.
He led by one stroke from his fellow Americans, Dillard Pruitt and Tim Herron, both of whom also played at Tucson National. The best score at the more difficult Starr Pass course was a 67 by Joel Edwards.Nelson, 48, was widely expected to captain the 1997 United States Ryder Cup team, but was overlooked in favour of Tom Kite. Manchester, currently six points behind Towers with a game in hand, hope to have Moore, 31, registered in time for their match at Doncaster tomorrow.Towers face Worthing Bears at Birmingham’s NEC tonight in the 7-Up League Trophy final.London, attempting to win their first title, slipped in their league quest last week when the Bears beat them for the first time in five meetings.

Basketball

Manchester Giants yesterday signed the England international Joel Moore from the Budweiser League leaders London Towers as they stepped up their title bid, writes Duncan Hooper.
Moore, who made his league debut 14 years ago and has won 43 England caps, found himself a victim of London’s salary cap restrictions this season and made just seven appearances. Golf

Larry Nelson, the American veteran on a mission after being overlooked for the 1997 Ryder Cup captaincy, seized the first-round lead at the Tucson Open in Arizona. Bears veteran Steve Nelson said: “We always believe we can beat them and last week we proved it to ourselves.”. It beat the previous Australian first-wicket record stand of 182 compiled by Rick McCosker and Alan Turner during the 1975 World Cup.Sri Lanka must now win their remaining two matches to qualify for the final.. But the loss of four wickets for 11 left their challenge in tatters and they finished on 183 for 9.Waugh dominated an opening stand of 189 off 216 balls with his captain, Mark Taylor, who made 85. Cricket

Mark Waugh’s career-best one-day score of 130 yesterday helped Australia to an 83-run victory over Sri Lanka and guaranteed them a place in the best-of-three World Series final.
Sri Lanka, already embarrassed by one of their bowlers being called for throwing, had Asanka Gurusinha reprimanded by the match referee Graham Dowling for bringing the game into disrepute when he and Steve Waugh exchanged words after Waugh delivered a wide.Sanath Jayasuriya and Romesh Kaluwitharana put on 56 in pursuit of Australia’s 266 for 6.