World Sports: India Women Lose 0-1 To Netherlands In FIH Pro League; Badminton Teams Start With Wins At Asia Championships

On Valentine's Day, love was in the air for all sports fans around the world. For admirers of football, the UEFA Champions League continues with the likes of PSG and Bayern Munich in action later in the night. For cricket lovers, the second New Zealand vs South Africa Test took an interesting turn in Hamilton with the Proteas mounting stiff resistance against the BlackCaps. In hockey, the Indian women's team fought valiantly before losing 0-1 to Netherlands in the FIH Pro League. Check out the highlights of the sports world on Wednesday, February 14. (Cricket News | Football News)

Real Madrid claimed the advantage in the UEFA Champions League round-of-16 first leg against RB Leipzig, courtesy of a goal from Brahim Diaz. Los Blancos will now take the narrow lead with them back to Santiago Bernabeu for the second leg, which takes place three weeks.

With key players ruled out left and right, Indian fans have been left to sweat over the participation of Jasprit Bumrah in the third Test against England. Bumrah is yet to report to the Team India camp, but rumours suggest that he will train with the side on the eve of the match in Rajkot before leading the pace line-up the following day.

Bad news for the hosts, who end their innings 31 runs behind the visiting South Africa after losing all ten wickets in a dramatic collapse. New Zealand, trailing the series 1-0, will now attempt to thwart the Proteas from extending their lead to an insurmountable position, before attempting to chase down the win.

South Africa: 242; New Zealand: 211

RSA Lead By 31.

Here are the results, so far: PV Sindhu beat Han Yue (singles), Tanisha Crasto and Ashwini Ponnappa lost to Liu Sheng and Tan Ning (doubles), Ashmita Chaliha lost to Wang Zhi Yi (singles), Treesa Jolly and Gayatri Gopichand beat Li Yi and Lou Xu (doubles) to make the tie 2-2.

Anmol Kharb taking on Wu Lou Yu for the decider.

Goals from Kevin De Bruyne, Bernardo Silva, and Phil Foden helped Manchester City to a comfortable win over FC Copenhagen in the UEFA Champions League round-of-16 first leg. Reigning champions City will take a 3-1 lead with them to the Etihad for the return fixture three weeks later.

PV Sindhu set the tone with a 21-17, 21-15 win over Yue Han, before teenager Anmol Kharb showed nerves of steel to beat Luo Yu Wu 22-20, 14-21, 21-18 in the decider of India vs China, Badminton Asia Team Championships 2024 women's tie!

The ex-India national team batter will lead New York Superstar Strikers in the second season of Legends Cricket Trophy. Singh will have the likes of Babar Azam, Rashid Khan, Keiron Pollard, Imam Ul Haq, Naseem Shah, Matheesha Pathirana, Rahmanullah Gurbaz, Asif Ali and Mohammad Amir at his disposal!

The wicket-keeper-batter reveals all in a candid interview with BCCI (with a special appearance from Yashasvi Jaiswal!)

England captain Ben Stokes has confirmed that Rehan Ahmed's visa issue is cleared and that the youngster is allowed to return to India to partake in the ongoing Test series.

"For any individual having to wait for that is always an anxious period, but thankfully, we got it through this morning, and great job from the guys at the airport for giving him his visa to get through initially, and everyone at the BCCI and the government to get the visa quickly," Stokes said ahead of the third Test. (PTI)

Mohammad Nabi has become the oldest player to scale the ODI all-rounder rankings, replacing Shakib Al Hasan at the pedestal. Meanwhile, Jasprit Bumrah has retained his numero uno Test spot for, at least, another round.

Debutants Namdhari FC have registered their third win in the ongoing I-League 2023-24 season, edging past NEROCA FC 3-2 in Ludhiana. The winners led 2-1 at half time in the match played at Namdhari Stadium. Both Namdhari FC and NEROCA FC are struggling in the ongoing league and languishing at 11th and 12th positions, respectively.

Olympic medal-winning grapplers Sakshi Malik and Bajrang Punia have alleged that national federation chief Sanjay Singh used devious means to get the suspension on WFI lifted by United World Wrestling (UWW) and threatened to restart their agitation against the body, PTI reports. The UWW on Tuesday lifted the provisional suspension on India but directed the national federation to provide written guarantees that there would be no discriminatory action against the protesting trio of Punia, Malik and Vinesh Phogat.

Union sports minister Anurag Thakur has handed over the Chess Olympiad Torch to Budapest, the Hungarian capital, which will host the 45th edition of the prestigious tournament this year, PTI reports. During a function at the Dhyanchand National Stadium in New Delhi, Thakur handed over the torch to the FIDE president Arkady Dvorkovich and representatives of the host city. The tradition of organising the torch relay was first initiated by India in June 2022 ahead of the 44th edition of the Chess Olympiad in Chennai in July-August.

The Indian women's hockey team held its own for the majority of the first half against the higher-ranked Netherlands, before the Dutch exhibited their class with a world-class goal to go ahead 1-0 at half-time of their FIH Pro League 2023-24 match in Rourkela. The third quarter is currently underway, so still some time for Savita Punia and Co to mount a fightback.

And that's that. The one-goal lead stays in the end as Netherlands beat hosts India 1-0 at the Birsa Munda Hockey Stadium in Rourkela. But India can take heart from this defeat, as they put up a much-improved show after a string of three successive defeats earlier in the Women's FIH Pro League 2023-24.

India have earned their fourth double podium finish at the 10m ISSF World Cup in Grenada, Spain, as Devanshi Dhama struck gold and Lakshita silver in the women's 10m air pistol junior event of the competition, PTI reports. Devanshi shot 240.0 and Lakshita 238.0 in the eight-woman final as India continued to lead the medal tally with four gold, three silver and two bronze.

Dabang Delhi erased a 13-point deficit to clinch a 45-43 win over Tamil Thalaivas in a Pro Kabaddi League Season 10 match in Kolkata, with Ashu Malik emerging the star for the winners, scoring 18 raid points. Narender came up with a 'Super 10' to give the Thalaivas a 12-point lead at 34-22, PTI reports. Just when it looked like the odds were stacked against Dabang Delhi, Meetu Sharma came up with a 'super raid' followed by Dabang an 'all out'.

With six minutes to go, Dabang Delhi were trailing by five points at 33-38. A raiding masterclass by Ashu helped Dabang Delhi level the scores at 38-38 and then a fine tackle from Manu on Narender in the 39th minute earned the winners an 'all out'.

We end today's coverage here. But stay tuned for an action-packed day tomorrow morning, starting with Rohit Sharma and Co take on England for the third Test in Rajkot. Goodnight.