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Fri/Sat/Sun July 21~23, 2017

CHRIS FROOME kept con-trol of his rivals in a gruelling Alpine ride to move a step closer to a 4th Tour de France title Wednesday, retaining the yellow jersey after the 17th stage, won by Primoz Roglic.

The defending champion was attacked by last year’s runner-up Romain Bardet and Ireland’s Dan Martin in the lung-busting ascent to the Col du Galibier but he stayed calm and covered every offensive move during the 183-km stage from La Mure to Serre-Chevalier.

Bardet and Martin’s accelera-tions, however, were damaging for Fabio Aru as the Italian lost 31 seconds and slipped from second to fourth place overall.

Froome leads Colombian Rigoberto Uran and Bardet by

27 seconds each, while Aru is now 53 seconds off the pace.

Cycling enthusiasts had antic-ipated an Alberto Contador vic-tory as the two-time champion, too far down in the general clas-sifi cation to threaten Froome, threw caution to the wind with a long-range attack. But the Spaniard cracked on the Galibier, a 17.7-km ascent at an average 6.9 percent gradient culminating at 2,642 meters above sea level, when Roglic attacked from the day’s break-away group.

Martin and Bardet launched countless attacks of their own on the climb, but Froome stayed in control. The Irishman, whose uncle Stephen Roche won the Tour in 1987, paid the price later on, but Frenchman Bardet

FORMER NBA All-Star Stephon Marbury will play one more year in the Chinese Basketball Asso-ciation (CBA), he announced Wednesday.

Marbury posted on his Insta-gram account that he will play with the Beijing Fly Dragons (Beikong) next season.

Marbury averaged 21.4 points and 5.5 assists with the Ducks, who dedicated a statue to him in 2012 after he led them to one of three championships. But he and the team couldn’t come to an agreement on his role in April, and his contract was ter-minated.

Marbury said his decision to join the Fly Dragons was some-thing the fans wanted.

“So the story goes like this. I’m staying in Beijing for my last and fi nal season,” he said on insta-gram. “The other Beijing team. I have to put on for the city no matter the team. It’s a differ-ent mission and vision over here. The fans said stay so I’m staying. They said ‘we will love you no matter where you go.’ It’s hard to leave that type of love. Thanking God for another contract!”

The sticking point in the nego-tiations with the Ducks was that the team wanted the 40-year-old to be an assistant coach.

Marbury instead reached out to CBA fans through Weibo, saying that he still wanted to play.

“My Chinese journey will open a new chapter,” Marbury

Marbury to play final season in CBA

said, posting a long article on Weibo later in the day. “This afternoon, I will formally sign a contract with Beikong club to play the 2017-2018 season for my beloved Beijing. This will be the last season of my 21-year career.”

Marbury, much beloved by basketball fans in the Chinese capital, spent six years with the Ducks since 2011 and won three Chinese Basketball Asso-ciation championships with the

team in 2012, 2014 and 2015.The Ducks fi nished ninth in

the 2016-17 regular season, fail-ing to advance to the playoffs. The club announced in April that Marbury would no longer be playing for the team.

But the American expressed a strong desire to remain in the CBA, saying on his Weibo account that he was willing to take a 20-percent salary cut to play for the Ducks for one more season, which was

unacceptable to the club.Marbury’s new team, the

Beijing Beikong Fly Dragons, fi nished only 17th in the 20-team CBA last season.

Still, the veteran star seemed contented enough with his new contract.

“It was a long two months deciding where to go,” Mar-bury wrote. “There were other opportunities but it’s hard to accept leaving Beijing to play for another city.” (SD-Agencies)

CHELSEA confi rmed it has agreed to sign Alvaro Morata from Real Madrid, with reports stating the fee agreed is US$97 million.

This deal is the biggest in club history, and the Blues released the following statement Wednes-day.

“Chelsea Football Club and Real Madrid have agreed terms for the transfer of Alvaro Morata to Stamford Bridge. The move is now subject to him agreeing personal terms and passing a medical.”

Morata, 24, is a Spanish inter-national forward, and he helped Real to lift a second successive Champions League last season.

It is believed Morata will arrive in London the next day to have a medical and discuss personal terms, with the Span-iard currently on Real Madrid’s preseason tour of the U.S.

For most of the summer it seemed like Morata would end up at Manchester United but the Red Devils plumped for Romelu Lukaku, pipping Chelsea to his signature in a US$96.5 million deal. Now the Spanish interna-tional striker (who has nine goals in 20 international appearances) is heading to west London.

Morata will link up with his former manager at Juventus, Antonio Conte, as the forward will become Chelsea’s main striker with Diego Costa now expected to leave Stamford Bridge for Atletico Madrid.

Last season Morata spent plenty of time behind Cristiano Ronaldo, Gareth Bale and Karim Benzema at Real Madrid, but still scored 20 goals as he returned to the Santiago Bernabeu following two fruitful years at Juventus.

Conte had taken Morata to Turin in 2014 and the preda-tory forward excelled in Serie A, scoring 27 goals in 93 games in all competitions. Overall he has netted 25 goals in 63 La Liga appearances for Real Madrid over the years with most of his appearances coming off the bench.

With Conte telling Costa last season that he was no longer needed, the Blues badly needed someone to replace his goals and now they have their man after an exhaustive search.

(SD-Agencies)

Alvaro Morata

Chelsea agrees to deal with Real for Morata

Stephon Marbury

Froome in control of Tour de France as Aru slips back

Chris Froome competes during the 17th stage of the Tour de France Wednes-day. SD-Agencies

Dongguan team wins qualifi er at Amateur Golf Super League Members of the Donguan Min Providers Golf Team pose for a picture at Mission Hills Dongguan during a China Amateur Golf Super League match Thursday.

The team won the group title in the second qualifying match of the Southern Conference, one of the six conferences in the nation. About 120 players from eight teams participated in the match.

The league, which was initiated by the Mission Hills Group, lasts for eight months throughout China. It is expected to create a record for a national golf league with the most participants. The last qualify-ing match of the Southern Conference will be held at Mission Hills on Aug. 24.

Windy Shao

hung on to fi nish fourth behind Uran and Froome.

Uran and Froome snatched small time bonuses but Bardet missed out, meaning

the Colombian from the Can-nondale-Drapac team leads the Frenchman by a few hun-dredths of a second.

Roglic held the group of main contenders off to become the fi rst Slovenian to win a Tour stage, crossing the line 1:13 ahead of Froome, Bardet, Uran and Frenchman Warren Bar-guil, who consolidated his grip on the polka dot jersey for the mountains classifi cation.

German Marcel Kittel, holder of the green jersey for the points classifi cation, abandoned the race after a crash. New leader Australian Michael Matthews looks likely to wear the jersey all the way to Paris thanks to his big lead over second-placed Andre Greipel.

(SD-Agencies)