TENNIS
Novak Djokovic won just three games in a lackluster quarterfinal performance at the Erste Bank Open in Vienna on Friday, losing 6-2 6-1 to 42nd-ranked Lorenzo Sonego.
It was only Djokovic’s third loss of the year, after being disqualified for hitting a line judge with a ball at the U.S. Open and losing the French Open final to Rafael Nadal.
Djokovic will not defend his title at the Paris Masters next week. The ATP will deduct no points in this shortened season because of the pandemic, while he also could gain no additional points as the defending champion.
Also, Andrey Rublev reached the semifinals, continuing his quest for a record fifth ATP title this season.
No. 5-seeded Rublev beat defending champion Dominic Thiem 7-6 (5), 6-2 to set up a semifinal against 2018 champion Kevin Anderson, who defeated Daniil Medvedev 6-4, 7-6 (5).
• Alexander Zverev denied accusations of domestic abuse on Friday, saying they are “simply not true.”
The 23-year-old German tennis player was responding to an interview former girlfriend Olga Sharypova gave to Russian sports website Championat on Thursday. Sharypova, a former Russian tennis player, said Zverev attempted to strangle her with a pillow and hit her head against a wall at a New York hotel before the U.S. Open in 2019. She said she feared for her life at the time.
Sharypova initially accused an unnamed ex-boyfriend of abuse on Instagram.
Zverev responded to the latest interview on Twitter, writing that he has known Sharypova since they were children, but he rejected the claims of abuse.
BASKETBALL
NBA: Mike D’Antoni and Amare Stoudemire are joining Steve Nash’s coaching staff, bringing a glimpse of the old Phoenix Suns to Brooklyn.
Nash hired his old coach and pick-and-roll partner as assistants Friday, filling out his staff for his rookie season as an NBA coach.
D’Antoni won the first of his two Coach of the Year awards in 2005 while leading the potent Suns to 62 victories behind the play of point guard Nash and power forward Stoudemire. They piled up points and 3-pointers with a small-ball style that was unusual then but the norm in the NBA now.
Ime Udoka was also hired as an assistant Friday following one season in Philadelphia and seven in San Antonio. The new assistants join holdovers Jacque Vaughn, who finished last season as the interim head coach, Adam Harrington, Jordan Ott, Tiago Splitter and Ryan Forehan-Kelly on Nash’s staff.
OLYMPICS
DOPING: Russia’s flagbearer at the 2014 Sochi Olympics opening ceremony lost his appeal on Friday against being banned for doping in a state-backed program to win a gold medal.
The Court of Arbitration for Sport said its judges upheld two-year bans imposed by bobsled’s governing body on four athletes including Alexander Zubkov. He was disqualified after piloting his four-man crew to victory at Sochi.
SOCCER
COVID-19: Cristiano Ronaldo has recovered from the coronavirus after 19 days and three missed matches for Juventus, the club announced.
Juventus said a swab test provided a negative result and Ronaldo “is no longer subjected to home isolation.”
Ronaldo first tested positive during the international break while with Portugal.
He missed Juventus’ draws with Crotone and Hellas Verona in Serie A as well as a loss to Barcelona in the Champions League. The five-time Ballon d’Or winner had been quarantined at his home in Turin.
Ronaldo could return on Sunday for Juve’s game at Spezia in Serie A, or on Wednesday at Ferencvaros in the Champions League in Budapest.
• African soccer confederation president Ahmad Ahmad tested positive for the coronavirus and began self-isolating at a hotel in Cairo.
Ahmad, who is also a FIFA vice president, had been in Morocco for the Confederation Cup club final Sunday and started showing “mild flu symptoms” after returning to Egypt on Wednesday, when he was tested, the Confederation of African Football said.
Ahmad, of Madagascar, was informed of the test result Friday. He will be in isolation at the hotel for at least 14 days, CAF said.
OBIT: Nobby Stiles, a tenacious midfielder who won the World Cup with England in 1966 and the European Cup with Manchester United in 1968, has died. He was 78.
Stiles’ family said Friday that he died following a long illness.
“The Stiles family are sad to announce that Nobby Stiles passed away peacefully today surrounded by his family after a long illness,” the statement said, according to Britain’s Press Association.
Stiles will forever be remembered for his jubilant jig on the field at Wembley Stadium — performed while holding the World Cup in one hand and his false teeth in the other — after England beat Germany 4-2 in the 1966 final. It became an iconic image from the greatest day in the history of English soccer.
CYCLING
SPANISH VUELTA: Defending champion Primoz Roglic retook the red leader’s jersey of the Spanish Vuelta from Richard Carapaz after winning his third stage with an uphill sprint finish in Stage 10.
Roglic worked his way toward the front of the peloton before striking out on the final meters of the slight ascent to the finish line to win the mostly flat 185-kilometer (115-mile) ride bordering the Cantabrian coast in northern Spain.
The Jumbo-Visma leader pulled level with the same overall time as Carapaz. He started the stage 13 seconds behind Carapaz, who rides for Ineos.
HOCKEY
HALL OF FAME: The Hockey Hall of Fame will have no new inductees in 2021, with the class of 2020 honored that year instead.
The 2020 inductees were to have been inducted Nov. 16 in Toronto, but the ceremony was postponed because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
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