Melbourne, January 28
Justine Henin capped her remarkable comeback by storming into the final on Thursday where she will meet the imposing Serena Williams gunning for her fifth title. The tenacious Henin is playing her first Grand Slam since coming out of an 18-month retirement and kept her historic run going with a 6-1, 6-0 demolition of unseeded Chinese Zheng Jie.

In the men’s draw, Andy Murray moved one step closer to ending Britain’s 74-year wait for a men’s grand slam champion when he beat Marin Cilic 3-6, 6-4, 6-4, 6-2 in their semifinal on Thursday. Murray will now meet the winner of Friday’s second semifinal between world number one Roger Federer and 2008 finalist Jo-Wilfried Tsonga. The 22-year-old Scot started sluggishly, dropping his first set of the tournament, but after breaking Cilic in the fifth game of the second set he found his form to claim victory. It will be the second grand slam final for the 22-year-old Murray, who was beaten by Federer in the 2008 U.S. Open final.

Williams also had to negotiate Chinese opposition and was made to work hard by 16th seed Li Na before grinding her down 7-6 (7/4), 7-6 (7/1) under a hot sun on the Rod Laver Arena to set up an enticing decider on Saturday. Ever since she announced her return to tennis the talk has been about whether Henin could emulate Belgian compatriot Kim Clijsters, who won last year’s US Open on her own comeback.

And the former world number one has lived up to expectations after being handed a wildcard by organisers. She destroyed Zheng as she stayed on track to add to her seven Grand Slam titles, including the 2004 Australian Open. “The dream continues. I am going to play the number one and defending champion,” said the 27-year-old, who became the first wildcard to reach the final here. — Agencies

Mumbai, January 28
Ravaged by injuries to key players, India today infused fresh blood into its Test squad by naming Karnataka pacer Abhimanyu Mithun and Bengal wicketkeeper Wriddhiman Saha for the first Test against South Africa beginning in Nagpur on February 6. With experienced batsman like Rahul Dravid and Yuvraj Singh ruled out of the series because of injuries, the selectors recalled Tamil Nadu middle-order batsman S Badrinath in the team and dropped wicketkeeper batsman Dinesh Karthik.

While 20-year-old Mithun was rewarded for his splendid show in the domestic circuit by emerging as the highest wicket taker in the Ranji Trophy season, the inclusion of the diminutive Saha came as a surprise. Apart from Mithun and Saha’s inclusion, there were no other suprises in the squad announced by BCCI secretary N Srinivasan after a meeting of the selection committee here.

Dravid, who sustained a face injury in the second Test against Bangladesh, has been advised rest for three weeks while Yuvraj Singh has also been ruled out of the Test series due to an injury to his left wrist. Stylish batsman VVS Laxman, who had also suffered a finger injury during the Test series against Bangladesh, has recovered sufficiently to be drafted into the squad.

Uttar Pradesh paceman Sudeep Tyagi, who also featured in the squad that toured Bangladesh, has retained his place largely because S Sreesanth’s injury. Tamil Nadu batsman Murali Vijay, who toured Bangladesh as a reserve opener, retained his spot in the squad and is likely to play in the middle order like he did in the second Test against Bangladesh as a replacement for Laxman.

“We have selected the best possible team considering the number of injuries that the Indian team have suffered in the recent series,” selection committee chairman Krishnamachari Srikkanth said. “The team has been selected just for the first Test. We will take a call on the team for the second Test after getting the fitness report of the injured players,” he added.

The South Africans will play two Tests - Nagpur (Feb 6-10) and Kolkata (Feb 14-18) - and three one-dayers in Jaipur, Kanpur and Ahmedabad during their tour of India. Squad for the First Test: V Sehwag, G Gambhir, Murali Vijay, S Tendulkar, VVS Laxman, S Badrinath, M S Dhoni (C), Harbhajan, Zaheer Khan, Ishant, Amit Mishra, Sudeep Tyagi, P Ojha, Abhimanyu Mithun, Wriddhiman Saha. — PTI

Chandigarh, January 28
In a virtual cover-up for its failure to get Major Dhyan Chand National Hockey Stadium, the venue for the next month’s World Cup Hockey Tournament ready in time, officials of the Sports Authority of India have virtually resorted to censorship blocking entry of media to the complex.

Incidentally, the national team will be arriving in the union capital on February 1 to start practice at new synthetic surfaces. “There will be lot of wax around and the playfields will be slippery for some days. So we have to get the home team adjusted to playing conditions as well as to the unpredictable weather here,” says chief coach Harinder Singh, who incidentally was in New Delhi yesterday to see for himself the state of preparedness of the stadium.

In all 38 matches will be played during the World Cup. Besides, all participating teams will have a few warm up matches on each of the two competition pitches and a practice ground. This will be the first complex in the country to have three latest poligras synthetic playing surfaces.

While work on laying of the poligras on the practice pitch is still underway, civil works around competition playfield number II and the practice pitch will need another 10 to 15 days to complete. Though work has been going on round the clock at the venue, a lot needs to be fixed and done to make all the three synthetic surfaces available for participating teams in time.

Only two days ago, the main stadium was formally inaugurated. And yesterday, hockey team of the Central Reserve Police Force was called to have a training session there for a preliminary check on the behaviour of the new synthetic surface. A visit to the venue a day after the Republic Day was not without “hiccups” unexpected of a venue where sport’s biggest event - the World Cup - is to be staged in less than a months’ time.

Security deployed at the venue would not allow any one from media to enter the complex unless express or written permission has been obtained from some high ups in the Sports Authority of India, the body that is required to keep the complex under lock and key on pretext of maintaining it after the event is over.

It was after a while that a functionary of the SAI came on line to permit this correspondent’s entry into the complex on the condition that no cell phone or camera would be allowed to be taken in. Name, address and contact details were entered in visitors’ register kept at the gate. While technical experts of the Jubilee Sports Technology Limited, an Australian company, were busy examining the base for the practice pitch, they were hopeful that work on spreading the poligras will start in a day or two and may take a week to complete.

“All depends upon the levelling of the base. On the surface it looks good,” said one of them. While the work on the main competition venue appears to be complete, there is still lot of wet point around. The sprinkler system and the subsequent drainage are yet to be put to critical test under the supervision of the FIH qualified technical experts. Unless a couple of good games are held on the new pitch, nothing can be said.

“We hope everything is fine. We have little or no time to rectify any technical or major snag even if it comes to our notice during pre-competition practice games,” said an official present at the venue. “We are keeping our fingers crossed. Our immediate concern is to complete all works and get out as soon as possible,” remarked another one looking after the civil works holding that unless proper curing is done, “some problems are bound to be there that can be checked and rectified after the World Cup is over.”

When coach Harinder Singh reached the stadium, CRPF team had just arrived. “New pitches are slippery because of waxing of the surfaces. It will take a while to go. Though the home team will arrive here on February 1, other teams will start arriving by February 22, five to seven days before the actual start of the World Cup. We want our players to acclimatise themselves well with the playing conditions here.

“We are planning a couple of practice matches. On February 23rd we will play a warm up game against Argnetina followed by game against the Netherlands on 25th,” says Harinder Singh promising that “it will be good show by home team. We hope to live up to high expectations. All problems have been taken care of and boys are training hard.”

Ludhiana, January 28
The weather gods have finally relented with the fog and chill giving way to some enjoyable sunshine. Making the most of it, JCT FC, who had been suffering from cold feet on the field, finally found their stride with a ‘heart-warming’ 2-0 win over Sporting Clube de Goa at the Guru Nanak Stadium here today.

Sporting, who are rooted at the bottom of the league table, found the going tough and were under pressure from the opening minutes. That soon paid dividends for the home side as in the 4th minute, Ajay Singh scored a sensational volley off a corner. The goal got the rumbling JCT machine moving and they wrested control for the rest of the half and went into the breather with a one goal lead.

After the break, it was some more sunshine as JCT’s prolific scorer, Baljit Sahni took the field. Sahni, who had been in sensational form before he met with an accident in Goa in November, soon found his feet, and he and Sakatar combined well to keep the Sporting defence on their toes.

Ultimately, the fluid JCT game made inroads into the Sporting half, and Baljit, after dodging three players, coolly slotted the ball into the back of the net and make it 2-0. It was a moment to cherish for the talisman, who had been extremely frustrated as the injury had cut into his sensational form.

JCT replaced Balwant with Pawan for the final few minutes, but not before Balwant had given the Sporting defence a torrid time. The diminutive striker, who has built himself a big reputation for his grit, challenged every ball and made sure his side were never physically overshadowed in a game they finally won 2-0. JCT’s manager Harjinder Jagga, while speaking to The Tribune said, “We have had a lot of players out with injuries and suspension. It was good that despite all that, we put in a good show here. There is still room for improvement and the guys out like Jagpreet and Sunil are long term injuries. Even Amandeep is out. While they try to recover, we should also start our recovery in the league after a tough little period.”