Boxing: Oscar De La Hoya has withdrawn his offer to fight Fernando Vargas on December 8th in what would have been a boxing showdown of rival junior middleweight world champions. Gary Shaw, chief operating officer of Vargas promoters Main Events, was told that de la Hoya had instructed his agents to kill the deal for a bout between the popular Hispanic-American boxers.
Both rivals have challenged each other for years. De la Hoya, 34-2 with 27 knockouts, won the World Boxing Council's junior middleweight title on June 23rd in Las Vegas with a unanimous decision over Spain's Javier Castillejo.
The World Boxing Association and International Boxing Federation titles in the weight class are currently vacant, although Vargas will fight for the WBA crown September 22nd in Las Vegas against Mexican southpaw Jose Flores.
Women's Hockey: The re-draw for next month's World Cup Qualifier in France, which had to be made following the International Hockey Federation's decision to change the format for the tournament, has placed Ireland in a pool with England, France, India, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Ukraine and Uruguay, reports Mary Hannigan.
A top two finish in the pool would guarantee Ireland's place in next year's World Cup finals while a third or fourth placing would give them two more chances to qualify through the cross-over matches. England will be favourites to top the pool, leaving Ukraine,
France and India as the most likely rivals to Ireland's ambitions. Pool B is made up of Belgium, Canada, Japan, Lithuania, Malaysia, Russia, Scotland and the USA.
WOMEN'S WORLD CUP QUALIFIER (Amiens/Abbeville, Sept 17th-30th): Ireland's pool schedule: Kenya, Sept 17th; India,Sept 19th; Uruguay, Sept 20th: England, Sept 22nd: France, Sept 23rd: Kazakhstan, Sept 25th: Ukraine, September 26th.
Rowing: Offaly's Eimear Moran reached the A semi-finals of the women's single sculls at the World Junior championships at Duisburg in Germany yesterday, writes Liam Gorman.
Ireland's lone representative at the championships finished second to Camilla Gossetti of Italy in her repechage, but in the slowest time of the qualifiers for the A semi-final. The 17-year-old Irishwoman thus seems unlikely to make the A final, although would still hope to do well enough in her semi-final to secure a top-10 place in the world.
Ireland's junior men's eight set a good headline for Moran when they won a bronze medal on Sunday at the Coupe de la Jeunesse, the west European junior championships, at Brive in France. The junior women's coxless four also took bronze, but in three-boat races.
