GOLF
Lexi Thompson kept a rough round from getting worse and wound up holding her own Thursday in the Shriners Children’s Open until darkness in Las Vegas kept her from finishing.
Beau Hossler set the pace by matching his career low on the PGA Tour with a 9-under 62, which included a tee shot that found the water left of the par-3 17th at the TPC Summerlin.
Thompson was the main attraction, the seventh woman to play a PGA Tour event, and the first in five years.
She was 1-over par through 16 holes and chose to mark her ball – a 20-foot par putt on the 17th – and return to finish the first round in the morning.
EUROPEAN TOUR: Jon Rahm got off to a solid start in his attempt to surpass Seve Ballesteros by winning a fourth Spanish Open title, shooting 4-under 67 to sit four shots off the lead after the first round in Madrid.
Matthieu Pavon was at the top of the leaderboard after a 63 at the Club de Campo Villa de Madrid that included seven birdies, an eagle and a bogey.
Wil Besseling was one shot back, while Mike Lorenzo-Vera, Pedro Figueiredo and Eddie Pepperell were another stroke behind in a tie for third.
LPGA: Maja Stark and Wichanee Meechai each shot 6-under 66 to take a two-stroke lead at the LPGA Shanghai event in the tour’s return to China after the COVID-19 pandemic.
Stark, one of three rookies on the European team which tied the Americans to retain the Solheim Cup last month in Spain, birdied four of her first six holes on the Qizhong Garden Golf Club course. Meechai overcame a first-hole bogey and finished strongly with a pair of birdies.
Americans Danielle Kang, Lauren Coughlin and Alison Lee and Chinese players Cai Danlin and Li Shuying were in a 10-way tie for third.
SOCCER
EURO 2024 QUALIFYING: Spain kept Scotland from becoming the first team to secure a place at the 2024 European Championship by beating the visitors, 2-0, for its 25th consecutive home win in qualifiers.
Scotland still leads the group with 15 points, three more than Spain and five more than Norway, which got two goals from Erling Haaland in a 4-0 win at Cyprus.
• UEFA postponed Israel’s European Championship qualifying match against host Kosovo on Sunday.
UEFA said in a statement that the game cannot be played “because the Israeli authorities currently do not allow their national team to travel abroad.”
Israel is now two games behind schedule in a tight qualifying group where it is competing with Switzerland and Romania for the top-two spots. Two teams advance to the Euro 2024 tournament in Germany.
Israel was scheduled to host group leader Switzerland on Thursday in Tel Aviv, but that game was postponed on Sunday. It will now be played Nov. 15, though it is unclear if Israel can safely host games.
OLYMPICS
RUSSIA SUSPENDED AGAIN: The International Olympic Committee’s executive board imposed a suspension on the Russian Olympic Committee for a breach of the Olympic Charter by incorporating sports councils in four regions in eastern Ukraine.
The suspension does not immediately affect any Russians who would be eligible to compete as neutral athletes. But the decision appears to highlight rising frustration from the IOC and its president, Thomas Bach, who can ultimately decide to impose a blanket ban on all Russian athletes from next year’s Paris Games.
TENNIS
SHANGHAI MASTERS: Sebastian Korda reached the semifinals at a Masters tournament for the first time by rallying to beat Ben Shelton 6-7, (10), 6-2, 7-6 (6) in China.
It was the first all-American Masters quarterfinal since 2017, and both players were two points from winning at the end.
KOREA OPEN: No. 1 seed Jessica Pegula advanced to the quarterfinals in Seoul by beating Ashlyn Krueger, 6-3, 6-1.
Pegula will play another American, Claire Liu, in the quarterfinals.
ZHENGZHOU OPEN: Fourth-seeded Ons Jabeur won her opening match and advanced to the quarterfinals in China by defeating Lucia Bronzetti, 6-3, 7-6 (5).
HONG KONG OPEN: Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova beat second-seeded Beatriz Haddad-Maia, 7-5, 1-6, 6-1, to reach the quarterfinals.
HORSE RACING
GRAND NATIONAL: The Grand National will reduce its field to 34 horses as part of a slew of significant changes, taking effect from next year, in an effort to make the world’s most famous steeplechase safer for horses and jockeys.
Other changes include softening the fences by using foam and rubber toe boards, and moving the first fence closer to the start to stop horses building up too much speed.
The race will also start earlier in the day so the course stays as soft as possible, and the horses will set off from a standing start.
The Grand National has had a field of 40 horses since 1984, which has often been cited – along with the size of the fences – as a reason why 16 horses have died in the race since the turn of the century.
TRACK AND FIELD
SUSPENSION: Four-time NCAA champion sprinter Divine Oduduru received a six-year ban for his role in a case first pursued by U.S. authorities under a law designed to combat widespread doping schemes across the globe.
The Athletics Integrity Unit, which oversees doping cases in track and field, said a disciplinary panel found the Nigerian sprinter guilty of possession and use or attempted use of multiple prohibited substances in the leadup to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. The AIU said there were aggravated circumstances that called for adding two years to the original four-year ban.
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