22 METROSPORT Tuesday, December 22, 2009 D Q14: Who did Padraig Harrington beat in a four-hole Open Championship play-off to win his first major in 2007? To P23 Petronas join Mercedes FORMULA ONE: Mercedes GP have signed a long-term title- sponsorship deal with Malaysian national oil and gas company Petronas. The team, formerly last seasons world champions Brawn GP, will be officially known as the Mercedes GP Petronas Formula One Team. Team boss Ross Brawn said: The collaboration gives our team a fantastic base from which to achieve our ambitions of competing at the top level of Formula One and building on the success of 2009. Chargers reach play-offs NFL: San Diego sealed their fourth AFC West title in a row with a dramatic 27-24 win over Cincinnati on Sunday, while Minnesota clinched the NFC North despite an upset loss to the Carolina Panthers. The Arizona Cardinals and Philadelphia Eagles also secured their places in the postseason with two weeks of games remaining Cincinnati, playing for the first time since the death of wide receiver Chris Henry on Thursday, lost 27-24 to Chargers kicker Nate Kaedings (pictured) 52-yard field goal with three seconds left. SPORTDigest Henin wild about Sydney TENNIS: Former world No.1 Justine Henin has been given a wild card to next months Medibank International Sydney. The Belgian, who won seven Grand Slams before retiring at the top of her game in May last year, will join a top-class womens field which features nine of the worlds top ten players ahead of her Grand Slam return at the Australian Open. Henin announced her comeback to professional tennis in September after 15 months on the sidelines. It will be great to get some tough, competitive matches at the before heading to Melbourne, said Henin. Strong field contest Qatar GOLF: World No.4 Lee Westwood will join Spains Sergio Garcia, Colombian Camilo Villegas and American Kenny Perry in a top- class field at next months Qatar Masters. Every year we see a strong pool of players confirming Doha in their diaries which is great news for the tournament and golf in the region, Qatar Golf Association president Hassan Al Nuami said. Ban: Dupuy could miss the Six Nations Dupuy to appeal as Stade claim anti-French bias RUGBY: Stade Francais scrum-half Julien Dupuy is to appeal against his 24-week ban for gouging Ulster flanker Stephen Ferris, the French club have confirmed. The incident occurred during Ulsters 23-13 win over the Parisians in a Heineken Cup match at Ravenhill. Should Dupuy, who joined Stade from Guinness Premiership champions Leicester in the summer, fail with his appeal it will see him miss all of Frances Six Nations campaign and the rest of the season. Stade president Max Guazzini hit out at the suspension and said: [European Rugby Cup] wanted to make an example of a symbolic player of Stade Francais and of the French team which has never had a disciplinary problem. Coyle fears Burnley will be priced out BURNLEY boss Owen Coyle admits he may struggle to sign even Championship players due to a tight budget at Turf Moor. The Clarets look in need of some new blood after Sundays 2-0 defeat at Wolves. But Coyle said: We have a budget which is not even a Championship budget. If I go and try to sign players from the Championship I might struggle. Some of them are on better salaries than what our boys are on in the Premier League. The established clubs, like Blackburn and Bolton, have three times our budget. We will try to do it under those financial restrictions but what this group of players have done to this point is fantastic. Weve the smallest squad in the division. We have players who are ready to give everything. Burnley have taken only one point on their travels from nine games and Sundays defeat means they have gone seven matches without a win. That is in stark contrast to their form at Turf Moor, where they have collected 18 of their 19 points so far. But Coyle insisted: It is not a psychological thing for me or a mental thing. Home and away it shouldnt be any different. If we can add points on our travels to our home form we will be fine. Agger: Slip in Anfield standards has to end LiverpooL defender Daniel Agger admits standards have fall- en at the club but has stressed they cannot afford to slide further. Saturdays 2-0 defeat at port- smouth on Saturday was the reds seventh of the season and, combined with other results, saw them slip to eighth in the Bar- clays premier League table. They are now closer to pompey, still rooted to the bottom despite a fourth win of the campaign, than they are to leaders Chelsea and the pressure is increasing on manager rafael Benitez. However, Agger said the play- ers have to take responsibility for their below-par performances, and put an end to a run just four wins in 17 matches in the busy festive period. it goes without saying that we are extremely disappointed and we know that it simply isnt good enough for this club, said the Denmark central defender. We have got to change this around. it didnt happen against portsmouth but we cant let it go on any further. Confidence appears to be at an all-time low among the squad and in recent matches the conces- sion of a goal has immediately provoked a negative reaction from many of the players. Why is this happening? its a bit of everything i suppose but we have got to try to get some confi- dence from somewhere soon, the 25-year-old Agger said. You get that by winning games but we are not doing that at the moment. its always a question of sticking together and we need to do that now more than ever. No confidence: Agger admits Reds form is unacceptable LIVERPOOL midfielder Javier Mascherano will use his four-match ban from his red card in the 2-0 defeat at Portsmouth to recover from the knee injury he suffered while making the tackle which got him sent off. The Argentina captain will miss the Premier League fixtures with Wolves, Aston Villa and Spurs and the FA Cup third round tie at Reading. But Liverpool believe his injury would have sidelined him for at least that long. Picture:EMPICS By DAvID KENNEDy SOCCER PREMIER LEAGuE McIlroys place at top table is confirmed gOlf rorY mciLroY has had a great year capped by end-of-year world rankings which show he is one of the biggest rising stars in golf. The 20-year-old irishman has finished 2009 at No.9 in the world 30 places up on last year. Highlights for mcilroy this year include winning the Dubai Desert Classic, claiming joint third in the US pGA and fifth in the BmW pGA Championship as he took second place in the race to Dubai. He is joined in the top ten by fellow irishman padraig Harrington and likely ryder Cup team-mates Henrik Stenson, Lee Westwood and paul Casey. But mcilroy is not the years biggest climber, with US pGA champion Ye Yang rocketing from 478th at the start of the season to 31st, while italian edoardo molinari has climbed to No.48 from 653rd. Sergio Garcia, vijay Singh, robert Karlsson, Camilo villegas and ernie els have dropped out of 2008s top ten. Tiger Woods stayed at the top all year but came close to losing his No.1 spot in march before returning from an eight-month lay-off following knee surgery. And his rankings lead is bound to close again now he has announced an indefinite break to try to sort out the much-publicised problems in his personal life. WORLD RANKINGS 2010 1 Tiger Woods (USA) ..........14.94pts 2 Phil Mickelson (USA) ..............8.41 3 Steve Stricker (USA)...............6.78 4 Lee Westwood (Eng)...............6.68 5 Padraig Harrington (Irl) ...........5.65 6 Jim Furyk (USA)......................5.62 7 Paul Casey (Eng) ....................5.45 8 Henrik Stenson (Swe).............5.44 9 Rory McIlroy (NIrl, pictured)....4.92 10 Kenny Perry (USA)................4.82 v1 index.html2.html3.html4.html5.html6.html7.html8.html9.html10.html11.html12.html13.html14.html15.html16.html17.html18.html19.html20.html21.html22.html23.html