WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 8, 2014 SPORTS NHL League set for Photo of the day smooth start to 2014-15 season TORONTO: With the NBA trying to recover the NHL’s longest active championship from the Donald Sterling fiasco and the NFL drought. The Maple Leafs, who are the only reeling from a string of domestic violence NHL franchise valued at $1 billion by Forbes, cases, the National Hockey League opens a have been a massive success everywhere but new season today free of controversy. With a on the ice having made the playoffs once in $5.2 billion Canadian television-rights deal the last nine years. and guaranteed labour peace through the While Leafs supporters have suffered, fans 2021-22 season, it seems as if NHL of the Blackhawks and Los Angeles Kings Commissioner Gary Bettman is looking for- have celebrated with thwe two teams having ward to the 2014-15 campaign with a smile. captured four of the last five Stanley Cups. “The game on the ice has never been No franchise has successfully defended more exciting, more entertaining, more com- the Cup since the Detroit Red Wings won petitive,” Bettman told the Canadian Club of back-to-back titles in 1997 and 1998 and the Toronto last month. “We’re coming off our Kings will have an opportunity to establish best season ever and we think this year is themselves a true hockey dynasty if they can going to be even better. skate away with the trophy for a third time in “The fact is this is the most stable our fran- four seasons. The Blackhawks, led by captain chises have ever been, the healthiest we have Jonathan Toews and the Kings, anchored by been ... we’re feeling good about where we defenceman Drew Doughty, start the season are, we’re feeling good about the future.” as the teams to beats in a Western With the 2018 Olympics nearly four years Conference packed with contenders. away the debate on whether to send NHL The Boston Bruins, the only team other players has been pushed to the back burner than Chicago or Los Angeles to lift the Cup along with any threat of a labor dispute as since 2010, again look the class of the East players and owners agreed to a 10-year col- but will have to fill the void left by Jarome lective bargaining agreement in 2013. The Iginla, who tied for the team lead in goals Carlos Sainz performs during the Peugeot 2008 DKR test in Chateau de Lastours, Portel des Corbieres, France. — www.redbull.com NHL will stage two outdoor contests, four less with 30 last season but has signed with than last season, starting with the Winter Colorado. Pittsburgh Penguins forward Classic on New Year’s Day between Sidney Crosby and Capitals sniper Alex Washington Capitals and visiting Chicago Ovechkin remain the NHL’s marquee names Aussies thump faltering Blackhawks. In late February, the San Jose piling up individual honours but the two cap- Sharks play the Los Angeles Kings at the tains have had not had the same success home of the NFL’s San Francisco 49ers. leading their teams to championships. Certainly the NHL’s problems have not all Ovechkin, a three-time league most valu- suddenly vanished in a blur of billion-dollar able players, has yet to have his name Pakistan in Twenty20 rights deals, record revenues and soaring engraved on the Stanley Cup while Crosby, attendance. the reigning league MVP, hoisted his only DUBAI: Australia put on a clinical performance There is still the troubling issue of concus- Cup in 2009. Now 27-years-old and about to to beat Pakistan by six wickets in the one-off sions and threat of a costly lawsuit as well as enter his 10th NHL season, Crosby, who led Twenty20 international in Dubai on Sunday. the debate over fighting which is sure to the league in scoring last season, is no Off-spinner Glenn Maxwell took a career best resurface the next time a player is left blood- longer ‘Sid the Kid’ and, like Ovechkin, is a (3-13) and debutant Cameron Boyce (2-10) con- ied and unconscious on the ice. The Canadian player in his prime under pressure to deliver demned Pakistan to their fifth lowest Twenty20 dollar has taken a pounding in recent months a championship. Detroit have made it the international total of 96-9 in 20 overs. and the NHL will surely keep a close watch playoffs for 23 consecutive years and there is Australia knocked off the target for the loss since the seven teams in the game’s spiritual no reason that run should end this season of four wickets in 14 overs with opener David home and financial engine earn revenue in with Mike Babcock, who piloted Canada to Warner hitting a robust 39-ball 53 not out with Canadian dollars but pay players in U.S. cur- gold medals at the 2010 and 2014 Olympics, four fours and three sixes. rency. The big concern for hockey-mad behind the bench. With an Olympic gold Warner reverse-swept Sohaib Maqsood for a Canadians, however, is not how well their cur- medal winning netminder in Carey Price, big six to complete the only half-century of the rency is performing but how well their teams one of the top defenceman in P.K. Subban match in a low-scoring game, much to the dis- will play since no Canadian team has cap- and a crop of solid forwards, the Montreal appointment of a packed Eid holiday crowd. tured the Stanley Cup since 1993. Canadiens remain the best bet to end Pakistan did make some inroads while defend- Nowhere are expectations higher than in Canada’s Cup drought while the New York ing their low total, with left-arm spinner Raza Toronto where the Maple Leafs, who have not Rangers could make to the finals for a sec- Hasan (2-17) dismissing skipper Aaron Finch won a Stanley Cup since 1967, will try toend ond consecutive year. — Reuters SCOREBOARD DUBAI: Scoreboard of the one-off Twenty20 international between Pakistan and Australia played at Dubai stadium on Sunday: Pakistan Ahmed Shahzad c Finch b Boyce 10 Awais Zia c Richardson b Maxwell 3 Umar Amin st Haddin b Maxwell 0 Sohaib Maqsood b Maxwell 0 Saad Nasim b Starc 25 Umar Akmal c Warner b Richardson 1 Shahid Afridi lbw b Abbott 2 Anwar Ali c Richardson b Boyce 5 Wahab Riaz c Starc b Faulkner 16 Raza Hasan not out 13 Mohammad Irfan not out 1 Extras: (lb7, w13) 20 Total (for nine wkts, 20 overs) 96 Fall of wickets: 1-13 (Zia), 2-13 (Amin), 3-23 (Maqsood), 4-33 (Shahzad), 5-36 (Akmal), 6- GLENDALE: Justin Hodgeman No. 52 of the Arizona Coyotes skates with the puck 46 (Afridi), 7-57 (Ali), 8-71 (Nasim), 9-86 (Riaz) ahead of Logan Couture No. 39 of the San Jose Sharks during the first period of the Bowling: Maxwell 3-0-13-3 (6w), Starc 4-0-17- preseason NHL game at Gila River Arena. — AFP 1 (5w), Boyce 4-0-10-2, Richardson 3-0-13-1, Abbott 3-0-17-1 (2w), Smith 1-0-4-0, Faulkner 2-0-15-1. Bangladesh urged to send SHARJAH: Australian bowler James Faulkner bowls during their first One Day International Australia cricket match in Sharjah. — AFP ‘any’ team to Pakistan D. Warner not out 53 (five) and Steve Smith (three) in an incisive four- Awais Zia (three), Umar Amin (nought) and A. Finch c Irfan b Hasan 5 over spell but that was not enough. Maxwell hit Sohaib Maqsood (nought) to leave Pakistan DHAKA: Pakistan’s cricket chief has urged cooperative relations... on the cricket front” G. Maxwell lbw b Afridi 17 three boundaries in his 17 before he fell to reeling at 23-3. Leg-spinner Boyce, one of four Bangladesh to send ‘any’ team to his country as which soured in early 2013 when Bangladesh S. Smith c Riaz b Hasan 3 Shahid Afridi but Warner and James Faulkner debutants for Australia, chipped in with the they seek to bring back international matches shelved a planned tour on safety grounds. P. Hughes c Maqsood b Riaz 6 (seven not out) saw Australia home. wickets of Ahmed Shahzad (ten) and Anwar Ali following the deadly attack on Sri Lanka’s team Pakistan responded by banning their own J. Faulkner not out 7 Pakistan were missing key spinners Saeed (five). It was left to Nasim to take Pakistan past bus in 2009. cricketers from playing in Twenty20 Bangladesh Extras: (lb4, w1, nb1) 6 Ajmal (suspended for an illegal bowling action) their lowest Twenty20 total of 74 — against Pakistan Cricket Board chairman Shahryar Premier League tournament. Total: (for four wkts; 14 overs) 97 and Mohammad Hafeez (injury) but they failed Australia at the same venue last year-with an Khan arrived in Bangladesh on Monday and “If your national team cannot come to Fall of wickets: 1-11 (Finch), 2-38 (Maxwell), declared that it was now much safer in his coun- Pakistan for security reasons-even though I yet again in their batting. enterprising knock. 3-42 (Smith), 4-56 (Hughes) Only debutant Saad Nasim (25), tail-enders Riaz and Hasan helped Pakistan add 25 runs try than five years ago. “We understand that would ask them to send a team to examine how Bowling: Hasan 4-0-17-2, Irfan 2-0-20-0, security situation is a hurdle in the way of your things are-I want to start cricket between two Wahab Riaz (16) and Raza Hasan (13 not out) for the last two wickets.