EAST LONDON, South Africa, Sept. 19--South Africa took just 28 overs to beat Zimbabwe by six wickets in the second one-day cricket international on Monday and earn an unbeatable 2-0 lead in the three-match series.
Zimbabwe was bowled for 152 two balls short of completing 50 overs, and South Africa made 156 for four at Buffalo Park.
The home side won the first match by five wickets last Friday, and the second was delayed a day because of rain.
The final match is at Sedgars Parks in Potchefstroom on Wednesday, AP said.
Loots Bosman, playing in just his second one-dayer, shrugged off a blow to the helmet from Ed Rainsford and hit 38 off 29 balls to kick-start South Africa’s chase.
He lost fellow opener Boeta Dippenaar at 14-1, but Bosman and Alviro Petersen--debuting at No. 3 for Herschelle Gibbs--put on 53 for the second wicket before the pair was bowled in the span of four balls by Piet Rinke in the 10th over.
At 72-3, stand-in South Africa captain Jacques Kallis steadied the home reply, and in making 26 he became the first player to score more than 8,000 runs and take more than 200 wickets in tests and one-day internationals.
His dismissal--bowled off an under-edge by Anthony Ireland--at 109-4 brought Justin Kemp (28 not out) to the crease and he and JP Duminy (31 not out) combined for the winning 47-run partnership.
Rinke was the best bowler for Zimbabwe with 2-35, while Ireland took 2-40.
Having won the toss, Zimbabwe captain Prosper Utseya hit 13 runs off Shaun Pollock’s last over to finish undefeated on 24 off 32 balls.
Opener Tawanda Mufambisi scored 21 off 24 balls before Pollock uprooted his leg stump with an off-cutter.
Chamu Chibhabha held the innings together, topscoring for Zimbabwe with 38. The No. 3 was the seventh man to be dismissed at 122 when he hooked Makhaya Ntini to Duminy at backward square leg while trying to accelerate the run rate.
Elton Chigumbura reached a painstaking 30 off 62 balls before he charged down the wicket against Robin Peterson and was stumped.
Andrew Hall led South Africa’s bowling with 3-23. Kallis took 2-22, and Robin Peterson 2-27.

KOLKATA, India, Sept. 19--Former world number one Martina Hingis romped to a 6-1 6-2 victory over Hungary’s Melinda Czink in the first round of the Kolkata Open on Monday.
The Swiss world number nine, aiming for her second singles title since her return to the game in January, faced a brief fightback early in the second set before prevailing over her 71st-ranked opponent on the slow indoor surface, Reuters said.
Hingis retired in 2002 with foot and ankle injuries and re-established herself among the elite with victory in the Italian Open in May. She is the top seed here and faces Tzipora Obziler next.
“I’m happy with the way I played today,“ said Hingis. “I love playing indoors. I’m working on coming in a little bit more and volleying.“
The five-times grand slam singles champion was delighted to have made her return to top flight tennis.
“It is because I missed it so much,“ Hingis said. “It is great to be back in the circuit, to know people missed you. I have friends all over who welcome me.“
Hingis, who reached the quarterfinals of the Australian and French Opens this year, said she would love to add another grand slam title to her impressive haul.
“I would definitely want to win another grand slam,“ she said. “It would be one of my biggest moments to be able to do so, but it is going to be very tough.
“I have to work very hard. The girls are much fitter now.
The trend was started by Martina Navratilova and Steffi Graff and now all of them are so fit.
“In fact, the Williams sisters re-wrote the script with their fitness.“
Thailand’s Tamarine Tanasugarn, once a top-20 player but now ranked 125th in the world, caused the first upset by scoring a 6-7 7-5 6-0 victory over sixth seed Kaia Kanepi of Estonia.

Lleyton Hewitt

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina, Sept. 19--Former world number one Lleyton Hewitt steps deep into enemy territory when he leads Australia into their potentially explosive Davis Cup semifinal away to Argentina this weekend.
Hewitt, with a string of angry confrontations with Argentine players behind him, is an unpopular figure in the South American country and will have two minders following his every move before and during the Sept 22-24 tie.
Australia will be attempting to avenge last year’s 4-1 quarterfinal home defeat against the same opponents, which has added further spice to the confrontation.
But Argentina, who will be backed by a fanatical 14,000 crowd at the Parque Roca arena and playing on their favored clay surface, start as overwhelming favorites to reach their first final since 1981, Reuters said.
David Nalbandian, one of the Argentine players who has clashed with Hewitt in the past, has fuelled the rivalry by predicting a straightforward win.
“It’s going to be easy, 4-1,“ he said.
“It’s going to be even nicer that he (Hewitt) is playing, it will be a better spectacle, but the Australians have the same chances as before.“
Nalbandian denied that Australia would get a rough reception, however.
“Everyone knows about the Davis Cup and when we play away they make our lives impossible,“ he said.
“There is noise everywhere, insults and you have to put up with it. People here are much more respectful than abroad.“
Hewitt, who had been doubtful because of an injured knee, arrived in Buenos Aires on Sunday evening and was whisked to a waiting car without speaking to reporters.
The bad feeling began in last year’s Australian Open when Argentina’s Juan Ignacio Chela was fined for spitting in Hewitt’s direction during a third round tie.
In the quarterfinals, Hewitt brushed shoulders at a change of ends with Nalbandian, the man he beat in the 2002 Wimbledon final, before winning a bad-tempered fifth set.
Then, Guillermo Coria and Hewitt traded allegations of bad sportsmanship when the countries met in the Davis Cup later the same year in Sydney.
Chela and Nalbandian have both been named in an Argentine team which is unchanged from the one which beat holders Croatia in their quarter-final in Zagreb.
Argentina, who have reached the semifinals for the fourth time in five years since returning to the World Group in 2002, have not lost a home tie for eight years.

NOTTINGHAM, UK, Sept. 19--Nick Matthew became the first home grown English player since 1939 to win the British Open when he beat former world champion Thierry Lincou of France on Monday.
The 26-year-old Yorkshireman came from 0-4 down in the final game to win 11-8 5-11 11-4 9-11, 11-6 against an opponent who had done well to extend another contest to the full five games.
According to Reuters, the night before Lincou had come from two games down, and from 3-8 down in the fifth, and saved five match points against world champion David Palmer.
His energy was severely depleted which made him odds against his winning he title, even against an opponent playing his first major final.
Matthew played good orthodox line squash, mixed with sudden increases of pace when he attacked, and was significantly the better mover.
The only previous England player to have won the British Open since 1939 was Peter Nicol, who was born and raised in Scotland.
“I rung Peter to get some help with one or two things last night,“ Matthew told reporters. “And he gave me a couple of hints.
“You can’t mention my name in the same breath as Jahangir Khan and Jansher Khan but I am just happy to have my name on a trophy like this.
When Lincou won the final point of the fourth game with the help of an audacious behind-the-back shot, it seemed a miracle might be possible.
But he hit a final wall of exhaustion midway through the fifth game and after that he had nothing left “I went to the end of what I could do,“ Lincou said.
“I have no regrets. I have done my work professionally.“
Earlier Nicol David, the first Asian woman ever to become world number one retained the title which started off the remarkable run last year which carried her to the top.
The top-seeded Malaysian’s 9-4 9-1 9-4 win over Rachel Grinham, twice the former British Open champion from Australia, was full of assertive volleying and the result was even more emphatic than the four-game win she had over the same player to take the world title in Hong Kong 10 months ago.

MADRID, Spain,
Sept. 19--China’s Bao Chunlai eased into the second round of the Badminton world championship on Monday with a 21-15 21-12 victory over Russia’s Stanislav Pukhov.
The seasoned Bao, a quarterfinalist at last year’s world championship in Anaheim and winner of last month’s Korean Open, had few problems disposing of the unrated Pukhov on the opening day of the world championship, Reuters said.
The Chinese, seeded joint fifth in a revised ranking issued by the tournament organizers during the day, will next face Austria’s Juergen Koch who overcame Andrew Dabeka of Canada 21-12 21-18.
South Korea’s Lee Il-hyun, also seeded to make the quarters, had to stave off a fight-back from Chetand Anand of India before winning through 21-18 18-21.
Dane Joachim Persson, a semifinalist in this year’s European championships, overcame Shon Seung-mo of South Korea 22-20 21-13, while Andrew Smith of England saw off home favourite Pablo Abian 21-15 21-13.
Eric Pang of Netherlands wrapped up a 21-11 21-14 win over Hong Kong’s Chan Yan Kit, but Bjoern Joppien had a tougher time of it in a nip-and-tuck 21-17 18-21 22-20 victory over Singapore’s Yen Hui Kendrick Lee.
The German now faces a daunting second-round match against top seed Chon Wei Lee of Malaysia.
Taufik Hidayat does not begin the defense of his crown until Tuesday when he takes on Ng Wei of Hong Kong.
The Indonesian will have to wait until Saturday to discover his fate after storming out of his quarter-final showdown against arch-rival Lin Dan at the Hong Kong Open last month in protest at a changed line call.
Lin, who lost to Hidayat in last year’s world championships, will not begin his bid to go one better until later in the week as he has been given a first-round bye.
In the women’s event, joint fifth seed Yao Jie of the Netherlands, a semi-finalist in the European championships, recovered from a slow start to see off Japan’s Yu Hirayama 21-16 21-11.
Germany’s Petra Overzier battled hard to edge a 22-20 19-21 1-16 victory over Lee Hwa-yun of South Korea, while Jiang anjiao of China, also seeded to make the last 16, beat India’s aina Nehwal 21-10 21-16.

Tom Boonen

SALZBURG, Austria, Sept. 19--Belgium’s Tom Boonen wants to prolong the attention that goes with wearing the world champions’ rainbow jersey by winning a second consecutive world road race title this week.
But Boonen, who won his title in Madrid last year with a powerful sprint, will find the course around the hilly countryside north of Salzburg much tougher than the Spanish capital’s city centre circuit, Reuters said.
Italy’s Gianni Bugno was the last man to win consecutive world titles in 1991 and 1992.
“The rainbow jersey stands out and gets you noticed. I’ve really enjoyed the special attention this year and want to experience it again in 2007,“ Boonen said recently.
“I know it’s always tough winning consecutive world titles but I’m in good shape and think I can be competitive.“
Boonen has planned the second half of his season around the world championships, which begin on Wednesday with the elite road race taking place on Sunday.
The Belgian trained hard in August and then used a mix of short stage races and tough one-day races to fine-tune his form.
To get used to the 266-km world championship distance he has often done extra training after riding 200-km races.
Boonen showed his finishing sprint is still fast and powerful by winning the last stage of the Tour of Britain in London on Sept. 3.
The 25 year-old will face stiff opposition from the likes of Olympic champion Paolo Bettini of Italy, Spain’s Alejandro
Valverde and Tour of Spain winner Alexandre Vinokourov of Kazakhstan.
Bettini has suggested the circuit around Salzburg is too hard for Boonen but the Belgian disagrees.
“I won the Tour of Flanders in April and that includes lots of short climbs just like the (Salzburg) circuit,“ Boonen said.
“I’ll need to be at my best to win but I’m more than just a sprinter. Bettini knows that and so perhaps is a little scared of me.“
The world championships begin on Wednesday with the women’s and under-23 men’s time trials over 26.1 km and 39.5 km respectively.
The elite men’s time trial over a distance of 50.8 km is on Thursday.
The under-23 men’s 176-km road race and the women’s 132-km road race are on Saturday and the 266-km elite men’s race is on Sunday.

SAO PAULO, Brazil, Sept. 18--The two-time defending champion United States and Australia remained unbeaten heading to the quarterfinals of the women’s world basketball championship on Monday.
The Americans downed European champion Czech Republic 63-50, while Australia walloped Argentina 83-49 to remain on course for a showdown in Saturday’s final.
In the quarterfinals on Wednesday, the United States plays Lithuania, Australia faces France, Russia meets Spain, and host Brazil plays the Czech Republic, AP said.
Candace Parker and Tina Thompson led the US with 14 points each, and Diana Taurasi added 13.
The United States won Group F from the Czechs, and Russia and France claimed the last two quarterfinal berths.
France lost to China 66-64, but the two-point margin helped the French advance by edging China on points difference.
Lijie Miao scored 23 points to lead China.
Ilona Korstin topscored for Russia with 26 points as it beat Cuba 96-81.
Lauren Jackson scored 30 points in 20 minutes to lead Australia, trying to reach its first final after bronze medals in the last two worlds.
Hollie Grima and Belinda Snell chipped in 10 points each for the Opals. Natalia Rios contributed 14 for Argentina.
Australia topped Group E, followed by Spain and Brazil.
Lithuania claimed the last quarterfinal berth in the group on points difference from Argentina.
Amaya Valdemoro scored 39 points and Ana Montanana added 11 in Spain’s 75-55 victory over Lithuania.
Brazil trounced Canada 82-41 led by Iziane Castro Alves with 17, as many as Canada scored in the second half.
Veteran Janeth dos Santos Arcain sprained her right ankle and was carried off the court, and team doctor Carlos Eduardo Marques said her condition was not serious.
Tamara Sutton-Brown was the only Canadian in double figures with 14.