World champion Viswanathan Anand got a mixed start in the Amber blindfold and rapid chess tournament as he won one and lost one game against Peter Leko of Hungary in the first round in Nice, on Sunday. Anand won the blindfold game in great style but his form in his favourite variant of the game - rapid chess -- was found wanting as Leko struck back and equalised the score.

Top seed Dinara Safina survived a tough test of her title credentials before beating Tsvetana Pironkova of Bulgaria 7-6, 6-2 in the second round of the WTA event in Indian Wells on Friday.

Top seed Koneru Humpy remained in the hunt for top spot with a hard-fought victory over former world champion Maia Chiburdanidze of Georgia in the sixth round of the IS Bank Ataturk Women's Grand Prix chess tournament in Istanbul. Registering her fourth win in the tournament apart from two draws, Humpy took her tally to five points out of a possible six and remained in the joint second spot.

Top seed Koneru Humpy could not get the better of Shen Yang's defence and settled for her second draw on the trot to slip to the joint third place after four rounds in the IS Bank Ataturk Women Grand Prix chess tournament now in progress in Istanbul.

Grandmaster Koneru Humpy could not breach Betul Cemre Yildiz's defence and settled for a draw against the lowest ranked local favourite in the third round of the IS Bank Attaturk Fide Women's Grand Prix chess tournament now underway in Istanbul.

Top seed Grandmaster Koneru Humpy scored a crushing victory over Elina Danielian of Armenia to jump in to the sole lead in the second round of IS Bank Ataturk FIDE Grand Prix chess tournament in Istanbul.

After revising the sovereign outlook for India from stable to negative, Standard & Poor's Director for Sovereign and International Public Finance ratings Takahira Ogawa says the fiscal position holds the key to future course of action.

Corruption isn't solely a matter of petty officials and small-time pay-offs. Nation-states play the game too--for much higher stakes.

ISRO Chairman G Madhavan Nair told PTI that the agency has invited the scientists and expects representation from scientists behind Indian payloads (scientific instruments) as well those from guest instruments, including from NASA and the European Space Agency. An ISRO official said, "It will be a closed-door meeting. The scientists will analyse data from preliminary findings".

Moon Mineralogy Mapper (M3) instrument of National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has beamed back images of the Orientale Basin on the western limb of the moon. An analysis of the images indicates abundance of iron-bearing minerals such as pyroxene, said Carle Pieters, a senior scientist of US-based Brown University and principal investigator for the M3 experiment.

In the US, recession started in December 2007, and will last at least until December 2009 - the longest and deepest US recession since World War II, with the cumulative fall in GDP possibly exceeding 5 per cent. The recession in other advanced economies (the euro zone, United Kingdom, European Union, Canada, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand) started in the second quarter of 2008, before the financial turmoil in September and October further aggravated the credit crunch.

The Indian men's and women's teams registered identical 3-1 victories over Czech Republic and Slovenia respectively, in the 10th and penultimate round of the 32nd Chess Olympiad in Dresden, Germany, on Monday. The women's team, with 14 points, improved to joint-seventh while the men's team moved to joint-ninth place.

The Indian medal hopes in the 32nd chess Olympiad suffered a severe jolt after the men could only manage a 2-2 draw with Slovenia while the women lost 1.5-2.5 to Serbia in the eighth round in Dresden, Germany. The Indian men slipped to joint 14th spot in the standings on 11 points out of a possible 16 and now face an uphill task to keep their medal hopes alive.

On a mixed day for India at the 32nd Chess Olympiad, the women's team defeated Bulgaria to move up to joint-third place while the men slipped to tied 10th after losing to France in the seventh round. Asian women's champion Tania Sachdev and Asian junior girls' winner Mary Ann Gomes helped the Indian women to a 2.5-1.5 victory over Bulgaria.

Striker Dimitar Berbatov will miss Manchester United's Premier League match at Aston Villa on Saturday (1730) after suffering a thigh injury, his agent said.

The Indian men's and women's teams scored identical 2.5-1.5 victories over Bosnia-Herzegovina and Italy respectively, in the sixth round of the 32nd chess Olympiad now underway in Dresden, Germany. The Indian men moved to joint-third place with 10 points out of a possible 12 in the Open section and are now behind Russia and Armenia, who share the lead on 11 points each. The women took their tally to nine points and share sixth place.

The steel plant will be closed down in 25 days unless an investor takes it over, operative executive director of the Bulgarian metallurgic enterprise Plamen Stoyanov told the Bulgarian media. Bulgaria's biggest steel plant has already shut down some of its production facilities, including two of its blast furnaces, and plans to stop operations completely by the end of this month.

Tottenham Hotspur sacked manager Juande Ramos on Saturday and Portsmouth's Harry Redknapp said he would be taking charge of the English Premier League team.

The Champions League burst into life on Tuesday with 36 goals in eight matches, including 24 in just three games, to equal a competition record.

Greet the scientists on achieving this major milestone!

Spain, Germany and England all chalked up victories in their qualifiers for the 2010 World Cup on Saturday.

Indian shuttlers had a field day in the KLRC Bulgarian Grand Prix in Sofia. Aditi Mutatkar, in the women's singles, Rupesh Kumar and Sanave Thomas, in the men's doubles, and the mixed doubles pair of V Diju and Jwala Gutta entered the quarter-finals on Thursday.

Twice UEFA Cup winners Feyenoord and Tottenham Hotspur came through testing away ties on Thursday to progress to the group stage of the competition. Feyenoord overturned a 1-0 home defeat to win 2-1 against Swedish league leaders Kalmar and go through on away goals while a 1-1 draw for Spurs in Poland helped the Premier League strugglers eliminate Wisla Krakow 3-2 on aggregate in the first round.

World champion Viswanathan Anand on Tuesday fell from the top spot to be placed fifth in the latest world rankings issued by the game's world governing body FIDE. It is after a gap of over a decade that Anand is placed outside the top three.

Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson said on Thursday he had to choose between youth and experience in replacing the suspended Nemanja Vidic for Sunday's Premier League game with Chelsea at Stamford Bridge. The Serbian international misses the clash between the champions and last season's runners-up through a one-match ban for his sending off in Saturday's 2-1 defeat at Liverpool.

The game against Carlsen was no problem although. Anand employed the Slav defense and faced the exchange variation, kept Carlsen's pieces at bay and exchanged at regular intervals to reach a balanced position where the draw was agreed to after just 29 moves. Topalov played a fine technical game to beat Ivanchuk who played black. The Semi-Slav defense by Ivanchuk did not help much as Topalov gained a small but lasting advantage after trading the queens in the midd

The two-week vacuum test to evaluate the thermal design of the spacecraft and to verify its endurance in the harsh environment of space has just been completed at Indian Space Research Organisation Satellite Centre in Bengaluru, sources in the space agency said.

Viswanathan Anand's incredible winless streak continues unabated as the World Champion played out yet another draw with Teimour Radjabov of Azerbaijan to slip to the joint fifth spot in the Bilbao Grand Slam Final in Bilbao, Spain.

A draw would have sufficed but Grandmaster Koneru Humpy showed no mercy and recorded her second successive win against Shen Yang of China to storm into the semifinals of the World Women's Chess Championship in Nalchik (Russia).

Viswanathan Anand's wait for his maiden win in the Bilbao Grand Slam Final chess tournament got prolonged again as the world champion drew his fifth round game with Magnus Carlsen to be joint fourth in the ongoing Euro 4,00,000 prize money tournament in Bilbao (Spain).

World Champion Viswanathan Anand was stunned by Veselin Topalov of Bulgaria in the fourth round of the Bilbao Grand Slam final chess tournament in Bilbao.

Owing to their AFC Challenge Cup triumph, India rose two places in the FIFA rankings and are now at 151.

World champion Viswanathan Anand will take on world number four Vassily Ivanchuk of Ukraine in the first round of the Bilbao Grand Slam of chess. The event, which was opened on Monday, will be a crucial test for Anand ahead of the World Championship match against Vladimir Kramnik of Russia slated next month.

With Vassily Ivanchuk and Magnus Carlsen eyeing his numero uno tag, World champion Viswanathan Anand, his pre-tournament favourite tag notwithstanding, just cannot afford to lower his guard in the Grand Slam Chess Final Masters starting in Bilbao, Spain, on Monday.

Russia won their third successive Olympic rhythmic gymnastics group gold with two dynamic and intricately choreographed routines on Sunday. Their flawless exhibition of agility and dexterity earned them 35.550 points, 0.325 more than surprise silver medallists China. Belarus took the bronze.

Norway captain Brede Hangeland scored a first-half goal to hand Fulham, who escaped relegation on the final day of last season, an upset 1-0 home win over Arsenal in the English Premier League on Saturday. Liverpool captain Steven Gerrard scored four minutes into stoppage time to cap a thrilling 2-1 comeback victory over Middlesbrough at Anfield that gives his side maximum points after two rounds.

Captain Steven Gerrard scored four minutes into stoppage time to cap a thrilling 2-1 comeback victory over Middlesbrough in the Premier League on Saturday.

American swimmer Michael Phelps became the most successful Olympian of all time when he won his 10th gold medal on Wednesday and his fourth of the Beijing Games. The mighty Phelps broke his own world record to continue his dominance in the Water Cube pool and overtake an elite group including Mark Spitz and Carl Lewis who had won nine golds.

Top seed Grandmaster Koneru Humpy suffered her second successive loss to go down 0-2 in the North Urals Cup at Krasnoturinsk, Russia.

Tottenham Hotspur have reported Manchester United and Liverpool to the EPL over their pursuit of strikers Dimitar Berbatov and Robbie Keane.