United aim to get title in bag fast with Barca in mind

Reuters, MANCHESTER, England, May 9: Manchester United have no doubt that winning the Premier League is a case of 'when' rather than 'if' and will hope to wrap it up this weekend to boost their chances of adding a European Cup.

The value of being able to rest players was proven on Sunday when United's first-choice team, who had did not play in midweek, exploded straight from kickoff against Chelsea to score in the first minute and threaten unrelentingly in a 2-1 victory.

Beating the champions, who would have gone top of the league on goal difference with a win, left United needing one point from their final two games to secure a record 19th league title.

Their first chance to complete the formalities comes on Saturday when they travel to Blackburn Rovers, who they already beat 7-1 this season, and once it is in the bag they could rest some legs before the Champions League final against Barcelona.

"We just need one point now and I think, knowing the players, they won't muck it up, they'll get their point -- there's no doubt about that," manager Alex Ferguson, who is in touching distance of a 12th Premier League title, said.

"In the next few weeks we've got to be doing some work on Barcelona. But we've got to get a point at Blackburn (first)."

Ferguson had made nine changes for Wednesday's Champions League semi-final second leg against Schalke 04 from the side that set up a comfortable lead in the first leg with an eye on the title-decider against Chelsea at Old Trafford.

The Scot used a total of 19 different starters in the two matches this week, drawing on nearly a quarter of a century of experience at the club to get full use out of his squad.

ENERGY LEVELS

If United fail to lift the trophy in Blackburn, they get a second chance on May 22 against relegation-threatened Blackpool in front of a home crowd who were already celebrating on Sunday and have not witnessed defeat on that pitch all season.

That would leave them less than a week before the May 28 European showpiece at Wembley against Barca, who are similarly close to securing the Spanish league title.

Barcelona have been favourites to win the continent's elite club competition all season but United's persistent attack against Chelsea will have given them plenty to think about.

If Park Ji-sung keeps up anything like the energy levels he managed on Sunday and Antonio Valencia ravages the right wing again, United could be hard to contain especially with 'Little Pea' Javier Hernandez lurking to shoot at any moment.

While United savour the possibilities that lie ahead, one of the sweetest will be breaking the record of 18 titles they share with bitter rivals Liverpool.

When the Merseyside club won the most recent of their titles 21 years ago, few thought the record would be overtaken any time soon -- especially not by a club who at that time had won the honour only seven times.

"Fifteen, twenty years ago, you'd never have thought it," midfielder Ryan Giggs, present in every single one of United's Premier League titles, said.

"It's a great achievement by the club and by the manager to haul back our biggest rivals over the 70s, 80s and 90s. We're nearly there and if we do it, it will be special."

'Special' was not the word being uttered at Anfield.

"We never thought anyone could knock us off our perch," former Liverpool defender Alan Hansen wrote in The Daily Telegraph.

"Just as United's fans found it hard to give Liverpool credit when we were the pre-eminent force, there will be little credit where it is due for Ferguson's achievement from Anfield.

"Instead, Liverpool's fans will concentrate on the one record they have left: five European Cups to United's three. And even that may be cut to one by the end of the month."

Turkey hopeful of keeping F1 race in 2012

Reuters, ISTANBUL, May 9: Turkish officials sounded more optimistic about keeping their race on the Formula One calendar on Monday after weekend talks with the sport's commercial supremo Bernie Ecclestone.

"We sat down with Ecclestone and Youth and Sport General Director Yunus Akgul and discussed the plans that we could implement," local media quoted Turkish Automobile Sports Federation Chairman Mumtaz Tahincioglu as saying.

"Both sides are trying to solve this issue. Comparing before the race and the current situation, there is a 50 percent difference," he added.

Istanbul Chamber of Commerce head Murat Yalcintas said before Sunday's race at Istanbul Park that the grand prix faced the axe next year because of a disagreement with Ecclestone over payments.

He also said the government had rejected a bid by the 80-year-old Briton to double the payment to stage the race to $26 million from 13 million.

Ecclestone subsequently said he would be disappointed to lose what is one of Formula One's better modern circuits, despite poor crowd figures.

Official figures released on Sunday put the race day crowd at 42,000, although some paddock observers questioned the numbers.

"We will do everything we can. We will talk with Ecclestone," said Akgul.

"We want this race to stay but it is not the be all and end all," he added.

"We will keep this track alive in every way. There are other races, we will go to them. We definitely want Formula (One) to stay here and we will do everything we can."

"The draft calendar will be discussed on June 3. Even if the issue is not resolved by that date, we must get into the draft."

Formula One teams and drivers hoped the race would stay on the calendar.

"It's a good circuit, it's a great city, we enjoy coming here and I think all the teams are of that mind," said McLaren team boss Martin Whitmarsh.

"It is a very special place for me. I won three times, especially the first time it was a big fight with Fernando (Alonso) and Michael (Schumacher) in 2006," said Ferrari's Brazilian Felipe Massa.

"We will miss it if we are not coming here next year."

Facebook driving more traffic to news sites: study

AFP, WASHINGTON, May 9: Facebook is driving an increasing amount of traffic to news sites but Google remains the top referring service, according to a study published on Monday.

The study by the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism looked at the behaviour of news consumers online during the first nine months of 2010 using audience statistics from the Nielsen Co.

The study examined the 25 most popular news websites in the United States, looking at how users get to the sites, how long they stay there, how deep they explore a site and where they go when they leave.

An average of 40 percent of the traffic to the top 25 news sites comes from outside referrals, the study found, with Google Search and, to a lesser extent, Google News the single biggest traffic driver.

The Nielsen figures did not break down where the remaining 60 percent of a news site's traffic comes from but the study said much of it stems from direct visits to the home page of a news site.

"Far from obsolete, home pages are usually the most popular page for most of the top news sites," the study said, and were the most viewed part of the site for 21 of the 25 studied.

Google Search was responsible for driving an average of 30 percent of traffic to top news sites with the Drudge Report and Yahoo! also ranking as major traffic drivers.

But social media -- and Facebook in particular -- is "rapidly becoming a competing driver of traffic," the study said.

At five of the top 25 sites, Facebook was the second or third most important driver of traffic.

"If searching for news was the most important development of the last decade, sharing news may be among the most important of the next," the study's authors said.

The website drawing the most traffic from Facebook links was The Huffington Post with eight percent of its visitors landing on the site that way.

Twitter, somewhat surprisingly, "barely registers as a referring source," the study found.

Only one website in the top 25 -- the Los Angeles Times with 3.53 percent -- derived more than one percent of its total traffic from Twitter.

Many visitors to top news sites are what the study described as "casual users" people who visit just a few times a month and spend a total of just a few minutes there at a time.

On average, 77 percent of the traffic to the top 25 news sites came from users who visited just one or two times, the study said, with the percentage varying among sites. Yahoo! News, had lowest number of people visiting only once or twice, but it was still more than half at 55 percent.

More loyal and frequent visitors -- what the study called "power users" -- return more than 10 times per month to a particular site and spend over an hour there over that time.

But "power users" make up an average of just seven percent of total users among the top 25 sites, the study said. CNN had the most "power users" -- 18 percent -- while 16 percent of Fox New's audience fell into that category.

Only six sites had "power user" figures in double digits.

"Overall, the findings suggest that there is not one group of news consumers online but several, each of which behaves differently," the study said. "These differences call for news organizations to develop separate strategies to serve and make money from each audience.

"Advertising may help monetize some groups, while subscriptions will work for others."

As for where readers go when they leave a site, Google is a leading destination accounting for up to seven percent of departure links.

The study also noted the divide between Google and Facebook in that Google does not send users to Facebook and vice versa.

"Google and Facebook are increasingly set up as competitors sorting through the material on the Web," it said. "They are two fundamentally different ways to navigate the Web."

The top 25 sites included 11 newspapers: The New York Times, The Washington Post, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, the New York Daily News, the New York Post, the Boston Globe, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Chicago Tribune and Britain's Daily Mail.

Six were the websites of broadcast or cable television networks -- MSNBC, CNN, ABC, Fox, CBS and the BBC -- and four were pure news aggregators -- Google News, the Examiner, Topix and Bing News.

Three were "hybrid" sites which mix aggregation of other news sources with original reporting -- Yahoo! News, AOL and The Huffington Post -- and one was a wire service, Reuters.

Yuvraj can't find an answer to seven consecutive defeats

Press Trust of India, Mohali, May 8: Yuvraj Singh is relieved after arresting the slide of his side but can't believe that Pune Warriors suffered seven straight defeats despite having a lot of talent in the squad.

 

Warriors beat Kings XI Punjab by five wickets and Yuvraj top scored for his side with 16-ball 35 at his "original" home ground.

 

"We were looking for that win. Fortunately or unfortunately it came at my home place. When I look at my team I can't imagine how we lost so many games with that talent. We just haven't clicked," Yuvraj said after the match.

 

The left-hander vowed to return stronger next season.

 

"We had energy on the field and didn't allow their batsmen to get away. 120 was a great bowling effort. The pitch was dry underneath and it was nice to get them to 120."

 

"We have learnt from our mistakes and hopefully can come back stronger in the next season," he said.

 

Tall leg-spinner Rahul Sharma won his second consecutive Man-of-the-match award as he yet again was exceptional, giving away just 17 runs in his four overs apart from taking two wickets.

 

"It feels very nice to get two successive man of the match award. Yuvraj has been supporting me a great deal. It feels good to do well for the match. I am just concentrating on basics and bowl wicket to wicket," he said.

 

When asked what was the plan to get Adam Gilchrist out, he replied," The plan was to try to bowl few full deliveries and try a googly. It worked."

 

Gilchrist said they did not put enough runs on the board.

 

"A score of 150 would have been a decent battle as it was getting slower and lower. We didn't build enough partnerships. I don't think we were unsure of how hard we go; we just took the wrong options. I took a wrong option when Valthaty was going so well. Rahul Sharma bowled very well; all the bowlers did well. Both sides batted with lack of confidence," he said.

 

Asked if he was still hopeful of making the play-offs as they have to win all the remaining five matches, the Australian said, "We have to start winning. Last year I was in a team to win four in a row but we have to win one first."

Rajasthan Royals eye revenge against Chennai Super Kings

PTI, Jaipur, May 8: Rajasthan Royals would bank on their formidable winning record at home and look to exact revenge of their first leg loss when they take on defending champions Chennai Super Kings in a crucial Indian Premier League match on Monday.

 

Both the sides are coming into the match after losing their previous matches and any slip up tomorrow could prove costly for either team for a place in the play-offs.

 

Chennai are on 12 points from 10 matches, third in the IPL table and they have come into tomorrow's match after their four-game winning streak was snapped by Kolkata Knight Riders in their last match.

 

Rajasthan Royals, on the other hand, are on 11 points from 10 matches and a win tomorrow will take them closer to a play-off berth. Besides, the Shane Warne-led side have a formidable record at home, having won 12 games out of 15 in the IPL. They have won four out of five games here this year.

 

Chennai, on the other hand, have been poor travellers having won only one out of their five away games this season and they would look to breach the Rajasthan Royals stranglehold at Sawai Man Singh Stadium.

 

With just three games each left after Wednesday's match, both the sides are expected to fight a fierce battle to take their sides closer to the play-offs.

 

The match will be played on a new strip after the pitch controversy generated by the remarks from Sachin Tendulkar, the skipper of Mumbai Indians who were restricted to 94 for eight here on April 29.

 

Though the Mumbai Indians insisted that there was no formal complaint, a new strip was ordered for the remaining two matches at Sawai Man Singh Stadium after a visit by the pitch inspector.

 

Chennai beat Rajasthan Royals by eight wickets in their last meeting on May 4 in Chennai. The Royals must be ruing the manner in which they squandered the advantage after being 92 for one in 13th over to post just 147 in 20 overs after batting first and subsequently lose the match.

 

Rajasthan Royals would, however, take positives from that match like Rahul Dravid cracking 66 of 51 balls and he shared a 92-run opening wicket partnership with Shane Watson.

 

Skipper Shane Warne has already announced that he will retire from the IPL after this season and he and his team are eager to finish in top four at least.

 

They will have to win at least two of their remaining four matches to make the grade.

 

Rajasthan Royals have had a roller coaster journey with five victories and a washed out tie from 10 outings to accumulate 11 for a fifth place as of now. They will have to put in some extra efforts to go through the race.

 

They will look up to Warne as usual in the bowling department and to extract the best out of his players at the home conditions with his tactical moves.

 

Shane Watson, Ross Taylor, Rahul Dravid, Johan Botha and Ashok Menaria will have to fire in tandem in the batting front.

 

Chennai, on the other hand, look formidable with likes of Michael Hussey, Murali Vijay, Suresh Raina, S Badrinath and skipper MS Dhoni capable of posting big scores and chasing down stiff targets.

 

Their bowling attack is also no less formidable with Albie Morkel, Doug Bollinger and deceptive spinner Ravichandran Ashwin in good form.

 

Chennai lost to Kolkata Knight Riders under D/L method last night but will look to be back to their winning momentum on Monday.