Baseball

Pinar del Rio defeated 7-3 to Matanzas on Friday in the 3rd game of the Grand Final of the 53rd Cuban Baseball Championship, and went ahead 2-1 in the series searching for the title.

Alfonso Urquiola's disciples who highlighted in the offensive were shortstop Luis Alberto Valdés, with 1 double, 2 RBIs, and 1 run scored, supported by 1 hit and 1 trailer of outfielder Roel Santos; while for Matanzas, which was not timely offensive and it really showed an erratic defense, stood out Yadiel Hernandez with 2 homers and 1 driven in, and Donal Duarte and William Saavedra, both with 1 hit and 1 RBIs.

The victory corresponded to right-handed Vladimir Baños, who worked with excellence for 7½ innings in which he only allowed 5 hits, gave away 2 tickets, struck 3 strikeouts and was scored 2 cleans, while left-handed reliever Julio Alfredo Martínez closed very well.

Meanwhile, Victor Mesa used 10 pitchers, almost record for one game, as 2 days ago he used 12. Interestingly, in the 4th inning, Victor Mesa took the controversial decision to remove his starter and leader of staff, lefty Yoanni, after giving away 2 tickets row, but so far had not allowed any hits... then came the Matanzas' debacle.

The 4th cap of the finals is scheduled for this Saturday from 16:15 local time, with an alleged duel of right-handed pitchers Yosvani Torres, by Pinar, and Yoelkis Cruz, for Matanzas.

Chess

Cuban GM Leinier Dominguez got another victory at the Russian Chess Championship Team, defeating his Russian counterpart Mikhail Kobalia in the 5th round of the contest.

The Cuban took black pieces on the 3rd board of the San Petersburg's team and won in 69 moves to help his team to tie it at 3 pts with University (Belorechensk).

So far, the Cuban is the 3rd best player in the tournament with 4 points out of 5 in an list dominated by Russian GM Alexander Grischuk, defending player of Malachite, and Georgian GM Baadur Jobava, representative of the University team.

This prestigious event, which takes place until February 13th in Krasnodar Loo, covers 13 casts and gives 2 points to the winner of each pairing and 1 point per draw.

Badminton

The Cuban badmintonist Osleni Guerrero hit a double victory at the International Badminton of Peru and advanced to the semifinals to be played today Saturday.

The Cuban, located 55th world ranking and 1st in America, won the Sri Lanka's Dinuka Karunaratne and Czech Jan Frohlich, the latter, winner of the recent Giraldilla Tournament held in Havana.

Osleni, defending champion of this tournament, will play in semifinals with American Howard Shu, who eliminated French Marin Baumann in the quarterfinals.

The other semifinal will cover American Hock Lai Lee and Niluka Karunaratne, from Sri Lanka.

WSB Semi-final

Cuba's Los Domadores will face today Saturday the USA Knockouts in the America city of Salem with the same vigor they have showed since the beginning of the World Series of Boxing, said the Cuban coach Rolando Acebal.

Although they only have to win 1 bout to advance to the semifinal, because of the 5-0 score previously achieved at Havana's Sports City Coliseum, the Cuban coach noted they won't belittle or underestimate their opponents.

The Cuban coach also acknowledged that Russia will be a top-flight opponent in the semifinals and advanced that winning 3-2 on the road next April 25th would be a good result in order to finish them off on May 2nd in the Cuban capital.

And talking about boxing, the team of Camagüey served its purpose today by leading the initial stage of the 1st National Series of Boxing, eastern zone qualifying round, held in Camagüey city.

The locals got 82 points in the event held at Rafael Fortun Sports Palace, in the city of Camagüey, and was followed by Villa Clara (64), Sancti Spiritus (44) and Ciego de Ávila (38).

The 2nd and final phases of the qualifying round of the central zone will take place in Villa Clara province, and the final will be attended by the best team of each one of the 3 zones of the qualifying rounds.

Regional University Games Canceled After Quake in Nicaragua

The Central American University Sporting Games 2014 have been canceled today due to the red alert issued in Nicaragua after the 6.2 earthquake that shook the country, the Organizing Committee has announced.

The decision was made in adherence to to the alert issued by the Nicaraguan government in order to preserve the wellbeing of the participant delegations, organizing Committee president Ivette Sánchez and the National University Council said.

They added they will see to the organized and safe departure of the delegations, made up of almost two thousand athletes from 20 universities in the region, who were competing in the country since Monday.

The Games' closing ceremony was scheduled for today.

The 6.2 earthquake shook the country on Thursday at 17:30 local time and its epicenter was located in the Managua lake, causing electrical and communications failure across the country. More than 400 aftershocks have been registered so far.