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Al-Hilal Beats Al-Ittihad 4-1 in Final of the Saudi Super Cup

Neymar (C) of Al-Hilal poses with the trophy on the podium after winning the Saudi Super Cup final between Al-Ittihad and Al-Hilal in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, 11 April 2024. (EPA)
Neymar (C) of Al-Hilal poses with the trophy on the podium after winning the Saudi Super Cup final between Al-Ittihad and Al-Hilal in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, 11 April 2024. (EPA)
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Al-Hilal Beats Al-Ittihad 4-1 in Final of the Saudi Super Cup

Neymar (C) of Al-Hilal poses with the trophy on the podium after winning the Saudi Super Cup final between Al-Ittihad and Al-Hilal in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, 11 April 2024. (EPA)
Neymar (C) of Al-Hilal poses with the trophy on the podium after winning the Saudi Super Cup final between Al-Ittihad and Al-Hilal in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, 11 April 2024. (EPA)

Al-Hilal beat Al-Ittihad 4-1 in the final of the Saudi Super Cup on Thursday to stay on course for an unprecedented four football titles this year.

The Super Cup trophy, lifted in Abu Dhabi’s Mohammed Bin Zayed Stadium, is the first of the season for the Riyadh side but is unlikely to be the last as the team is also 12 points clear of Cristiano Ronaldo’s Al-Nassr at the top of the Saudi Pro League with just seven games remaining.

Al-Hilal, also in the semifinals of the Asian Champions League and the Saudi King’s Cup, has extended its world record winning streak for top-tier teams to 34 consecutive games in all competitions.

Three days after defeating Al-Nassr in the semifinal, during which Ronaldo was sent off for elbowing Ali Al-Bulaihi, two goals from Brazilian winger Malcom did the damage for Al-Hilal. Salem Al-Dawsari and Nasser Al-Dawsari sealed the win with late goals.

“It was a difficult game and I am very happy to score two goals,” Malcom told Saudi television. “We are also happy to collect our first title of the season but we are chasing more trophies.”

Ittihad striker Karim Benzema, signed from Real Madrid last summer, was unable to find the net while colleague Abderrazak Hamdallah made up for missing a penalty by getting on the scoresheet.

In 2023, the Super Cup was expanded from a single game between the league champions and King’s Cup winners to include the runners-up from both competitions. It was also moved to Abu Dhabi.

Al-Hilal returns to the United Arab Emirates on Tuesday to take on Al-Ain in the first leg of the Asian Champions League semifinals as it seeks a record fifth continental title.

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Coco Gauff Comes Back at US Open and Beats Elina Svitolina

USA's Coco Gauff celebrates winning the second set against Ukraine's Elina Svitolina during their women's singles third round match on day five of the US Open tennis tournament at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in New York City, on August 30, 2024. (Photo by TIMOTHY A. CLARY / AFP)
USA's Coco Gauff celebrates winning the second set against Ukraine's Elina Svitolina during their women's singles third round match on day five of the US Open tennis tournament at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in New York City, on August 30, 2024. (Photo by TIMOTHY A. CLARY / AFP)
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Coco Gauff Comes Back at US Open and Beats Elina Svitolina

USA's Coco Gauff celebrates winning the second set against Ukraine's Elina Svitolina during their women's singles third round match on day five of the US Open tennis tournament at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in New York City, on August 30, 2024. (Photo by TIMOTHY A. CLARY / AFP)
USA's Coco Gauff celebrates winning the second set against Ukraine's Elina Svitolina during their women's singles third round match on day five of the US Open tennis tournament at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in New York City, on August 30, 2024. (Photo by TIMOTHY A. CLARY / AFP)

Coco Gauff was not aware that she'd lost five consecutive matches against opponents ranked in the top 50. She was not sure exactly how many points in a row she'd dropped — 11, it turns out — to give away the first set against Elina Svitolina in the US Open’s third round on Friday.
Here, then, is what was entirely clear to Gauff at that moment: “I needed a reset.” So before the second set, the 20-year-old from Florida went to the bathroom, changed part of her outfit and splashed water on her face. Then Gauff went back on court and extended the defense of her first Grand Slam title by turning things around to beat the 27th-seeded Svitolina 3-6, 6-3, 6-3, The Associated Press reported.
“Felt like a new person coming out,” the third-seeded Gauff said. “I just didn’t want to leave the court with any regrets.”
After making mistake after mistake early on at Arthur Ashe Stadium, Gauff managed to reel off nine of 11 games in one stretch and won again despite losing the opening set, something she did three times en route to claiming the 2023 trophy at Flushing Meadows, including in the final against Aryna Sabalenka.
“It was in my mind today. It gave me a lot of confidence,” Gauff said, “just because it felt like déjà vu a little bit.”
On Sunday, Gauff will face No. 13 Emma Navarro, one of her teammates at the Paris Olympics, for a berth in the quarterfinals. Navarro eliminated Gauff in the fourth round at Wimbledon.
“I did a good job of neutralizing her serve and just playing really aggressive from the baseline and pushing back against her groundstrokes,” Navarro, who is from South Carolina and won an NCAA title for Virginia, said about that matchup last month. “And then always getting one more ball back in the court.”
Navarro advanced Friday with a 6-4, 4-6, 6-3 victory over No. 19 Marta Kostyuk. Other women's fourth-round matchups set up in the afternoon were No. 7 Zheng Qinwen vs. No. 24 Donna Vekic, and No. 26 Paula Badosa vs. Wang Yafan. No. 2 Sabalenka was set to play No. 29 Ekaterina Alexandrova at night, with the winner to face No. 33 Elise Mertens, who outlasted No. 14 Madison Keys in three sets.
The first men’s fourth-round pairing that was set up was No. 6 Andrey Rublev against No. 9 Grigor Dimitrov. No. 8 Casper Ruud will meet No. 12-seeded Taylor Fritz.
Zheng-Vekic is a rematch of the gold medal match at the Summer Games four weeks ago; Zheng won that one.
Vekic beat Gauff in the third round at the Olympics, part of Gauff's recent drought against top-50 foes. That also was part of a recent slump that saw Gauff win just five of her previous nine matches.
Such a contrast to a year ago, when Gauff won 18 of 19, and 12 in a row, along the way to two tuneup titles on hard courts and then the championship at the U.S. Open that made her the first U.S. teenager to triumph at Flushing Meadows since Serena Williams in 1999.
By the conclusion of one set against Svitolina, it seemed as if another loss might be in the offing. Gauff’s totals were 16 unforced errors — nine on backhands — and just seven winners. She put only 45% of her first serves in. She went 0 for 3 on break points. She allowed Svitolina to claim 19 of the 28 points that lasted more than four strokes.
All of those numbers got better across the last two sets as Gauff tried to be more aggressive with her forehands and be more careful with her backhands. And something else changed, at the behest of her coaches: Gauff got the partisan crowd more involved.
Svitolina said afterward she was bothered by an ankle injury picked up last week
“I feel like she started to go (for) more a little bit. But to be fair, I didn’t play the way that I wanted to play. ... Then she started to be more alive," said Svitolina, a three-time Slam semifinalist. "And, of course, the crowd was behind her."
Everything began to change for Gauff on Friday after 1 hour, 10 minutes, when she broke to lead 4-2 in the second set, smacking a cross-court forehand winner. She celebrated with a yell of “Come on!” and raised her left hand to wiggle her fingers and ask the spectators to get louder.
Soon that set belonged to Gauff, who closed it with a 94 mph ace, shook a fist and shouted.
In the third, with UConn women’s basketball stars Paige Bueckers and Azzi Fudd sitting in her guest box at Ashe, Gauff broke right away, then held to go up 2-0 with the help of one 38-stroke point that she took when Svitolina sent a backhand wide.
Soon it was 5-1 for Gauff, whose only late wobble came when she served for the match at 5-2. She wasted three match points and got broken there. But Gauff broke right back to close things out.
“I’m glad that I had that match,” Gauff said, “because I think it just makes me match-tough and gets me ready, probably, for future challenges.”