Iceland ready for Fischer

Tokyo: Chess legend Bobby Fischer has been granted an Icelandic passport and the right to reside there but has been refused permission to leave the detention centre where he is being held pending deportation to the US, his lawyers and supporters said on Monday.

?His passport is waiting for him at the embassy,? said former Iceland Parliament Member Gudmundur Thorarinsson, who met with Fischer on Monday for the first time since the Grandmaster was released from four days of confinement in a solitary cell. ?But the Japanese are not ready to let him leave. We don?t understand why.?

Hidayat pulls out

London: Olympic men?s singles champion Taufik Hidayat of Indonesia has pulled out of this week?s All England championships with a knee injury. Hidayat, twice an All England finalist, sustained the injury in training. ?The injury does not require surgery, simply rest,? a tournament spokesman said on Monday. The six-day championships starts with qualifying on Tuesday.

England campaign

Paris: England will start their defence of the 2007 rugby World Cup against the third-ranked American qualifier ? possibly Canada, Uruguay or the United States ? on September 8 in Lens following the announcement of the tournament schedule on Monday.

Host country France will face the first American qualifier, probably Argentina, in the opening game of the tournament on September 7 at the Stade de France.

Australia, winners in 1991 and 1999 and runners-up on home soil in 2003, will start their 2007 campaign against an Asian qualifier on September 8 in Lyon in pool B that also includes Wales.

CCI to fete John Major

Mumbai: The Cricket Club of India (CCI), which has honoured a host of foreign cricketers and administrators over the last few years, has decided to confer honorary life membership on former British Prime Minister John Major. Major, an avid cricket follower, will be feted by the CCI on March 11 during his visit to the megapolis, a CCI release said on Monday.

Barthez injured

Paris: Olympique Marseille goalkeeper Fabien Barthez said he pulled out of Sunday?s Ligue 1 match at St Etienne because he strained a thigh muscle warming up on the snow-covered pitch.

Barthez told French television after the game he had refused to play because a bolt was thrown at him from the stands.

?The pitch was frozen and while I was warming up I felt a pain in the back of my thigh. It?s the reason why I pulled out of the game,? Barthez was quoted as saying by a French sports daily.

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