The Oval—England went to lunch two steps closer to Ashes glory on a hyper-charged fourth morning at The Oval, after Graeme Swann and Stuart Broad delivered a brace of breakthroughs in the space of four deliveries in the first half-hour of the day. Despite a redoubtable third-wicket stand of 81 between Ricky Ponting and Michael Hussey, Australia still trailed at the break by a massive 375 with five sessions of the summer remaining, on a surface retaining just enough malice to ensure survival was at the forefront of their minds.

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Tokyo—Athens Olympic gold medallists China bowed out without a medal after losing to Germany on the final day of the World Grand Prix women’s volleyball tournament on Sunday. In the other early game, Russia beat the Netherlands 25-20, 25-23, 25-21 to keep the pressure on leaders Brazil, who need to beat struggling hosts Japan later in the day to win an eighth grand prix title. The Chinese crashed to a 25-14, 23-25, 25-21, 25-14 defeat to finish a bitterly disappointing week with a 1-4 win-loss record in the six-team round robin. I’m very angry about

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Berlin—For the last time, Usain Bolt will repeat that rhetorical question he has answered over and over again at this year’s world championships — “Who’s faster?”As if anyone still questions what has been written on billboards and T-shirts across Berlin for weeks.But Saturday, he will need a little help from his Jamaican friends.The great Jamaica-U.S. battle for sprint domination comes to a close with the 400-meter relay finals.

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Toronto—Second-seeded Serena Williams breezed through to the semifinals of the Rogers Cup with a straight-sets victory over Lucie Safarova of the Czech Republic.Williams, the 2001 tournament champion, was rarely challenged in a 6-3, 6-2 win over the 46th-ranked qualifier. Williams will next face No. 4 Elena Dementieva of Russia, who advanced with a tough three-set win over Australia’s Samantha Stosur.I think it’ll be a great match,” said Williams. “She is obviously a great player, and our last match was really insane. I love playing her.”

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Monitoring Report

THE middle-order batsman Adam Voges has been recalled to the Australia one-day squad for the Champions Trophy while David Hussey and Marcus North have missed out. There were few other surprises in the 15-man group, which features all the members of Australia’s ODI squad to play seven matches in England besides the

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