MUMBAI: The one year countdown to the Sydney Olympic Games began in the city on Wednesday night. Shabbir Wahid, Australian Consul General and Trade Commission, gave a brief insight to a formal gathering inclusive of Olympian and chief guest M Somayya into what visitors could expect at the games.

Wahid said that for the first time in the history of the games, all athletes will live in one Olympic Village. Over 10,200 athletes and approximately 5,100 support staff from 200 countries are expected to participate. The millennium's last Olympics is scheduled to be held between September 15 and October 1 next year.

IOC, MRF in final

HYDERABAD: Indian Oil Corporation (Mumbai) will clash with MRF (Chennai) in the final of the All India Moin-ud-Dowla Gold Cup Cricket Tournament tomorrow. In the semi-finals today, IOC score a 19-run victory over Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (Delhi) while MRF scored an emphatic 73-run victory over India Pistons.

Brief Scores: IOC 282-7in 50 overs (Abbas Ali 94, Wasim Jaffer 31, Mayur Kadrekar 85, Mandar Phadke 39; Ravi Sehgal 3-41) bt ONGC 263 all out in 48.1 overs (Rizwan Shamshad 33, Amit Sharma 58, Md Saif 31; Vishal Mahadik 2-53, KB Desai 2-39, Iqbal Siddiqui 3-35). MRF 271-5 in 50 overs (Saba Karim 40, Tanveer Jabbar 68 n.o., Amol Muzumdar 62; Raghavendran 3-23, RS Sodhi 2-56) bt India Pistons 198 in 44.5 overs (Vasanth Kumar 37, Vikram Rathour 33, Reuben Paul 34, Badani 4-24, Aashish Kapoor 3-34, Sairaj Bahutule 2-28).

SAF karate team

NEW DELHI: India will field a 20-memberkarate team for the first time in the SAF Games at kathmandu later this month.

The team: Men: Sudhir Kumbhar (below 50 kg), Balram Sathe (below 55 kg), Mahesh Gurung (below 60 kg), Arvind de Silva (below 65), Manoj Kumar (below 70 kg), Raju Gawali (below 95), Rajesh Kumar (below 78), Sohan Singh (below 82)

Women: Neelam Sharma (below 48 kg), Vidya Kamble (below 54), Anuradha Surinder (below 60), Renu Badriprsad (below 85), P Kumar (below 60), NiteshJyoti (below 75), Rajinder Singh (below 50), Kalyani Mukundrao (below 50), Hitesh Kishori (below 55), Rupa Badriprasad (below 45 kg).

Salgaocar victors

MARGAO: Salgaocar Sports club scored a 4-0 win over Mormugao Port Trust and register thier second victory in a row in the Director's Special professional football league tournament here.

Habib Adenkunle and Franky Barreto and substitute Domingos Vaz (2) scored the goals.

Salgaocar now have six points and are placed second, below Churchill Brothers (seven points from three outings). For MPT, it is their third defeat in a row and have no points to their credit.

IHF camp begins

PUNE: The Indian Hockey Federation (IHF) under-19 junior hockey camp got under way here on Wednesday.

Thirty one promising juniors arrived at the Shiv Chhatrapati Sports Complex, Balewadi, near here over the last two days. Another six expected tonight along with three others tomorrow will boost the contingent to 40.

Clarence Lobo, coach of Tata Sports Club andAjay Bansal who guides Air-India Academy (Delhi) selected the youngsters at Bangalore during the Junior National Championships in June.

The Pune camp coincides with one at Bangalore where 40 under-20 players are under trial.

Rohitaaz injured

KOCHI: Leading two-wheeler rallyist Rohitaaz Kumar, who is here to participate in the Popular Rally, met with a road accident near Aluva today and escaped with a foot injury that will put him out of action for four weeks. Rohitaaz, a member of the MRF team, was returning after a `recce' arranged by the organisers when the accident occurred in the `free-run' section.

Rohitaaz's leg got tangled under his own bike as a truck went over it near Aluva. He lost considerable flesh from the top portion of his right foot and escaped major injuries because he had thick boot protection. Rohitaaz will have to undergo a plastic surgery to get his foot back in shape.

ENS & Agencies