Kaizer Chiefs moved to the top of the Castle Premiership after they scored a hard fought 1-0 win over Ajax Cape Town at Ellis Park on Sunday. The match lived up to its top-of-the table label with both sides giving the 30 000 crowd more than their money’s worth.

An extra-time strike from Santos’ Marawaan Bantam gave his side a 2-1 win over Black Leopards in a Castle PSL match played at the Athlone stadium in Cape Town on Sunday. Santos were forced to play the whole of the second half with 10 men after Kamaal Sait was red-carded in the first stanza.

The Uefa Champions League has begun and with it the resumption of the battle between Italy and Spain for global supremacy. It might not quite be England-Turkey, but they are starting really to dislike each other, these two. The Spaniards’ dislike of Italian football is so intense it has acquired a quality of moral outrage.

Pakistan on Monday threatened to sue South Africa for ,5-million in losses from their cricket tour cancellation, unless the International Cricket Council intervened to force a rethink by the Proteas. The Pakistan Cricket Board estimates it will lose this amount in sponsorship and television rights.

Namibia took a World Cup blow on Monday when four of their squad playing professionally in South Africa withdrew from their trip Down Under. Hooker Hugo Horn, prop Jane du Toit, lock Johannes Theron and fullback Lean van Dyk have been replaced by lock Shaun van Rooi, prop Andries Blaauw, hooker Phillipus Isaacs and fullback Vincent Dreyer.

Ireland have extended head coach Eddie O’Sullivan’s contract to 2008. ‘Sullivan, appointed in November 2001 for a two-and-a-half-year period to the end of the 2004 Six Nations championship, will carry on for a further four years.

France utility back Xavier Garbajosa is doubtful for the Rugby World Cup with a suspected torn thigh muscle. The French coaching staff said the 26-year-old, switched from outside centre to right wing this season, would undergo a scan to assess the extent of the injury.