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Osaka vows to have fun after making winning return from long break — Sport — The Guardian Nigeria News – Nigeria and World News

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Osaka vows to have fun after making winning return from long break — Sport — The Guardian Nigeria News – Nigeria and World News

Naomi Osaka said Tuesday that she aims to enjoy herself on court this year as she won on her return to action following a tearful exit at the US Open in September.

The four-time Grand Slam champion, who has fallen to 13 in the rankings, said after her third-round defeat at Flushing Meadows that she was “dealing with some stuff” and would take an indefinite break from tennis.

The former world number one from Japan had mostly laid low before flying into Melbourne last week to prepare for her Australian Open defence.

The 24-year-old was nowhere near her best but defeated France’s 61st-ranked veteran Alize Cornet 6-4, 3-6, 6-3 in the Melbourne Summer Set tournament and said that being back in Australia was like “a breath of fresh air”.

Osaka is determined to avoid the “extreme build-up” of emotions last year that made her feel “sad”.

“I feel like for me, I only really have one major goal this year, and it’s completely unrelated to results,” she said, holding a press conference again after her stance last year over the negative impact they had on her mental wellbeing.

“For me, I just want to feel like every time I step on the court I’m having fun. I can walk off the court knowing that even if I lost, I tried as hard as I could.

“Also I have a goal in the press room — that I’m never going to cry again, so hopefully that works out in my favour,” she added.

“I’m the type of person that cared a little bit too much about the results and the ranking and stuff like that.

“And I just need to find a way to enjoy the game again because that’s the reason why I was playing in the first place.”

Osaka last year withdrew from the French Open and Wimbledon over mental health issues, saying her problems were exacerbated by speaking to the media after matches.

She said on Tuesday her feelings and emotions were “like an extreme build-up and you just happened to see it all released last year”.

During her self-enforced absence, Osaka tried to have a normal life away from the pressures of the tennis tour, spending time with family and friends and enjoying sleepovers, something she had never experienced before.

“During the off-season I just hung out with my friends and talked to my family a lot, and I felt like that was a way of decompressing the pressure I had on myself,” she said.

“Then I just slowly started to regain the feeling of love that I had towards the game — and it’s not like it ever completely went away.

“But I felt like it got overshadowed by a lot of emotions that I was feeling, just by constantly playing year after year… sometimes it’s good to remember why you’re playing.”

Her win on Tuesday set up a last-16 clash with Belgium’s Maryna Zanevska, who eased past Croatia’s Petra Martic in straight sets.

NBA reschedules 11 recently postponed games

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NBA reschedules 11 recently postponed games
6:21 PM ET

  • Tim BontempsESPN

The NBA announced Monday that 11 games have been rescheduled in response to the wave of postponements that have taken place over the past several weeks due to the recent surge of COVID-19.

A total of 21 games were impacted: 11 that were previously postponed, another eight future games that were changed because of the postponed games being rescheduled and two more — the San Antonio Spurs visiting the Brooklyn Nets on Sunday, and the Boston Celtics visiting the New Orleans Pelicans on Jan. 29 — that are being played at a different time on the same day.

Nineteen different teams had at least one game impacted, with the Toronto Raptors leading the way among individual teams with six games being adjusted.

The Raptors were followed by the Nets and Chicago Bulls (5), Denver Nuggets, Atlanta Hawks and Pelicans (3) and Spurs, Philadelphia 76ers, Detroit Pistons and Miami Heat (2) as teams with more than one game being shifted as a result of the schedule changes.

The schedule adjustments will see many teams have to get through several games in a short amount of time — and in a wide variety of places — as the NBA tried to retrofit the schedule to make up for the games that have been postponed, all of which have been rescheduled from this Sunday through March 31.

The Nets, for example, are now playing at noon Sunday in Brooklyn against the San Antonio Spurs, before then flying across the country to play the Portland Trail Blazers Monday night. Brooklyn will then fly halfway across the country to Chicago to play the Bulls — in a previously scheduled game — next Wednesday.

“There’s no easy way to do this,” Nets coach Steve Nash said after Monday’s announcement, and before the Nets took on the Memphis Grizzlies at Barclays Center Monday night. “If we were expecting it to be a sweet little add to the schedule, and no blood drawn, that would be foolish.”

Toronto, on the other hand, is now hosting the Bulls on Feb. 3 — which had been the day that franchise legend Kyle Lowry was going to make his return to Scotiabank Arena for the first time since leaving the Raptors this offseason for the Heat.

Lowry’s return will instead come two days earlier, as Miami will play in Toronto on Feb. 1. The game that Toronto was originally scheduled to play that day — a game in Atlanta — will now be played on Jan. 31.

The NBA has spent the past several weeks dealing with the fallout of the Omicron variant of COVID-19, which has surged through the league and sent well over 100 players — and several head coaches — into the league’s health and safety protocols.

To combat the virus, the league has not only postponed the 11 games, but it’s also taken several steps to ease roster rules and increase flexibility for teams to add players on a short-term basis in order to have enough players available on a nightly basis to avoid any further postponements.

Dakar Stage 2: Loeb wins, closes on Al Attiyah

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Dakar Stage 2: Loeb wins, closes on Al Attiyah

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Nine-times world rally champion Sebastien Loeb won Monday’s second stage of the Dakar Rally in Saudi Arabia to trim Qatari Nasser Al Attiyah’s overall lead to under ten minutes.

The 47-year-old Frenchman finished three minutes and 28 seconds ahead of the Toyota driver, who won Saturday’s prologue and Sunday’s first stage but had to go first and clear the way on Monday’s 338km timed stage from Ha’il to Al Qaisumah.

“Nasser was pushing very hard. He was opening the road for the cars but still he was really fast. We had to push like in WRC for almost 340 km. At the end I caught him, so I was able to follow him through the dunes,” said Loeb.

The overnight bivouac was moved from Al Artawiya due to heavy rain, with a planned marathon stage cancelled.

Britain’s Sam Sunderland took over the lead in the motorcycle category from Australian GasGas team mate Daniel Sanders, who lost his way and finished 23rd in the stage to drop to third overall.

“We missed a waypoint because we went one valley too far to the left. We spent a fair bit of time there trying to find it. I lost about 20 minutes, so it was pretty crazy,” said Sanders.

Motorcycles: Joan Barreda won the stage on a Honda.

Former MotoGP rider Danilo Petrucci requested an airlift after his debut Dakar ended with his KTM suffering mechanical problems he could not fix.

Loeb’s stage win was his 15th in the endurance event and first since 2019 as well as a first for Prodrive, who run the Bahrain Raid Xtreme team.

“It wasn’t easy because the tracks of the bikes were a little bit difficult for us, but it looks like we are in a good way,” said Al Attiyah.

“I think it will be us two until the end fighting, but there’s still a long way.”

The electric Audis of triple champion Carlos Sainz and 14- times Dakar winner Stephane Peterhansel finished the stage third and fourth respectively after a nightmare Sunday wrecked their overall chances.

Peterhansel: We are going to try to win some specials

Defending champion Peterhansel, nicknamed ‘Mr Dakar’ for his success in the event on two wheels and four, was 23 hours behind triple champion Al Attiyah after his car was sidelined with a smashed rear axle.

The Frenchman blamed the incident on a rock stuck between the chassis and a wheel and said his main focus now was to gather data and help his teammates.

“Now, we are going to try to win some specials and put the car to the test, to prepare for next year in reality,” said Peterhansel.

The Dakar, now in its 44th edition, is the first major motorsport event of the year and one of the most dangerous and gruelling.

It started in 1978 as a race from Paris to the Senegalese capital but moved from Africa to South America for safety reasons in 2009. It is now held entirely in Saudi Arabia. (Report by Alan Baldwin)

Note to Readers: Although our site is dedicated to reporting F1 news, during the off season keeping our readers informed of the big racing events around the globe provides an appetiser for the season ahead.

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Charlie Woods looks like he is ready to carry dad Tiger Woods again at the PNC Championship

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Charlie Woods looks like he is ready to carry dad Tiger Woods again at the PNC Championship

All the attention at this year’s PNC Championship will be on Tiger Woods. Sure, there will be eyes on his 12-year-old son, Charlie, who took the golf world — and internet — by storm a year ago at this event.

But the focus this year will, largely, be on father instead of son. Almost 10 months since Tiger Woods’ single-car crash in Los Angeles that nearly cost him his leg, he returns to a golf course to play a competitive round. How will he hold up? Is his injured right leg ready for three consecutive days of golf — one pro-am round and two competitive rounds? What will his swing speed and distance be like? Does he have the endurance?

While everyone is focused on those things, Charlie Woods will try to carry the team again. A year ago, Tiger joked that Charlie was the key player on the two-person squad, with Charlie posting his first-ever eagle and hitting quality shot after quality shot after quality shot. The team finished in a tie for seventh.

Think Charlie is ready to go this year? Take a look at what he did in Friday’s pro-am.

Yeah, one more roll and that thing goes in. It’ll be interesting to see what Saturday’s and Sunday’s competition will bring.

Tsitsipas crashes to Schwartzman as Argentina beat Greece at ATP Cup | The Guardian Nigeria News

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Tsitsipas crashes to Schwartzman as Argentina beat Greece at ATP Cup | The Guardian Nigeria News

World number four Stefanos Tsitsipas crashed to defeat in his first singles match since elbow surgery Monday, losing an epic battle with feisty Argentinian Diego Schwartzman 6-7 (5/7) 6-3, 6-3 at the ATP Cup.

The Greek star went under the knife in late November after pulling out of the ATP Finals in Turin, hoping to be at full fitness for the Australian Open later this month.

He was scheduled to return against world number nine Hubert Hurkacz at the teams event on Saturday, but withdrew before the match, opting instead to ease himself back in a doubles rubber.

He showed up to play 11th-ranked Schwartzman and looked at his battling best in winning the first set tiebreak, moving freely with little sign of his right elbow causing problems.

But the 23-year-old lost his focus, and with it, five games in a row.

After being broken in the second set, there was no way back on a humid Sydney evening.

“It’s his first match for two months after surgery and I was just thinking if the match was going to go long I had a chance,” said Schwartzman after the 2hr 42min battle that helped Argentina win their second ATP tie after beating Georgia on day one.

“I was ready for that and I think everything is going very well, playing Stefanos is not easy.”

Federico Delbonis had earlier continued his perfect start to the season by overcoming Greek number two Michail Pervolarakis 7-6 (7/5), 6-1 to give Argentina a 1-0 lead.

In morning action, Hurkacz ensured Poland also went 2-0.

But the world number nine was forced to dig deep against Georgian Aleksandre Metreveli, ranked just 570, who stepped in after Nikoloz Basilashvili was a no-show.

Once he found his groove, though, last year’s Miami Open champion raced to a 6-7 (5-7), 6-3, 6-1 victory.

“He played well in the first set and things were not going my way. But I got better with each set and am happy to get the win,” Hurkacz said.

Kamil Majchrzak gave Poland a strong start when he dropped just two games against Aleksandre Bakshi, winning 6-1, 6-1 in 53 minutes.

Whoever wins between Poland and Argentina on Wednesday will make the semi-finals, with only the top nation from each of the four groups progressing to the knockouts.

– Feeling good -Veteran Roberto Bautista Agut, meanwhile, upset Norwegian world number eight Casper Ruud to give Spain their second straight win.

The 33-year-old Bautista Agut is the lead singles player for his country in the absence of 20-time Grand Slam champion Rafael Nadal and has stepped up in style.

After crushing Chile’s world number 17 Cristian Garin in Sydney on Saturday, he backed it up with a battling 6-4, 7-6 (7/4) victory over Ruud, the first Norwegian to win an ATP Tour title.

“I played very good with very few unforced errors,” said 19th-ranked Bautista Agut. “It’s a good start (to the season) and I’m feeling good.”

It ensured Spain won the tie with an unassailable 2-0 after Pablo Carreno Busta made a quick start when he dismissed Norway’s 345th-ranked Viktor Durasovic 6-3, 6-3 in just 69 minutes.

Former top-10 star Carreno Busta is now 4-1 in singles in his ATP Cup career, having beaten Chile’s Alejandro Tabilo on Saturday.

“It’s always important to win the first match. Today I felt more and more comfortable than the first day,” he said. “We need to get the rhythm, we need to get the confidence.”

Aus vs Eng 4th Ashes Test

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Aus vs Eng 4th Ashes Test
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Some net bowlers are back, but with four coaches in isolation, everyone available has been helping with preparations

Low on coaches, low on runs, and low on expectations – England’s Test team has entered 2022 in a pretty grim state but captain Joe Root is clinging to the hope that the turnaround can begin at the SCG, although similar sentiments were expressed last week in Melbourne and things did not go well as they conceded the Ashes by the third Test, inside 12 days of action.
With four coaches in isolation – including Chris Silverwood – everyone available has been helping with preparations for the fourth Test. That has included the captain giving throwdowns and the analyst helping with catching practice. There were, at least, some net bowlers available on Monday after the scare the previous day when the entire group had to be removed following a positive Covid-19 test.

“With the amount of coaches we’ve had missing, it’s made things slightly disjointed and challenging,” Root said. “But it’s an opportunity for us as a group to come tightly together, help each other prepare as well as we can do, and stand up in a bit of adversity and use that in a positive way when we get out there.

“We are all feeling for those guys sat in isolation desperately wanting to help us turn things around and we’ve got an opportunity in these two games to do that. We have to make sure we stand up and show we are a better team, which I know we are, than we’ve produced so far on this tour. See that as an opportunity, don’t see it as a heavy burden, see it as a real chance to make some big Test runs, win a game with ball in hand and walk away from the trip with something.”

But can the team, with so many batters seemingly low on confidence, really find a way to turn things around after the meek 68 all out on the third morning in Melbourne – albeit an innings that was set back by one of the finest hours of fast bowling you could witness?

“You can dwell on what’s happened so far or we can look at the opportunities that present themselves in the immediate future,” Root said. “That can be the making of some sides and the start of something, that’s the approach we’ll have to take.”

“I’ll look at my future beyond this tour at the end of it. Don’t think that’s a distraction that should be around the group or I should be wasting energy on right now”

Joe Root on his future as England Test captain

Quite what the XI will look like come Wednesday remains to be seen, but a decision will need to be made over whether there is any benefit in tinkering with the batting again. Bringing Rory Burns back one Test after dropping him would be an odd look but Haseeb Hameed has been picked apart by Australia’s quicks. Dan Lawrence is the one specialist batter yet to be used. Ollie Robinson may have run his race after playing the first three Tests although there have been two extra days to recover.

The pitch was well-grassed two days out and showers are forecast throughout the game. England have not adjusted to any of the conditions they have faced in the series although things are unlikely to be as tough for batters here as in Melbourne.

“Whatever we’re presented with here in two days we have to make sure we are on the right side of that and make sure we try to wrestle that momentum early on the Test match then drive it home,” Root said.

He again refused to be drawn into a discussion on his future as captain. There is a short turnaround to England’s next Test series in the Caribbean during March with the current feeling that it could be Silverwood, who is the first to pay the price for this drubbing and the startling decline in the team’s Test cricket.

“I’ll look at my future beyond this tour at the end of it,” Root said. “Don’t think that’s a distraction that should be around the group or I should be wasting energy on right now. I need to make sure I’m throwing everything I can into these next two games, I owe that to this team and the players.”

Andrew McGlashan is a deputy editor at ESPNcricinfo

VanVleet leads Raptors 120-105 over Knicks

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VanVleet leads Raptors 120-105 over Knicks

TORONTO – For Fred VanVleet, getting the band back together suited the Toronto Raptors guard just fine.

VanVleet scored a season-high 35 points in the Raptors’ 120-105 win against the depleted New York Knicks on Sunday, a game that saw all the significant Raptors healthy and playing together for the first time in the 2021-22 campaign.

The Raptors began the season shorthanded because Pascal Siakam missed the first 10 games as he recovered from off-season shoulder surgery. Then a hip injury took down OG Anunoby for a month, and COVID-19 ripped through the Raptors roster in late December.

Rookie Scottie Barnes was the last to exit the league’s health and safety protocols, and a sore knee kept him out in the Raptors win against the Los Angeles Clippers on New Year’s Eve. But he returned against the Knicks to give the Raptors a full roster.

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“I think we felt good about our group all year,” VanVleet said. “I just like our spirit and our chemistry and kind of the enthusiasm that we have for the game. It’s going to take time to get it to be where we need it to be, but you would hope if we keep climbing by April and May we’ll be at our best, and that’s kind of the goal.

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“To start (2022) off with everybody back, and hopefully we can run off a couple here playing good basketball, this is kinda where you want to be. We’ve just gotta continue to get better individually and collectively, and I think that we’ll be a tough team to beat if we can keep growing towards the end of the year.”

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The win pushed the Raptors (16-17) past the Knicks (17-20) and into a spot for the play-in tournament at the end of the regular season.

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VanVleet scored 31 points on Friday to give him 30 or more points in back-to-back games for the first time in his career. He has accomplished the feat five times this season.

Against the Knicks, Siakam was next with 20 points, followed by Anunoby’s 14 and Barnes’ 13.

VanVleet shot an efficient 11 of 17 in his three quarters of action, including a deadly 7 for 13 from beyond the three-point arc. He benefitted from having Siakam’s aggressiveness down low and having all the other talent around him.

“You just wanna have more weapons and be at an advantage at all times,” VanVleet said. “It’ll probably take some time to get the chemistry and the flow, the rhythm was a little off sometimes, but I thought we were pretty locked in for most of the game.”

The Raptors plucked their second win in a row since the provincial government decided last week to once again empty sports arenas and concert halls as a COVID-19 measure.

But playing before about 100 family members and friends didn’t deter Barnes and others from keeping the energy level high from the bench.

“I thought, in general, our team had good energy,” Raptors head coach Nick Nurse said. “They were really active from the bench. We’ve talked about creating our own energy because there’s not many in the arena, and I thought our guys really did a good job of kind of coaching and cheerleading and just supporting each other all the way.

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“I would say the other night when Scottie didn’t play, he was very active and energetic on that part of it too. And that’s good spirit. And you’ve got to create your own fun sometimes.”

The Knicks were without Kemba Walker (left knee), Derrick Rose (right ankle surgery), Julius Randle and Mitchell Robinson. The latter two were added to the league’s health and safety protocols list on Thursday and Saturday, respectively.

France’s Evan Fournier led the Knicks with 20 points, followed by Canadian RJ Barrett of Toronto and Obi Toppin with 19 apiece.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 2, 2022.




© 2022 The Canadian Press

Danilo joins Messi among PSG Covid-19 cases | The Guardian Nigeria News

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Danilo joins Messi among PSG Covid-19 cases | The Guardian Nigeria News

Danilo became the fifth Paris Saint Germain player to test positive for Covid-19 and will miss the French Cup match with Vannes later on Monday, the club said.

The 30-year-old Portuguese international midfielder joins Lionel Messi and other team-mates in self-isolating as the Omicron variant shows little sign of loosening its grip.

Messi, Juan Bernat, Sergio Rico and youngster Nathan Bitumazala were revealed to have tested positive on Sunday.

Their enforced absence has prompted PSG coach Mauricio Pochettino to call on South American players who only resumed training on Sunday for the clash with fourth division Vannes.

Marquinhos and Messi’s fellow Argentinians Angel Di Maria and Mauro Icardi are among those who could get a run out.

Home team Vannes are counting the cost of the French government’s newly introduced crowd restrictions on Monday with 5,000 spectators only permitted at outdoor events.

Vannes had been hoping for a 9,600 sell-out and according to their president Maxime Ray are set to miss out on revenue of 250,000 euros ($282,000).

“We are missing out on what is a fortune to us,” he said last week.

Sources — Houston Rockets’ Kevin Porter Jr. leaves arena after halftime confrontation

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Sources — Houston Rockets’ Kevin Porter Jr. leaves arena after halftime confrontation
Jan 2, 2022

  • Tim MacMahon

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    ESPN Staff Writer
    • Joined ESPNDallas.com in September 2009
    • Covers the Dallas Cowboys and Dallas Mavericks
    • Appears regularly on ESPN Dallas 103.3 FM

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    Senior NBA Insider
    • Host of The Woj Pod
    • Joined ESPN in 2017

Houston Rockets point guard Kevin Porter Jr. lost his temper during a heated halftime discussion and didn’t return to the court, leaving the Toyota Center during the second half of Saturday’s 124-111 loss to the Denver Nuggets, sources told ESPN.

Porter became upset after assistant coach John Lucas challenged him, revisiting an issue that led to Porter losing his composure on the bench during the first half, sources said.

The Rockets, who trailed 77-55 at halftime of their seventh consecutive loss, did not return to the court until moments before the third quarter began.

“We had a spirited debate,” Rockets head coach Stephen Silas said during his postgame media availability. “I have certain demands of this team as far as playing hard. … I wasn’t satisfied with the effort.”

The Rockets announced during the second half that Porter was questionable to return due to his left thigh being evaluated. Porter has been bothered for weeks by a left thigh contusion, causing him to miss several games, but that was not the issue that led to his absence after halftime, according to sources.

Silas did not mention Porter specifically during his postgame comments.

Center/power forward Christian Wood, the Rockets’ leading scorer this season, did not start Saturday night due to breaking a team rule, Silas said. Wood played eight scoreless minutes in the first half, during which Houston was outscored by 17 points, and did not play in the second half.

“Coach’s decision,” Silas said of Wood sitting out the second half.

A source said that potential discipline, if any, for Porter has yet to be determined.

The Cleveland Cavaliers traded Porter to the Rockets last January for a top-55-protected second-round pick after deciding to move on from their former first-round selection due to off-court issues, which led to Porter being inactive for the beginning of the 2020-21 season. The Cavaliers announced their intention to trade or release Porter, the No. 30 overall pick in the 2019 draft, after he exploded on team officials over them moving his locker to an auxiliary area. The Cavaliers had given his locker to Taurean Prince, who had arrived with Jarrett Allen as part of the four-team James Harden trade. Porter Jr. showed up to the arena for the first game of the season when he discovered his locker had been moved.

Houston sent Porter to its G League affiliate to ease his transition to the Rockets, who moved him from wing to point guard. Porter, 21, has had some success in Houston, averaging 15.0 points and 6.1 assists per game over the last two seasons.

Dakar: Al-Attiyah extends lead, Peterhansel hits trouble

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Dakar: Al-Attiyah extends lead, Peterhansel hits trouble

201-toyota-gazoo-racing-toyota-al attiyah

Stephane Peterhansel’s hopes of defending his Dakar Rally title effectively disappeared on Sunday after the Frenchman’s electric Audi suffered a smashed rear axle on the first stage in the Saudi desert and he lost more than five hours.

While Qatar’s Nasser Al-Attiyah continued his form from Saturday’s prologue to stretch his lead to 12 minutes 44 seconds, 14-times Dakar winner Peterhansel had to wait for assistance.

The French veteran had been in second place at the first waypoint but the challenge fell apart some 153km into the 333-km loop around Ha’il.

Toyota driver Al Attiyah’s closest rival is now Frenchman Sebastien Loeb, a nine-times world rally champion, for the Bahrain Raid Xtreme team.

Triple champion Al Attiyah thanked co-driver Matthieu Baumel for keeping him on the right track over the rocky and sandy stage.

“Really it was a very difficult stage,” said the Qatari. “It’s not easy… Mathieu did a really good job in navigation. We saw a lot of lines gone too much to the right and Mathieu said ‘no, you need to be left’.”

Peterhansel’s teammate Carlos Sainz, a three-times Dakar winner who was second after Saturday’s prologue, lost his way in the desert and ended the day more than two hours adrift of Al Attiyah.

Audi, who also have Sweden’s Mattias Ekstrom an hour and a half off the pace, seeking to become the first manufacturer to win the Dakar with an electrified powertrain but the challenge looks over for this year.

Their Audi RS Q e-tron also features a petrol engine to charge the car’s batteries during the longer stages of the two-week endurance event.

Sanders remained the overall motorcycle class leader for the GasGas team

In the motorcycle category, Australian Daniel Sanders remained the overall leader for the GasGas team after winning the stage more than three minutes clear of Chilean rival Pablo Quintanilla.

The International Automobile Federation (FIA) meanwhile expressed support for French driver Philippe Boutron, recovering from injuries sustained in an unexplained explosion involving a team support vehicle in Jeddah last week.

“The FIA trusts the local authorities to get to the bottom of what happened and to continue to ensure the safety of the race in link with the organisers,” the governing body said in a statement.

New FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem was present at the start of the first Dakar under his watch.

Monday’s second stage is a 338-km timed run featuring a chain of dunes on the way to Al-Artawiya. (Reporting by Alan Baldwin)

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