World Cup Field Complete After Iran Beats Australia
Iran won the 32nd and final spot in next summer’s soccer World Cup in France, overcoming a two-goal deficit in the final 15 minutes to tie Australia, 2-2, Saturday at Melbourne.
Combined with a 1-1 tie last weekend in Tehran, the teams had a 3-3 aggregate score in the home-and-home, total-goals playoff. Iran qualified because the first tiebreaker is more away goals.
In the 631st and final match of qualifying, Australia took a 2-0 lead on Harry Kewell’s goal in the 32nd minute and Aurelio Vidmar’s in the 48th.
Karim Bagheri scored Iran’s first goal in the 75th off a defensive mix-up. Five minutes later, Khodadad Azizi ran through the defense and beat goalkeeper Mark Bosnich.
“The Iranian people may get help by this result as far as world peace is concerned,” said Iran Coach Valdir Vierra. “People, when they are happy, don’t think about fighting. I asked the boys to fight here so they don’t have to fight at home. Today you have 70 million Iranians as happy as can be.”
Australia finished first in Oceania qualifying and had to beat the fourth-place team in Asian qualifying to advance.
Iran, which lost Asia’s third-place game to Japan, will be making its second appearance in the World Cup. It went 0-2-1 in 1978 and was eliminated in the first round.
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George Czarnowski scored in the 17th minute of overtime to give Seattle a 2-1 victory over Rockhurst of Missouri in the NAIA championship game at Birmingham, Ala. Seattle, appearing in its first NAIA tournament, extended its winning streak to 27 games. . . . Christine Harrington’s overtime goal led top-seeded and undefeated Mobile to a 2-1 victory over Simon Fraser in the NAIA women’s national championship game at San Antonio.
Winter Sports
Mark Grimette and Brian Martin of the United States swept to their second World Cup doubles victory of the season in luge doubles at Berchtesgaden, Germany, and increased their lead in the overall standings.
Grimette and Martin, who also won the season’s first World Cup event, had a winning time of one minute, 30.253 seconds to edge Italians Gerhard Plankensteiner and Oswald Haselrieder at 1:30.308.
Andrea Tagwerker of Austria won the women’s singles in 1:31.416.
Ids Postma of the Netherlands set a world record in the men’s 1,500-meter speedskating event in a World Cup meet at Berlin.
Postma was timed in 1 minute, 49.81 seconds, breaking the mark of 1:50.05 set by Canada’s Neal Marschall on March 16. Germany’s Gunda Niemann-Stirnemann won the women’s 1,500 meters in 2:01.17.
Dieter Thoma of Germany won the season’s first World Cup ski jumping event at Lillehammer, Norway. He won the first round with a 125-meter jump, and went 125 1/2 meters in the second round.
The newlywed team of Elena Leonova and Andrei Khvalko finished first in the pairs technical program in the U.S. Open Professional Figure Skating Championship at Cincinnati. Former Olympic silver medalist Elizabeth Manley won the women’s single technical program. Jozef Sabovcik of Slovakia won the men’s singles technical program.
Tennis
Andre Agassi will play Sargis Sargsian of Armenia today for the singles title of the HealthSouth/USTA Challenger at McCambridge Park in Burbank.
Agassi, seeded third in the $50,000 tournament, struggled before defeating second-seeded Daniel Nestor of Canada, 6-4, 5-7, 6-3. In his semifinal match, the top-seeded Sargsian defeated fifth-seeded Martin Sinner of Germany, 6-1, 7-6 (7-5).
Water Polo
USC upset top-ranked Pepperdine, 10-9, to advance to the finals of Mountain Pacific Sports Federation water polo tournament at Belmont Plaza Pool in Long Beach.
The fourth-ranked Trojans, who meet Stanford today at 2:30 p.m., scored the final three goals of the game. The Cardinal advanced with a 5-4 victory over California.
In the consolation semifinals, UCLA defeated Long Beach State, 10-6, and UC Irvine beat UC Santa Barbara, 13-6.
Baseball
The Dodgers are expected to meet with Japanese free-agent pitcher Masato Yoshii and his agent this week to discuss signing the right-hander, who was a teammate of Hideo Nomo’s while with the Kintetsu Buffaloes. Like Nomo, Yoshii, 32, throws in the low 90s and has a good forkball.
“Our pitching staff is fairly well set,” Dodger Executive Vice President Fred Claire said. “I feel comfortable with our staff, but we’re certainly not going to pass up the opportunity to speak with him.”
