United News of Bangladesh

Hosts Bangladesh clinched the Bangabandhu Asian Central Zone Under-23 Men's International Volleyball title, with an unbeaten record, beating Kyrgyzstan by 3-2 sets in the final in Mirpur on Monday. In the keenly contested final at the Shaheed Suhrawardy National Indoor Stadium, Bangladesh beat their rivals by 25-18, 15-25, 22-25, 25-19 and 18- 16 points. Sri Lanka finished third in the competition defeating Nepal by 3-2 sets in the morning.  Read: 27th National Youth Hockey final Tuesday Chief of Army Staff General SM Shafiuddin Ahmed was the chief guest at the final and handed over the trophies. Bangladesh Volleyball Federation General Secretary Ashiqur Rahman Miku handed out the best player award to Kaviska of Sri Lanka.  Nepal, Sri Lanka, Kyrgyzstan and Bangladesh took part in the competition.

The final of the Al Arafah Islami Bank 27th National Youth Hockey Championship 2022 will be held on Tuesday at the Maulana Bhashani National Hockey Stadium in the capital. Bangladesh Krira Shikkha Protishtan (BKSP) will face Rajshahi District in the title-decider, which will kick off at 3pm. Read: National Athletics: Army lead medal table with 15 golds, 11 silvers, 13 bronzes Air Chief Marshal Shaikh Abdul Hannan, chief of air staff of Bangladesh Air Force and president of the Bangladesh Hockey Federation, will watch the final as chief guest. Al Arafah Islami Bank acting managing director SM Zafar will be present. Dinajpur District finished third in the championship beating Natore District 5-0 in the third place match last Tuesday. Fifty-seven teams took part in the first phase of the meet in nine zonal venues and later 18 qualified teams competed in the final phase in Dhaka.  

State Minister for Power, Energy and Mineral Resources Nasrul Hamid has said sports have brightened Bangladesh's image. Sports can play a vital role in enhancing global connectivity, he added. "Sports and cultural activities are doing a great job keeping young people creative and thoughtful," he said while speaking at the closing ceremony of the 5th Hamidur Rahman National Youth Shooting Championship 2022 organised by the Bangladesh Shooting Sport Federation and sponsored by Hamid Group in Dhaka on Sunday. "Shooting has made good progress. Promising shooters can emerge if the shooting federation takes initiative to spread the game across the country instead of focusing on Dhaka," Nasrul added. Around 105 contestants – 65 boys and 40 girls from 23 rifle and shooting clubs of the country – participated in the competition. BKSP Shooting Club became the champions and Comilla Rifle Club runner-ups. Bangladesh Shooting Sport Federation President Lieutenant General Ataul Hakim Sarwar Hasan presided over the event and Bangladesh Olympic Association Secretary General Syed Shahed Reza and Bangladesh Shooting Sport Federation Secretary General Istekhabul Hamid spoke on the occasion.  

Army had a clear lead in the Bangabandhu 46th National Athletics Championships 2022 medal table after securing 15 gold, 11 silver and 13 bronze medals at the end of day two Saturday. At the Bangladesh Army Stadium in Banani, the second-placed Navy collected 11 gold, 15 silver and eight bronze medals. Bangladesh Ansar and VDP, Prison Directorate (Bangladesh Jail) remained in third place with one gold, one silver and two bronze medals each. Out of 40 events of the three-day national competition, 28 were decided in the first two days, featuring five new national records.   Three national records were made today – all by Navy women's athletes in the discus throw, 50000-metre run and 3000-metre run. Zafrin Akter made the day's first record in the women's discus throw covering a distance of 43.49 meters to break the 29-year-old event's record of 42.90 metres made by Josna Afroz in 1993. Read more: Bangabandhu National Athletics begins on Friday Rinki Biswas made the day's second record in the women's 5,000-metre run with a timing of 19:41.40 seconds to improve her previous record of 19: 57.50 seconds in the event. Shamsun Nahar Ratna set the day's third record in the 3,000-metre run with a timing of 10:39.55 seconds to break the event's record of 10:43.30 seconds made by Rinki Biswas in 2021.

The unspoken deal between sports fans and their favorite teams and players has been, in theory: Sure, there are billions of dollars being thrown around, but at the core, sports are supposed to be fun and games, a never-ending menu of two- or three-hour escapes into a land of winners and losers where nobody really gets hurt. For all but the most starry-eyed fanatics, that worldview unraveled in 2022 — much as it did the year before, the year before that, and the year before that, and so on. A more accurate assessment might be that sports are not so much an escape from the world’s problems as simply another window into them. Hardly a day passed in 2022 when a headline running across the ticker on ESPN would’ve been every bit as fitting on CNN or Fox Business or, in some cases, on NBC’s “Dateline.” The intersection between sports and real life ranged from toxic workplace environments, alleged sexual misconduct, sportswashing, cryptocurrency, transgender sports and the COVID-19 pandemic — plus a sprinkling of doping, geopolitics, hypocrisy and corruption. The AP Sports Story of the Year was about a basketball player, Brittney Griner, whose plan to travel to Russia to play in the offseason ended up as a high-stakes diplomatic battle between the United States and Russia. Griner was sentenced to nine years in prison for possessing a small amount of hashish oil, which is illegal in Russia. Months of tense negotiations ensued. Ultimately, Griner was released, and the sign-off for both countries’ negotiating teams came from none other than Presidents Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin. Putin, who, as much as any world leader, has tried to use sports to project his country’s strength, began the year front-and-center with Chinese premier Xi Jinping, as the autocrats used the start of the Beijing Olympics to highlight their partnership on the world stage. Shortly after those Games, Russia invaded Ukraine, leaving the global sports community to wrestle with whether Russian athletes should be able to compete in international events, sometimes head-to-head against athletes from the country under siege. Read more: What is ‘One Love’ armband and why is FIFA against it in World Cup 2022? “I think it’s fairly simple,” said Sebastian Coe, the head of World Athletics, when asked in November what it would take to see a Russian in a track meet anytime soon. “Get out of Ukraine.” As the year closed and the war remained far from a conclusion, Coe was hardly in the majority among world sports leaders. Many of those leaders, meanwhile, had brought their athletes home safely from China, where the government shuffled all 2,800 competitors and thousands more officials and media in and out of the country for the Beijing Games without suffering a major COVID-19 outbreak. It happened thanks to the country’s draconian, opaque testing procedures and cordoned-off Olympic venues, all of which served to tamp down any notion of dissent or free speech in a land that doesn’t view any of that kindly. The COVID restrictions helped China ultimately prove that it could pull off a major worldwide event in the midst of the pandemic — even if the festivities fell short of the global outpouring of peace and love that the Olympics so desperately wants to be. “It’s kinda like sports prison,” Canadian snowboarder Mark McMorris said. China was hardly the only country hoping to use sports for air of legitimacy — or to whitewash its own perceived sins. The creation of the breakaway LIV Golf tour took up virtually all the oxygen in that sport, as much for disrupting the status quo as for being bankrolled by a wealth fund backed by Saudi Arabian leaders who detractors said had blood on their hands. For a time, the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi and the Saudi citizenship of the 9/11 terrorist attackers drowned out birdies, bogeys and Tiger Woods’ health as the biggest talking points in golf. Later in the year, misgivings about holding soccer’s World Cup in Qatar were placed under a similar microscope. The country’s poor treatment of migrant workers and members of the LGBTQ community, to say nothing of the alleged corruption involved in awarding the tournament to a kingdom with no soccer roots, overshadowed the run-up to a tournament that nevertheless concluded with Argentina winning one of the most thrilling soccer matches ever. While the World Cup was unfolding, the cryptocurrency world was melting down. The bankruptcy of multibillion-dollar crypto exchange firm FTX and the arrest of its owner, Sam Bankman-Fried, had sports connections everywhere. Tom Brady and Steph Curry were pitchmen for the company, and FTX’s name quickly came off the arena where the Miami Heat played. Read more: FIFA’s punishment threat forces European team captains to abandon ‘One Love’ armbands Despite that, 2022 was the year that crypto officially became entrenched in sports, for better or worse, via sponsorships of leagues, endorsement deals by athletes and, of course, crypto-backed non-fungible tokens (NFTs) that are becoming a new status symbol of sports stars, who have, for decades, had a knack for inducing fans to buy what they buy and wear what they wear. “It would make sense for these (crypto) companies to work with a sports team or a sports celebrity because there’s an emotional attachment that goes along with that partnership,” said Brandon Brown, who teaches sports and business at New York University’s Tisch Institute for Global Sport. In basketball, Griner’s was hardly the only story that strayed far outside the lines. The year was filled with reports about the rot that infiltrated the NBA’s Phoenix Suns, whose owner, Robert Sarver, was pressured into selling the team after the details emerged. Employees documented years of abuse and toxic workplace culture that included frequent disrespect of women and use of racially inappropriate language. Another owner behaving badly: Daniel Snyder of the NFL’s Washington Commanders. Snyder found himself accused by a congressional committee of standing in the way of investigations about sexual harassment and misconduct that had allegedly been prevalent throughout the organization for two decades. Part of the investigation suggested the franchise was receiving help from the NFL itself in slowing down investigations. It’s a claim the NFL has denied, while pointing to its own outside probes into conditions that existed on Snyder’s team. In many corners, the saga reflected poorly on a league that has long been trying to grow its female fan base. Not helping was the ongoing story of one of the league’s best quarterbacks, Deshaun Watson, who, in 2022, reached settlements with 23 women who accused him of sexual misconduct while he was getting massages. He served an 11-game suspension that ended just in time for the holidays. He has not admitted guilt. But perhaps the single issue that underscored the inseparable bond between sports and all it touches was the furor over the future of transgender athletes. It is among society’s most complex topics, one steeped in a mix of physiological science, common sense, human decency and, yes, politics — and one that has left different sides of the debate at seemingly intractable loggerheads. The international swimming federation, in the wake of Penn transgender swimmer Lia Thomas’ title at the NCAA championships, was among a number of global sports entities that wrote, or updated, guidelines in 2022 in an attempt to bring clarity. So did legislatures in no fewer than 18 states across the U.S. One goal, said Olympic swimming champion Donna de Varona, an outspoken advocate in the transgender debate, should be to find some nuance in both the debate and the policymaking. “But nobody wants nuances,” she conceded. Such is the bottom line in sports, the place where fans go not for shades of grey, but, rather, to see wins and losses neatly summed up in black and white. What became clear as ever in 2022 is how far past the scoreboard we have to look to see the true outcomes of the games.

The Bangabandhu 46th National Athletics Championship'2022, organised by Bangladesh Athletics Federation (BAF) begins on Friday (December 23) at the Bangladesh Army Stadium in Banani here.  The most attractive events of the meet --men's and women's 100-meter sprints--will be held at 4:30 and 4:45 pm respectively on the day. The marathon race of the meet already completed Saturday ( Dec 17) morning marching with Bangabandhu Victory Day National Marathon. Read more: Bangabandhu 46th National Athletics begins Friday Although the competition will begin Friday morning, but the BAF President and Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister Md. Tofazzel Hossain Miah will inaugurate the three-day meet in the afternoon at a simple ceremony to be chaired by BAF Vice President Nuruddin Chowdhury Nayan, MP.    Some 500 athletes from 64 districts, eight divisions, universities, education boards, BKSP, BJMC and other affiliated organizations are expected to compete in the 40 events of the meet--22 for the men and 18 for the women. The organizer will award the top three athletes of all the 40 events of the meet with Tk 3,000 as first prize, Tk 2,000 as 2nd prize and Tk 1,000 as the 3rd prize.  Besides, the record holder athletes will be awarded with a prize money of Tk 5,000 each.

The Bangabandhu Asian Central Zone Under-23 Men's International Volleyball Championship'2022 began here on Thursday (Dec 22) at the Shaheed Suhrawardy National Indoor Stadium in Mirpur. Four countries---Nepal, Sri Lanka, Kyrgyzstan and hosts Bangladesh are taking part in the competition. LGRD and Co Operatives Minister M Tajul Islam inaugurated the four-nation meet as the chief guest Thursday afternoon.  Read more: Asian Men's U-20 Volleyball: Bangladesh finish 5th with win over China MP(Member of Parliament) Elias Uddin Mollah was the special guest at the function chaired by the President of Bangladesh Volleyball Federation (BVF) and Dhaka North City Corporation Mayor Atiqul Islam. BVF Senior Vice President and Tournament Committee Chairman Mohammad Younus, BVF general secretary Ashiqur Rahman Miku, Unique Group chairman Mohammad Nur Ali were also present on the occasion.   In two opening day's matches, Bangladesh taking on Nepal while Sri Lanka playing against Kyrgyzstan.

The Bangabandhu 46th National Athletics Championship 2022, organised by the Bangladesh Athletics Federation (BAF), will begin Friday at the Bangladesh Army Stadium in the capital's Banani. BAF President and Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister Md Tofazzel Hossain Miah will inaugurate the three-day competition in the afternoon at a ceremony to be chaired by BAF Vice-President Nuruddin Chowdhury Nayan MP. Around 500 athletes from 64 districts, eight divisions, universities, education boards, Bangladesh Krira Shikkha Protishtan, Bangladesh Jute Mills Corporation, and other affiliated organisations are expected to compete in the 40 events – 22 for men and 18 for women – of the championship. Read more: Bangabandhu 44th National Athletics ends BAF Vice-President Nuruddin Chowdhury Nayan MP disclosed the details of the championship at a press conference in Dhaka Wednesday. BAF General Secretary Advocate Abdur Rakib Montu was also present. The organiser will award the top three athletes of all the 40 events of the meet with Tk3,000 as the first prize, Tk2,000 as the second prize and Tk1,000 as the third prize. Besides, the record holder athletes will be awarded prize money of Tk5,000 each.  

Bangladesh Hockey Federation preliminarily announced a 25 members squad to form a Bangladesh team for the eight-nation Men's Junior Asian Hockey Federation (AHF) Cup (Under-21) Hockey Tournament to be held in Muscat, Oman from January 6-12 next year. Selected players have been asked to report to team manager Hazi Mohammad Humayan on Tuesday (December 20) at 4 pm at the federation office. Earlier, Bangladesh put in four-team Pool B  alongwith Sri Lanka, Hong Kong China and Uzbekistan while Pool A team comprises hosts Oman, Thailand, Chinese Taipei and Indonesia. Bangladesh will play Hong Kong in the inaugural match on January 6,  play Sri Lanka on January 7 and meet Uzbekistan on January 9 in the pool matches. Selected players are: Goal-keeper-  Nuruzzaman Nayan, Saifuddin and Al Amin Defender- Amirul Islam, Mehrab Hasan Samin, Hujaifa Hossain, Ramin Hossain, Asaduzzaman Chand, Aman Sharif, Sabadur Rahman Mithu, Azizar Rahman, Rahid Hasan Jibon Midfield- Prince Lal Samanta,  Abed Uddin, Shahidur Rahman Saju,  Tanveer Rahman Siraj, Tayub Ali, Shimul Islam Forward- Rafiqul Hasan Rocky, Obaidul Haque Joy, Debashis Kumar Roy, M Zahid Hossain, Tahsin Ali,  Abdullah,  Deen Islam.

German tennis legend Boris Becker has returned to Germany after serving eight months in prison in Britain, his lawyer said Thursday. The 55-year-old German, who has lived in Britain since 2012, was released on Thursday morning and traveled back to Germany shortly thereafter. Becker “has thus served his sentence and is not subject to any penal restrictions in Germany,” his lawyer, Christian-Oliver Moser, said in a statement. He did not give additional details about Becker’s location in Germany.  Read more: Roger Federer’s tearful goodbye to tennis at 41 The three-time Wimbledon champion ​​had been sentenced to 30 months in prison in April for illicitly transferring large amounts of money and hiding assets after he was declared bankrupt. He would normally have had to serve half of his sentence before being eligible for release, but was released early under a fast-track deportation program for foreign nationals. He had been convicted by London’s Southwark Crown Court on four charges under the Insolvency Act, including removal of property, concealing debt and two counts of failing to disclose estate. Becker rose to stardom in 1985 at the age of 17 when he became the first unseeded player to win the Wimbledon singles title. The former world number one was declared bankrupt in June 2017.