British competitors rounded off an impressive trip to Melbourne with two silver medals courtesy of Mark Foster and Zoe Baker on the third and final day of the Australian leg of the FINA World Cup. Foster faced a world-class field in the 50m freestyle and just missed out on the touch to Dutchman Pieter van den Hoogenband. Baker was in the same type of company when she went in the 50m breaststroke but it was the in-form Emma Igelstrom, of Sweden, who snatched it at the end in 30.58 to push Baker into silver.

lGergor Tait (City of Edinburgh) added 100m backstroke victory to his 200m success from Friday, competing at the British Grand Prix meeting in Bath yesterday. Tait, who clocked 57.78sec, went on to take second in the 400m freestyle behind Coventry's Adam Faulkner in 4:01.12. His clubmate, Ian Edmond, was second to Newcastle's Chris Cook in the 100m breastroke in a time of 1:06.20, while Hayley Preston finished third in the women's 50m breaststroke in 34.65.

Alpine skiing

Italy's Karen Putzer stormed to a surprise victory in a World Cup super-G yesterday. The Olympic bronze medallist beat Germany's Martina Ertl, who finished second, while Carole Montillet, of France, who won the downhill on Saturday, recorded her third podium finish of the weekend when finishing third.

The World Cup super-G champion, Hilde Gerg, looks set to miss the rest of the season after damaging the anterior cruciate ligament in her left knee in Saturday's downhill.

In the men's race yesterday, Didier Cuche, of Switzerland, claimed his first win of the season, beating Liechtenstein's Marco Buechel into second, while Hannes Trinkl, of Austria, finished third. In the men's downhill on Saturday, Stephan Eberharter continued to sweep aside all challengers in the downhill to register his fourth win of season. Scotland's Finlay Mickel was 55th.

Badminton

Scotland's Kirsteen McEwan (Bridge of Weir), who was partnering England's Simon Archer for the first time, reached the mixed doubles semi-finals of the BMW International in Saarbrucken, Germany, only to go out to the fifth seeds Mathias Boe and Rikke Olssen, of Denmark, 11-6, 11-7. The Danes in turn lost in the final to England's Nathan Robertson and Gail Emms, who won 11-9, 3-11, 11-9.

lLongniddry's English team man, Robert Blair, teamed up with Ian Palethrope to win the men's doubles title at the Irish International in Lisburn yesterday. Blair and Palethorpe faced Peter Jeffrey and Julian Robertson, the English pair who put out Scots David Forbes and Neil Gilchrist in the quarter-finals, and won 15-5, 14-17, 15-9.

In the women's final, Yuki Shimada was beaten by Karina de Witt, from the Netherlands, 11-7, 4-11, 11-3. Stirling's Susan Hughes won into the singles quarter-finals before losing out to Juliana Schenk, of Germany 11-6,

11-6.

Basketball

Scottish League leaders City of Edinburgh Kings and Midlothian Saints kept their unbeaten table-topping records yesterday, Kings defeating Boroughmuir 115-62 at Wester Hailes, the gap between the two teams being only slightly less than when they met on the opening day of the season at Portobello. The match was tight for the first quarter until Kings' 6ft 9in centre Simon Flockhart took over with a run of 13 points in a row.

With Kings in cruise control, shooting guard Dan Wardrope took the chance to consolidate his place at the top of the leading scorers' list with another 33 points, while Valentin Foss added 15 in a fine all-round display, his best to date. Only Matt McGuire with 23 made much impact for 'Muir.

Midlothian, helped by 16 points each from Heather McNeill and Leanne Stupart, defeated the Kings sister team Kool Kats 65-59 at Lasswade yesterday, an almost identical score to that when they last met.

Bowls

Prestwick's Kevin Nibloe, who lost out in the national singles final to Stuart Cruickshank last week, counted three shots on the last end of the best-of- three set match to beat Blantyre's Jim McCann and Tom Wallace to reach the semi-finals of the National two-bowl pairs championship, which will be played at the Richard Corsie Stadium in Edinburgh in January.

Nibloe, with his uncle, Morris Sturgeon, will take on Glasgow's Ricky Taylor and Jim Lyness, who defeated fellow West of Scotland pair Charlie Boyle and Alex McWhinnie 2-0. Completing the last four line-up are Elgin's Norman Barker and Mike Stepney, who meet Doug Walls and Jim Roxburgh from Headwell. Elgin beat Aberdeen's Jim Stewart and Ian Laird 2-0 while Headwell qualified with a 2-1 win over Alloa's Bruce Ramage and Alan Murray.

boxing

Wladimir Klitschko again showed he is a major force in the heavyweight division, recording a 10th-round technical knockout of American Jameel McCline to retain his WBO title on Saturday. The Ukrainian, whose elder brother Vitali is set to challenge Britain's Lennox Lewis for the world heavyweight crown in March, dominated the contest before flooring McCline late in the 10th round.

lRichard Williams retained the IBO light-middleweight championship with a 10th-round stoppage over Paul Samuels at the Brentwood Leisure Centre on Saturday night.

l One of Scotland's longest serving amateur boxing coaches, Andy Grant, will be presented in Nottingham tonight with the inaugural Harry Carpenter award for services to British boxing. East Kilbride-based Grant was Glasgow University boxing coach for 46 years and a ring second to Glasgow's British and European middleweight Champion John ''Cowboy'' McCormack in the 1960s.

cricket

Scottish officials are begging big businesses to stump up enough cash to let them offer contracts to the country's leading players. The Scots, who had their first winter nets session in Edinburgh yesterday, enter England's national one-day league next season without a major sponsor and it is is still not clear whether they will be paid for taking part.

Hockey

Argentina yesterday ended the Australian, German and Dutch

pre-eminence in the world game by winning the women's World Cup in Perth with a sudden-death penalty- stroke victory over Holland after the sides finished the 70 minutes locked at 1-1. Eight of the 10 first-phase penalty strokes were saved but it was Holland who blinked first in the sudden death drama that followed, and Argentina won 4-3.

On Saturday, Scotland finished 12th after going down 3-0 to New Zealand.

lIn the men's Spektra indoor league at the Bells Sports Centre, Perth, Wanderers took a clear three-point lead at the top when Grange did them a favour by coming from behind to defeat main rivals Menzieshill 4-2 yesterday. Wanderers had a 6-4 victory over Pro-Life Kelburne, thanks to a brace each from Gordon Shepherd and Paul Dailly.

ice hockey

Ladislav Kudrna put up the shutters as Edinburgh Capitals recorded their first win over Dundee Texol Stars last night. The surprising 4-2 reverse dented the Tayside team's hopes of retaining the British National League title and it came only two weeks after Stars failed in the semi-final of the Findus Cup, They are now in danger of relinquishing pole position in the table to Coventry Blaze.

Capitals move into fifth place in the table following their victory while struggling Fife Flyers sit in sixth. They slipped to their third defeat in four games when a confidence-sapping 5-2 reverse at fourth-placed Guildford Flames.

SPEEDWAY

Christian Henry is expected to sign for Glasgow Tigers in the next 48 hours after being shown the door by rivals Edinburgh Monarchs. Tigers officials were given the go-ahead to speak to the misfiring Australian at the weekend.

shinty

Kingussie's win over holders Newtonmore in the Tulloch MacTavish Cup, which earned them a semi-final spot against Kilmallie, was won by the narrowest of margins. However, their domination of the game and the amount of chances they squandered could well be a source of concern. Fraser MacIntosh scored for More against the run of play in the 23rd minute, but a brace by Ronald Ross put the home team ahead. Glen MacIntosh equalised for Kingussie who then missed two penalties in quick succession before Ross came to the rescue with the winner with six minutes left.

In the other half of the draw, Fort William await the winners of the Lochaber versus Glengarry clash to see who goes through. That tie was postponed on Saturday because of a local bereavement.