Sports briefs 5/13/05

Baseball

* Colorado pitcher Christian Parker and Chicago White Sox utilityman Jorge Toca were among 11 players given 15-game suspensions Thursday for violating baseball's minor league steroids policy.

Fifty-nine players have been suspended this year for violating the minor league program. Five players have been given 10-day penalties for violating the major league program.

Parker, a former New York Yankees prospect, is 3-1 with a 1.41 ERA in seven starts this season for Double-A Tulsa.

Hockey

* Andy Roach nearly struck again in the shootout.

Roach held the United States' hopes on his stick but Tomas Vokoun stopped his backhander, giving the Czech Republic a 3-2 quarterfinals victory Thursday at the world hockey championship.

Martin Rucinsky netted the lone shootout goal, sending the Czechs into Saturday's semifinals against Sweden, the runners-up the past two years. Sweden beat Switzerland 2-1 on Thursday in Innsbruck.

Canada beat Slovakia 5-4 in Innsbruck to advance to the semifinals. The two-time defending champions will face Russia, a 4-3 winner over Finland in another game decided by a shootout in Vienna.

The United States, which squandered a 2-0 lead, won't get the opportunity to match or top its bronze medal of 2004.

Roach, a defenseman who played in Switzerland this season after four years in Germany, was the last of five U.S. skaters in the shootout. He needed to score to even the tiebreaker at 1, but was the fifth shooter stopped by Vokoun -- the Nashville Predators' star goalie.

Soccer

* Tampa Bay Buccaneers owner Malcolm Glazer gained control of the world's richest soccer team Thursday, drawing resentment from Manchester United fans who fear the "heart and soul" of the storied club has been sold to foreign interests.

Glazer began a $1.47 billion takeover bid of the team by becoming its majority shareholder. His ownership reached 56.9 percent after he bought a 28.7 percent share held by Irish racehorse owners J.P. McManus and John Magnier.

Financial analysts said the deal seemed certain to succeed, and suggested Glazer's ownership could quickly reach the critical 75 percent threshold. At that level, he could take the club private.

Tennis

* Top-ranked Roger Federer moved closer to his sixth title of the year Thursday, beating Tommy Robredo 6-2, 6-3 to reach the quarterfinals of the Hamburg Masters.

Christophe Rochus came from behind to upset fourth-seeded Gaston Gaudio, last year's French Open champion, 2-6, 7-5, 6-3.

Juan Ignacio Chela rallied past fifth-seeded Tim Henman 3-6, 6-4, 6-2, and French teenager Richard Gasquet routed Dominik Hrbaty 6-1, 6-2 in this clay-court tuneup for the French Open, which begins May 23.

* Defending champion Amelie Mauresmo was far from her best Thursday in reaching the Italian Open quarterfinals with a 6-4, 6-3 victory over Silvia Farina Elia.

Mauresmo, who has advanced to the Rome final the past four years, beat an opponent who was treated for a neck injury in the second set.

Mauresmo will next meet four-time Italian Open winner Conchita Martinez in this clay-court tuneup for the French Open, which begins May 23. Martinez advanced when seventh-seeded Nadia Petrova pulled out because of a strained right thigh from Wednesday's match.

Earlier, sixth-seeded Vera Zvonareva of Russia defeated Catalina Castano of Colombia 6-1, 5-7, 6-2; and eighth-seeded Patty Schnyder of Switzerland beat Ana Ivanovic of Serbia-Montenegro 6-3, 6-2.