FRAMINGHAM, Mass. — Former New England Revolution star Taylor Twellman said Friday that the Major League Soccer team ignored his symptoms of multiple concussions, even sending him back on the field after he said, “I have a concussion,” following the hit that eventually forced him to retire.
The keynote speaker at a conference on brain trauma, Twellman said the trainer instead asked him his name, the score of the game and to count backward from 100 before telling him he doesn’t have a concussion and sending him back into a game in 2008.
“It’s horrifying,” said Chris Nowinski, a founder of the Sports Legacy Institute, which raises public awareness of head injuries. “I’m appalled. I’m angry.”
Revolution spokeswoman Lizz Summers said the team had no comment.
Tar Heels top AP basketball poll.
North Carolina broke a tie with its fiercest rival and moved into one with one of college basketball’s most storied programs.
The Tar Heels, who return all five starters from the team that reached the regional finals last season, were the runaway No. 1 in The Associated Press’ men’s preseason top 25. It is the eighth time they have received that honor since the preseason poll started in 1961-62.
That breaks a tie with Duke, North Carolina’s Tobacco Road rival, and moves them into a tie with UCLA.
• California men’s basketball coach Mike Montgomery said he was diagnosed with bladder cancer and had surgery last week that has left him cancer-free.
McIlroy leads by two strokes
SHANGHAI — U.S. Open champion Rory McIlroy shot a 3-under-par 69 to increase his lead to two strokes after the second round of the Shanghai Masters.
McIlroy is at 11-under 133, while Noh Seung-yul, a 20-year-old South Korean, was second after a 63. Louis Oosthuizen (66) and Anthony Kim (68) were tied for third at 8-under.
• Scotland’s Richie Ramsay shot a 1-over 72 to hold his two-stroke lead after the second round of the Andalucia Masters in Sotogrande, Spain, in which only four players reached the halfway point under par.
• American Jeff Overton shot a course-record 9-under 62 for a share of the second-round lead with Sweden’s Fredrik Jacobson (64) at the Asia Pacific Classic in Selangor, Malaysia.
Footnotes.
The Los Angeles Angels have chosen Arizona Diamondbacks executive Jerry Dipoto, who pitched for the Rockies and was their director of player personnel in 2005, to be their new general manager.
• The United States upset world power Argentina 4-2 in the women’s field hockey final at the Pan American Games in Guadalajara, Mexico, to secure an automatic berth in next year’s London Olympics.
The Associated Press
