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PeakMetrics / Fact Checks

Sports fact checks

Explore claims publishers have checked about sports. Read their original ratings and follow the evidence.

1,766 published reviews in this topic

Fact Crescendo Sri LankaSports

IPL තරගාවලිව සඳහා සුපිරි පිතිකරු භානුක රාජපක්ෂ KKR විසින් මිලදී ගත්තද?

Publisher’s rating: Misleading

The review investigated a social-media post saying that Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) had bought Sri Lankan batter Bhanuka Rajapaksa for the 2022 IPL. Its key qualification is timing: the review said the player auction had not yet taken place, so a team could not then be identified as having selected him. The question was therefore not whether Rajapaksa was eligible for the auction, but whether KKR had already bought him. To check the claim, the review consulted IPL-related announcements and the published auction information. It reported that the 2022 mega-auction was scheduled for February 12 and 13 in Bengaluru, with 590 cricketers listed to go under the hammer. Rajapaksa was among 23 Sri Lankan players selected for the auction, with a starting price of 50 lakh Indian rupees. Being on that list meant he could be bid for; it did not establish that KKR—or any team—had bought him. The review also noted that KKR had retained Andre Russell, Varun Chakravarthy, Venkatesh Iyer and Sunil Narine before the auction. Its conclusion was that, although Rajapaksa was an auction candidate, the auction had not yet happened and no team had yet bought him. Thus the post’s claim of a completed KKR purchase was not supported at the time covered by the review.

dpaSports

Vier Spieler sind bei den Australian Open wegen Herzmuskelzündung ausgeschieden.

Publisher’s rating: Es gibt keinerlei Hinweise darauf, dass Tennisspielerinnen oder -spieler bei den Australian Open 2022 wegen Herzmuskelentzündungen das Turnier abgebrochen haben. Verletzungen sorgen immer wieder einmal dafür, dass Matches abgesagt oder abgebrochen werden - so war es auch beim ersten Grand-Slam-Turnier des Jahres.

The claim concerned four players said to have left the 2022 Australian Open because of myocarditis. The review examined whether withdrawals or interrupted matches at that tournament supported the allegation. It reports checking the Australian Open website’s records of players who did not start or whose matches were stopped, and searching for reporting about myocarditis at the tournament. Those checks found no evidence connecting any withdrawal to myocarditis. The review notes that some cases had no publicly specified reason, while several others were attributed to injuries. The tournament records listed withdrawals or stoppages in several categories: four in women’s qualifying, two in men’s qualifying, one men’s doubles match and one junior match. The review says that reasons were not detailed for some players, including Dalila Yastremska and Richard Gasquet. But the cases for which it identifies explanations involved injuries: Arthur Rinderknech’s wrist, Elena Rybakina’s thigh, Marina Zanevska’s lower leg, and an unspecified injury for Harmony Tan. The absence of a stated reason in some cases does not establish myocarditis. The review also traced two examples cited in Facebook comments to different events. Dalila Jakupovic’s 2020 match stoppage was attributed to breathing problems amid smoke pollution from Australian bushfires; Nikolo Basilashvili’s stoppage took place at the ATP Cup, not the Australian Open, and its cause was unclear. The review therefore distinguishes those incidents from the claimed 2022 tournament and finds no evidence that four Australian Open players withdrew because of myocarditis.

dpaSports

Trois joueurs abandonnent l'Open d'Australie à cause de problèmes respiratoires.

Publisher’s rating: Les publications s’inspirent de faits réels. Mais ceux-ci ont soit été sortis de leur contexte, soit déformés. Sur les trois joueurs mentionnés, deux participent bien à l’Open d’Australie 2022, tandis que l’abandon de la dernière remonte à 2020.

The claim conflates three players’ separate histories and says they all abandoned the 2022 Australian Open because of respiratory problems. The review identifies Nikoloz Basilashvili, Dalila Jakupovic and Nick Kyrgios, and checks whether each actually withdrew from that tournament. It concludes that two were participating in the 2022 event, while Jakupovic’s Australian Open withdrawal was in 2020—not 2022. The review also says there was no evidence linking the reported breathing problems to Covid-19 vaccination. Basilashvili played at the 2022 Australian Open, losing to Andy Murray on January 18 and playing doubles on January 19. His breathing difficulty occurred earlier, during an ATP Cup match on January 5, where medical staff intervened. The review reports that his mother attributed his shortness of breath to residual effects of Covid-19, which he had contracted weeks earlier, and said he was improving. It notes that he gave no further details and that no link between the incident and vaccination had been established. Jakupovic did withdraw during qualifying for the Australian Open, but in January 2020. The review attributes her coughing and feeling unwell to smoke pollution from severe Australian wildfires, and says she was not participating in the 2022 tournament. Kyrgios, meanwhile, was playing the 2022 Australian Open and had not withdrawn from it. His asthma-related withdrawal was from a Melbourne tournament on January 4, held alongside the Australian Open; he later tested positive for Covid-19. The review says he had stated that he was vaccinated, but found no evidence connecting his asthma or withdrawal to vaccination.

Fact Crescendo Sri LankaSports

දිනේෂ් චන්දිමාල්ව සිම්බාබ්බේ සමග තරග කරන සංචිතයෙන් ඉවත් කර තිබුණාද ? ?

Publisher’s rating: Explainer

The claim concerned a social-media post saying that Dinesh Chandimal and Angelo Mathews had been removed from a squad named for new fitness tests ahead of matches against Zimbabwe and Australia. Fact Crescendo traced the claim to a Hiru News broadcast from January 5, 2022, and checked it against the subsequent Zimbabwe series and Sri Lanka Cricket’s squad announcement. The review reports that Chandimal played in the first one-day match against Zimbabwe on January 16 and scored a half-century, which is inconsistent with the claim that he had been left out of the squad for that match. The review also says Sri Lanka Cricket announced the squad for the Zimbabwe one-day series on January 13. Its media manager, Prasanna Rodrigo, told the outlet that Chandimal was included because some players in the preliminary squad could not join the series. The reasons he gave included failing fitness tests, personal reasons and COVID-19 infection. Rodrigo said all players then in the squad had passed the fitness test. Thus, the post’s account of Chandimal being removed did not reflect his eventual inclusion and participation; the review’s account indicates that the squad changed as players became unavailable. The review distinguishes Chandimal’s case from Mathews’s: Rodrigo said Mathews was not in the squad, while Bhanuka Rajapaksa was also absent after submitting a resignation letter by the time the squad was selected. The evidence therefore does not support treating the two players as having been removed together in the way the post claimed.

dpaSports

Deze gevaccineerde tennissers doen niet meer mee aan de Australian Open vanwege problemen met ademhalen. Dat zou komen door het coronavaccin.

Publisher’s rating: De vrouw in de video wordt ook genoemd in het andere bericht. Het gaat om Dalila Jakupovic. Het beeld en het nieuws van haar terugtrekking uit de Australian Open is daarentegen al uit 2020. Dit heeft dan ook niets met het coronavaccin te maken. Ze kreeg geen lucht omdat ze te veel rook van de destijds woedende bosbranden had ingeademd. Ook voor Nick Kyrgios, die een wedstrijd liet schieten, is geen link met een vaccinatie. Hij bleek positief getest op COVID-19. De reden dat Nikoloz Basilashvili benauwd werd, is niet volledig duidelijk. Ook hij zou een paar weken voor zijn incident een coronabesmetting hebben doorgemaakt. Beide mannen doen wel degelijk mee aan de Australian Open van 2022.

Fact Crescendo Sri LankaSports

භානුක රාජපක්ෂ ජාත්‍යන්තර ක්‍රිකට් තරග වලින් සමුගැනීමේ තීරණය ඉල්ලා අස් කරගෙන?

Publisher’s rating: Explainer

The review examined social media and website posts claiming that Bhanuka Rajapaksa had reversed his decision to retire from international cricket and would be selected for Sri Lanka’s coming one-day series against Zimbabwe. At the time of its initial investigation, the publisher said it could not reach Rajapaksa. Sri Lanka Cricket’s media manager, Prasanna Rodrigo, told the publisher that he had not received official information that Rajapaksa had withdrawn his decision; the review also cited sports journalist Danushka Aravinda’s post saying the claim was not true. The evidence described for that initial check therefore did not confirm a withdrawal.

FACTLYSports

Image of Sachin Tendulkar taking part in the funeral procession of Sindhutai Sakpal

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerns an image said to show Sachin Tendulkar taking part in Sindhutai Sakpal’s funeral procession. FACTLY identifies the image as an older photograph from a different funeral: its review says it “dates back to 2019, when Sachin took part in the funeral procession of his childhood coach Ramakant Achrekar.” Thus, the image’s identification with Sakpal’s funeral is misleading, even though it depicts Tendulkar at a funeral procession. The review places the claim in the context of Sakpal’s death and funeral in Pune. It reports that her last rites were performed on January 5, 2022, and says Tendulkar publicly mourned her death in a tweet. However, it distinguishes that tribute from attending the funeral: “there are no reports of Sachin taking part in her funeral procession.” For the image’s earlier provenance, FACTLY says the same viral image had been published by The Indian Express in 2019, when it showed Tendulkar at Achrekar’s funeral. Its conclusion is that the image does not show Tendulkar participating in Sakpal’s funeral; it is a 2019 image recirculated with that claim.

dpaSports

Dit is een lijst van topsporters die zijn overleden.

Publisher’s rating: Allereerst zijn zeker 32 personen op deze lijst niet overleden. Van het merendeel van de sporters op de lijst is geen vaccinatiestatus bekend. Ook is in veel gevallen de precieze doodsoorzaak niet publiekelijk bekend. Een link tussen die de vaccinatie en het incident is daarom bij een groot deel niet te bewijzen. Bij dertien personen op de lijst heeft hun dood of ziekte zeker niet te maken met coronavaccins.