Following are the top 10 sports stories of 1999 voted by Xinhua News Agency:

1. The world table tennis championships, which had been scheduled to take place in Belgrade in May, was relocated and rescheduled due to NATO bombing of Yugoslavia. In a split championships held in Dutch city of Eindhoven in August, China swept all gold and silver medals to underline its dominance of the sport. The world team championships will be held in Malaysia in February 2000.

2. Manchester United won four titles -- Premier League, FA Cup, European Champions' Cup and Toyota Cup.

3. Salt Lake City bribery scandal forced IOC expulsions, reforms.

4. The United States beat China in penalty shoot-out to win the women's soccer Word Cup.

5. Lennox Lewis out-pointed American Evander Holyfield, as the first Briton, to unify the heavyweight boxing titles on November 13. An early controversial meeting between Lewis and Holyfield was judged as a draw although Lewis had dominated the bout.

6. American Michael Johnson broke the 11-year-old 400m world record by clocking 43.18 seconds in the world athletics championships in August. Two months earlier, his compatriot Maurice Greene set the 100m world record of 9.79 seconds.

7. Babu Chiri Sherpa of Nepal camped alone for 21 hours at the summit of the 8,848-meter Mount Qomolangma. It was his ninth conquest of the world highest peak.

8. German women's tennis legend Steffi Graf retired after 17 glittering years on court while American Andre Agassi added the year-end top ranking to three Grand Slams titles.

9. Former Olympic men's 100m champion Linford Christie of Britain, Jamaica's Merlene Ottey, twice world champion in the women's 200m and Cuba's men's high jump world record holder Javier Sotomayor tested positive for banned drugs.

10. Finland's Tommi Makinen won the world auto rally championship for four straight times. (Xinhua)