BRIEFLY : WORLD CUP PROMISE: NO OLYMPIC CONFLICT.

Byline: Daily News Wire Services

Soccer's governing body promised Wednesday not to stage the World Cup in the same year as the Summer Olympics, avoiding a multimillion-dollar conflict between the world's two biggest sports events.

While vowing to push ahead with his plan for a World Cup every two years, Sepp Blatter, president of the soccer federation FIFA, told IOC president Juan Antonio Samaranch that the schedule would not conflict with the Summer Games.

Blatter ``expressed very clearly that never the Olympic Games and the World Cup will be held in the same year,'' Samaranch said. ``It is not possible to have in the same year, the same summer, the World Cup and the Olympic Games. There will not be a winner, there will be only two losers.''

Both the Olympics and the World Cup draw the majority of their income from TV rights and sponsorship fees, and placing both events in the same summer could drain those revenue sources.

Blatter, who previously said the new cycle would begin in 2008 - a Summer Olympic year, wouldn't say whether the tournament would be held in odd years rather than even years, as it has been since the first World Cup in 1934.

Six years after a stinging defeat, Chinese sports officials approved a new bid by Beijing to host the Olympics.

A Chinese return to Olympic bidding has been the subject of intense speculation in international sports and among China's citizens ever since Beijing lost by two votes in 1993 to Sydney in the fight to host the 2000 Olympics.

BASEBALL: Toronto Blue Jays pitcher Paul Quantrill underwent surgery after breaking his right leg in a toboggan accident. Quantrill, 30, was injured at his home in Port Hope, Ontario, on Tuesday.

TENNIS: Michael Chang, Gustavo Kuerten and Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario all were upset losers in tune-up tournaments for the Australian Open.

Chang lost to Scott Draper 6-3, 7-6 (8-6) in the second round of the Australian Hardcourt championships in Adelaide, where Michael Tebbutt beat Kuerten 6-7 (2-7), 7-6 (7-5), 7-6 (7-3).

In Perth, meanwhile, world junior champion Jelena Dokic beat Sanchez-Vicario 6-3, 6-2 in the Hopman Cup.

NHL: Buffalo Sabres goalie Dominik Hasek heads the list of six players voted as starters for the World team in the NHL All-Star Game on Jan. 24 in Tampa, Fla.

Forwards Peter Forsberg of the Colorado Avalanche, Jaromir Jagr of the Pittsburgh Penguins and Teemu Selanne of the Mighty Ducks will join Hasek as repeat starters on the World team.