By David Owen
January 30 – Twenty years have passed since I was dispatched on one of those hardship assignments: a visit to L’Ecole Nationale Supérieure de la Pâtisserie in a quiet little town noted for its brioches in La France profonde.
January 30 – Mexico broke the four-championship winning streak of the US to take their first-ever CONCACAF Under-20 Women’s title at the weekend in Trinidad. A 4-2 penalty shoot out win made it third final lucky for the Mexicans who had lost to the US in 2010and 2014.
January 29 – The respected media lawyer, entrepreneur, father to three children, dedicated husband and a man of vision, Dr Martin Wagner, was brutally slain on Sunday, January 28, 2018 in his home outside Basel, Switzerland.
By Andrew Warshaw
January 29 – Far too long delays, questionable judgements, wrong decisions, contrasting opinions. The global debate over whether to introduce video technology – which FIFA president Gianni Infantino is determined to do before the World Cup – shows no sign of abating following yet more controversy at the weekend.
By Samindra Kunti
January 29 – In freezing and snowy conditions Uzbekistan clinched the AFC U-23 Championship with a dramatic extra-time winner from substitute striker Andrey Sidorov to break Vietnamese hearts in Changzhou, China. Despite the loss the Vietnamese team were still received as heroes back home.
January 29 – One of India’s biggest clubs has written to their governing body claiming two of their players have been approached via social media to fix matches.
January 29 – Italy’s Serie A is in talks with Spain’s Mediapro on a €950 million deal for the 2018-2021 seasons. This follows a breakdown in discussion with Sky Italia who had not met the €1.05 billion minimum set by the league’s advisor Infront.
January 29 – A confidential report commissioned by FIFA president Gianni Infantino into the organisation’s financial workings before he took over from Sepp Blatter has uncovered an eye-watering spending spree by the old guard, most of whom have now been forced out including Blatter and his one-time right-hand man, Jerome Valcke.
January 29 – Hosts Morocco and surprise package Sudan progressed to the last four of the African Nations Championship. Nigeria and Libya are the other semi-finalists.
January 29 – City Football Group (CFG), the expanding ownership group that includes Manchester City and New York City FC, has increased its commercial representation reach via a partnership with CAA Sports.
January 29 – The AFC’s executive committee has restated its decision that Champions League match-ups between Qatari, Saudi and UAE clubs will be played on a home and away basis despite an ongoing political and economic blockade of Qatar by its neighbours.
By Tim Rohn and Andrew Warshaw
January 26 – The growing sense of unease pervading FIFA under the regime of Gianni Infantino has been exposed by a blatant attempt to undermine a scathing report into the organisation’s record on governance by the Council of Europe. FIFA’s lobbying fell on deaf ears as the council overwhelming voted in favour of adopting the report with 131 votes in favour and just five against.
January 26 – Every club in the Premier League recorded more than 96% of their stadia full for Round 24 of the Premier League season, a record attendance capacity for the league as a whole for the past two season.
By Anthony Harwood
January 26 – Another World Cup, another flurry of complaints about the poor condition of some pitches that teams will have to play on.
By Andrew Warshaw
January 26 – A part-time English team is going where bigger clubs fear to tread by taking a stand against betting sponsorship, partly because of the scourge of match-fixing pervading the sport.