By David Owen
May 7 – A French second division team has named a female manager in a milestone for gender equality in the sport. Helena Costa, 36, from Portugal will take over at Clermont Foot 63, currently 14th in Ligue 2, for next season.
By Andrew Warshaw
May 7 – The dangerous political tensions in Ukraine have forced a number of league fixtures as well as the domestic cup final to be relocated from the country’s pro-Russian eastern cities as well as the Russian-occupied Crimea peninsula for security reasons.
May 7 – The Italian government says it will crack down on hooliganism following the mayhem that marred last weekend’s domestic cup final in Rome.
May 7 – An English second-tier striker has been has been handed a suspended three-month ban and fined £60,000 in the latest breach of football’s betting rules to hit English football.
By David Owen
May 6 – The Football Association (FA)’s national football centre will be a hive of activity next month while Roy Hodgson’s England squad are on the other side of the Atlantic in Brazil attempting to win the country’s second FIFA World Cup and their first in nearly 50 years.
“Authority should derive from the consent of the governed. Not from the threat of force.” Barbie, Toy Story 3
When Barbie exasperatedly vents words more suited to a treatise by Friedrich Hayek than to an animated doll, the scriptwriters at Disney gave us one of the truly great lines of movie history. Because although spoken by the very embodiment of infantilism – a plastic doll played with by generations of young girls –
By Richard van Poortvliet
May 6 – Russia could be about to introduce a salary cap for its clubs, according to the Honorary President of the Russian Football Union, Vyacheslav Koloskov (pictured). The Russian State Duma took the lead in promoting the idea to the association.
The words were worthy enough, the message unequivocal. But the real intentions were cringingly obvious to anyone who has followed Asian football politics.
Last week’s attempt by Asian Football Confederation president Sheikh Salman Bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa’s to mark the first anniversary of his leadership by focussing on his so-called achievements served only to highlight the unedifying rift that continues to divide his increasingly fractious organisation.
Ever since he took over last year,
By Andrew Warshaw
May 5 – The Gambia, one of Africa’s smallest countries, has been banned from all international competition for two years for fielding no fewer than five over-age players in a qualifier for the Continent’s under-20 Championship.
By Paul Nicholson
May 5 – Depending on which part of the world you ask the questions, you will get different reactions and emotions regarding the Qatar 2022 World Cup. Doha-based Agency 222 conducted a survey that found local feeling was that the World Cup was defining and shaping an emerging nation.
By Paul Nicholson
May 5 – FIFA’s revamp of its development programmes in 2013 and the changes in the regulations have made the year a big one for FIFA’s a team that has been responsible for spending $500,000 a day on development activity and corporate social responsibility projects.
By Jaroslaw Adamowski
May 5 – CSKA Moscow has signed a sponsorship deal with one of Russia’s leading aircraft manufacturers, Russian Helicopters.
By Paul Nicholson
May 5 – Initial reaction to the announcement last week that the Copa America Centenario will be played in the US and hosted by CONCACAF in 2016 has been positive.
By David Owen
May 4 – The most powerful man in world sport faces a nervous week as one of his favourite football clubs battles to avoid relegation from the German Bundesliga.
With Real Madrid and their noisy but vastly improved neighbours Atletico, earning well-deserved places at this year’s UEFA Champions’ League final in Lisbon, the fraternity looks forward to what is certainly going to be a keenly contested encounter.
But as Europe’s – and undoubtedly the world’s – leading club tournament grows in competitive and commercial strength, certainly helped by the huge global audience it continues to pull, it is a telling reminder, to African club football,