June 19 – With the Gulf diplomatic crisis continuing, reports suggest Saudi Arabia plans to set up new TV channels to challenge the regional dominance of Qatar’s BeIN Sports which is banned in the country, but is the dominant regional player in the sports rights market holding most of the key international league and national team properties.
June 20 – FIFA has embraced the new Augmented Reality (AR) technology opportunity on the Facebook platform to give fans a new way of showing their support for their teams.
June 18 – Premier League Swansea City have unveiled their 2017-18 Joma kits with new main shirt sponsor LeTou, an online betting site, taking the premium sponsor slot on the front of the jersey and Barracuda Networks as one of the league’s first sleeve sponsors.
June 16 – Newly promoted Scottish Premier League side Hibernian have unveiled Eden Mill as a new back-of-shirt sponsor in a one-year deal.
June 16 – Parc Olympique Lyonnais stadium has upgraded to next-generation LED lighting using the Philips ArenaVision LED pitch lighting system. It is the first French stradium to implement the solution which is being hailed as a breakthough for stadium entertainment and provides a greater flexibility for mix-used stadium events.
June 15 – Visa is rolling out 1,600 point-of-sale terminals and more than 120 mobile concessionaires throughout stadium concourses at the 2017 Confederations Cup in Russia that kicks off this week.
June 15 – The English Football League (EFL) is expanding its broadcast platform for its three professional from next season with the launch of the iFollow service for overseas markets. Matches already being broadcast outside the UK and Irelands will not be available on iFollow. More than 1,500 games will be streamed digitally.
June 14 – Long time Czech league sponsor Grambinus is to pull out of its deals with the Czech football Association (FAČR), including its title sponsorship of the country’s top league, saying that the corruption scandals that have hit the presidency of the federation are now impacting on their brand image.
By Paul Nicholson
June 13 – The rapidly re-growing sport of Subbuteo – the table football game where players use their fingers to move figures on the pitch to score goals – is adding a new regional confederation in Asia to help develop the sport in the region.
June 9 – Scottish Premiership treble winners Celtic have announced that they have “smashed the 50,000 barrier for season tickets sold for the coming 2017/18 season.” The club did not lose a league game under new manager Brendan Rodgers last season.
June 8 – New Balance has added Belgian first division side Royal Standard de Liège to its kit supply roster, taking over Kappa. The US sportswear firm will provide the team with kit, training wear and equipment starting with the 2017/18 season.
June 7 – Cristiano Ronaldo will be the cover athlete for EA Sports FIFA 18 game that will go on worldwide release September 29. Incredibly, it is the first time Ronaldon has been on the cover.
June 6 – Big players do big things. While Ronaldo was scoring two goals to win the Champions League final in Cardiff, Wales, with Real Madrid, Lionel Messi was in Beijing launching a football theme park that will bear his name in Naijing, China.
June 6 – Egyptian giants Al Ahly and Zamalek have announced they will boycott the Qatari-owned television network beIN Sports following the damaging diplomatic rift between Qatar and several Arab countries, including Egypt and Saudi Arabia.
June 6 – CONCACAF has signed the Allstate Insurance Company as its Official Insurance Sponsor for all championships for the next four years. No figure has been disclosed for the deal that also included four-year renewals of deals with the MLS and the Mexican national team’s US tours.