October 12 – Germany became the first team to qualify for the 2022 World Cup after breezing past North Macedonia 4-0 on Monday to claim top spot in Group J with two games to spare.
October 11 – Mexico are back at the top of Concacaf’s Qatar 2022 qualifying after another seesawing round of qualifiers that saw Panama stun the US and Canada draw with Jamaica.
October 8 – Saudi Arabia moved a step closer to 2022 World Cup participation with a landmark 1-0 victory against Japan to maintain a perfect record with nine points from three matches in Group B in Asia’s third round of qualifiers.
October 8 – Ahead of the Netherlands’ World Cup qualifiers against both Latvia and Gibraltar, the Dutch FA (KNVB) is accelerating its ‘Football supports change’ campaign, which seeks to achieve sustainable change for labour migrants in Qatar.
October 7 – World Cup 2026 bid city Houston kept their focus on the hosting prize with the launch the ‘Spirit of Houston’ campaign yesterday marking the start of the campaign with a social ‘roadblock’ that saw organisations and indivduals share the campaign launch video.
September 24 – FIFA has completed its first round of visits to 2026 World Cup host city candidates, with inspections of Boston, Nashville, Atlanta, Orlando, Washington DC, Baltimore, New York/New Jersey, Philadelphia and Miami.
September 24 – 2026 World Cup host bidder Houston has announced a $6 million campaign to support Houston 2026’s Grow the Game initiative which aims at providing underserved communities access to football. The initiative launches as FIFA’s host city bid inspections gather pace in the US.
September 23 – The English Premier League looks set to break for an unprecedented six weeks to incorporate the 2022 World Cup, the first ever to be staged in winter.
September 10 – The host city selection process for the 2026 World Cup moves on a stage next week with FIFA beginning its inspection visits September 15-23.
September 8 – FIFA has confirmed it has opened disciplinary proceedings against Brazil’s and Argentina’s Football Associations following the farcical scenes that led to their eagerly anticipated World Cup qualifying clash being suspended after just five minutes when Brazilian health officials stormed the pitch to question the quarantine status of certain players.
September 8 – Iran, Australia and Saudi Arabia have taken early advantage in the last round of Asian Qualifying for Qatar 2022. All three won their opening two games and top Groups A and B in the 12 team qualifiers.
By Samindra Kunti
September 7 – Brazil’s federal police are investigating Argentina’s four Premier-League based players whose presence prompted health officials to storm Sunday’s World Cup qualifier in Sao Paulo, which led to the match’s abandonment.
By Samindra Kunti
September 6 – In an extraordinary and unprecedented sequence of events, officials from the Brazilian health authority Anvisa stormed on to the pitch of the World Cup qualifier between Brazil and Argentina after four minutes to deport four Argentine players from England’s Premier League, leading to the match being abandonment.
September 2 – The Netherlands stumbled to a disappointing 1-1 draw against Norway in World Cup qualifying on Louis van Gaal’s return to the Dutch dug-out, prompting the veteran coach to call his own team “sloppy” with pressure growing on Oranje.
By Paul Nicholson
August 16 – The World Leagues Forum (WLF) has slammed FIFA’s decision to amend the international match calendar without consultation and which has seen the rescheduling of South America’s FIFA World Cup qualifiers that had originally been due to be played in March 2021 to extended triple match windows in September and March.