May 20 – Italy’s women’s cup final has been cancelled as a result of the alleged description of female players as a “bunch of lesbians” by the president of the Italian Amateur Football Association (LND), Felice Belloli (pictured).
May 20 – More than 50 people including coaches, directors and players, have been arrested as part of a massive match-fixing crackdown in Italy.
By Jaroslaw Adamowski
May 20 – Elisabeta Lipa, the chief executive of Dinamo Bucharest, has unveiled plans to demolish its Stefan cel Mare stadium and build a new sports facility with a total capacity of 30,000.
May 20 – Italy are making TV production history with the first broadcast of a football match in the new 4K Ultra-HD format. The Juventus versus Lazio TIM Cup Final at Rome’s Stadio Olimpico tonight, will be the first to offer broadcasters a live feed in the fledgling TV format.
By David Owen
May 19 – Hamburg, a confirmed runner in the race for the 2024 Olympics, may be about to suffer an immense blow to its sporting prestige. With just one game to go, the city’s premier football club – Hamburger Sport-Verein – is in serious peril of relegation from Germany’s Bundesliga for the first time in its history.
By Andrew Warshaw
May 19 – With a raft of clubs struggling to comply, UEFA have agreed to relax the rules on financial fair play that were introduced in 2011 to curb overspending, but which have led to the widely anticipated threat of legal challenges.
By David Owen
May 18 – Top football clubs face a common problem: as their global brands become more powerful, their fan-bases become more remote and harder to engage with – and to monetise. Digital technology seems an obvious route to addressing this issue, and this week Real Madrid, which has been notably quick off the mark in the use of social media, will launch its latest initative for connecting with supporters worldwide.
May 18 – Six months after federation president Carlo Tavecchio was banned for his notorious “banana eaters” comments when referring to African footballers, Italian football has been plunged into fresh embarrassment with another less than savoury verbal faux pas.
By Alexander Krassimirov
May 18 – Turkish international and current captain of Turkey’s Fenerbahce Emre Belozoglu (pictured) has been attacked by Besiktas supporters while traveling on a ferry.
By Matt Scott
May 15 – Major Greek clubs are in open revolt over the corruption scandal that has put the owner of Olympiacos in the dock over allegations of extortion, bribery and arranging a bombing.
By Andrew Warshaw
May 15 – If the FIFA presidency was awarded to the candidate with the best human rights approval ratings, Michael van Praag would be looking forward to a single four-year term of office come May 29.
By Samindra Kunti
May 15 – The president of RC Lens Gervais Martel has insisted a new investor will inject €15 million in the much troubled club to keep Lens afloat in France’s second division Ligue 2 after majority shareholder Hafiz Mammadov defaulted.
May 15 – Despite the Spanish courts lifting the threat of an end-of-season La Liga strike over the imposition of a collective TV rights bargaining agreement, the unsavoury war of words between the various parties shows little sign of abating.
By Samindra Kunti
May 15 – Ajax Amsterdam failed to win the Dutch title this season, finishing second behind champions PSV, but the club wants to reestablish itself as Holland’s number one team through the construction of Ajax City, a state of the art training complex. At the same time the Amsterdam Arena may seek a stadium naming rights deal.
May 15 – After a season in which his club has been at the forefront of a series of racist incidents, the president of Torpedo Moscow, instead of apologising, has indulged in an outrageous piece of self-denial.