August 7 – The United Soccer League (USL) which runs the second and a third tier league in the US, has announced plans for a USL Academy League and the criteria for its clubs to enter.
By Osasu Obayiuwana
August 6 – Christian Lagnide, the CEO of Sports Marketing firm LC2, currently in a near $20 million debt dispute with the Confederation of African Football (CAF), says his company is not in violation of its previous TV rights contract with the continental football governing body.
August 6 – South Africa’s hastily assembled squad has been dumped out of the African Nations Championship qualifiers after a 3-0 defeat to Lesotho on Sunday saw them lose 6-2 on aggregate.
August 6 – Concacaf have released the schedule and venues for the first round group stage matches in the 2019-2020 Concacaf Nations League that will see 34 matches for Leagues A, B and C played in the September 2019 international window.
August 6 – German third tier side Chemnitzer have sacked their captain Daniel Frahn (pictured) for “openly displaying sympathy” for a neo-Nazi hooligan group.
By Osasu Obayiuwana
August 5 – beIN Sports, the international pay-tv broadcaster, financed by the government of Qatar, is officially the number one financial partner of the Confederation of African Football (CAF).
August 5 – Paris-Saint Germain retained the French Super Cup and Borussia Dortmund surprised Bayern Munich 2-0 in the German equivalent as both France and Germany gear up for next week’s big league kick offs.
August 5 – FIFA’s secretary general Fatma Samoura has officially started her reforming mission at the Confederation of African Football (CAF) despite strong opposition from within sections of African football’s hierarchy.
August 5 – Lionel Messi has been banned from international football for three months after claiming the Copa America was “corrupt”.
August 5 – For the first time ever, a female referee will take charge of a senior men’s European showpiece fixture after France’s Stephanie Frappart was appointed by UEFA to handle the Super Cup final between Liverpool and Chelsea in Istanbul on August 14.
August 5 – Philadelphia Union captain and US international Alejandro Bedoya has called on US Congress to “end gun violence” after 29 people were killed in two mass shootings in Texas and Ohio over the weekend.
By Paul Nicholson
August 2 – The former president of the Trinidad and Tobago Football Association (TTFA), Tim Kee, who left the federation with a crippling TT$40 million debt when he vacated the presidency in 2015, is making a bid to regain control as part of a group calling itself ‘United TTFA’ when elections take place later this year.
August 1 – He has become the most notorious ‘villain’ still at large in world football – if the US indictments of 2015 are to be taken a face value – Jack Warner has returned to the Trinidad and Tobago courts. This time he is not fighting his extradition to the US – still on-going – but battling the local FA for $2.3 million of loans he claims he provided but hasn’t been repaid.
By Osasu Obayiuwana
July 31 – In a further twist to the controversy that has bedevilled last May’s abandoned African Champions League final in Tunis, between Esperance of Tunisia and Wydad Athletic Club of Morocco, the Court of Arbitration of Sport (CAS) has nullified the decision of CAF’s executive committee on June 5 in Paris, ordering a replay of the game.
By Paul Nicholson
July 31 – Musa Hassan Bility, the CAF executive committee member banned by FIFA less than 24 hours after filing a complaint to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), has written an Open Letter to the FIFA Council calling into question the governing body’s “weaponised” Ethics committee.