March 3 – Goals win matches, but you have to create the chances. Lionel Messi tops a ranking of players who create ‘big’ chances, making a significant goal opportunity every 90 minutes, according to data from the CIES Football Observatory looking at Europe’s Big 5 leagues.
March 2 – FIFA have enlisted Belgian company Double pass as a partner to roll out a new ‘Talent Development Progamme’.
February 28 – It’s not VAR per se that’s at fault, it’s the law itself that’s an ass. That’s the argument often churned out by the experts whenever goals are wiped out by the video assistant referee because of marginal offside decisions such as the width of a toe.
February 28 – LaLiga’s Valencia CF has added to its growing global network of academies with the opening of a new VCF Academy in Morocco.
By Andrew Warshaw
February 24 – When is VAR not VAR? When the system itself admits it has made a mistake!
February 21 – In a time of little international football Belgium have remained top of the FIFA ranking. Palestine moved up the ranking following their success in January’s Bangabandhu Cup.
February 20 – Internazionale are expanding Inter Academy portfolio, agreeing a partnership with IT.Sports to launch a series of football schools throughout country.
February 18 – Former Arsenal manager Arsène Wenger, now FIFA’s head of global development, is pushing for the offside rule to be tweaked in time for this summer’s Euro 2020 finals in response to a spate of VAR controversies this season.
February 19 – Morocco has become the first African country to use VAR in a top-flight league game.
February 19 – Tottenham Hotspur’s South Korean international forward Son Heung-min has fractured his arm and could miss the rest of the season, a crushing blow to last season’s Champions League finalists who are already without long-term injury victim Harry Kane.
February 18 – Another Premier League fixture, another headline-making VAR controversy, this time in favour of Manchester United after not one, but two Chelsea ‘goals’ were ruled out in Monday’s high-profile clash in the race for the top four.
February 12 – In what is surely one of the shortest high-profile managerial stints on record, former German national team manager Jurgen Klinsmann has stepped down as Hertha Berlin’s interim head coach after just 10 weeks in charge citing a lack of support and trust.
February 10 – The Video Assistant Referee (VAR) system is not being used properly in some countries according to FIFA president Gianni Infantino.
February 7 – The names of neither Barcelona nor Real Madrid will be on the Copa del Rey this season after both were sensationally knocked out of the Spanish cup at the quarterfinal stage.
February 6 – The English Football Association is to introduce new guidelines limiting the amount of heading children will be allowed to do in training.