November 21 – A former top-flight Syrian goalkeeper now based in the UK has given a heartfelt and graphic description of how life was before fleeing his homeland.
By Andrew Warshaw and Paul Nicholson
November 18 – The full scale of the pressure on Jose Mourinho to succeed in his first season at Manchester United has been underlined by the revelation that the club will lose more than £20 million in sponsorship income from Adidas if they fail to qualify for next season’s Champions League. But the club says it is still on course to hit record revenue of between £530 million and £540 million for the full year.
By Andrew Warshaw
November 18 – The entrance to an insurance company headed by under-fire Cyprus Football Association (CFA) boss Costakis Koutsokoumnis has been bombed in the latest ugly protest against his leadership.
November 18 – Taking advantage of the burgeoning Chinese market, the English Premier League has sold its television rights in the country to streaming service PPTV for a staggering $700 million (£565 million), according to a number of reports in the UK and Asia.
By Samindra Kunti
November 18 – The Brazilian FA, the CBF, and Samsung have parted ways. Samsung is the fifth major sponsor the CBF has lost since the FIFA scandal engulfed the world game and shone the spotlight on decades of corruption in Brazilian football.
November 18 – FIFA has opened disciplinary proceedings against England and Scotland after both countries defied football’s world governing body by wearing poppy emblems on black armbands in last week’s World Cup qualifier to commemorate Armistice Day which ended World War One.
By Paul Nicholson
November 18 – With the US national team floundering at the bottom of their final World Cup qualifying group and looking increasingly uncomfortable with the ball at their feet with every game, they could do worse than send their players to one of the TOCA Soccer centres for some intensive ball work.
By Samindra Kunti
November 18 – Belgium’s oldest club Antwerp has dismissed sporting director John Bico after just one turbulent month as the club’s sporting director.
November 18 – The rise of Thailand as a footballing power in the region was recognised by Asian Football Confederation (AFC) president Shaikh Salman bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa, who pledged further support for the Football Association of Thailand (FAT) during a visit by a Thai delegation to AFC House in Kuala Lumpur.
November 18 – So now we know. After delaying a ruling in a mysterious disciplinary case involving CSKA Moscow and Finland midfielder Roman Eremenko, UEFA have banned him for two years after he tested positive for cocaine.
“Far from being willing to execute his enemies, a real king must be willing to execute his friends.” T.H. White
Walt Disney’s rendering of TH White’s novel The Sword in the Stone glossed over it but the author always tackled themes of justice and proper governance persuasively. Indeed, White’s lessons are apt for football to learn after so many years of Sepp Blatter running FIFA like a feudal fief.
November 17 – The rumour was that it would be a Chinese sponsor but in the end it was Japan’s Rakuten that signed up as FC Barcelona’s new main global partner in a four-year €220 million deal that could rise with bonuses.
By Paul Nicholson and Andrew Warshaw
November 16 – Saoud Al-Mohannadi, the Qatari official who FIFA disqualified at the last moment from standing as an Asian member of its ruling Council, has now been banned by FIFA’s ethics committee for one year for failing to cooperate as a witness with a FIFA investigation.
November 17 – The cost of watching English top-flight football, for years deemed prohibitive for average-earning fans, has fallen in the first season of a record £8 billion global TV rights deal according to a BBC survey.
November 17 – As this weekend’s Milan derby approaches with both clubs now in the hands of Chinese investors, officials are questioning the authenticity of one of the deals.