By Paul Nicholson
August 20 – Russian sports minister Vitaly Mutko has turned down a FIFA proposal to reduce the number of stadiums and cities that will host the 2018 World Cup. FIFA president Sepp Blatter met with Russian president Vladimir Putin as well as Mutko in Sochi last weekend and suggested a possible reduction.
By Andrew Warshaw
August 20 – FIFA is to host the first ever conference on ethical sports leadership in conjunction with the Brussels-based World Forum for Ethics in Business.
By Andrew Warshaw
August 20 – Luis Suarez insists he is a reformed character and won’t be biting opposition players ever again. The Uruguayan striker was officially presented to Barcelona’s fans on Tuesday five weeks after his transfer from Liverpool as a result of the terms of his four-month suspension from competitive action being modified by the Court of Arbitration for Sport which ruled, on appeal, that he could at least train and not be suspended from all football-related activities.
By Paul Nicholson
August 20 – With just two weeks to go before the start of the Central American Cup 2014, telecoms group Tigo have stepped up as title sponsors for the championship which is being played in the US for the first time.
The recent reshuffle within the corridors of power at the South American confederation, Conmebol, following the death of its FIFA vice-president Julio Grondona, made for interesting reading. Not so much because of the personnel involved but because of the political structure that was put in place with regard to FIFA representation.
August 19 – English Premier League club Crystal Palace have been fined over how they obtained leaked details of an opponent’s starting line-up ahead of a fixture last season.
By Mark Baber
August 19 – Alhaji Aminu Maigari (pictured) was restored to his position as head of the Nigerian Football Federation (NFF) on Monday, after having been impeached, resigning and then having FIFA intervene on his behalf.
By Mark Baber
August 19 – A new free Wi-Fi service, introduced for the benefit of fans, sparked fierce protests during PSV Eindhoven’s comprehensive 6-1 win over NAC in the Philips Stadium on Saturday, leading to widespread media coverage as the PSV Rood-Witten ultras unfurled a banner saying ‘F**ck WiFi, support the team’.
By Jaroslaw Adamowski
August 19 – While Romanian football continues to be rocked by corruption-related scandals, the latest proposal put forward by one of the clubs to introduce more transparency into the Romanian league has sparked controversy. Cornel Sfaiter (pictured), chief executive of Romania’s FC Botosani, has suggested that the chief executives of the clubs competing in the country’s top tier, Liga I, should no longer be allowed to watch matches played by their sides from the subs benches.
August 19 – Revealing instances of match-fixing has become an almost daily occurrence in the media but in Malawi a journalist has been sanctioned for allegedly getting involved in manipulation.
By Andrew Warshaw
August 19 – Legia Warsaw’s last-ditch attempt to seek what they perceive as sporting justice has failed after the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) rejected their bid to be provisionally reinstated in the Champions League, clearing the way for Scottish champions Celtic to take on Maribor on Wednesday in the final playoff round.
August 19 – St Petersburg is looking beyond FIFA World Cup 2018 and this past weekend hosted a UEFA delegation inspecting candidate cities to be one of the 13 host venues for the Euro 2020 tournament.
By Mark Baber
August 18 – India defeated Pakistan 1-0 on Sunday in the first match between the two Asian neighbours for nine years. All sporting ties between India and Pakistan were suspended following the 2008 terrorist attack in Mumbai, with little contact since then other than a one-day cricket series in 2012.
Il calcio italiano ha un presidente federale e un commissario tecnico. Voi direte: che cosa c’è di strano? Nulla, eppure tanto. Dopo il progressivo affondamento del movimento che ruota attorno al pallone – materializzatosi nei fallimenti degli ultimi due Mondiali, nel progressivo affondamento nei ranking Fifa e Uefa e nella violenza che la fa da padrone – l’11 agosto l’assemblea federale ha eletto il nuovo presidente della Figc. Come ampiamente previsto, il “nuovo che avanza”
By Andrew Warshaw
August 18 – The head of Russia’s 2018 World Cup organising committee has broken his silence over calls in some quarters for the country to be stripped of host status as a result of the widely condemned military and political intervention in Ukraine.