Al-Thawadi questions the Qatari doubters and prepares welcome for Garcia

Hassan al-Thawadi4

By Andrew Warshaw
December 11 – Three years after winning the bid to stage the 2022 World Cup by a landslide vote, Qatar’s organising chief is back on the offensive, rebuffing any suggestion that the Gulf state was guilty of any impropriety. Hassan Al-Thawadi, Secretary General, Qatar 2022 Supreme Committee, insists Qatar complied with FIFA regulations and that allegations to the contrary have “absolutely no basis”.

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Clear and present danger: English match-fixing is happening here and now

DJ Campbell

By Andrew Warshaw
December 10 – The spot-fixing scandal that has rocked English football has moved up a gear with the relevation that five of the six men arrested are past or present players, the most high profile being DJ Campbell, a striker with Blackburn Rovers in the second tier of the domestic game who previously played in the Premier League with three different clubs.

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Massimo Cecchini: Juventus, children, and bad habits

Sembrava un’iniziativa astuta, ma tutto sommato assai bella. Peccato che – parlando di calcio italiano – sia finita nel modo consueto: tra le polemiche. Ci riferiamo al caso scoppiato dopo che la Juventus aveva aperto gratuitamente le proprie curve a circa 12.000 bambini in occasione del match casalingo contro l’Udinese giocato il primo dicembre.

Inutile dire che a svuotare due settori sempre pieni c’era voluto il giudice sportivo, visto che gli ultrà bianconeri (già recidivi) avevano pensato di continuare le loro squallide performance rivolgendo ai tifosi del Napoli insulti che avevano il sapore della <discriminazione territoriale>,

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