By Alexander Krassimirov
August 12 – Former Bulgarian under-21 international and Slavia Sofia midfielder Borislav Baldzhiyski has been charged with murder after a man was killed on Tuesday night in Sofia. Lawyer Peter Aleksov was beaten to death in front of a casino. Baldzhiyski could face up to 20 years in jail if found guilty.
August 11 – CONCACAF took the first steps with its own coaching programme at the weekend with the launch of its D License coaching course in Mexico City. The D License is the first official licensing programme for coaches and will be the foundation of the Confederation’s coaching educational programme.
By Andrew Warshaw
August 11 – England’s two main football authorities are on a collision course over the 2022 Qatar World Cup after new Football Association chairman Greg Dyke (pictured) backed calls for the tournament to be switched to winter. In one of his first media briefings since taking up his role last month, Dyke said it would be “impossible” to stage the event at the traditional time because of the searing Gulf heat.
By Andrew Warshaw
August 11 – Fenerbahce’s appeal against a two-year ban for match-fixing has thrown their Champions League playoff clash with Arsenal into confusion, with UEFA unwilling at this point to make a ruling on what has become a thorny issue for all parties.
By David Owen
August 9 – The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) has suspended the accreditation of the UFRJ doping control laboratory in Rio de Janeiro just 10 months before the 2014 FIFA World Cup is scheduled to get under way in Brazil. The move – likely to cause acute embarrassment to Brazilian authorities – comes less than a year after the laboratory, also known as Ladetec, was reinstated following a partial suspension from January 2012.
By Mark Baber
August 9 – The Australian football federation’s (FFA) move to introduce a new model for State elite-level football for Australian semi-pro clubs, one tier below the A-League, is running into difficulty in Victoria, where an alliance of clubs is seeking to make changes to the proposed licensing structure.
By Mark Baber
August 9 – Adidas cut its sales forecast for 2013 saying it was expecting low mid-single percentage sales, down from the previous mid-single digit forecast. The downgrade was blamed on weak European trading and adverse currency movements, especially in Japan, masking the company’s high sales growth in Latin America and China and solid foundations being laid for the World Cup in 2014.
在都灵的Football Avenue论坛上，我见到了意大利足球传奇人物，吉亚尼·里维拉，1969年的金球奖先生、1970年世界杯意大利的10号。这位AC米兰名宿，和同时期国际米兰马佐拉，为一时瑜亮。里维拉来演讲的话题，是关于青少年足球培训，着重于青少年业余足球培训的各种细节，从”足球父母”如何在配合孩子学业的过程中，将足球作为孩子成长的重要工具，到孩子们训练周期的安排，以及不同年龄组别孩子在接受培训后，教练和父母应该特别注意把握的一些心理培训尺度等等。
当年的”金童”，如今已是七旬长者，里维拉和巴乔一样，都是意大利足协的青少年足球推广大使，这样的”大使”，不是被安排为引发观众尖叫踩踏、临走时挥一挥衣袖的偶像，而是真正加入到青训普及工程中，用自己的专业知识和社会影响力，来着力推动青训的导师。
Football Hooliganism never really was ‘the English disease’ alone. The English were just good at it and, perhaps, the best at reporting it.
But English football has had another uncomfortable reminder it still exists in a nation whose reputation for trouble at football was once ‘world infamous’.
This season was only three days old when football fans and horses were back in the news. Preston fans invaded the pitch and charged at their local rivals Blackpool in a League Cup match.
By Andrew Warshaw
August 9 – English football leaders have hailed the forthcoming introduction of goalline technology in the Premier League as one of the most crucial breakthroughs in the history of the laws of the game.
There may not be many people who feel kindly towards Luis Suarez at this moment, apart that is from his mum. Yet this whole unedifying Suarez transfer saga may well help us understand and, even possibly, get a workable buy out clause in future contracts. And that can only be for the good of the game.
Now transfer talk invariably involves coded language where words acquire a wholly different meaning. So the player who seeks to move –
By Andrew Warshaw
August 9 – UEFA has suspended two Armenian officials who attempted to “manipulate the outcome” of a Europa League fixture last month.
By Andrew Warshaw
August 9 – Asian Football Confederation President Shaikh Salman bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa has called for an end to sports events being targeted for political ends following the deadly bomb blast at a local football match near Karachi that killed at least eight people, several of them children, and wounded more than 24.
It is only an idea at this stage but one which perhaps might work and should be considered.
For the last few months, seemingly everyone involved in football politics has had their say over whether the 2022 Qatar World Cup should be staged in summer or winter.
The latest voice to be heard on the issue is that of Harold Mayne-Nicholls, the FIFA-appointed expert whose inspection team went round the world in the build-up to the December 2010,
By Mark Baber
August 8 – A bomb blast at around 2:20am on Wednesday morning, following a football match in the Lyari district of Karachi, killed at least 11 fans, injuring many more, mostly children.