July 2 – Having looked like a team that were struggling to find any cohesion or common purpose after four straight losses, including a miserable performance in March at the Concacaf Nations League final, suddenly the USA look as though, if not the real deal, they are certainly worth a reappraisal.
July 2 – Elite football in the form of major tournament returns to Switzerland for the first time since 2008, with Euro 2025 and the quest for continental glory set to take over the Alpine nation this July with more than 600,000 tickets sold and increased prize money on offer for the 16 finalists.
By Duncan Mackay
British Sports Internet Writer of the Year
January 12 – Sepp Blatter today received backing for his campaign to continue as President of FIFA from an unexpected quarter – Reynald Temarii, one of the two FIFA Executive Committee members banned after they were linked to corruption allegations in the build-up to last month’s World Cup vote.
By Duncan Mackay in Lausanne
British Sports Internet Writer of the Year
January 12 – Frankie Fredericks, the chairman of the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) Athletes’ Commission, today added his voice to the growing chorus for London 2012 to honour its bid promise and retain the running track at the Olympic Stadium after the Games.
It was entirely predictable that Sepp Blatter’s comments on the 2022 World Cup in Qatar being played in January raised a howl of protest.
Not only does it seem extraordinary that after the game is over, the rules of the game are changed, but the near-revolution this would cause to the European game is incalculable.
But what has been missed in all this is that Blatter, the most consummate of sports politicians –
By Andrew Warshaw in Nyon
January 11 – UEFA President Michel Platini (pictured) today issued his strongest warning to date that clubs who recklessly overspend risk being heavily sanctioned until and unless they get their houses in order.
By Mike Rowbottom
January 11 – The League Managers Association has rung the alarm bell over the subject of short-term hiring and firing policies which “scapegoat” managers, increasingly damaging the fabric of the English game.
By Duncan Mackay
British Sports Internet Writer of the Year
January 11 – Simon Greenberg, chief of staff during England’s disastrous bid to host the 2018 World Cup, has taken up a new role as the first director of corporate affairs at Rupert Murdoch’s News International.
January 11 – One of the world’s leading full-service hospitality agencies has been appointed by Coca-Cola to support its hospitality and ticketing programmes at Euro 2012 in Poland and Ukraine.
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The imminent arrival of Wembley chairman David Bernstein in the same post at the English Football Association (FA) has sent me scurrying to the FA’s accounts.
By Andrew Warshaw in Doha
January 10 – He is young, he is dedicated and he insists he will not be influenced by politics or petty feuds.
January 9 – Three candidates are standing to replace suspended FIFA vice president Reynald Temarii as leader of the Oceania Football Confederation (OFC), it has been announced.
By Duncan Mackay
British Sports Internet Writer of the Year
January 8 – Spurs’ plan to sign former England captain David Beckham on loan from Major League Soccer team Los Angeles Galaxy is to try to help them win their bid to take over the Olympic Stadium after London 2012, it has been claimed by Karren Brady, the chair of rivals West Ham United.
By Andrew Warshaw in Doha
January 8 – The International Olympic Committee (IOC) handles its finances “like a housewife”, FIFA President Sepp Blatter has claimed in a bitter attack on the organisation he has been a member of since 1999.
By Andrew Warshaw at the Khalifa Stadium in Doha
January 7 – If a jaw-dropping opening ceremony and a dazzling firework display (pictured) high into the night sky are a barometer of a country’s ability to host a World Cup, then Qatar should have no worries about staging theirs in little under 12 years from now.
By Andrew Warshaw in Doha
January 7 – The prospect of a winter World Cup in 2022 moved a giant step closer today when FIFA President Sepp Blatter (pictured) gave the concept his personal backing.
By David Owen
January 7 – FIFA has announced details of how a $40 million (£25.9 million) pot it earmarked for clubs whose players took part in last year’s World Cup in South Africa is being distributed.