By David Owen
August 3 – Pandemic-related lockdowns and travel restrictions have wreaked havoc with football schedules. But the enforced isolation of individuals and family groups for weeks on end in many soccer-mad countries is evidently doing no harm at all to the video-gaming and esports booms.
By Samindra Kunti
August 3 – Belgian football has settled on a 18-team format for the next two seasons in the top flight after a court ruling, confirming Waasland-Beveren couldn’t be relegated, forced a u-turn from the Pro League. As a result, both OH Leuven, owned by King Power, and Beerschot, with a Saudi majority owner, were promoted to 1A.
August 3 – Barcelona president Josep Maria Bartomeu (pictured) says the club will not be splashing out on re-signing Neymar this summer, putting an end once and for all to rumours of his return.
August 3 – Heineken has signed a new sponsorship with UEFA for the Europa League that will begin with the resumption of the competition this week and run through to June 2024.
August 3 – Sepp Blatter has been quick to call for his successor, Gianni Infantino, to be suspended by FIFA after criminal proceedings were opened against the latter in Switzerland last week.
August 3 – The Asian Football Confederation (AFC) has issued another life time ban on a Laos national team player for match fixing.
FIFA president Gianni Infantino’s insistence that he will continue in post and brazen it out in face of the criminal investigation into his own behaviour – repeat, CRIMINAL investigation into his own behaviour – is no small thing. On multiple levels.
By Andrew Warshaw
July 31 – In a messy, acrimonious end to a long drawn-out saga that couldn’t go on for much longer, the proposed £300 million take-over of English sleeping giants Newcastle United by a Saudi-led consortium has collapsed, leaving the club and its fans once again in a state of limbo and frustration.
By Andrew Warshaw
July 30 – Despite persistently brushing aside any semblance of wrongdoing for weeks on end, criminal proceedings were dramatically launched against FIFA president Gianni Infantino today by a Swiss special prosecutor over undocumented dealings with the country’s former attorney general Michael Lauber who resigned last week.
July 31 – Belgium’s Pro League will again consider plans for the 2020/21 season after a court ruled that Waasland-Beveren, previously relegated, needed to be included in the fixtures list. The new season is due to kick off on August 8.
July 31 – Manchester City’s battle with UEFA over alleged financial fair play breaches is back in the spotlight after the German newspaper Der Spiegel, on whose leaked information UEFA originally based their case, claimed it had fresh evidence showing that City had lied to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.
July 31 – Andrea Pirlo has returned to Juventus to become the club’s new U-23 manager, the Turin-based club announced on Thursday.
July 31 – England’s women’s national team have pulled out of next year’s SheBelieves Cup in the US, mainly because of existing uncertainties around the Covid-19 pandemic which has ravaged so much of the country.
July 31 – The UEFA Financial Fair Play (FFP) rules are not completely in tatters after the Manchester City case. The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) has ruled against an appeal filed by Turkish club Trabzonspor that will see them banned from next season UEFA club competition.
July 31 – Paris St Germain will be aiming for a domestic treble tonight when they take on Lyon in the rescheduled French League Cup final.