By David Owen
December 6 – Cardiff’s Millennium Stadium – which was a venue for the London 2012 Olympic football tournament and may play a part in UEFA’s innovative, multi-country Euro 2020 competition – generates more than £130 million a year for the Welsh economy and sustains more than 2,500 permanent jobs, a new report has revealed.
By Andrew Warshaw
December 5 – In arguably his most radical idea since becoming UEFA president, Michel Platini is calling for yellow cards to be scrapped, with players instead being sent to a rugby-style sin bin.
December 4 – With Christmas fast approaching, sponsors are looking to activate their partnerships for the buying season. Rotary and EA Sports have both come out with new promotions, while footwear manufacturer Puma has launched a limited edition boot with BMW.
December 5 – When more than 12,000 school children were allowed to occupy the stands behind both goals normally used by Juventus’ infamous Ultras, who had been banned for abusive chanting, the Italian giants must have hoped they were sending out the right message.
By Andrew Warshaw
December 5 – One of football’s most infamous match-fixing scandals is back in the spotlight with the retrial in Bochum, Germany, of notorious kingpin Ante Sapina (pictured), accused of being part of an international match-fixing network that shocked the game’s authorities.
By Andrew Warshaw
December 5 – UEFA chief Michel Platini has again denied that he bowed to government pressure to vote for Qatar to stage the 2022 World Cup. Almost exactly three years since the vote in December, 2010, Platini, who has made no secret of which country he supported in the secret ballot, is still having to fend off suggestions that he did not make an independent decision.
By Andrew Warshaw
December 4 – The prospect of football re-unification between Greek and Turkish Cypriots, an item on the agenda at the two-day FIFA executive committee meeting which began today in Brazil, has received another timely boost.
By Jaroslaw Adamowski
December 4 – German investor Michael Budzinski has announced plans to sell his majority stake in Hungary’s Vasas SC, Budapest-based football club. Vasas has a particularly strong following in Budapest’s north-eastern Angyalfold district. In spite of this, over the past years, the Hungarian club has been struggling to stay financially afloat.
By Andrew Warshaw
December 4 – UEFA president Michel Platini is reluctantly considering staging a u-turn over goal-line technology for the 2016 European Championship finals – even though he still opposes the system.
By Andrew Warshaw
December 3 – Zahir Belounis, the French-Algerian footballer whose story of being trapped in Qatar claiming 18 months’ of unpaid wages prompted the intervention of human rights organisations and even the French government, has broken his silence over his treatment by saying he plans to sue the two clubs he played for in the Gulf state.
By Andrew Warshaw
December 3 – In a case that has again brought focus in Spain on to the hot topic of clubs and the sale of their TV rights, Barcelona and Real Madrid are among four Spanish teams that have been fined for breaking broadcast competition rules.
By Matt Scott
December 3 – Clubs should run background checks on their players’ betting habits before recruiting them or they will risk becoming targets for match fixers. That is the view of Peter Limacher (pictured), one of the foremost authorities on the illegal activities that threaten football from within.
December 3 – Match-fixing has again hit Estonia as illegal gambling dens continue to spread their criminal activities.
By Jaroslaw Adamowski
December 2 – Poland’s Ekstraklasa is planning to host the country’s next Super Cup match abroad. The top tier of Poland’s professional football league wants to move its showpiece match to a location in Western Europe, primarily to increase its advertising revenues from the high-profile event.
November 29 – Scottish Premier league club Heart of Midlothian looks set to exit administration after creditors today voted in favour of a company voluntary arrangement (CVA). Fan group Foundation of Hearts (the preferred bidders of the administrators BDO) offered £2.5 million towards debts of £30 million.