January 22 – Russian stadium preparations for the 2018 World Cup are progressing with the design for the 45,000-seat stadium in Nizhny Novgorod said to be almost complete. So far only two of Russia’s venues for 2018 are ready, though neither have yet staged an official football match.
By Andrew Warshaw
January 22 – FIFA has warned Brazil’s World Cup organisers that the host city of Curitiba could be thrown out unless work on its stadium is speeded up – and quickly. In the most serious crisis to date over Curitiba preparations for the tournament, FIFA has set a February 18 ultimatum for the stadium, which is hosting four group games, to prove it can meet requirements.
January 21 – FIFA Secretary General Jerome Valcke at last had some good news after his latest visit to the new Sao Paulo stadium in Brazil which will host the opening game of the World Cup.
January 20 – FIFA general secretary Jerome Valcke is back in Brazil checking on the progress of World Cup stadiums – but has apparently cancelled a visit to Manaus because of a workers’ dispute at Arena Amazonas which is due to host a number of group games next summer.
By Andrew Warshaw
January 16 – Amidst the razzmatazz of this week’s world player of the year award, FIFA president Sepp Blatter provided small but significant new details of the time scale leading up to a decision on the timing of the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.
By Paul Nicholson
January 16 – Fans who are being priced out of attending the Brazil World Cup because of the high rates of accommodation should take a look at a campsite option launched by two Englishmen in Recreio, in the west of Rio de Janeiro. For £35 a day per person, campers can turn up and get the full World Cup experience in one of Rio’s safer districts and in an area of outstanding natural beauty.
By Paul Nicholson
January 13 – Russia’s Cabinet of Ministers announced yesterday that the country will spend about $34 million on developing training grounds for the 2018 football World Cup.
January 10 – Switzerland coach Ottmar Hitzfeld has joined the chorus of disapproval over FIFA’s decision to select Manaus in the heart of the Amazon rain forest as one of the World Cup stadiums.
By Andrew Warshaw
January 9 – The European Professional Football League, which looks after the interests of more than 800 clubs in some 30 countries, remains convinced that no official position has yet been taken over when to stage the 2022 World Cup.
By Andrew Warshaw, chief correspondent
January 8 – In a move that took the entire football world by surprise, FIFA general secretary Jerome Valcke appears to have jumped the gun by stating that the 2022 World Cup in Qatar will be definitely switched to winter.
By Andrew Warshaw
January 7 – Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff has hit back at FIFA President Sepp Blatter’s attack on her country’s lack of sufficient World Cup preparation by insisting it will stage the best tournament in history. Last weekend Blatter expressed FIFA’s growing concern in no uncertain terms, chiding Brazil for being further behind any World Cup organiser he had ever known at this stage in the proceedings.
By Andrew Warshaw
January 6 – FIFA president Sepp Blatter has revealed the full extent of Brazil’s lack of World Cup preparations with an unprecedented blast at this year’s hosts. As FIFA’s December 31 deadline for the 12 World Cup stadiums to be ready came and went with half of them still behind schedule, Blatter criticised the organisers by declaring no host had ever been as far behind at this stage in his 38 years with football’s world governing body.
December 27 – Brazil’s World Cup preparations were dampened with another infrastructural setback with the revelation that the 73,000-capacity national stadium in Brasilia has a leaking roof less than eight months after it was completed.
By Paul Nicholson
December 23 – Human rights abuses in Qatar have made the Gulf state the whipping boy of the western media. If there was no World Cup planned for 2022 in Qatar then probably the rest of the world might not be so interested – perhaps a comment on the west as much as the Qataris. But the World Cup will be in Qatar and the world has been drawn into the story.
December 19 – Construction is set to resume at the World Cup stadium in Manaus where a young worker recently fell to his death, prompting a walkout amid heightening safety fears six months ahead of the big kickoff.