Asia Archives - Page 25 of 48 - Inside World Football

Aussies get a handle on self promotion and push the Twitter boundaries

Aussie twitter team sheet

By Tom Parsons
November 20 – Football Federation Australia (FFA) has come up with a new way of displaying their players names on official team sheets for their international home games. Instead of the traditional name and number combination that has served clubs and countries well over the years, the FFA introduced their squad by putting their Twitter handles on the team sheet for their 1-0 win over Costa Rica at Sydney’s Allianz Stadium this week.

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UN scrutineer urges Qatar to use 2022 to end ‘Kafala’ and migrant abuse

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By Andrew Warshaw
November 15 – A leading United Nations official has called on Qatar 2022 World Cup organisers to use the tournament to improve the conditions of migrant workers. Qatar has the highest ratio of migrants to citizens in the world: nearly 88% of the total population are foreign workers, employed largely in construction, services and domestic work.

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FIFPro calls for action in Qatar as Belounis hits rock-bottom and talks of suicide

Zahir Belounis

By Andrew Warshaw
November 14 – FIFA have been urged by football’s main players’ union FIFPro to come to the aid of a French-Algerian midfielder involved in a contract dispute in Qatar.

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Aussies express fear that civil unrest will make Brazil 2014 unsafe

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November 13 – Australia are believed to be the first country to publicly raise concern about security at next year’s World Cup finals in Brazil because of all the recent civil unrest.

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Request for gender test sparks fury in South Korean women’s league

Park Eun-Seon

By Andrew Warshaw
November 8 – South Korea’s women’s football league has been rocked by an unusual gender row that has led to the resignation of a team coach and prompted a major human rights dispute. Six of the seven K-League teams recently requested that star striker Park Eun-Seon, who plays for Seoul City Hall Amazones, undergo a gender test. They also asked Korea Women’s Football Federation (KWFF) to bar Park from playing until her gender is verified.

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Blatter pushes Iranians to end stadium ban on women watching men’s matches

Iranian women fans

By Andrew Warshaw
November 8 – FIFA president Sepp Blatter has urged the Iranian authorities to end the ban on women attending men’s matches, a policy that has been in force since the 1979 Islamic revolution. Blatter, wrapping up a two-day visit to Tehran, said he had raised the issue with that Iran’s top female government official, Vice President Masoumeh Ebtekar.

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FIFA makes Aussie match fixing ban global as court case is ongoing

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By Andrew Warshaw
October 31 – FIFA has imposed global bans on four players and a coach from Australia’s Southern Stars Victorian Premier League side in an escalation of the most serious match-fixing scandal to hit the country.

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Asia sets out blueprint for grassroots football

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October 29- Under the chairmanship of Fifa vice-president Prince Ali Bin Al Hussein, Asian football officials have concluded a high-profile round table in Jordan by recommending a series of proposals to boost the development of grassroots football in the region.

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More trouble for Makudi in his bid to retain power in Thailand

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By Andrew Warshaw
October 22- Embattled Fifa executive committee member Worawi Makudi insists he retained the presidency of Thai football perfectly legally despite last week’s election success suddenly being plunged into fresh chaos.

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Makudi wins another 4 years as Thai FA chief after bitter election fight

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By Andrew Warshaw
October 18 – Controversial Thai football boss Worawi Makudi has finally retained control of his federation after months of internal squabbling. Makudi was re-elected president of the Football Association of Thailand for another four years after defeating former national team boss Virach Chanpanich 42-28 in a secret ballot to earn his fourth straight term. Two votes were deemed invalid.

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AFC review offers hope of lifting Iraqi ban on home matches

Iraq fans

By Andrew Warshaw
October 14 – Iraq’s bid to overturn a FIFA ban on playing home internationals has won the conditional support of their confederation as the dispute over the country being stripped of hosting the Gulf Cup escalates.

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Exclusive: Prince Ali voices concern over political interference

Prince Ali

By Andrew Warshaw, chief correspondent
October 10 – Asia’s FIFA vice-president Prince Ali Bin Al-Hussein has questioned the decision to strip Iraq of host status for the next Gulf Cup, intensifying Asian football’s latest controversy especially over the issue of what does and doesn’t constitute political interference in sport. The competition, due to be held late next year or early in 2015, features the six member states of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC),

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Iraqis boycott Gulf Cup in protest at lost hosting, AFC steps in with warning

By Andrew Warshaw
October 10 – Just when it is striving to enter a new era of unity and cohesion, Asian football has been rocked by a spat between Iraq and Saudi Arabia over the next Gulf Cup of Nations due to be held late next year or early in 2015. The competition, featuring the six member states of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), plus usually Iraq and Yemen, is little known outside the region but hotly contested whenever it takes place.

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Qatargas focusses sponsorship on youth and commits to Qatari’s second flight

Qatari league football

By Mark Baber
October 9 – Qatargas and Qatar Football Association (QFA) signed a three-year deal on Monday at QFA headquarters in the Al Bidda Tower, as part of which Qatar’s 2nd Division will be known as the Qatargas League.

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Prince Ali calls for ‘official’ Arabic language and lifting of Iraqi home ban

Prince Ali

By Andrew Warshaw
October 9 – FIFA’s Asian vice-president Prince Ali Bin Al Hussein has called on the organisation to make Arabic one of its official languages in addition to English, French, German and Spanish. In a wide-ranging statement on a number of issues, Prince Ali said FIFA needed to recognise how many people across the world spoke Arabic as a first language.