By Paul Nicholson
September 16 – Manchester City, who opened their Champions League campaign last night with a 1-2 home loss to last year’s beaten finalists Juventus, are top of one table with an almost unassailable lead but it will be little consolation. The club tops the rankings of club spending both in the transfer window just closed, and in spending since 2010.
September 15 – Barcelona have announced a total restructuring of its business model with a new department to be headed by Francesco Calvo (pictured), appointed as the club’s new commercial director and joining from Juventus where he was sales manager.
September 15 – Bolivian football, already rocked by their federation chief being arrested, has been further hit by a players’ strike.
By Jaroslaw Adamowski
September 15 – Romanian government authorities have launched the construction of a new stadium for CS Universitatea Craiova. The build will cost about €50 million, and will see the Romanian side move to a new stadium with a seating capacity of 30,854.
By Alexander Krassimirov
September 14 – Bulgaria’s Levski Sofia has paid more than BGN 3 million (€1.5 million) in debt settlement to former and current players, and coaches. Ivo Tonev (pictured), one of the majority owners of the club made the announcement after a meeting of the Governing Council.
By Paul Nicholson
September 14 – The Somali Football Federation’s campaign to win back their national stadium in Mogadishu, which is currently being occupied by African Union troops, took a step nearer realisation last Friday when the country’s president announced the stadium would be vacated.
By Paul Nicholson
September 14 – While the South Americans seem convinced that the 2016 Centennial edition of the CopaAmerica will be played for the first time outside of the region in the US, in partnership with CONCACAF, the idea this is now a done deal does not seem certain.
By Andrew Warshaw
September 14 – He was only elected to FIFA’s inner circle at the end of April but Malaysia’s Tengku Abdullah Sultan Ahmad Shah (pictured) has announced he is stepping down as president of his country’s federation.
By Paul Nicholson
September 14 – Just one month after the candidates have to confirm their nominations for the FIFA Presidential race, and three months before the election itself, the International Football Arena (IFA) Conference will take place at the Home of FIFA in Zurich, November 19.
September 11 – The International Centre for Sport Security (ICSS) has upped its support and commitment to battling against match-fixing and is hosting the first technical meeting on the manipulation of sports competitions as a follow-up on the recommendations and commitments of the Declaration of Berlin with UNESCO in Doha, September 16-17.
By Andrew Warshaw
September 11 – Major League Soccer commissioner Don Garber has vigorously defended the unique structure and calendar of his 20-team league, says David Beckham’s Miami franchise is close and insists MLS is not simply a retirement home for ageing foreign stars looking for a career-ending financial windfall.
By Alexander Krassimirov
September 11 – Bulgaria’s CSKA Sofia will have to declare themselves bankrupt if the club want to return to professional football. The statement was made by the chief executive director of the club Alexander Todorov (pictured).
By Mark Baber
September 10 – The Israel Football Association (IFA) announced on Wednesday that “all professional league and youth league games will take place as planned this weekend,” after Israel’s Attorney-General issued a ruling that the 1951 law mandating permission from the Ministry of Economy in order to work on the Sabbath need not be applied.
By Jaroslaw Adamowski
September 10 – Gigi Becali, the controversial owner of Romanian football club Steaua Bucharest, is reportedly planning to leave the troubled side and purchase a new club competing in the country’s top tier Liga 1.
By Mark Baber
September 10 – The failure of Barcelona to comprehend that they are in any way at fault for flouting the FIFA regulations designed to stop the exploitation and trafficking of children in football is once again apparent, even as the club, faced with the real possibility of a new transfer ban, decide to treat the issue as of “extremely high priority,” according to reports in the Spanish press.