By Ben Nicholson
August 6 – The speculation surrounding the future of Chivas USA continued this week as the MLS community was gathered in Portland for the MLS All-Star game activities. Deputy commissioner Mark Abbott stressed that the league wants to keep Chivas USA in Los Angeles, suggesting a possible stadium location in downtown LA.
By Andrew Warshaw
August 5 – The World Cup may be a month old but surprise quarterfinalists Costa Rica, with just 4.3 million inhabitants, are far from resting on their laurels after disproving more than a few myths about being one of the underdogs in Brazil.
August 5 – The new season of European club competition may have only just started but already discrimination by fans has led to UEFA’s disciplinary authorities being called into action.
August 5 – Italian Serie A soccer champions Juventus have renewed their long-running deal with carmaker Fiat. The Turin-based company, who have long been inextricably linked with Juve, has agreed a six-year extension to its shirt sponsorship deal which will now run until the end of the 2020/21 season.
August 5 – With existing and emerging threats to sport on the increase, Securing Sport, the international conference organised by Qatar-based integrity watchdog the International Centre for Sport Security (ICSS) is being staged in London for the first time.
By Ben Nicholson
August 5 – This past weekend saw a major breakthrough for soccer in the USA. Average attendance figures for the ten professional soccer matches of the weekend was higher than the average attendance figures for the 15 Major League Baseball games over the same period.
By Andrew Warshaw
August 5 – Corinne Diacre became the first woman to coach a men’s professional team in a competitive match in a major European country on Monday but ended up on the losing side as Clermont Foot narrowly went down 2-1 at Brest in the French second division.
By Ben Nicholson
August 5 – The bidding war for the final expansion team spots in the MLS has intensified further as the previously thought long shot Sacramento has raised eyebrows with a big money investor.
August 4 – UEFA has opened an investigation into the crowd trouble that marred last week’s Champions League qualifier between Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk and Copenhagen in Ukraine.
By Andrew Warshaw
August 4 – Strict new betting rules previously announced by English football authorities to prevent players, managers, club employees and match officials from gambling on any football-related matter worldwide have now come into effect.
August 4 – Luis Suarez will learn later this week whether he can start training with his new club after the Court of Arbitration for Sport confirmed it will hear his appeal against his four-month ban for biting at the World Cup on Friday.
August 4 – Lens have won their fight to gain promotion to the French fop flight that begins this week but will be playing home games elsewhere.
August 4 – A regional club Futsal championship will make its debut in CONCACAF at the end of this month in Guatemala. The draw for the inaugural CONCACAF Futsal Club Championship was held last week with six clubs representing their member associations.
By Andrew Warshaw
August 4 – In what will be regarded as, at best, an unfortunate turn or phrase and at worst another disgraceful gaffe, the Italian official at the centre of the latest racism storm in European football says he believes he has suffered more pressure than even former US president John F Kennedy’s assassin.
By Alexander Krassimirov
August 4 – A Bulgarian national youth team player has been arrested on suspicion of manipulating U19 matches. Although the Bulgarian Football Union (BFU) has not released the name of the 20-year-old player it is known that he is plays in Bulgaria’s A Grupa.