May 19 – The Premier League may have finished slightly later than planned with the forced shift of Manchester United’s final home game against Bournemouth to Tuesday night because of security concerns, but fans set a record attendance across the country for the Sunday 3pm kick offs.
May 19 – Leicester City, the rags to riches English Premier League champions who have rewritten the rules on the pitch, have moved swiftly to expand their international footprint and are reported to be focussing on China with a plan to train Chinese youth players at their academy.
Gianni Infantino, less than three months into the job as the man chosen to lead FIFA into a new era of respectability, turned to his fawning converts and declared: “I can officially inform you here, the crisis is over.”
By Andrew Warshaw
May 18 – Michel Platini’s successor as UEFA president will be elected on September 14, with veteran Dutch FA chief Michael van Praag already in the frame.
By Paul Nicholson
May 18 – Angel Villar Llona (pictured), Spain’s controversial FIFA vice-president and the man currently in charge at UEFA following the sanctioning of Michel Platini, is facing legal action at home from rival candidate for the Spainish federation presidency Miguel Angel Galan.
By Andrew Warshaw
May 18 – Two-time FIFA presidential candidate Prince Ali bin al-Hussein of Jordan has angrily condemned Gianni Infantino for a “complete betrayal” of FIFA’s membership following Infantino’s controversial power grab at last week’s Congress in Mexico.
May 18 – The Barcelona trio of Messi, Neymar and Suarez fill three of the top four best performing big-5 league strikers, according to the CIES Football Observatory. The surprise is that Suarez, who has had a storming goalscoring end to the season is the fourth ranked striker.
By Samindra Kunti
May 19 – Brazilian club Corinthians are closing in on a naming rights deal for their stadium, but which could maintain the name ‘Arena Corinthians’.
FIFA picks its jury for first Diversity Award
May 18 – The last jury members have been named for the first FIFA Diversity Award, which will be presented in July 2016. US World Cup winner Abby Wambach, former captain of the German national team Thomas Hitzlsperger, and former Dutch international Clarence Seedorf are the big name players to join the 11-person jury.
By Samindra Kunti
May 17 – Nationwide strikes in France against the ‘Loi Travail’ labour laws threaten to disrupt the smooth running of the Euro 2016 Championship this summer, particularly when it comes to travelling around the country.
By Andrew Warshaw
May 17 – FIFA’s first ever female secretary general, Fatma Samoura, has vowed “to help football restore its tarnished image” and says she should be given time to make her mark despite having negligible footballing experience.
May 17 – Italian national coach and incoming Chelsea manager Antonio Conte says he feels “stronger” after being cleared of any wrongdoing in a match-fixing scandal.
By Paul Nicholson
May 17 – Seemingly at the centre of everything FIFA president Gianni Infantino did during the FIFA Congress in Mexico City last week were his band of legends. Whether it was accompanying him on his whistle stop visits to confederations, being introduced one-by one and embraced at the opening ceremony, sitting in the front row of the Congress itself, or Infantino sitting on the bench while the icons played 9-a-side knockabout matches in the iconic Azteca Stadium,
May 17 – The fledgling Sport Integrity Global Alliance (SIGA) has signed its second country and the first in North America to its membership.
May 17 – Manchester United’s 18-year-old striker Marcus Rashford (pictured) is the surprise selection in England manager Roy Hodgson’s initial 26-man squad for next month’s European Championship finals in France that will be trimmed to 23.