By Mark Baber
July 19 – Sky Bet have picked up the title sponsorship for the Football League in a five year deal that will also see Sky Television extend its coverage of the Football League to a total of 148 live games per season from the 2015/2016 season onwards.
By Andrew Warshaw
July 19 – In a blow to the revenue-boosting hopes of FIFA and UEFA but a huge boost for fans without access to pay-tv, the European Court of Justice has ruled countries can insist on the World Cup and European Championship continuing to be made available on free-to-air channels.
By Andrew Warshaw
July 19 – As expected, England’s Premier League has wasted no time criticising proposals to move the 2022 World Cup in Qatar to the winter, slamming the idea as “neither workable nor desirable”.
By Alexander Krassimirov
July 19 – Bulgarian club Levski has begun a large-scale reconstruction of its Georgi Asparuhov stadium in Sofia, although it has not yet formally signed a sponsorship agreement with Russian energy giant Gazprom that will significantly help fund the redevelopment.
By Andrew Warshaw
July 19 – In a move that will infuriate UEFA who banned them both over match-fixing allegations, Fenerbahce and Besiktas have won the right to have their names placed in Friday’s qualifying draws for the Champions League and Europa League after winning an emergency ruling from the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).
By Gareth Messenger
July 19 – Spanish clubs have acted to halt the falling crowd attendancess by reducing prices for their season tickets. In the last five years, attendances have dropped by more than 7% – variously attributed to the Spanish economic crisis and the already high price of match tickets.
Louis Paul Mfede, the influential, classy midfielder in the Cameroonian side that reached the quarterfinals of the 1990 World Cup, died last month, at the relatively young age of 52.
But as sad – and shocking – as his demise was, the cause of his passing is far more surprising. Mfede died of a lung infection, which he was unable to treat at a Yaoundé hospital, because he could no longer pay for his hospital treatment.
So now we finally know where we stand on the 2022 World Cup. More importantly, so does Qatar.
Six months ago, I wrote that every time FIFA was asked whether it would sanction a winter tournament, it gave the same answer: only if Qatar, as host nation, officially requested it. I also wrote that every time you posed the same question to the Qataris, you also got the same answer: only if they were formally asked to switch by FIFA.
By Mark Baber
July 18 – Striker Papiss Cisse is not participating in Newcastle United’s tour to Portugal, as the dispute between the player and his club escalates over the club’s insistence that he wear the logo of legal loan-sharks Wonga on his shirt, against his personal Muslim beliefs.
By Alexander Krassimirov
July 18 – Bulgaria’s most successful football club CSKA Sofia looks set to open a new chapter in its illustious history and become a public company. The club has had a turbulent few months which has seen it flirt with bankruptcy and Bulgarian football legend Hristo Stoichkov, who was brought into the club but then quickly left.
By Andrew Warshaw
July 18 – The Lebanese referee jailed for six months after pleading guilty to accepting sexual favours in exchange for match-fixing has been back in court to give evidence in the trial of a Singaporean businessman accused of being behind the affair.
By Mark Baber
July 18 – UEFA Champions League Sponsor, Heineken on Wednesday had its “Road to the Final” advertisement banned by the UK’s Advertising Standards Authority as “socially irresponsible, because it condoned or encouraged behaviour that was either illegal or not permitted.”
By Andrew Warshaw
July 18 – The Italian match-fixing scandal has snared one of its most high-profile figures to date, with Belgium’s national goalkeeper Jean Francois Gillet among 20 individuals punished by the Italian football federation over two matches involving Bari in Serie B in 2008 and 2009.
By Andrew Warshaw, chief correspondent
July 18 – After months of strong hints and tactical manoeuvring, FIFA president Sepp Blatter has finally come out and supported the growing calls to switch the 2022 Qatar to the winter.
