By Andrew Warshaw, Chief Correspondent
March 5 – Rocked by corruption and controversy, Chinese football has gone for the boldest of coups in an effort to enhance its battered image on and off the field: signing up David Beckham.
By Paul Nicholson
March 5 – Manchester United may sit on top of the money league as the world’s most value sports club, but their colleagues in the Premier League are finding it much tougher to compete at their level, both on the pitch and off it.
By Paul Nicholson and Andrew Warshaw
March 4 – One of the three west Asian candidates seeking to replace Mohamed bin Hammam and run football in the entire Continent until 2015 has urged his two rivals to step aside to avoid a potentially damaging split.
As the Asian Football Confederation announced a four-man race for the presidency on May 2, Yousuf al Serkel (pictured), of United Arab Emirates, said he is to ask the two other regional candidates bidding against him to stand down. Read more …
By Mark Baber
March 4 – Dilichukwu Onyedinma, chair of the Nigeria Women Football League and a member of the Nigerian Football Federation (NFF) executive committee, has reportedly announced after the Annual General Assembly on Thursday, that lesbianism is now officially banned from Nigerian football.
March 4 – Former French club giant Auxerre, currently in Ligue 2, is under scrutiny by French football’s financial watchdog and has until the end of the season to recapitalise or face possible relegation.
March 4 – What better place could there be to head for a football business gathering and what better timing? In a major announcement the International Football Arena (IFA) has teamed up with the Financial Times (FT) to host a summit, June 17, in Rio de Janeiro.
Every time you ask FIFA whether they would sanction switching the 2022 World Cup in Qatar to the winter, you get the same answer: only if Qatar, as the host nation, officially requests us to do so.
And every time you ask Qatari organisers the same question, you also get the same answer: only if we are asked to do so by FIFA as world football’s governing body.
It’s a clever tactic,
By Andrew Warshaw, Chief Correspondent
March 4 – FIFA’s new anti-racism chief says tougher penalties need to be introduced to help eradicate abuse and wants to meet with both the perpetrators and victims. FIFA vice-president Jeffrey Webb, who runs the CONCACAF confederation that covers north and central America and the Caribbean, believes black players have been let down by football’s authorities and is determined to do something about it.
By Osasu Obayiuwana in Lagos
March 3 – The Confederation of African Football (CAF) has warned DR Congo’s government to stop interfering in its domestic football or face severe sanctions.
By Andrew Warshaw in Edinburgh
March 2 – FIFA are setting up a new crack unit to deal with the worrying resurgence of racism throughout the game, Sepp Blatter has announced.
March 1 – In a world first, a club TV channel has bought the broadcast rights to an international football league. Benfica TV has been awarded exclusive audio visual broadcast rights for all Barclays Premier League matches per season for from 2013/14 – 2015/16 in Portugal.
March 1 – An unlikely trade mission this week pitched former World Cup bidding foes together in a show of friendship and economic opportunity. The Qatar 2022 Supreme Committee and the US Embassy in Qatar concluded a joint trip to Los Angeles, Portland and Seattle.
By Andrew Warshaw, Chief Correspondent
March 1 – FIFA vice president Prince Ali Bin Al Hussein (pictured) has summoned three of the candidates hoping to run Asian football to a summit in Jordan next week to make sure they have a proper agenda and are not just playing politics.
By Andrew Warshaw, Chief Correspondent
March 1 – The race to lead Asian football into a new era of unity and stability has suffered a dramatic blow amid reports that China’s Zhang Jilong (pictured), who has been in charge on an temporary basis for almost two years, has decided not contest the presidential election in early May.
By Andrew Warshaw, Chief Correspondent
March 1 – Football’s lawmakers, meeting in Edinburgh on Saturday, are to discuss the idea of trialling an electronic chip in players’ shirts that could potentially prevent cardiac attacks such as the one suffered by Fabrice Muamba (pictured) last year.