By Andrew Warshaw
May 3 – Birmingham City owner Carson Yeung failed in his final bid to avoid facing money laundering charges today – then heard the prosecution claim that huge amounts of cash had gone through the ex-hairdresser’s bank accounts.
By Mark Baber
May 1 – NBA player Jason Collins this week became the first active competitor in a major American professional sport to announce he is gay, shining the spotlight on homophobia in football around the world, as we approach Friday’s 16th anniversary of the tragic suicide of Justin Fashanu (pictured), Britain’s first £1m black footballer and still the only prominent player to come out as gay to date.
By Andrew Warshaw, chief correspondent
April 30 – Joao Havelange, who controlled FIFA for 24 years as he stalked the corridors of power, has resigned as honorary president after being officially denounced for having taken bribes while running the organisation. In a move that will reverberate through football’s world governing body and focus even more public interest and attention on FIFA’s reform process, the veteran Brazilian, now 97, quit what was very much a ceremonial role –
By Andrew Warshaw
April 29 – Birmingham City owner Carson Yeung pleaded not guilty to charges of money laundering today as his legal team called for the case to be thrown out.
By Andrew Warshaw
April 23 – Surely it couldn’t possibly be genuine? After all, April 1 was three weeks ago. Sepp Blatter, according to Twitter, was sensationally stepping down as FIFA president and the decision to award Qatar the 2022 World Cup involved money illegally changing hands.
By Andrew Warshaw, chief correspondent
April 23 – Just weeks after complaining that anti-corruption proposals to clean up FIFA had deliberately been “neutered”, one of the reform process’s key advisers has quit in protest.
April 19 – Europe’s biggest insurer Allianz is reportedly in talks to buy the naming rights for a new stadium in Sao Paulo.
By Mark Baber
April 18 – Real Madrid has displaced Manchester United as the world’s most valuable soccer club in the new Forbes list.
By Mark Baber
April 16 – As EA Sports prepares to unveil its plans for the launch of FIFA 14, evidence suggests Brazilian 2nd division sides will be included in the new game, speculation has renewed over when women will be included.
By Paul Nicholson
April 14 – FIFA’s chief investigator Michael Garcia has been declared persona non grata and put on a ‘black list’ by the Russian government. He is one of 18 US citizens on the list who will be denied any entry to Russia.Garcia, who is central to the FIFA investigations into allegations of corruption, has yet to report any findings but is known to be looking into the ISL case and the 2022 Qatar World Cup award.
By Mark Baber
April 10 – A proposal by two politically right-wing-leaning football figures for a minute’s silence before this weekend’s Premier League fixtures, in tribute to former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher, has been met with an almost unanimously hostile reaction from English football fans and writers, who have been remembering her approach to football.
By Andrew Warshaw, chief correspondent
April 4 – FIFA’s reform process has been “haunted by the past”, according to Sylvia Schenk, senior advisor for sports for the anti-corruption watchdog Transparency International, which produced an eight-page report in 2011 that was used as basis for FIFA’s subsequent and ongoing clean-up campaign.
By Andrew Warshaw
March 22 – Kevin-Prince Boateng, the Italian-based footballer who made headlines by famously taking his AC Milan teammates off the pitch in protest at racism, has described it a “dangerous disease” with no easy cure.
By Mark Baber
March 21 – Today is the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. This year the theme, chosen by the UN Human Rights Office, is racism in sports.
By Andrew Warshaw in Doha
March 20 – Any time Qatar stages a high-profile sports conference – and there have been a good number in recent months – the increasingly divisive debate over switching the 2022 World Cup to winter invariably springs to prominence. So it was at the Securing Sport 2013 summit in Doha. Except this time, it wasn’t supposed to happen quite like that.