Help Football
This is part of our efforts to improve football. In this column we discuss the key issues facing football – using more technology, money in the game, diving / simulation, developing young players and football training in general, changes to rules (governing football and clubs) and a lot more.
UEFA to ‘investigate’ Real Madrid quintet for unsporting conduct – but ignore missed penalties
“Uefa has charged Jose Mourinho and four of his Real Madrid players over allegations he ordered Sergio Ramos and Xabi Alonso to get themselves sent off in a Champions League match. Uefa’s disciplinary committee will investigate Mourinho for alleged unsporting conduct as well as Alonso, Ramos, Iker Casillas and Jerzy Dudek. The Uefa Control and…
Metalist, Lies & Videotape
It’s those men again. Despite catcalls in Kharkiv, derision in Donetsk and vilification in Lviv, the longest-running comedy show in Ukraine shows no indication of planning for a graceful retirement. The question today is how much longer the Football Federation of Ukraine (FFU) will remain the only show in town. As a result of recent…
TV rights row threatens to split Spanish football
The new La Liga TV rights deal is unfair to everyone except Madrid and Barcelona. A rift is beginning to develop in Spanish football over the share of future television money from the LFP (Spanish League) after a meeting attended by all first division clubs. Six of them – Sevilla, Zaragoza, Villarreal, Real Sociedad, Athletic…
Time to be a real sport FIFA: bring on the goal line technology
For some reason, the concept of goal line technology, essentially a NON-ISSUE, now threatens the very the integrity, if not the very innocence of football. Platini, the incorrigible leader of UEFA, lamented that the introduction of goal line technology would turn Football into Playstation football. Football may be theater, but the drama queens that…
It’s Just A Game
At some point we all have to sit back and realize that there is indeed life beyond the pitch. It is often hard to imagine what life would be like without Saturday action in the European leagues, but every so often something happens that makes us realize that it is just a game and our…
Vote Rigging 101: How World Cup Votes Can Be Bought And Sold
The FIFA executive committee that votes on World Cup hosts uses an ‘exhaustive ballot’ system, whereby the candidate receiving the fewest votes in each round is eliminated until a single candidate is chosen by the majority. This method is open to corruption, and I’ll explain how below. Note that this is not a condemnation of…
Fifa World Cup Voters
They’ve got the whole world in their hands…or at least the destination of the next two World Cups, which is still more valuable than 99% of any ‘voting’ privileges you can possibly find, and arguably more valuable than a seat on the UN Security Council. The 24 men who form FIFA’s executive committee are scheduled…
NESV will borrow money for Liverpool, just like Hicks and Gillett
Football club ownership, like politics and any public sphere activity that commands the attention of the masses (i.e. is a money-spinner), is an absolute sham. You’re not only being lied to be the players involved but also by the people you trust to tell you the truth, all at the expense of money and a…
Agents for Change
“I will not rest until I have you holding a Coke, wearing your own shoe, playing a Sega game *featuring you*, while singing your own song in a new commercial, *starring you*, broadcast during the Superbowl, in a game that you are winning, and I will not *sleep* until that happens. I’ll give you fifteen minutes to call me back.”
Fifa should ban corruption, not Nigeria
Fifa suspended Nigeria from participating in any international football fixtures after government interference in the game. Fifa rules – and this is a good rule in principle – prohibit any government interference with it’s members. It makes sense – you want sport to stay free from political influences, and from a global perspective having a…
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