By Andrew Warshaw
April 1 – In an unprecedented off-the-field success for Palestinian football over its Israeli neighbour, FIFA has ordered Israeli premier league club Hapoel Haifa and their former player, Ali Khatib, to compensate Palestinian side Jabal al-Mukabbar after Khatib broke his contract with them.
By David Owen
April 1 – The all too brief experiment with fielding men’s and women’s Great Britain Olympic football teams is over. Barely a few weeks after signalling its desire to continue sending teams to the Olympics, the Football Association (FA) has been obliged to backtrack and to formally withdraw its proposal.
April 1 – European club representatives will join the top table of UEFA in a major breakthrough in terms of the way European football is governed. Two European Club Association officials will sit on UEFA’s executive committee meeting as “co-opted” members with full voting rights to follow, to be implemented at next year’s UEFA Congress.
March 31 – UEFA has renewed its exclusive marketing deal with TEAM Marketing for a further six seasons from the end of the 2014/15 season. It has an option to extend for a further three years if it meets performance criteria.
By Mark Baber
March 31 – Real Madrid has signed its first Chinese sponsorship deal – with Luyuan, an electrical vehicle manufacturer based in Zhejiang.
By David Owen
March 31 – Southampton have joined the stampede of Premier League clubs reporting unusually strong profits for last season. The South Coast club, currently lying an impressive sixth in the league table and playing consistently well under Dutch coach Ronald Koeman, have announced that after-tax profit for the year ended June 30, 2014 reached £33.4 million, compared with a £7.1 million loss the previous year.
By Andrew Warshaw
March 31 – The resentment, you feel, still partially lingers and the wounds of defeat have perhaps not completely healed. But ask Lennart Johansson whether Sepp Blatter, who beat him to the FIFA presidency back in 1998 and has reigned ever since , has any chance of being dethroned on May 29 and the Swede provides a categoric one-word answer.
“No.”
By Andrew Warshaw
March 31 – The administrative footballing career of former Asian powerbroker Vernon Manilal Fernando has effectively come to an end after his appeal against a life ban was turned down by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).
By Andrew Warshaw
March 30 – Historic efforts to use football as a tool for change on the politically divided island of Cyprus have triggered an immediate backlash, with local politicians stepping in to try and block any deal.
By Jaroslaw Adamowski
March 31 – The Greek government has unveiled a draft bill designed to curb the growing trend of in-stadium fan violence at football matches.
By David Owen
March 31 – Tottenham Hotspur, the North London Premier League football club, have reported one of the biggest profits in Premier League history – as foreshadowed by Insideworldfootball in August 2013. A concise announcement on the club website notes that profit for the year ended June 30, 2014 after interest and tax was £65.3 million, compared with just £1.5 million the previous year.
By Paul Nicholson
March 30 – Bonita Mersiades, the self-outed whistleblower from the Michael Garcia report into corruption in the 2018 and 2022 World Cup bidding process, has again hit the headlines, this time with the revelation that she was found guilty of government fraud in Australia.
By Mark Baber
March 30 – The Azadi stadium in Tehran was packed with 80,000 Afghans on Sunday evening as their under-23 team lost 6-0 to the Iranian Under-23 team, ending their hopes of progressing in the AFC Under-23 Championship and of winning a place in the 2016 Olympics in Rio.
March 30 – FIFA will announce the host country for the 2026 World Cup nine years earlier in May 2017, with the United States, Mexico and Canada all considered possible contenders.
By David Owen
March 30 – Newcastle United have become the latest Premier League club to report strong financial figures for the 2013-14 season. For the year ending June 2014, the Magpies generated a record after-tax profit of £18.7 million, not far off double the £9.9million achieved in 2013, and the fourth consecutive year in the black for the club which is owned by businessman Mike Ashley.