March 19 – Battling for sports integrity is not unlike the fight against coronavirus. You can’t see the enemy but you know that it is there and potentially can destroy everything you hold close. And you can’t let your guard down.
March 16 – Manchester City’s appeal against their two-year ban from European football for allegedly breaking financial fair play rules is suddenly up in the air as a result of the coronavirus.
March 12 – US Soccer has apologised after a backlash against statements in court documents this week that players on the men’s national team possess greater skill and have more demanding jobs than their female counterparts. The federation is also feeling the heat from sponsors.
March 12 – Former DFB President Wolfgang Niersbach (pictured) has made a surprise court appearance at the 2006 World Cup tax fraud trial – despite the advice of his doctor not to attend.
March 11 – Coronavirus fears have prompted SIGA to postpone its VI SIGA Sport Integrity Forum and general assembly, scheduled for 24-25 March in New York. The integrity group will now rearrange for a date in the Autumn.
By Andrew Warshaw
March 10 – The eagerly awaited trial of three of Germany’s most high-profile former football chiefs plus ex-FIFA Secretary General Urs Linsi linked to suspicions that Germany bought votes to obtain the 2006 World Cup has been adjourned after three of the four were absent from the courtroom near the Swiss-Italian border because of the coronavirus.
By Andrew Warshaw
March 6 – After a relatively quiet few months in the delicate debate over how European club football should be organised in the future, Juventus president Andrea Agnelli has re-stoked the flames of controversy by again making the case for the most prestigious clubs to be commercially prioritised.
By Paul Nicholson
March 6 – LaLiga has responded swiftly to a Madrid court ruling today that dismissed the league’s appeal against the RFEF’s decision not to authorise the Miami match between Girona and Barcelona that was going to be played January 26.
March 6 – It may not carry the same clout as the Champions League or be as newsworthy as financial fair play or VAR but UEFA is celebrating the fifth anniversary of its Foundation for Children, using football as a tool to aid vulnerable kids, particularly in less-privileged parts of the world.
By Samindra Kunti
March 5 – Portuguese police have raided 76 addresses, including the home of super-agent Jorge Mendes, as part of a nationwide investigation into money laundering and tax evasion in 2015.
By Paul Nicholson
March 5 – Controversial Swiss attorney general, Michael Lauber (pictured), who led the Swiss investigations into FIFA but mysteriously failed to remember or document meetings he held with FIFA president Gianni Infantino, has been sanctioned for disloyalty, lying and breaching his office’s code of conduct.
By Andrew Warshaw
March 5 – Former UEFA president Michel Platini, who has been free to work again in football from last October, has nevertheless suffered another blow to his reputation after losing his appeal at the European Court of Human Rights against his four-year ban from the game.
March 4 – UEFA are considering tweaking their financial fair play regulations after Manchester City announced they were taking their fight to overturn a two-year ban for breaching the rules to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).
March 3 – Former England striker Daniel Sturridge has been banned from football for four months and fined £150,000 for breaching betting rules.
March 2 – Bayern Munich, flying high both domestically and in Europe, have had to issue an apology after their fans shamed the club by displaying an insulting banner at Hoffenheim that led to a protest by players on both sides taking matters into their own hands by refusing to play on and simply swapped passes with each other for the last 13 minutes.