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The match fixing scandal in cricket has spilled over into football with allegations made that Ryman league club Croydon Athletic has been used for money laundering purposes. Originating from a merger of two clubs, and plagued by other financial scandals in its short history, it is reported that Mazhar Majeed has been arrested by Revenue and Customs.
UEFA has used its meeting to Monaco to launch its financial fair play rules and emphasise their importance for the future health of the European game. They consider that before the rules ‘anarchy’ was prevalent in European football.
Karl Oysyton has quit as chairman of Blackpool amid reports of disharmony at the club. He will stay on as chief executive for a transitional period. Apparently he told the board earlier this month that he would resign if they disagreed with his approach to handling promotion.
The fanshare scheme devised by the Arsenal Supporters’ Trust and backed by the club’s major shareholders was launched today. It was such an immediate hit with Arsenal fans that the website allowing fans to buy online fell over and had to be moved to another server.
Hungarian football faces many challenges. We are therefore grateful to Jagoditis Rómeó who runs a football website in Hungary for translating out of Hungarian for us an article on some recent developments. The original contribution has been edited because of its length.
This season sees the introduction of a Home Grown Player rule in the Premiership which will limit the size of squads and where they are sourced from. This is not the result of any intervention by Fifa and Uefa: their efforts to have a 6+5 rule foundered on the rocks of EU law (although the Champions League does require eight out of 25 players to be home grown, four from a club’s academy). It’s the result of an agreement by the Premiership clubs, although no doubt pressure on them to develop rather than buy players was one reason that pushed them to introduce the rule
Uefa are known for their resistance to anything that looks like innovation, particularly across national borders. Now they have rejected a plan for French 2nd division team Evian to play 35 kms.
Former Conference side Grays Athletic have been admitted into the Ryman League North for next season, but only after threatening to use an injunction against the Isthmian League. They had been refused admission after the league authorities declared themselves not to be satisfied with their agreement to ground share with East Thurrock United. They would have had to go down to Step 5 from each only one club is promoted from a league each season and has been described as a ‘graveyard for fallen clubs’.
A European country will win the World Cup tonight and a European country is already in third place. What does this success for Europe mean, in particular for the future of football?
African wire services are reporting that the Nigerian Goverrnment has lifted its ban on the national team taking part in international competitions. The decision has been widely welcomed and means the end to a very tricky crisis in international football.