Women's soccer in America has encountered another setback. The top-tier female league in the United States, Women's Professional Soccer, is facing a loss of sanctioning by the U.S. Soccer Federation as a Division I league. Entering its fourth season, WPS "terminated" its Florida franchise, magicJack, bringing the number of teams down from six to five in early November.

Fair play to CLeague champions Phnom Penh Crown for making it to the AFC President's Cup Final last weekend. They met hosts Taiwan Power and of course won 6-0! Nah, did they bollocks! They lost 3-2 and had three players sent off when the ref, whose name may not have been Homer, decided not to award the Cambodian team a 'nailed on' penalty deep in injury time.

* Saturday night in Rio sees the draw for the 2014 World Cup qualifiers for all except South America (CONMEBOL).
All eyes will be on the European draw where 1998 World Cup winners France have been downgraded to the second pot, meaning they will play one of the top seeds England, Spain, Holland, Germany, Portugal, Italy, Croatia, Norway or Greece.

Three South East Asian teams will be listening carefully to this Saturday's World Cup draw. Their fate will be decided along with the other 17 remaining countries on the road to Brazil.
Indonesia, Thailand and Singapore will not be drawn against each other, that's for sure. Instead they will face one from each of the following 'pots'.

Tom Sermanni has shocked the Matildas and W-League football followers by leaving out of his starting eleven in tonights game against Brazil three of the stars from the last World and Asia Cup.
Lauren Colthorpe
Claire Polkinghorne
Sally Shipard
and Aussie cricketer and footballer Ellyse Perry who burst on to the scene after the last World Cup - looked a shoe-in for a starting birth - has been overtaken by a 16 year old Caitlin Foord.

Cabrera used the same starting lineup against both the Czech Republic and UzbekistanEsteban Rodriguez, Mobi Fehr and Alfred Koroma are the only players to appear in all 12 U.S. international matches in 2011. Nathan Smith was the only U.

Asia will begin the race to the FIFA World Cup 2014™. Ahead of the Preliminary Draw in Brazil on 30 July 2011, teams from the Asian continent will contest a preliminary round of matches. The draw for this first round takes place on 30 March 2011 at AFC House in Kuala Lumpur.

The first round will consist of seven home-and-away series, featuring the 14 lowest ranked teams in Asia.

Iraq today was the last Arab team to be knocked out of the Asian Cup with a 0-1 defeat with a beautiful header from Kewell after extra time.
Iraq, Jordan and Qatar, all played really nice football and did big games. However, it terms of numbers, this is the worst Asian Cup since 1972.

Really looking forward to this mouth-watering clash as are the Koreans if you go by the numbers of Koreans posting on Aussie blogs!
Young fast and mobile with players, that's Korea, playing in big leagues in Europe against an Aussie team ageing and in decline.
Korea thumped Australia 3-1 earlier this year in Seoul and it could be a similar night tomorrow.

Dr. Joel Rookwood
'January 2011 is the month which will see Australia crowned kings of Asian football in Qatar' - a bold statement to offer up at the start of a competition (and an article), and one I will stand by, at least until they get knocked out in a semi final penalty shoot out that is.

DOHA, Qatar — A 92nd minute goal by Maya Yoshida saved three-time champions Japan from a shock defeat at the hands of underdogs Jordan as the two sides drew 1-1 in their opening Asian Cup match Sunday. Hasan Abdel Fattah's shot on the stroke of half-time ricochetted off VVV Venlo defender Yoshida into the net [.

Qatar lost to Uzbekistan 0-2 and Kuwait to China with the same result. The two games summarize what's going on in Asian football today.
- The decline of football in Western Asia: in 1978, Iran was the team from Western Asian to qualify to the world cup. Western Asia added 9 more teams till the 2006 World Cup: Kuwait, Iraq, UAE, Saudi Arabia and Iran.