I understand that FIFA have other priorities, you know, the small matter of the World Cup in June next year. Surely though, they have a dedicated team that watch as many as matches of clubs from around the globe. Looking at the current list of nominees however, leads me to question whether FIFA has actually watched domestic football since 2006.

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Friday 23 October
19.30 Bayer Leverkusen v Dortmund, Bundesliga, ESPN
BVB's fourth Ruhr derby in a row sees them make the short trip to the current table-toppers. Readers of the Bundesbag will know of our resident expert's suspicion as to whether or not Leverkusen can keep hold of their lofty place - this could certainly be where they lose it. Click to continue reading...

Could Man United star Dimitar Berbatov be hitting some goal scoring form? Last night he scored not one, not two, but three goals for Bulgaria. This coincides with the news that Berbatov has become a dad- congratulations to him and his girlfriend.
The Bulgarian captain and Man United striker helped his team to a comfortable 6-2 win over Georgia at the Vassil Levski stadium in Sofia. Click to continue reading...

If you were your country's top scorer with a healthy 35 goals in 73 appearances, chances are you'd be an established top league player in most countries in Europe. Add to that record a career that has seen you start out at Manchester United and take in spells at Leeds United, Sunderland and Fulham, you'd expect a pretty good record.

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(All times - UK)
The more observant amongst you will notice that this week's Midweek TV Preview is unnaturally short. We would like to point out that this is not because we forgot to write most of it - merely that next weekend's World Cup qualifiers have resulted in most domestic football being put on the back burner for a week. Click to continue reading...

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Note: There is a print link embedded within this post, please visit this post to print it. | Listen to the report here

La Liga kicks off this weekend and on this week's main report we ask whether the Spanish League is now better than the Premier League. Explanations of key terms are explained in bold at the end of the transcript below.

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Gold Coast United has lifted the bar for domestic football in Australia.
Jason Culina, Joel Porter, Shane Smeltz, Robson, Bas Van Den Brink all lit up the Brisbane night with intelligent, skilful football. 3-1 to United. Great for the A-League, great for football fans everywhere.
Joel Porter particularly caught my eye. Click to continue reading...

Argentina football season suspended due to debts

Reuters

August 5, 2009

The kickoff to the Argentine domestic football season was put on hold indefinitely on Wednesday, while the game's national governing body sought a solution to clubs' massive debts.

Bussed-in protesters also attacked the Argentina Football Association (AFA) headquarters, smashing windows and demanding the resignation of AFA president Julio Grondona.

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the end of the wacky waving inflatable arm flailing tube man

Muricy Ramalho has been given the chop by São Paulo. On Friday evening, the coach had a meeting with club president Juvenal Juvêncio were it was decided that Ramalho had no future at the Morumbi. The decision came after São Paulo's exit form the Libertadores after they lost 2-0 at home to Cruzeiro on Thursday.

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With no domestic football to talk about (apart from what's being churned out by the massive rumour factory), the 2009 Confed Cup is doing a very good job of satisfying my appetite for football. It produced two cracking games...

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For some people, the end of the football season in years that end with odd numbers means a return to the real world. For two and a half months they become normal people, spending time with family and friends, allowing their sofas and their wallets to recover from the arduous few months that have just passed and giving every impression of being normal, well-rounded human beings.

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I was coaching at Iona College in New York during the spring of 1996 when US Soccer and Nike came out with its bold PROJECT 2010. We hosted a Nike Cup event on our campus, where members of Nike's national marketing department announced this massive financial initiative (recorded at $50 million) that would put the US in a position TO WIN THE WORLD CUP BY 2010. Click to continue reading...

Following England's routine win over Kazakhstan on Saturday, I was listening to Five Live's 606 programme, which has the unfortunate habit of being gripping despite being mostly filled with ranting, rambling nonsense.

Irritating as Alan Green, the usual presenter, can sometimes be, he does bring a certain level of wit that adds entertainment to his acerbic comments, whether or not his points have actual merit when fully considered.

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The Premier League and Football Association are under increasing pressure to solve the 2010 fixture list to try and fit it in with the 2010 World Cup. Fifa's rules state that no domestic football...
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The Finnish newspapers have been full of talk about Veikkausliiga's apparent 'crisis' in the last few weeks. Domestic football in Finland has long suffered from poor facilities, low attendances, players leaving for richer foreign leagues, but these problems have become more prominent recently, and the football media has not been slow to point out the difficulties.

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Thanks to FIFA's rules and the poaching of players nations such as France and Mexico have engaged in lately, more focus and emphasis than ever has been placed on players eligible to play for more than one nation recently. Obviously the United States has previously depended on naturalized players like Earnie Stewart, Tom Dooley, Hugo Perez and even the forgotten Brian Quinn and David Regis, but recently the US has become more defensive in stopping other nations from poaching players developed here at home.

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When the Abu Dhabi United Group bought Manchester City at the beginning of this season, both myself and football fanatics around the world sensed a new beginning for the blue side of Manchester. Names like Kaka and David Villa were all rumored to be heading to the City of Manchester Stadium, and even when the signing of Robinho was clinched I genuinely believed that the club would at least comfortably wrap up a UEFA Cup spot.

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BRAZILIAN midfielder Lucas reckons that Liverpool's dramatic last-gasp victory over Fulham has given them the belief that they can finally land the Premier League title.
Liverpool returned to the summit on Saturday night courtesy of substitute Yossi Benayoun's injury-time strike at Craven Cottage but dropped back down to second yesterday following Manchester United's dramatic late victory over Aston Villa. Click to continue reading...

It's another gala weekend of domestic football action across Scotland this weekend. With the teams recovered from their mid-week cup success (unless you're St. Mirren) they're all no doubt chomping at the bit to get back into the saddle as they jockey for position at the top of the table. Dispensing with the horse metaphors for [. Click to continue reading...

It's another gala weekend of domestic football action across Scotland this weekend. We have the first of this season's New Firm Derby's to look forward to, and Kilmarnock face the green half of the Old Firm when Celtic travel down to Ayrshire. Can Kilmarnock keep up with Rangers at the top? Down in the [. Click to continue reading...

It's all domestic football this week. Without so much as time to take a breath, the seventh round of the Apertura is already looming. There's an all-Sur clash between Arsenal and Banfield in Sarandí, leaders San Lorenzo host Colón and Racing are in bad need of a win against the newly managerless Estudiantes. Click to continue reading...

After the break for the World Cup Qualifiers (which saw the national side play two games as they began their World Cup qualification bid) it's back to league action for the four divisions in Scottish domestic football. As always, this week sees the usual mix of interesting fixtures, not least in Division Two and Three [. Click to continue reading...

The Mariners have launched their Academy programs today.
And it's interesting to see the numbers of players involved in their Academies. For example, One centre for 9 years olds will train 16 players. And there are FIVE centres. That's 80 players per age group.
At least five centres spread across the Region. Click to continue reading...

The ISL will continue on through the fasting month this season with games kicking off at 9pm to allow the players to break their fast and recover from their first meal.
Normally there has been a break but this season given the Independence Cup in Jakarta and the Merdeka Cup in KL we could have been without domestic football from the end of August till the end of October and then where would we be? Click to continue reading...

Before we press on with other matters, here's a final word on the subject of football kits.
Just before the current domestic football season started here in the UK, we carried out some research to see which kit manufacturers were the most popular among the 92 league clubs, and duly compared our findings to those of last year. Click to continue reading...

Ladies and gentlemen, these are exciting times.
At this very moment, the Olympic football tournament is enthralling a worldwide audience in Beijing, China. Throughout Europe, qualification games for the Champions League and UEFA Cup are already sorting the men from the boys as the quest for continental domination starts its long and arduous journey. Click to continue reading...

It's our great pleasure now to welcome back an old friend to Some People Are On The Pitch that we haven't heard from for some time. Kedge has been watching Euro 2008 with great enthusiasm over the last few weeks, but now the action's all but over he wonders whether England fans can afford to be optimistic about what's to come. Click to continue reading...

After over a month of no laser lightshows, and no killer whale mascots, the J League returns to action tomorrow. With the European Championship winding down, the attention in Japan will be returning to domestic football, and since we've been a bit distracted ourselves, let's take a look at how things stand in J [. Click to continue reading...

For the second time in two weeks, a Serie A player scored a decisive goal in a game, took his short off to celebrate and was immediately handed his marching orders for a second yellow card. Siena's Massimo Maccarone scored a sublime free kick in the 80th minute against Tuscan rival Fiorentina and was so [. Click to continue reading...

Is Essam El-Hadary going to be our test case for the Webster ruling, or isn't he? The battle is on. Just last week Daryl was saying that Essam El-Hadary, the African Cup of Nations-winning goalkeeper from Egypt, was going to be the Webster test. Webster, if you remember, is the extremely controversial new ruling [. Click to continue reading...

Way back in the summer 2006 of the Selecao were the prohibitive favorites to take home one of sport's most coveted mantle pieces. It was a little bit of a Tiger Wood complex, in fact. There was Brazil and then there was "The Field". Any time an interview was taken it was less "who do [...] Click to continue reading...