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Search: 'Brazil'

Stories

Full-time job

wsc303Sepp Blatter causes a stir with his views on part-time refereeing, writes Steve Menary

When Sepp Blatter announced that referees at all World Cup finals from 2014 onwards must be full-time, he caused consternation among many ambitious match officials. “Some people say there’s not enough money to pay them, but there always seems to be plenty in the professional leagues,” said Blatter. This prompted particular concern among Germany’s part-time officials. When Blatter recently clarified his position he did not back down, insisting that German football association must “establish a system in which the referees are its employees”.

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Quality Control

wsc302John Duerden says that despite an influx of money across the continent, clubs and governing bodies remain haphazard in their organisation

“A team that has scored just one goal in four matches has eight points. I am simply too amused to try and find an explanation to this,” said Uzbekistan’s Olympic coach Vadim Abramov of United Arab Emirates’ resurgence in the qualifying group. Amusement was not the general reaction after the worst of the wildly varying standards of professionalism in Asian football were revealed once again.

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A new ball game

wsc302Andrew Crawford believes that an influx of money, famous players and foreign managers could help football become China’s most popular sport

The Chinese Super League (CSL) season gets underway on March 15. Most of the country’s big clubs receive substantial funding from various wealthy business tycoons or state-owned enterprises, and several teams have recruited expensive foreign reinforcements. Shanghai Shenhua started things off last December in spectacular fashion by snapping up Chelsea’s Nicolas Anelka for £190,000 a week. Since then, Beijing Guoan have spent around £1.9 million to secure strikers Andrija Kaludjerovic and Reinaldo, while Shandong Luneng have paid a reported £830,000 for their own Brazilian forward, Gilberto Macena.

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Party music

wsc302Jack Lang argues that since his big-money move to Flamengo, which angered his hometown club, Ronaldinho has not profited as expected

“Don’t throw coins at Ronaldinho: he’ll only start collecting them” read one handmade sign. Hundreds of others simply bore the words “crook” and “mercenary”. Some pioneering fans even went to the effort of printing fake R$100 notes with his face on them. This was not the homecoming Ronaldinho had hoped for, but he could have expected nothing less. His return to boyhood team Grêmio in October was always going to be a tense affair, following his decision to snub the club earlier in the year.

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Tongue tied

wsc302Poland, the Euro 2012 co-hosts are struggling to find a common language in the dressing room, writes Liam Nolan

During the past six months, Poland’s coach Franciszek Smuda has faced a barrage of domestic criticism for trying to lure footballers with Polish ancestry to play for the national team. Five of Smuda’s starting 11 were either born or raised abroad. French born Ludovic Obraniak (Bordeaux) and Damien Perquis (Sochaux) cannot speak Polish, and three German-Poles – Eugen Polanski, Adam Matuszczyk and Sebastian Boenisch – feel much more at ease speaking in German.

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