A great football novel is like a perfectly executed bicycle-kick goal, like players such as Argentine legends Diego Maradona and Lionel Messi; they come along once in a generation. Against the accumulated…
The derby match between Salernitana and Nocerina started strangely. Played in the third tier of Italian football, the match saw three Nocerina substitutions after just three minutes. Soon, another Nocerina…
The man touted as the next Socceroos coach, Angle Postecoglou, meets Australian soccer’s greatest export Craig Johnston. Should we have local coaches for our national teams?
AAP/Hamish Blair
Another foreign coach of an Australian national sports team has been ushered to the overseas departure terminal. Having overseen the team’s qualification for the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, the Socceroos…
You probably haven’t heard of English footballer Joe Yoffe. Why would you? Until recently, he played for UMF Selfoss in the second tier of the Icelandic league. But Yoffe could be about to change the way…
QPR’s Joey Barton wore rainbow laces in a recent match.
John Walton/PA
Last week, world football was shocked by a match-fixing scandal that swallowed a minor league Australian club and cast it into a world of international betting intrigue. As allegations were levelled at…
Is it always wrong to use racial epithets, regardless of the context? It’s an old debate, recently revived and applied to football fans. The Football Association (FA), anti-racism campaigners and Jewish…
Victorian soccer club Southern Stars has been caught up in the biggest match-fixing scandal to hit Australian sport. What can be done to prevent further instances of corruption?
ABC News
Since taking over as chief executive of the Football Federation Australia (FFA), Australian soccer’s governing body, David Gallop would have “sold his arse” (to paraphrase Tony Abbott) to have the sport…
Some decades ago, there used to be a series of jokes in Britain that began with the line “there was an Englishman, an Irishman, a Scotsman and a Welshman”. Such jokes are generally no longer told: among…
Gareth Bale: keeping bargaining theorists busy.
Chris Radburn/PA
The Gareth Bale transfer saga drags on, as Real Madrid consider buying Tottenham Hotspur’s star player for a world record transfer fee of around £100m. For those of us who have studied the process of bargaining…
Rooney: rumoured to have once been bald.
Martin Rickett/PA
Summer’s football transfer rumour season is in full swing; an annual activity as predictable as strawberries and cream at Wimbledon or suntans and sports cars at the Monaco F1 Grand Prix. World Cup years…
Chinese youngsters are keen to associate themselves with global football brands.
ivanwalsh
The football clubs of Western Europe are off to Asia this summer in the hope of engaging fans and building relationships with some of their target customers. For example, China plays host to the Barclays…
Perhaps it is a matter of culture, possibly it is something to do with indifference, but sporting mega-events appear to be considerably less popular in Brazil than in the UK. Whereas a majority of the…
When you’re going for goals, seeing is believing.
Johnson Cameraface
In just a few weeks, soccer-playing robots from around the world will converge on Eindhoven in the Netherlands to compete for the prestigious RoboCup 2013. With around 2,500 particpants, competition is…
Manchester City: soon to be celebrating global domination?
Dave Thompson/PA
Walk down the high streets of Britain, through the shopping malls of the United States or around the retail complexes of East Asia, and you will inevitably be confronted with a McDonald’s food outlet…
The Western Sydney Wanderers have had a ‘fairytale’ debut season in the A-League - but does this say more about how the league is run than the team itself?
AAP/Dean Lewins
Western Sydney Wanderers’ inaugural A-League season is the feel-good sports story of the year. The team is undefeated in 13 matches, won the league (generally regarded as the “real” championship in soccer…
The Herald Sun has described fans of A-League soccer club Melbourne Victory as ‘soccer hooligans’, a label many fans feel is unfair.
AAP/Martin Philbey
In 2011, I attempted to warn then-Victorian Police Superintendent Rod Wilson and Australian soccer’s governing body, Football Federation Australia, from “amplifying the actions of a few unruly football…
Fans of English soccer club Brighton & Hove Albion have faced constant homophobic taunts over the years - and they’ve had enough.
rockjimford
It’s been an ugly week in English soccer. Up north, outrage of many persuasions flowed around Paolo Di Canio’s politics. Down south, supporters from Championship side Brighton & Hove Albion presented…
New Sunderland manager Paolo Di Canio is facing a storm of criticism over his stated ‘fascist’ political views.
EPA/Filippo Monteforte
The resignation of senior British political figure David Miliband as non-executive director and vice-chairman of English soccer club Sunderland A.F.C. - in protest at Paolo Di Canio’s appointment as the…
We already know robots manufacture cars, work in factories, even vacuum our homes - but could they form a world-beating soccer team? The question seems like ripe pickings for a movie mogul, given Hollywood’s…