27 May 2023

Women mingles with men, endless part

Like in other confederations in Oceania too there are (new) things happening for the first time.
The assistant referee from Tonga Lata Kaumatule was the first female to officiate at men football game last Wednesday between Solomon warriors and Lupe o le soaga. Just 24 hours later her colleague duo from New Zealand have made their mark in Vanuatu on Ifira black bird - Pirae where Anna-Marie Keighley was the main judge on the pitch that was helped by Sarah Jones as lineswoman.
As a debut, the first three names have made their presence in an international club competition: the Champions league.

26 May 2023

Disobedience will not be tolerated

Two clubs has thought a way of how to punish footballers in a totally ridiculous and a stupid attempt.
At the second weekend of this month players from Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 were asked to wear numbers in colours of the rainbow due to the international day of homophobia, biphobia and transphobia that was noticed on 17 May.
However, in this campaign some players refused to wear it. Mostafa Mohamed of Nantes was punished financially for declined to go out with it for personal reasons, while five opponents from Toulouse (also for personal reasons) were thrown out of the list. The French football federation did not penalized the disobedience, but this cannot be said to the clubs who act it very harsh against 'the offenders'.

25 May 2023

United logo revealed

For the first time in history of the World Cup three countries are going to host the event in 2026. With the help of several agencies, and under the name "We are 26" the world football organization last Wednesday has unveiled the logo for the spectacle that will begin in three years from now.
However, majority of the fans do not like this logo, gave negative comments about it as are saying that the design is uninspiring, too simple, disappointing, creators have no imagination, lack of creativity, very cheap, little kids can do this as well in elementary school....
Also two dates were confirmed for this event: 25 May has been set as the deadline where coaches of the 48 teams would have to give their final list of players who will participate in the competition, and the last game itself (grand finale) would be played on Sunday, 19 July.

24 May 2023

Performing the draw of its main championship

Five days ago the African football organization has accepted the calendar up until 2026. And in this plan are mentioned two championships that are going to happen.
All rounds from qualifying games of the World Cup that will kick-off in three years time have been determined. The 9 elimination groups of 6 teams from first phase would be known on 12 July 2023 at Cotonou in Benin, while playing years are: from November 2023 right through October 2025 when the 10 match nights would complete. Stage two have to commence on November 2025, and the inter-confederation play-offs will occur in March 2026.
Just 3 months before the start of the main championship on the continent the Africa Cup of nations draw was  confirmed that will be staged on the ceremony in Ivory coast on 12 October 2023.

23 May 2023

Groups for season number three

In a televised ceremony from 16 May, the North, Central America and Caribbean confederation has performed the draw for its Nations league event for 2023-24 season. As was announced earlier, for the first time League A is going to be expanded with four new teams (from 12 to 16). The outcome for the 37 of them that were divided in 9 groups is the following:

League A
Group 1: Panama, Guatemala, El Salvador, Martinique, Curacao, Nicaragua.
Group 2: Haiti, Jamaica, Honduras, Cuba, Suriname, Grenada.

Whoever are placed in the first two positions, those teams are going to play the quarter-final stage together with the first four high ranked ones (Mexico, United States of America, Costa Rica, Canada) which will be joined in the process. These duels are scheduled to kick off this November. Once the group stage is completed, part number two of this competition (finals or semi-finals, classification and last game) have to be played in March next year.
At 2024 in one of the oldest team competition in the world would play participants from this region. This being said six teams will fight to enter the Copa America event, and those are going to come only from league A.

League B
Group 1: Guadeloupe, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Sint Maarten.
Group 2: Trinidad and Tobago, Dominican Republic, Montserrat, Barbados.
Group 3: French Guiana, Bermuda, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Belize.
Group 4: Guyana, Antigua and Barbuda, Puerto Rico, Bahamas.

League C
Group 1: Bonaire, Saint Martin, Anguilla.
Group 2: Aruba, Cayman islands, United States Virgin islands.
Group 3: Dominica, Turks and Caicos islands, British Virgin islands.

Games for the last two leagues (B and C) would be played this fall (September, October, November).