Politics

NYON, Switzerland - Ukraine has joined Spain and Portugal in their bid to host the 2030 FIFA World Cup, the Spanish Football Federation (RFEF) and the Portuguese Football Federation (FPF) said on Wednesday, in what they hailed as an act of European solidarity.

They said the decision, announced at a news conference at the Swiss headquarters of UEFA, had the full support of European soccer's governing body and also of the Spanish, Portuguese and Ukrainian governments.

"Our bid is not an Iberian bid anymore, it's a European bid," Luis Rubiales, president of the RFEF, said. 

A total of 2,198 football-related arrests were made in the 2021-22 season in England and Wales, the highest number since the 2013-14 season, a report by the Home Office said on Thursday.

The 2021-2022 season was the first full season where all scheduled matches were played at full spectator capacity following the COVID-19 pandemic.

The arrests made last season were around 59% higher than those in the 2018-2019 season, which was before the COVID-19 pandemic. The most common offense types were public disorder (36%) and violent disorder (20%).

HONG KONG - Iran hopes history will repeat itself at this November's World Cup in Qatar, 24 years after overcoming a fractious build-up to score a memorable triumph over the United States — the country's decades-long geopolitical rival — in France.

As the teams prepare to clash again, and their governments wrangle over reviving the 2015 Iran nuclear pact, the Iranian side's preparations have been thrown into turmoil by a divided squad and maneuvering over its leadership.

BENGALURU - India's soccer fraternity breathed a sigh of relief as FIFA lifted the suspension imposed on it after 11 days, but the decision came too late for Gokulam Kerala FC whose hopes of playing at the AFC Women's Club Championship were shattered.

FIFA suspended the All India Football Federation (AIFF) on Aug. 15 for undue third-party influence leading to Gokulam Kerala being banned from the club championship — a pilot tournament before the launch of the AFC Women's Champions League in 2024.

DUBAI - Dragan Skočić has been reinstated as head coach of Iran after a meeting between the board of directors of the Iranian Football Federation and its technical committee, the official IRNA news agency reported on Sunday.

Skočić's dismissal had been reported on Monday, prompting widespread criticism among the public just four months ahead of the World Cup finals in Qatar.

History was made on Friday when U.S. Soccer announced USWNT star Megan Rapinoe will become the first soccer player to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom. U.S. President Joe Biden will award Rapinoe, along with 16 other recipients including gymnast Simone Biles, the medal on July 7 at the White House.

PARIS - The Paris police chief said on Thursday that he might have been wrong when he said up to 40,000 Liverpool fans tried enter the Champions League final with fake tickets and that there was no scientific evidence to support the claim.

Didier Lallement added during a hearing in the French Senate that the police action around the match between Liverpool and Real Madrid at the Stade de France was a "failure" both because fans were harmed and the image of France was degraded.

BELLINZONA, Switzerland - The trial of former FIFA president Sepp Blatter and French footballing legend Michel Platini over alleged corrupt payments ground to a halt on Wednesday when Blatter said he was too ill to testify.

Swiss prosecutors accuse the pair, once among football's most powerful figures, of unlawfully arranging a payment of $2.08 million in 2011. Blatter and Platini both deny the charges. But Blatter, looking frail during the hearing at the Federal Criminal Court in Bellinzona, said he was unable to address the court due to chest pains.

SAN FRANCISCO - Players and coaches for the Golden State Warriors and Boston Celtics as well as the U.S. men's soccer team on Sunday urged Congress to support stricter gun laws amid a surge in mass shootings in the United States.

A shooting in Philadelphia left at least three people dead and 11 others wounded, police said on Sunday in the latest case of gun violence in the United States following recent massacres in Texas, New York and Oklahoma in which dozens died.