Business

Barcelona coach Quique Setien is pessimistic that the Spanish top flight season will be able to be completed and has called LaLiga's conditions for the campaign recommencing "a non-starter" due to the continued threat of the novel coronavirus. 

LaLiga has been on hold since March 10 due to the pandemic although president Javier Tebas has said matches could start up again on either May 29, June 7 or June 28, most likely without spectators. Tebas has estimated Spanish clubs would lose around $1.09 billion if the season is not completed. 

The U.S. Soccer Federation said on Wednesday it was shutting down its youth development academy permanently due to the financial fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic. 

U.S. Soccer, the sport's governing body in the United States, said in a statement the decision to shutter the academy, which it founded in 2007 and included competitions across five age groups, was effective immediately. 

Many female footballers are at risk of losing their livelihoods due to the global soccer shutdown caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, a report by global players' union FIFPRO said on Thursday. 

The report said specific measures were needed to help women's football during the crisis, which has brought world sport to a standstill and caused the postponement of major international events including the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. Otherwise, it said, the women's game could be facing an existential threat.

Major League Soccer will not return until at least June 8, according to multiple reports. The timetable is in line with the latest official word from MLS, which was confirmation that a hoped for mid-May return would not happen due to the ongoing restrictions aimed at stopping the spread of the coronavirus. 

Commissioner Don Garber said MLS remains focused on getting in as many games as possible. Garber expanded the league's guidelines prohibiting group workouts, which initially stretched to April 24. 

A possible takeover of Premier League side Newcastle United by a group fronted by British financier Amanda Staveley with Saudi Arabian backing appeared to be moving closer to completion on Tuesday. 

A 31-page charge agreement filed with Companies House and signed by Staveley for PCP Capital Partners and a lawyer for St James Holdings Ltd indicated a framework for a deal was being put in place. 

MLS commissioner Don Garber told ESPN that the league will explore alternative formats when it comes to completing the 2020 season. Garber said that MLS is "focused at getting in as many as games as possible" if play resumes following the coronavirus pandemic. 

European champions Portugal will donate half of their prize money for qualifying for the now-postponed Euro 2020 championships to support amateur football amid the coronavirus outbreak, the team said on Monday. The virus has shut down many countries and has wreaked havoc with the sporting calendar across the globe. 

For those who thought that marble racing, cherry pit spitting and the Stupid Robot Fighting League represented the future of sports, I regret to inform you that they’ve now each had their respective moments to shine and failed miserably.

The outbreak of COVID-19 has reshaped our lives now and forever, but there’s just no point in hoping that an android with a vacuum cleaner chassis for a body and plastic skateboard deck for a fist can ever captivate in the ways that Lionel Messi or Cristiano Ronaldo could.

Without knowing how this’ll all play out, it’s tough to speculate or predict much with regards to the 2020 summer transfer window. UEFA insists that the 2019-20 season must be completed, but we have no clear idea as to when that’ll happen with European football still suspended.

U.S. prosecutors on Monday announced new criminal charges against two former executives of 21st Century Fox Inc and others stemming from a long-running investigation of corruption surrounding FIFA, soccer's world governing body.

The former Fox executives, Hernan Lopez and Carlos Martinez, were indicted in Brooklyn federal court on wire fraud and money laundering along with Gerard Romy, former co-CEO of Spanish media company Imagina Media Audiovisual SL, and Full Play Group SA, a Uruguayan sports marketing company. Lawyers for the defendants could not immediately be identified.