Robben confessed penalty unfair, says Mexico captain

AFP Photo

FORTALEZA (Brazil): Mexico’s captain Rafael Marquez said Arjen Robben had admitted to him that the Dutch forward should not have been awarded the penalty that decided Sunday’s last-16 clash.

With extra time looming, the pacey Robben went down in the box under a challenge from defender Marquez, giving the Netherlands a penalty that won the game 2-1 but brought accusations of play-acting from Mexico.

Ethics: The fixers and the officials

South Africa versus Colombia, May 27, 2010. According to reports from officials, this match was most likely fixed | Salymfayad/Flickr

“The fixers have, at times, gone into the offices and boardrooms of the top officials who organize the sport,” writes Declan Hill*, who uncovers how match-fixing on high level has taken place with the connivance of top-level soccer officials.

It was a symbolic game – South Africa versus Colombia, May 27, 2010. The game took place a few days before the World Cup, it was in the beautiful new stadium at Soccer City in Johannesburg. The South Africans before a raucous crowd of vuvuzela-totting fans won 2-1. The stadium, indeed the entire event, was a sign that a new South African was ready for the international stage. It seemed to show that this was a South Africa that had emerged from apartheid to become a prosperous, multi-cultural society. It was a wonderful day for sport and society.

The only problem was that the game was probably fixed.

Coca-Cola’s World Cup ad from Palestine blames football struggles on culture, not occupation

“To the uninformed viewer, Palestine is a place where women go to see their liberties stripped away,” writes Sami Kishawi, Sixteen Minutes to Palestine, of the multinational’s bogus and false marketing, World Cup trophy tour. “This is a world sport, but for Palestinians, nothing can be further from the truth.”

Algeria’s win and Palestine

Algerian star dedicates World Cup success to the Arab world, ‘especially to Palestine’

Algeria’s qualification to the knockout round of the 2014 World Cup is historic. On June 26, after a late equalizer against Russia, sending them home on Aeroflot, Algeria clinched its spot in the round of 16, finishing second in Group H. This will be the first time a North African team has advanced to the knockout stage since 1986. And with Nigeria finishing second in Group F, two African teams will play in the next round of World Cup action for the first time ever.

It’s not just a football game. There was a tweet in Arabic from the leading Algerian player, attacking midfielder Sofiane Feghouli, dedicating the victory to Palestine.

The message can roughly be translated to, “Thankful to God that we forty million Algerians and millions of Arabs have advanced. We gift all of the Arabs with this win, especially the people of Palestine. Thank you.”

Coca-Cola – Colombia: Replay of the 1970s & 1980s

Coca-Cola is a leading corporate sponsor of FIFA and the Olympics and marketed as an iconic symbol of the “American way of life.” We are printing the following indepth report on its practice for the information of readers; its abuses in Colombia, now being integrated into NATO: “Replay of the 1970s & 1980s.”

SINALTRAINAL’s leadership has steadfastly showed the courage and determination to stand up against Coca-Cola, paramilitary threats and death squads. Union President Javier Correa leads demonstraion in Colombia (Photo from “The Coca-Cola Case”)

Strong labor unions are critical to improve wages, working conditions and human rights for all workers and for democracies to flourish. For workers in Colombia and Guatemala, a strong union can also mean the difference between life and death. According to “The Coke Machine,” by Michael Blanding, published in September 2010, “…the union members do look to the lawsuit and the Killer Coke Campaign as the reason they are still alive.”

Brazil playmaker’s debt to futsal

This is the plan: Oscar (right) talks tactics with Neymar (left) and Fred ahead of Brazil’s last-16 game with Chile|GETTY

By Henry Winter, Football Correspondent, The Telegraph, Rio de Janeiro

(27 June 2014) – When Brazil are in possession, when their players are steering the ball through tight areas, their debt to futsal is demonstrated. When Oscar and Fernandinho struck those trademark toe-poked finishes against Croatia and Cameroon respectively, their early days playing futsal was celebrated.

Neymar and others were raised the futsal way, the approach that Brazil will hope will help them overcome Chile at Belo Horizonte on Saturday.

Inside Major League Baseball’s Dominican sweatshop system

The Toronto sports media is forever promoting the “Dominican connection” of the Blue Jays baseball franchise. Teen shortstop Yewri Guillén died the day the Nationals were supposed to ship him to America. Has MLB learned from the tragedy?

By Ian Gordon | March/April 2013 Issue, Mother Jones

Yewri Guillén, in an undated family photo

THE BASEBALL MEN started coming around when Yewri Guillén was 15. Like thousands of other boys in the Dominican Republic, he had been waiting for them for years, training on the sparse patch of grass and dirt across the road from the small concrete-and-wood house he shared with his mother, father, and two sisters in La Canela, a hamlet 45 minutes southwest of Santo Domingo. By the time the American scouts took notice, he had grown into a 5-foot-10, 165-pound, switch-hitting shortstop with quick hands and a laser arm. In 2009, at the age of 16, he signed for $30,000 with the Washington Nationals. The first thing he’d do with his bonus, he told his parents, was buy them a car and build them a new house.

Sighting: Ethics of the World Cup – Enyeama-Messi or Suarez-Chiellini?

Photo of the day: Vincent Enyeama, Nigeria’s No 1 goalie, was all smiles as he pumped fists with Argentine talisman, Lionel Messi, in the tunnel before the world cup game between Nigeria and Argentina; with the Albiceleste running out 3-2 winners.

Yesterday, as the Nigerian and Argentinian teams at the World Cup waited together momentarily in the tunnel before emerging onto the field for the second half, the Nigerian goalkeeper Vincent Enyeama reached out to Lionel Messi and patted him on the back.

Nigeria had stood on the brink of being the first, and only, team from Africa to qualify for the round of 16. The Super Eagles, the reigning African champions, required just a point from their match with Argentina to secure qualification. But one man, Messi, had stood in their way.

Despite facing one of the top players of all-time, Nigeria keeper and vice-captain Vincent Enyeama had not been worried, as a press report published the day before the match related.

Legendary Cuban volleyball coach passes away

Eugenio George Laffita – considered to be the best women’s team coach of the 20th century by the International Volleyball Federation (FIVB)

Eugenio George with the fantastic Morenas del Caribe.

Eugenio George Laffita, prize-winning coach who for years trained Cuba’s women’s volleyball teams, winners of three Olympic and two World Championship gold medals, died May 31, at 81 years of age, of cancer.

Cuba denounces denial of athlete visas for World Youth Games

Prensa Latina News Agency (June 19) – The Cuban Athletics Federation has denounced the refusal of U.S. visas to four members of the Caribbean delegation to attend the World Youth Championships, to be held in Eugene, Oregon, in the USA.