Matt Scott

Whelan cleared of all charges of Brazilian World Cup ticket touting

February 12 – While English top-flight football basks in the affluence of its new record-breaking television deal, in Spain, another of the so-called ‘big five’ European leagues, the situation could not be more different with clubs desperate to adopt…

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By Andrew Warshaw February 18 – Four years after South Korea’s Chung Mong-joon, one of the most influential figures in world football administration, suffered a humiliating defeat after almost a generation as Asia’s FIFA vice-president, his family is…

Matt Scott: An explosion of truth could blow everything up at Chelsea

“Quand on enferme la vérité sous terre, elle s’y amasse, elle y prend une force telle d’explosion, que, le jour où elle éclate, elle fait tout sauter avec elle.” Émile Zola, J’accuse The French author Émile Zola was the Charles Dickens of his place…

Genius Sports breaks its Russian embargo supplying data to Russian betting site

April 14 – Genius Sports, the official data supplier to the Premier League, has continued to offer its services to Russian punters in the weeks after it announced it was withdrawing business from the territory. Using the hashtag #standwithukraine, on…

Matt Scott: £50m footballers are two a penny – but we have been there before

“We must avoid the impulse to live only for today, plundering for our own ease and convenience the precious resources of tomorrow.” Dwight D Eisenhower As the Supreme Commander of the allies’ war effort in the European theatre during World War Two…

Matt Scott: How Voldemort threatened the world’s oldest club with extinction

“Greatness inspires envy, envy engenders spite, spite spawns lies.” Lord Voldemort, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, JK Rowling There is something magical about Notts County. They are the world’s oldest league football club, formed six…

Matt Scott: Infantino turns a Greek tragedy into a global governance comedy

“Far from being willing to execute his enemies, a real king must be willing to execute his friends.” T.H. White Walt Disney’s rendering of TH White’s novel The Sword in the Stone glossed over it but the author always tackled themes of justice and…

Top Greek referees quit after violent threats, as FIFA battle to keep control

November 7 – Turmoil in Greek football took a chilling new turn on Saturday when all three members of the Hellenic Football Federation’s new Central Refereeing Commission quit following threats towards one of their number by unidentified thugs. The…

Matt Scott: ‘Bung’ revelations are just grist to the media mill, not cause for regulation

“The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilised community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others.” John Stuart Mill Greed, egotism, immorality and corruption. These are the vices of which some of…

Greek league on hold as clubs refuse to play Olympiacos; Marinakis faces remand calls

August 7 – Only a week before UEFA’s most senior officials decamp to Athens for their presidential elections, the owner of Greece’s most successful club reportedly faces a battle to avoid custody over match fixing allegations. According to…

Infantino has blown it, says Pieth, calling for state control of FIFA

June 18 – It is time for state intervention at FIFA after Gianni Infantino’s supposed modernisation of FIFA “plunged it into the Dark Ages of Blatter”, according to the former chairman of the Independent Governance Committee. Mark Pieth and the IGC’s…

Greek Cup final postponed amid new fears over fan violence

May 9 – The Greek Football Cup final scheduled for Saturday was postponed by the government amid safety fears for the match. A 48-hour strike by public-service unions began in Greece on Saturday, causing a reduction in the numbers of police available…

Rangers tax case draws calls for independent inquiry into Scottish football

May 5 – Glasgow Rangers escaped being stripped of historic league titles by the Scottish Football Association on false pretences, a report by the Tax Justice Network (TJN) has alleged. The report claims that the SFA commission of inquiry headed by…

Seven is Premier League’s magic number as it drops title sponsor in strategy rethink

April 27 – The most unusual Premier League season in the competition’s 23-year history has made the commercial messaging markedly easier for executives selling sponsorship inventory around the world’s most popular domestic football…

The latest Greek affair shows how Infantino and Theodoridis are not Knights in shining armour

“Politics, these days, is no occupation for an educated man, a man of character. Ignorance and total lousiness are better.” Aristophanes, The Knights There was of course no football 2,400 years ago when Aristophanes was writing his plays, and still…

Greek government takes on FIFA saying HFF must ‘purify’ its administration

April 7 – Greek government officials ordering the Hellenic Football Federation to reform over corruption and crowd trouble have issued a defiant statement in response to FIFA’s threat to ban Greece from international competitions. Stavros Kontonis…

Matt Scott: UEFA’s oversight on Olympiacos has opened dangerous ground

“Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?” Juvenal, Satires “Who watches the watchmen?” This question, first posed by classical writers thousands of years ago, is perhaps one we would do well to ask ourselves now, as civil liberties hard won in the second…

Matt Scott: Infantino has not got UEFA’s house in order. So why let him into FIFA House?

“Birds of a feather flock together.” Aesop When Sepp Blatter gave an interview to the Tass news agency recently it made headlines everywhere. The Football Association chairman, Greg Dyke, even took what Blatter had said to the British parliament. The…

Matt Scott: Is FIFA immoral? If so the Swiss will soon wind it up

“We are threatened with suffering from three directions: from our body, which is doomed to decay… from the external world which may rage against us with overwhelming and merciless force of destruction, and finally from our relations with other men.”…

Matt Scott: Bolton have lost their power. It won’t be long before the lights go out

“I am somewhat exhausted; I wonder how a battery feels when it pours electricity into a non-conductor.” Arthur Conan Doyle Electricity is a wonderful, life-giving force. The defibrillator whose high-voltage pulse revives the dead from cardiac arrest;…