In Review: Week of April 27 - May 3

By Alex Kotler

Hats off to FIFA, on to Iran

The Iranian girls football team is returning to compete in the Youth Olympics after being barred for wearing hijab scarves, traditional worn to protect the modesty of Islamic women.

FIFA today approved a motion for the team to wear specially-made caps that cover their heads to the hairline without extending below the ears to the neck. The team will feature in a six-nation tournament for girls at the games being held August 12-25 in Singapore.

Should any headwear be permitted? Should FIFA be more amenable to religious custom?

Read Nasser Karimi’s article on Google

Promotion worth about £90 million

It’s worth about £90 million to clubs getting promoted from England’s second division to the Premier League.

“The Championship Play-off Final winners will benefit from at least £40m of additional revenue in 2010/11, the vast majority of this coming from television income and the rest from higher gate receipts and increased commercial income,” said Paul Rawnsley, Director of the Sports Business Group at Deloitte.

That’s a lot of cheddar.

Read more in SportBusiness

United still, despite United collapse

Praful Patel, president of the All India Football Federation, is resolute that Mahindra United’s decision to disband will not affect Indian football over the long term.

He said: “It is unfortunate that they have taken such decision, but I don’t think it will really impact Indian football. Already, in Pune FC and Mumbai FC, we have two new teams from Maharashtra. So football here wasn’t only about Air India and Mahindra United.”

Is it lip service or truth?

Read Dhiman Sarkar’s article in the Hindustan Times

Son of a pitch: Soccer field revitalization delayed

Proponents of the controversial plans to revitalize three Golden Gate Park soccer fields by replacing natural grass with tuff are miffed following news that the project would be delayed for at least a year.

As reported by Brent Begin in the San Francisco Examiner, ‘artificial turf and lights would be safer for athletes and increase the amount of time the soccer fields near the Beach Chalet can be used, but critics such as the Sierra Club decry the plan because the changes could affect bird migration and create runoff issues.’

What are your thoughts? Save the birds or the public soccer space? Can both be done?

Read the original article

Called Off: Underage callgirl case halted until after the World Cup

To the relief of Raymond Domenech and the players embroiled in a scandal involving an underage prostitute, police have postponed their investigation until after the 2010 World Cup.

The case, which involves Les Bleus team members Franck Ribery, Karim Benzema and Sidney Govou and their alleged relations with the (then 17) Algerian-born Zahia Dehar, will be pursued later this summer - freeing the players to focus on the tournament and not the sideshow (or the afterparty).

Is this fair?

More in the BBC