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Strikers and midfielders love it. Goalkeepers hate it. The ball that will be used at the World Cup in Germany probably will be praised as much as it is disparaged.
   The ‘Teamgeist’ (team spirit) ball is the last in a line of 10 World Cup balls by Adidas. It features the latest in design and technology, promising a more accurate flight.
   ‘It’s a nightmare, an absolute nightmare,’ DC United goalkeeper Troy Perkins said. ‘There’s going to be a lot of goals when the World Cup starts. But I guess that’s people want to see.’
   Major League Soccer and the Argentine first division are the two leagues officially using the Teamgeist since the beginning of the year, providing an early testing ground for a new 14-panel ball without stitches.
   ‘Technology hasn’t favoured goalkeepers, that’s for sure,’ said New York Red Bulls keeper Tony Meola, who has 100 appearances with the United States. ‘It’s lively, it knuckles a lot, especially if it gets anything on it – dirt, sand, water.’
   The Champions League used the Teamgeist since its introduction in December through the final, and some clubs in Germany, where the home teams provide the ball, also have been using it.
   In MLS, at least, for every detractor, there are more than enough advocates.
   ‘For me, it’s very good. It has a very good touch,’ Red Bulls and former France midfielder Youri Djorkaeff said. ‘I don’t know if a perfect ball exists, but it’s close to perfect.’
   Of course, Djorkaeff’s compliments came a few weeks after a 35-yard free-kick goal in the Red Bulls’ season opener against DC United, when he beat Perkins.
   Statistics provide little support for the anecdotal evidence.
   Scoring in MLS through mid-May this season compared with last is down nearly two-tenths of a goal a game (2.96 to 2.80). In Argentina, scoring dropped from 2.7 goals a game in the 2005 Clausura championship to 2.3 this year.
   ‘Whenever we’ve introduced a new ball, it’s always been the same – goalkeepers don’t like it,’ said Antonio Zea, head of product marketing for Adidas’ US soccer division. ‘They have to react quicker, act faster.’
   American goalkeepers aren’t the only ones complaining. When Jens Lehmann had his first experience with the ball at the German national team training camp in Geneva, he didn’t like it, either.
   ‘When it rains, it’s going to be very uncomfortable for us,’ Lehmann said. ‘It gets very slippery and flutters in the air.’
   Adidas contends the Teamgeist is three times more accurate than its closest competitors, but does not provide data from tests with its robotic leg at its laboratory in Scheinfeld, Germany.
   Adidas introduced the familiar 32-panel ball to the World Cup in 1970 in Mexico with its ‘Telstar.’ It was iconic in a sense that it also introduced the widely recognised pattern of alternating black and white panels that year, mainly for the purpose of television.
   The 32-panel ball replaced the standard design of all-brown or all-white leather featuring 18-panels of horizontal strips, a design similar to a volleyball. That style was known by many in the trade as the Santiago because of its use at the 1962 World Cup in Chile.
   The World Cup ball is white with black markings and some gold lines; the MLS ball has blue and green. The ball for the July 9 final in Berlin will have a gold tint.
   While the Telstar was the first laceless ball at the World Cup, Teamgeist will be the first stitchless ball. Adidas is using a gluing and heating process to create a watertight seal as well as a more supple feel.
   Teamgeist also includes a graphic change from the 2002 World Cup Fevernova ball that was criticised for a wobbling appearance while rotating in flight.
   ‘There is a symmetrical balance in the engineering, a true centre of the ball,’ Adidas senior industrial designer Scott Tomlinson said.
   Regardless of design, intent or empirical data, entrenched perceptions remain.
   ‘Goalkeepers always hate a new ball,’ Chivas USA and former Mexican national team striker Francisco ‘Paco’ Palencia said. ‘The people that make balls always want to see more goals. So it’s not good for (goalkeepers). But for me it’s good.’

Crazy as it sounds, not all Brazilians will be rooting for their country in the 2006 World Cup.
   In fact, some will be working hard to keep Carlos Alberto Parreira and his Brazilian players from repeating as world champions.
   To be fair, most would have been happy to help their countrymen – but they couldn’t catch on with Brazil’s team, so they’ll take part as members of other national squads instead. In addition to Parreira, four other Brazilians will be coaching national teams, and five Brazilian-born players have been summoned to play with other nations.
   And it’s no surprise. The country’s soccer talent pool is so deep that some say its second-stringers could contend for the title. Standouts such as Real Madrid’s Julio Baptista and Valencia’s Edu were left off the final roster.
   ‘Every time is like this,’ Mario Zagallo, Brazil’s assistant coach and a former player, said recently. ‘There are always a lot of options for Brazil.’
   The most prominent names among coaches include Zico, a former Brazilian all-star who commands the Japanese national team, and Luiz Felipe Scolari, who led Brazil to their fifth world title in 2002 and now coaches Portugal.
   Players include one of Portugal’s stars, Deco, who was born in Brazil and grew up playing locally before adopting Portuguese citizenship. The Barcelona midfielder said he made the move after realising he would not have an opportunity to play on Brazil’s national team.
   Parreira recently said Deco would likely have a chance to play for Brazil now, but FIFA doesn’t allow players to switch back their citizenship once it has been changed.
   Brazilian-born midfielder Antonio Naelson made a similar move, seeking Mexican citizenship so he could play for that country. Barely known in Brazil, Naelson has been included in coach Ricardo Lavolpe’s Mexican squad for the World Cup.
   Spain enter the tournament with midfielder Marcos Senna, a 29-year-old Brazilian naturalised Spaniard who moved to Villarreal in 2002 after failing to settle with Brazilian clubs. He debuted with Spain on March 1 as a substitute in a 3-2 win over Ivory Coast in a friendly.
   ‘It would be a dream come true to participate in this World Cup,’ he said before his final selection.
   Japan, one of Brazil’s opponents in Group F, selected midfielder Alessandro Santos, who was born in Brazil and now is a regular starter on Zico’s team. And Tunisia will count on Brazilian striker Jose Clayton, a key player in the African team’s campaign to qualify for their second straight World Cup finals.
   Another Brazilian in Germany is coach Marcos Paqueta, who will lead Saudi Arabia. Paqueta, who has been coaching Arab clubs since 2004, has seven Brazilians as members of his staff.
   Costa Rica also will be led by a Brazilian coach for the second consecutive World Cup. Alexandre Guimaraes will lead the Costa Ricans when they open the tournament against host Germany on June 9.

Frankfurt will try to shake off its image as a grey financial capital by proving it has a knack for the spectacular at the World Cup.
   The small city on the river Main breathes power and money—the European Central Bank and all major German banks have their headquarters here—but is not at first glance one of Germany’s more lively or attractive places.
   Frankfurters like to refer to the place as ‘Mainhattan’ for a collection of skyscrapers that are among the tallest in Europe but the comparison to New York City otherwise seems faintly absurd.
   Most of the 50 million people landing each year at Frankfurt airport, the biggest in continental Europe, skip the city altogether, taking connecting flights or the high-speed trains that provide outstanding links with much of the rest of Europe.
   There is an interesting collection of museums and a handsomely rebuilt main square, where Germany teams are traditionally welcomed home after successful tournaments.
   There is little else, though, to attract the casual visitor to Frankfurt, especially when the influx of business travellers for the many trade fairs pushes hotel prices to scandalous highs.
   Hotel rooms will be at a premium during the World Cup as well but that will not stop football fans packing the city for an attractive series of games.
   England play Paraguay here in their first match at the rebuilt Waldstadion on June 10 and the handy location will lead many fans to use the city as a base for the tournament.
   That represents a good opportunity and the city wants to make use of it by staging two spectacular events. Now that the planned opening gala in Berlin has been cancelled, Frankfurt believes its Sky Arena project will be remembered as the real opening ceremony.
   From June 3-5, the city stages a huge light show, projecting photographs and other images on to 40 skyscrapers dotted around the city.
   Gigantic close-ups of Ronaldo and Oliver Kahn leering into the night might not be to everyone’s taste but it should be a striking way to celebrate the final build-up to the world’s greatest sporting event.
   The other sign of Frankfurt’s ambition to shed its image is the choice of public viewing site.
   While other towns and cities across Germany will show matches in squares or parks, Frankfurt has chosen the river Main itself, with a giant screen being erected on the water for fans to see from the banks.
   For those interested in seeing a bit more than football, there are seven excellent museums along the Schaumankai on the south bank of the river. The highlight is the Staedel, an outstanding art gallery.
   In the west end of the city is the Senckenberg, one of Europe’s most important natural history museums, and in general there is more history here than outsiders might imagine.
   Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Germany’s great poet and dramatist, was born here in 1848, while kings and emperors were crowned in the city for almost a thousand years from the ninth century to the 18th.
   Now, Frankfurt is notable for its international flavour, with around a third of the 650,000 or so inhabitants being of non-German nationality.
   The old town was largely destroyed in bombing raids towards the end of World War Two. Plenty of hideous concrete buildings were hastily thrown up in the centre, which can give the city the feel of a 1970s shopping centre but around the Roemerberg at the very heart of the city a much finer job was done in recreating the look of the Altstadt.
   Most visitors to Frankfurt will naturally head south of the Main to the attractive Sachsenhausen district.
   The old part of Frankfurt contains the old taverns specialising in Apple wine, of which the city is bizarrely proud. Those who remain unconvinced by what is basically flat cider will find plenty of more modern bars with international menus on the wide streets of the district.
   Frankfurt is hosting five matches, including one quarter-final. The Waldstadion, a veteran of the 1974 World Cup but now completely rebuilt, should please most fans, as long as the rain holds off. The stadium hosted the final of the Confederations Cup in 2005 and organisers were acutely embarrassed when heavy rains burst through the large canopy over the stadium and cascaded down on the pitch.
   The fault has been fixed, says the stadium’s manager Herr Nass, which fittingly translates as Mr Wet. With luck, the amended design will not be put to the test.

Brazilian stars Cafu and Kaka are fully aware of the threat posed by Czech Republic at this summer’s World Cup finals.
   Living legend Cafu is eyeing up his third winner’s medal in the tournament, which will see him equal the great Pele in regards to world titles.
   Cafu’s club-mate Kaka is aiming to become the second youngest player to win the World Cup twice, a record that is held by Pele.
   And the young star is anxious to show his ability at this tournament after limited participation in 2002.
   ‘If it turns out well, I would be very, very happy,’ he said.
   However, both players admit that they have a lot of hard work ahead of them and many difficult teams to beat, none more so that Czech Republic for whom Milan team-mate Marek Jankulovski is a vital player.
   ‘We have spoken to Marek about the World Cup finals, for example about how tough both of our groups are,’ said Cafu.
   ‘Even if Marek does not start in all the games, we know of his qualities from his time at Milan,’ Kaka added.
   ‘As well as him (Jankulovski) we also know of Pavel Nedved from Juventus who is a very gifted player.’
   Perhaps somewhat strangely Cafu is sad to see the two nations drawn in separate groups at the World Cup.
   ‘It is a pity that we don’t have Czech Republic in our group, that way we could have advanced together and avoided each other later on in the tournament.
   ‘This way there is a lot more work to do.’
   When asked to compare the World Cup-winning side of 2002 to the current Brazil squad, the experienced full-back said, ‘They are two very different teams,two different styles of play but our goal is always the same.
   ‘To obey the coach, reach the final and become world champions once again.’

Togo’s World Cup preparations have been hit by cold weather and a chicken-pox scare, according to the country’s team doctor.
   Togo were forced to train on an artificial pitch at their camp here due to driving hail and temperatures that plummeted to 10 degrees Celsius, but it was the discovery of the potentially contagious chicken-pox in the camp that has most worried the west African nation.
   Striker Richard Forson, who plays for French amateur side Poire-sur-vie, was the first to be struck down with the virus.
   ‘Forson was really ill, he had a fever and was bed-ridden,’ said Togo’s German doctor Joachim Schubert who said the player could start training again in two or three days.
   ‘We don’t yet know if the other players had chicken-pox when they were young and hence whether they have been immunised against this contagious virus,’ added Schubert, although none of the others have come down with the virus.
   Meanwhile, the players have demanded 155,000 euros (200,000 dollars) each to participate in the June 9-July 9 finals, Togo football president Rock Gnassingbe told national television on Monday.
   ‘The players have demanded 155,000 euros each... this figure is high given the financial situation of our country,’ said Gnassingbe who will head a delegation from the federation that will travel to Germany to discuss the financial package with their players.
   They have also demanded 30,000 euros (38,600 dollars) per victory and half that amount for each defeat, meaning the tournament could cost the federation six million euros (7.7 million dollars).
   Togo’s players have a history of making such demands having acted similarly prior to the African Nations Cup finals in Egypt earlier this year.
   Then, however, they demanded just over 3,000 euros (3,860 dollars) each to join a training camp and 10 times that amount for playing in the tournament. They received all their training camp demands but only half of that for the competition.
   ‘We will try to sort this situation out as best as possible,’ added Gnassingbe.

France World Cup coach Raymond Domenech is backing a project by musicians and athletes to use soccer to break down social barriers, stop racism and create jobs.
   Domenech called for an end to ‘intolerable displays of racism inside soccer stadiums’ and said the ‘whole French team is supporting the means to stop this.’
   Singer Marc Lavoine and Yannick Noah – the former French Open champion turned singer – are recording a World Cup song called ‘Douce France,’ or ‘Tender France.’ They are among 50 people, including France defender Jean-Alain Boumsong, featured on the record.
   ‘We need to amplify this project at a national level,’ Domenech said. ‘Football is the link we needed to put this project into the spotlight.’— AP
   Ronaldinho’s locks on auction
   Two locks of Brazil star Ronaldinho’s hair were put up for auction by a Swiss newspaper Tuesday to raise funds for a cancer charity.
   The hair was collected by a team of Swiss barbers who were called in to the Brazilian squad’s lakeside training base at Weggis in central Switzerland, the tabloid daily Blick said.
   ‘They’re very thick and strong with lots of natural curls. Not easy hair,’ one of the hairdressers, Beat Fuchs, told the newspaper.
   ‘Ronaldinho wants a comfortable cut that doesn’t hamper him during the game.’
   Bidders were invited to send their bids for the slender curls of hair by text message, or by post by Wednesday at the latest. The money will go to the central Swiss anti-cancer league. — AFP
   Anything but football
   A hotel is offering football-free breaks for ‘soccer widows’ desperate to escape wall-to-wall coverage of the World Cup.
   Any guest who overhears a member of staff mentioning the f-word – football – will be given a free glass of champagne.
   ‘The bookings are starting to stream in,’ said Mike Bevans, manager of the Linthwaite House Hotel in the picturesque Lake District, one of the country’s prime tourist destinations.
   The sport supplements are being taken out of daily newspapers and, instead of blanket TV coverage of the big games, guests will be offered a string of romantic movies on DVD like ‘Dirty Dancing’ and ‘Pretty Woman.’ —Reuters
   South Koreans see semis as a bridge too far
   Nearly 90 per cent of South Koreans think their team will reach the second round of the World Cup but fewer than four per cent think the side can make the semi-finals.
   On home soil in 2002, South Korea reached the last four where they lost to Germany, the hosts this time around.
   The survey of 1,094 people, conducted by Sports Forum 21 and Global Sports Marketing, two Seoul-based private sports research centres, found that 88.3 per cent of South Koreans thought the team would survive the group stage, Yonhap reported.
   Also, 24.1 per cent said they believed the South Korean team would reach the quarterfinals.
   However, only a hardcore 3.8 per cent expected the team to do as well as it did in 2002 and make it to the semifinals.
   No margin of error for the survey was given, Yonhap said. — AFP
   Ukrainian PM urges bosses to let staff watch match
   Ukraine’s prime minister has urged bosses to adjust the working day or set up television sets so staff can watch the national side open their World Cup campaign against Spain on June 14.
   ‘On June 14 at 4:00pm we can expect an epidemic of unknown diseases. People will call in sick en masse,’ Yuri Yekhanurov told a cabinet meeting on Wednesday. —Reuters

Germany officially declared itself ready for the World Cup on Wednesday when a final government progress report said everything was in place for a successful tournament.
   ‘Germany is ready,’ Interior Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said, nine days before the climax of nine years of planning.
   At a Berlin news conference alongside soccer great Franz Beckenbauer, who is head of the tournament’s organising committee, Schaeuble was at pains to stress German hospitality after a wave of negative publicity over racist attacks.
   ‘We want to show our country is friendly to foreigners,’ Schaeuble said. ‘Germany is an open, peaceful and tolerant country and we will show that during the World Cup too.’
   He said the government had agreed with world soccer body FIFA to send out a strong anti-racism message during the 32-nation tournament which kicks off on June 9.
   Before the quarter-final games, all team captains will read out statements condemning discrimination in soccer and in society, with the motto ‘Say No to Racism’.
   Schaeuble said it was a universal message and denied it was a specific response to fears that German far-rightists might try to exploit the World Cup for propaganda purposes.
   Germany sees hosting one of the biggest events in sport as a chance to boost its image throughout the world and show its people as welcoming and fun-loving.
   It has adopted the tournament motto ‘A Time to Make Friends’, although Beckenbauer jokingly conceded that some of his more reserved countrymen might need ‘a bit of a push’ to lighten up and smile.
   Preparations have been dogged at various times by criticism of ticketing arrangements and stadium safety, and fears that far-rightists or hooligans could spoil the party.
   Schaeuble said ‘everything that is humanly possible’ had been done to guarantee security, in the face of what authorities describe as a generalised risk of terrorist attacks. They stress they have no intelligence of any concrete militant plans.
   On the other main security challenge, hooliganism, he said troublemakers would be dealt with ‘very decisively’.
   ‘We are closely cooperating with all neighbouring and participating countries on the hooligan problem,’ he said.

If Germany does well at the World Cup, some of the merit will be American.
   Coach Juergen Klinsmann resisted pressure from many soccer officials to move back to Germany and continued to live in his Californian home until shortly before the World Cup.
   It won’t change if he keeps the job after the World Cup.
   Living in the United States, Klinsmann said, ‘was definitely an advantage, or is still, even if I continue afterward back and forth, to get a distance and look at things outside the box and it helps.’
   ‘You learn to set priorities and what is really important to develop this team. And living in the US it gives you a different perspective,’ he said.
   Klinsmann usually commutes between Los Angeles and Frankfurt, a decision that irked a number of important officials, including Franz Beckenbauer, the country’s most influential soccer personality and president of the World Cup organizing committee.
   But he never gave in, often stressing how important for him it was to spend enough time with his American wife and their two children.
   Speaking to a group of reporters at the German training base in Switzerland, Klinsmann talked about other US influences.
   ‘Living in the US gives you a different perspective. I learned from Bruce Arena and from different coaches in different sports in the US It widens your picture, definitely,’ he said.
   Klinsmann is good friends with Arena, the coach of the United States team, and spent some time observing Arena’s methods.
   He also worked with the Los Angeles Galaxy and he is a partner in Soccer Solutions, a consultancy that developed his concept for running the German team.
   Among other moves that raised eyebrows in Germany, Klinsmann hired Mark Verstegen to be his main fitness trainer. Verstegen is founder and president of Athletes’ Performance, a high-tech training outfit with centers in Arizona and California used by many US pro athletes from different sports.
   Verstegen has brought in some of his staff and some of his equipment to improve the German team’s fitness before the World Cup.
   Klinsmann, who completed a coaching course in Germany but was never in charge of a team until getting one of the biggest jobs in international soccer has surrounded himself with a staff of trusted friends and colleagues. Andreas Koepke is goalkeeping coach, Joachim Loew devises training programs and game plans and general manager Oliver Bierhoff works with sponsors, media, logistics and similar.
   So, is Germany soon to have defensive and offensive coordinators?
   ‘I think, independently now of what happened in the US, the future in professional sports will go more and more individual because if you have a team of 23 players, they are all different.
   ‘In order to make everyone a better player you have to work individually more and more and then bring them back together, to fit the puzzle into the group dynamic,’ Klinsmann said.
   He said players will realize they need professional advisers in many area, ‘and I don’t mean those that tap them on the shoulder every day, but real professional advisers.’
   ‘From a personal fitness coach, possibly a mental coach or sports psychologist, you have your financial adviser, your legal adviser, so every player, every athlete will have a set of experts in order to get better.

The Austrian maker of the energy drink Red Bull denied reports on Tuesday that it had offered Brazilian striker Ronaldo a 10-year contract worth 120 million dollars to play for US club Red Bull New York.
   ‘It is false that there is or was a 10-year offer in the absurd amount of 120 million dollars,’ the company said in a statement.
   ‘There was and is no such offer for Ronaldo. Therefore, he cannot have rejected it,’ Red Bull added.
   The company said it had been in talks with the Brazilian superstar however, including over a move to the New York team, which Red Bull bought in March.
   Ronaldo, who plays for Spanish club Real Madrid, said Monday he could envisage playing in the United States in the future but was for the present focused only on his country’s defence of the World Cup.
   His agent Fabiano Farah said, however, that he had turned down a 120-million-dollar, 10-year deal for Ronaldo to play for Red Bull New York in the US Major League Soccer.

Frank Lampard wants the chance to avenge the 2002 World Cup defeat to Brazil, at this summer’s tournament.
   The 27-year-old midfield maestro did not feature in the 2-1 defeat to the world champions, but desperately wants to make up for the result.
   Popular opinion suggests that Brazil are the favourites and Lampard does not disagree, but feels England’s team spirit could take them all the way.
   ‘I would love to play against them,’ he told the German Kicker magazine.
   ‘It would give us the chance to put things right again after they beat us 2-1 in the quarter-finals in the 2002 World Cup.
   ‘A good defence, goals and a portion of luck are what every team needs if they want to win tournaments – it’s irrelevant whether we’re talking about a club team, a national team, a professional or amateur team, a World Cup or a youth tournament.
   ‘We owe it to ourselves to beat them this time.’
   England’s World Cup campaign gets underway against Paraguay on June 10, before they play Trinidad & Tobago and Sweden in the last games in Group B.

David Beckham has revealed that Frank Lampard will continue with his penalty duties for England, despite missing against Hungary.
   The Chelsea midfielder saw Gabor Kiraly save his spot-kick during the first half of England’s 3-1 victory at Old Trafford.
   Beckham has explained that Lampard will remain the number one penalty taker and he also paid tribute to team-mate Steven Gerrard, who headed the opener from an excellent cross by the captain.
   ‘Of course Frank’s the penalty taker and I’ve missed one or two in the past and carried on taking them,’ Beckham told Sky Sports.
   ‘Frank’s a great penalty taker and hardly misses. Unfortunately tonight [he did], but he’ll definitely stay penalty taker.
   ‘I think Steven can play so many positions as he’s so talented and strong, going forward and in defence, but I think his strong part is going forward. That gave him the option tonight so everyone was happy with his performance.
   ‘Everyone was happy with his performance, of course, he’s a great player who has had a great season so far. It worked well tonight.’
   Beckham is still hoping Wayne Rooney will be fit to take part in the finals, despite all the pessimism surrounding his make-or-break scan next week, with Theo Walcott ready to shine after grabbing Rooney’s record of being the youngest player to represent England.
   ‘Of course, everyone wants Wayne to be fit,’ he stated. ‘I want Wayne to be fit and I want him to be right but, at the end of the day, we have got other players in the team.
   ‘It’s a big squad and a talented squad and we proved tonight we can play football and, if we work hard together, we’ll win games.
   ‘It does make me feel old when I look at Theo but he’s a very talented player. He’s very young but lively and, when he gets a chance, he’ll take it.
   ‘Congratulations to him and his family. He’s a great player and also a great lad as well.’

Every four years, the eyes of the world turn to the largest sporting event on the planet – the World Cup.
   The immense global interest in this event of course cranks up the pressure behind the scenes. With three million spectators in the 12 stadiums, and more than 30 billion television viewers expected to follow the competition, FIFA has become one of the world’s heaviest IT network users and is placing non-stop demands on critical systems, from accreditation and security to logistics and match results.
   FIFA and the German organising committee needed fast and reliable systems, applications and infrastructure, both beforehand, for the planning, and even more so now, for the smooth running of an event as large-scale and significant as the World Cup. Everything, therefore, has to function perfectly – and this is where the Information Technology (IT) Solution is playing a crucial role, with four key players involved.
   Avaya, Deutsche Telekom, Toshiba and Yahoo are each market leaders in their respective fields and have provided the cutting-edge products and services necessary to the success of the technology implementation project that is the IT Solution. One look at the key stats confirms the complexity of the project: 40,000 network connections; 10,000 communications and network devices; 3,000 notebooks; 1,000 IT staff members and volunteers; 25 communication servers; 45 application servers; over 8,000 kilometres of temporary cabling and more than 15 terabytes of converged voice and data traffic.
   ‘There is real pressure on FIFA to get the project done,’ says Michael Kelly, head of IT Solution at FIFA. ‘For example, every stadium is its own entity with various technical differences. Nevertheless, the IT Solution must deploy – in less than a month - a dynamic, secure and highly reliable event network which integrates all 12 World Cup stadiums into one seamless entity. At FIFA, we rely on our official IT partners to help us successfully manage what is effectively 12 simultaneous large-scale implementation projects.’
   As the official convergence communication provider, Avaya is providing the data networking components, services and software needed to power the event network, and is responsible for implementing and managing the voice and data network infrastructure and software to meet the stringent availability requirements of the World Cup. The company is also working together with Deutsche Telekom in the implementation, monitoring and overall management of the event network.
   Avaya set up a highly impressive and efficient test laboratory in Frankfurt featuring the core components and control panels which have actually been implemented in all 12 stadiums. The various devices used throughout the venues were put through their paces here, with every conceivable (and inconceivable) situation simulated to make sure that this advanced technology had a few warm-up matches before the tournament began – after all, the FIFA World Cup event network must be able to cope with the kind of demands imposed by multinational corporations with complex processes and high levels of time pressure.
   Via its T-Com and T-Systems operating units, Deutsche Telekom is providing the telecommunications and systems integration services and products needed to drive event operations. T-Com forms the backbone of the World Cup event network, supplying all of the telecommunications services to support the data and telephony needs of the World Cup as well as the networking experts to work together with Avaya to design, plan and build the event network.
   The T-Systems division of the company is providing support services for the event network, systems integration and IT operations at all venues as well as the central IT command centre, and is also hosting all IT Solution applications at a highly secure data centre located in Germany. This ‘fortress’ is acting as the nerve centre for the entire FIFA IT Solution, housing the servers that support the Event Management and Event Information Systems.
   In 2002, 90 per cent of the computers used at the World Cup Korea/Japan were desktops. Four years on, FIFA exclusively uses Toshiba Tecra notebooks – 3,000 of them, in fact - meaning that all of those involved with the running of the tournament have access to information, statistics, match data and online reports via their personal Toshiba notebook PCs – a boon for FIFA and organising committee employees who are constantly travelling between the 12 host cities. As well as being high-performance, the Tecra notebooks are both robust and secure in terms of viruses and also physical theft, thus maximising productivity and minimising risk and downtime.
   Through Yahoo’s leading Internet solutions, the press have all the information that they need at their fingertips. Yahoo has developed the media channel - the virtual media centre of the 2006 FIFA World Cup which is available to the 15,000 accredited press representatives working at the event. As the official website services provider of the 2006 FIFA World Cup, Yahoo has also created the official website, FIFAworldcup.com.
   It is not merely a business proposition for the four official IT Partners, however. They are here because they love football. ‘The reason we originally became involved in the FIFA World Cup was that after being spun off from Lucent Technologies, we saw it as both a branding opportunity and an internal morale-booster,’ explains Doug Gardner, managing director of Avaya’s FIFA World Cup technical programme. ‘It’s been very good for raising our global profile, as almost everyone is passionate about the FIFA World Cup.’
   Perhaps Thomas Wolter, T-Systems Enterprise Services’ executive vice-president of Systems Integration, sums it up perfectly ‘It’s just like when you go into the stadium and hear your national anthem - you get goose pimples. That’s how all our employees working on this project feel and that’s why they take pride in working on it.’

Sven-Goran Eriksson promised that Theo Walcott will see World Cup action this summer after watching the Arsenal forward claim Wayne Rooney’s record as England’s youngest ever international.
   Walcott, a shock inclusion in Eriksson’s World Cup squad having never played a Premiership match, ousted Rooney from the record books when he came on as a 65th-minute substitute for Michael Owen in England’s 3-1 win over Hungary.
   Walcott was just 17 years and 75 days as he took to the field, 36 days younger than Rooney was when he made his debut against Australia in 2003.
   He might have done better with the solitary half-chance that came his way but it was clear that Walcott’s pace had an unsettling effect on the tiring Hungarian defenders.
   Eriksson said afterwards that was exactly the sort of impact he hoped the youngster could have in Germany.
   ‘I think he wins confidence every time he trains with us, every time he plays or comes on and I think in the World Cup you will see him, although not from the beginning maybe,’ Eriksson said.
   ‘The pace he has—he showed it once again—can be very useful.’
   Like Rooney before him, Walcott was promoted to the full national squad without having featured for the under-21s.
   His elevation was all the more remarkable because he has not appeared in the Arsenal first team since joining from Southampton in January in a deal that could eventually cost the London club 12 million pounds—a world record for a 16-year-old.

For Argentina defender Roberto Ayala, Tuesday’s encounter against Angola was more than just a warm-up match for the 2006 World Cup.
   The man they call El Raton (The Mouse) made his 100th appearance in the famous blue and white stripes as Maxi Rodriguez’s strike and an own goal from Angola’s Andre Mateus secured a 2-0 win for Jose Pekerman’s team.
   However, whatever his pride at this achievement, Ayala stressed that he had an even greater goal on his mind. ‘I’d gladly exchange my 100 caps for winning the World Cup,’ said the imposing centre-half before the match in Salerno, Italy. In completing his century, Ayala joined a select band of players that includes the likes of Diego Simeone (106) and Javier Zanetti (102).
   The Valencia man made the libero position his own back in 1994 and has been an undisputed first choice in the Albiceleste back line ever since. As well as being a key component of the side that took silver at the 1996 Olympic Football Tournament in Atlanta, Ayala featured in all five of his country’s games at the 1998 FIFA World Cup in France.
   It was an entirely different story at Korea/Japan 2002, though, when he was struck down with injury while warming up for the opening game against Nigeria, and was forced to sit out the rest of the tournament.
   The tough-tackling centre-back began his career with Ferro Carril Oeste and enjoyed a spell with River Plate before embarking for Europe, where his first port of call was Italy. After turning out for Napoli and AC Milan, he signed on the dotted line for an upwardly mobile Valencia in 2000.
   With so much experience behind him, the 33-year-old is calmness personified in the countdown to his country’s opening game against Cote d’Ivoire on June 10. Speaking before the Angola match, he said: ‘I’m very relaxed, just like the rest of the squad.

Mexico coach Ricardo La Volpe, an Argentine known for his gruff manner, laid into the Mexican press on Tuesday.
   ‘You know nothing about football, nothing,’ La Volpe told a reporter in a hotel in the Dutch town of Noordwijk, where Mexico were preparing for a friendly on Thursday against the Netherlands.
   ‘Don’t break my balls between now and the World Cup,’ said La Volpe, who has often courted controversy in his 3 ½ years in charge despite a series of good results.

Forward Jose Antonio Reyes believes Spain could do with Fernando Morientes’s eye for goal after Saturday’s 0-0 draw with Russia in a World Cup warm-up.
   ‘We miss him because he does well for us up front and scores lots of goals,’ Reyes told a news conference on Tuesday.
   Morientes, who has just agreed to move from Liverpool to Valencia, was left out of the World Cup squad after Luis Aragones opted to take only three strikers.
   ‘Morientes is a magnificent player but it is more positive to talk about the players who are here than about those that aren’t,’ Valencia goalkeeper Santiago Canizares said.
   ‘The warm-up games are all about trying out different systems and players in different positions.

Portugal winger Luis Figo is tipping Manchester United star Cristiano Ronaldo to spark their charge towards World Cup glory.
   Ronaldo’s bewitching skills have lit up The Premiership and Internazionale veteran Figo is tipping him to carry his form on into Germany.
   ‘He has been working well and can be one of the stars of the tournament,’ said Figo.
   ‘Cristiano is having an incredible career.’
   Figo is in the autumn of his career and is hoping to bow out on a high.
   ‘I hope, in 40 years, I will be able to say I once lifted the World Cup,’ he added. ‘We will give it our best chance.
   ‘Our aim is always to make it to the final.’

Travel agent forced to cancel tours
   A Japanese travel agency said Wednesday it had cancelled tours to World Cup football matches involving Japan after failing to obtain match tickets promised by a Chinese go-between.
   Seiichi Sashida, president of Max Air Service, said the China International Sports Travel Corp. had promised his company tickets for the finals, which open on June 9, but the Beijing firm had failed to deliver them.
   ‘I feel very angry about the fact that the corporation has failed to obtain a single ticket as a result. I don’t know how I can apologize to (football) supporters,’ he told a news conference.
   He said about 1,100 people had applied for the tours priced at up to 550,000 yen (4,460 dollars). The highest price was for an all-inclusive package complete with match tickets, air travel and accommodation.
   Sashida said he had paid the government-affiliated firm some 80 million yen (7,100 dollars) for about 3,700 World Cup tickets as advance payment for a contract he signed in January.
   He quoted a senior official of the firm as saying: ‘We are deeply involved with the 2008 Beijing Olympics and we can obtain World Cup tickets from the (football governing body) FIFA through special channels.’
   Sashida said the corporation told him it had no tickets when he visited Beijing this week and that he decided on Tuesday to cancel the tours.
   ‘I have trust in the Chinese firm but I will take legal action if it is confirmed that I have been deceived,’ he said.
   Don’t frighten the horses
   Patriotic English fans who attach flags to their cars could be in trouble with the police.
   Motorists in rural Hampshire have been warned their World Cup flags are frightening the horses.
   ‘It is commendable that the nation is getting behind their football team, but I do have concerns that motorists may cause an animal to bolt and possibly cause injury to itself, its rider or innocent passers-by,’ said Police Constable Derek Grist.
   Thousands of cars and vans across the country are sporting the English flag, often attached to the radio antenna, in the run-up to the World Cup which starts in Germany on June 9.
   Grist, the local force’s Equine Liaison Officer, said drivers could face assault charges if their flag flew off and struck a pedestrian or a cyclist and hurt them.
   ‘We are not trying to be killjoys. All we ask for is a little bit of consideration,’ he said in a statement. — Reuters

Sven-Goran Eriksson gave his new-look England side a cautious thumbs up after they beat Hungary 3-1 in a pre-World Cup friendly on Tuesday.
   Eriksson used midfielder Steven Gerrard as a forward and defender Jamie Carragher as a holding midfielder as he looked for a way to replace injured striker Wayne Rooney.
   It was not wholly convincing, but England got the result they needed less than two weeks before opening their Group B campaign in Germany against Paraguay.
   Eriksson’s men toiled in the first half before headed goals soon after the break from Gerrard and John Terry, his first for his country, set them on their way. Substitute Peter Crouch added the third after a fine strike by Hungary’s Pal Dardai.
   ‘We talked about it at halftime, that we have to be patient and try to win the ball a bit higher up,’ Eriksson said.
   ‘In the first half, every time we lost the ball they started to attack and did it very well. When we won it, they were good at getting nine men behind the ball.
   ‘It was very difficult to find space...We can do better. We could have scored a couple of goals and things would have been different.
   ‘But overall it was a good result, nice goals from us and a very nice one from Hungary. I’m happy. Many more positive things than some small negative things.’
   As for Gerrard’s performance, he said, ‘Wherever I put Steven Gerrard he plays excellently. He’s a complete footballer, he can do everything.’
   Eriksson was delighted with skipper David Beckham, whose crosses set up the first two goals.
   ‘The assist he gives, you can’t find in all the world,’ he said.
   He defended the performance of Owen, who lacked sharpness and is clearly short of his best after a prolonged injury absence.
   ‘I’m not worried about Michael Owen,’ he said. ‘I’ve known him for more than five years.
   ‘When it’s the World Cup, the music is different for him. It’s always been like that. He didn’t go into hard tackles today and I agree with him but he will when it’s the World Cup.’
   Eriksson said right-back Gary Neville had been taken off earlier than planned.
   ‘We did it because he had a small problem with his hamstring but it was a precaution,’ he said.
   There was praise for 17-year-old forward Theo Walcott who came on as a substitute and made history as England’s youngest player, having turned out in a B international last week.
   ‘He wins confidence every time he trains with us and plays for us,’ Eriksson said.
   ‘I think you will see him in the World Cup, maybe not from the beginning, but he showed his pace here and that can be useful.’

Top seed Roger Federer beat Colombia’s Alejandro Falla 6-1, 6-4, 6-3 to reach the French Open third round on Wednesday.
   The Swiss world number one now faces either Chilean 32nd seed Nicolas Massu or Max Mirnyi of Belarus for a place in the fourth round.
   Russian fourth seed Maria Sharapova booked her place in the French Open third round on Wednesday with a 6-4, 6-1 win over the Czech Republic’s Iveta Benesova.
   Sharapova now takes on either Australia’s Alicia Molik or Anda Perianu of Romania for a place in the fourth round.
   Earlier, Russia’s Nikolay Davydenko and Dinara Safina reached the French Open third round on Wednesday, revelling in the cold, damp conditions which were more Moscow than springtime Paris.
   Davydenko, the men’s sixth seed, booked his place when Brazil’s Flavio Saretta pulled out with flu with the Russian leading 6-2, 4-1 while Safina, the women’s 14th seed, brushed aside Hana Sromova of the Czech Republic 6-0, 6-2.
   Russia had 15 women in the first round draw here while five Russian men started out hoping to emulate compatriot Yevgeny Kafelnikov, the last man from their country to lift the men’s title here in 1996.
   ‘There’s no doubt that the Russians are getting better and we will really be ready for the Davis Cup semi-final with America in September,’ said Davydenko.
   Former world number one Marat Safin was a first round loser but Dmitry Tursunov, Mikhail Youzhny and teenager Evgeny Korolev all made it through to the second round.
   Igor Andreev, the world number 26 and the last man to beat Rafael Nadal on clay, is absent through injury.
   Davydenko believes part of the reason for the growth in men’s tennis in Russia is the tendency for players to live and practice outside the country.
   Davydenko now faces 1998 champion Carlos Moya of Spain, the 30th seed who put out Youzhny 6-3, 6-4, 6-2.
   Safina, who now faces Slovenian 24th seed Katarina Srebotnik, admitted that advice from big brother Marat Safin had helped her in the last twelve months.
   Japanese 22nd seed Ai Sugiyama was knocked out by French qualifier Aravane Rezai 4-6, 6-4, 6-3 who goes on to face either Czech 16th seed Nicole Vaidisova or Sun Tiantian of China.
   Paris Masters champion Thomas Berdych of the Czech Republic, the 20th seed, was an early winner beating Filippo Volandri of Italy 6-3, 6-1, 6-1. He will take on either Frenchman Marc Gicquel or German 13th seed Nicolas Kiefer.
   Action early on Wednesday was interrupted by two lenghty rain delays.
   Later, Argentinian third seed David Nalbandian was to tackle France’s Richard Gasquet while American 11th seed Venus Williams had a date with Emma Laine of Finland.

David Platt says Sven-Goran Eriksson got it half right against Hungary – with Steven Gerrard’s new role the one experiment that didn’t work.
   The former England midfielder was happy with Jamie Carragher’s performance in the infamous holding role, but believes his Liverpool team-mate has some way to go before he can fill Wayne Rooney’s boots and play off a lone striker.
   Gerrard set Eriksson’s men on their way to a morale-boosting 3-1 win with a header and although he managed to find enough space to score his seventh international goal, Platt believes that is the biggest concern about England’s new second striker.
   ‘In my opinion, Steven Gerrard is such a good player that he makes a good fist of wherever you put him on the pitch,’ he told Sky Sports News.
   ‘For Liverpool this season he’s operated in that position but it’s not been his starting position. Rafa Benitez has played him on the right-hand side and told him he can drift into that position and as a consequence, drifting from the right-hand side, he gets in there free.
   ‘I think last night because that was his actual starting position, that it wasn’t as successful as the Jamie Carragher experiment.
   ‘Like I say, he is such a good player that he makes a good fist of it but I’m not too sure that against a really good side, he’s going to get any real space. And finding space is the key to playing in that area.’
   Platt, who won 62 caps in the England midfield and starred in the 1990 World Cup, was more positive about Carragher’s performance in front of the back four.
   The Liverpool defender was the surprise inclusion ahead of Michael Carrick and Owen Hargreaves and although he was moved to right-back at the break, did little wrong, defensively at least, in a rare England start.
   ‘He isn’t going to sit in there and spread passes around like Carrick,’ he said. ‘Michael Carrick is much more offensive in that situation.
   ‘But playing Carragher in there, he’s got those defensive principles, that defensive mind and he’ll shield John Terry and Rio Ferdinand.
   ‘He’ll break up play, he’ll win the ball and give it to the others. He played in that hole and I think he played very well in there. I thought that experiment worked very well.’
   Platt also gave his backing to skipper David Beckham, despite many calls to give Aaron Lennon a run down the right-hand side after his livewire debut against Belarus.
   The England skipper is under pressure in some quarters despite setting up the first two goals with trademarks crosses from the right, but one of his predecessors says there is absolutely no question of leaving the Real Madrid man out – if only because of his dead-ball delivery.
   ‘I can never understand the clamour to take David Beckham out of the team because set pieces are responsible for so many goals at every level of football,’ he said.
   ‘Probably about 40 per cent of all the goals scored will come from set pieces and we have a player who delivers a football where he wants to, delivers a football at what pace he wants to and a player who is second to none in the world at doing that.
   ‘There isn’t a player in the world who can do that on such a consistent basis. Therefore, he becomes a really important weapon for us in the World Cup. In a tight game it can be the difference and we have someone who invariably puts it on the money all the time.’

The visiting Asian Football Confederation officials gave the green signal to the Bangladesh Football Federation to launch its first ever professional football league after the conclusion of the three-day workshop for the clubs intending to play in the league.
   At a press briefing, held at BFF House on Wednesday, the AFC officials disclosed the required ingredients for a professional league – which more or less exists in the country, but it needs restructuring and remodelling.
   The three AFC officials – Brendan Menton, Imtiaz Rehman and Subrata Suresh – conducted a three-day workshop for the participating clubs and they were satisfied with the response.
   ‘The clubs attended the workshop enthusiastically and we have discussed a lot of relevant things focusing on the professional management of a club,’ said Brendan Menton.
   ‘I think if the procedures are followed accordingly the proposed professional league make an instant impact on the country’s football.
   ‘Don't expect to achieve a miracle in a short time,’ said Menton who is AFC's Director of National Associations and Clubs.
   Kazi Salahuddin, the chairman of the professional League committee, was also hopeful about coming out from the traditional ways.
   ‘I believe that the clubs will be able to meet the demands of professional league as these are is not unattainable and football will come of age,’ said the former star.
   Abahani, Mohammedan Sporting Club, Brothers Union, Muktijoddha Sangsad KS, Sheikh Russell KC, Farashganj SC, Arambagh KS, Chittagong Abahani KC, Chittagong Mohammedan SC and Khulna Abahani KC have already confirmed their participation in the league, scheduled to kick off in September this year. Rahmatganj MFS may become the twelfth team.
   BFF general secretary Anwarul Huq Helal, senior vice-president Monir Ahmed also were present on the occasion.

England batsman Kevin Pietersen is a modern day Denis Compton, according to another former Test star Geoff Boycott.
   Pietersen's cavalier strokeplay has brought him centuries in both Tests in the current series against Sri Lanka.
   ‘People said Compton did outrageous things,’ said Boycott, in his column for the BBC Sport website.
   ‘But everybody I speak to tells me Compton had a sound basic technique and played lot of orthodox cricket shots - Kevin Pietersen does the same.’
   The 25-year-old's hundred at Edgbaston took his total to 1,203 runs from 13 Tests at an average of 50.12 and he is now in the top 10 of both the Test and one-day batting rankings.
   Compton, who was also an accomplished footballer with Arsenal, finished with a similar average after scoring 5,807 runs in 78 Tests between 1937-57.
   Like Pietersen, his flamboyance on and off the field earned him celebrity status.
   Pietersen's performances have fuelled talk of him ranking alongside the greats of English cricket when his career finishes.
   Boycott added: ‘It's too early to say that but he certainly has the ability and desire to go a long way.
   ‘It's difficult to judge somebody so early in his career but what's gone so far is very good.
   ‘Let's be frank, the Sri Lankan bowlers are not very good apart from Murali, who is an exceptional player even though Pietersen played him superbly.
   ‘The rest of the bowling is pretty ordinary but all you can do is play well against what you're given.’
   Meanwhile, English Cricket coach Duncan Fletcher claimed Tuesday that enigmatic batsman Kevin Pietersen’s success is down to attention to detail rather than pure flair. The 25-year-old scored 142 in England’s victory over Sri Lanka in the second Test at Edgbaston, taking Pietersen into the International Cricket Council’s top 10 batting rankings.
   Since breaking into the England team for the victorious Ashes series last year, Pietersen has average more than 50 in his first 13 Tests, including four centuries.
   That aggressive style of batting, which has already helped him hit 27 sixes to put him fifth on the England list of Test big-hitters, has led to some critics labelling him as nothing more than a slogger.
   But Fletcher claims it is his attention to detail that serves him so well. I just think he’s a very exciting player,’ said Fletcher.
   ‘He’s new to Test cricket and he’s done very, very well. He is exciting and I find him a very clever cricketer. People think he just goes out there and just plays the game, but he really thinks what he’s going to do. He doesn’t go out there and just play by instinct. Some shots maybe, but generally he’s got a good plan of how he’s going to play every bowler.’

Japan striker Naohiro Taka-hara believes his country can reach the semi-finals of the World Cup following their impressive display in Tuesday’s 2-2 friendly draw against hosts Germany.
   Takahara produced two clinical strikes on 57 and 65 minutes to put Japan two goals to the good in Leverkusen and the Asian champions were unfortunate not to win the match.
   Japan were just ten minutes away from becoming only the second team to beat Germany at home in the past two years but fell victim to two late strikes.
   ‘We have great potential and our aim is to reach the semi-finals,’ said Takahara.
   ‘The tactics were good against Germany. We led 2-0 so to be pulled back to 2-2 is a real shame.
   ‘A victory would have been much nicer but we were a bit tired at the end.’
   Takahara, who turns 27 on Sunday, has scored just 13 goals in 69 games for his German club SV Hamburg, but his brace against Germany took his international record to 17 in 41 appearances.
   The forward says that is mainly down to their Brazilian manager Zico who has helped him and the other players.
   ‘We have learnt a lot in four years under Zico and he has really helped to bring us along,’ Takahara explained. ‘We are better than in 2002.’
   ‘The opening game against Australia is very important. We need to win that match.’
   Japan face Croatia and holders Brazil in their other Group F matches.

America’s Andy Roddick and Nadia Petrova of Russia became the first major casualties of the 2006 French Open on Tuesday.
   Roddick, the fifth seed, retired from his first round match with Spanish journeyman Alberto Martin trailing 6-4, 7-5, 1-0, still feeling the effects of the ankle injury he picked up at the World Team Cup in Germany last week and which had always put his participation here in doubt.
   Third seed Petrova was one of the favourites for the women’s title having won three clay court events this year and arriving in Paris having put together a 15-man winning streak on the surface.
   But she paid a heavy price for injuring her leg in training on Saturday and tumbled out 6-2, 6-2 to Japan’s Akiko Morigami.
   Lleyton Hewitt avoided the fate of his fellow hobblers.
   The Australian 14th seed, who damaged his ankle playing his first clay court match for two years in Austria last week, marked his return to Roland Garros after a two-year absence with a gritty 7-6 (7/5), 3-6, 6-2, 6-0 win over Czech Jan Hernych.
   He now faces Mathieu Montcourt of France.
   Hewitt’s fellow world number one Marat Safin, who is still struggling to find his way back after knee surgery last year, suffered his earliest ever Roland Garros exit losing 6-3, 1-6, 6-3, 6-1 to Chilean ninth seed Fernando Gonzalez.
   While Petrova and Roddick left Paris under a cloud, there were no such problems for defending women’s’ champion Justine Henin-Hardenne.
   Belgium’s Henin-Hardenne, seeded five, brushed aside Estonia’s Maret Ani 6-3, 6-0 and now faces Anastasiya Yakimova of Belarus.

Marat Safin was fined the maximum $10,000 for refusing to attend a news conference after his first round defeat at the French Open on Tuesday, the International Tennis Federation said.
   The Russian former world number one was beaten 6-3, 1-6, 6-3, 6-1 by ninth-seeded Chilean Fernando Gonzalez, his earliest defeat at Roland Garros.
   It is the second time Safin has declined to attend a press conference at the French Open. He was also fined $10,000 for skipping one in 2001.
   Safin, who missed last year's US Open and this year's Australian Open with a knee injury, has slipped to 53rd in the rankings.

Independent investigators have cleared seven times champion Lance Armstrong of doping during the 1999 Tour de France and found the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) behaved in ways ‘completely inconsistent’ with testing rules.
   Dutch law firm Scholten, assigned by the International Cycling Union (UCI) to investigate newspaper allegations, referred in a statement on Wednesday to ‘misconduct’ by WADA and the French national doping lab LNDD.
   American Armstrong, who first won the Tour that year and retired after his record seventh consecutive victory last July, has always denied taking banned substances.
   French sports daily L'Equipe reported last August that it had access to laboratory documents and six of Armstrong's urine samples collected on the 1999 Tour showed ‘indisputable’ traces of the blood-boosting drug erythropoietin (EPO).
   Dutch lawyer Emile Vrijman, a former director of the Netherlands national anti-doping agency, was appointed by the UCI last October to investigate the allegations. In February the UCI revealed its chief medical officer Mario Zorzoli had provided the newspaper with the documents.

Australian opening batsman Justin Langer says losing the Ashes to England was good for world cricket.
   ‘We were successful for so long. But for us to lose to England showed other countries that the competition was still on,’ he told the BBC’s Five Live Sport.
   ‘I think losing the Ashes was great for world cricket, English cricket and, to a degree, Australian cricket.’
   Langer, 35, said the Ashes is Australia’s top sports event, as important as the football World Cup is to English fans.
   Australian cricket officials say the demand for tickets to the return series starting in Australia in November is unprecedented.
   ‘This is going to be a huge summer, undoubtedly the biggest summer that Australian cricket has ever seen,’ said Cricket Australia chief executive James Sutherland.
   ‘Most of the core of the team who lost last time will be together and will be doing everything we can to be ready and to give England as hard a time as possible, as hard as England gave us last summer,’ he said.
   ‘Since the day we returned from England there was a lot of soul-searching. It hurt losing the Ashes. We are taking the Ashes seriously. It’s going to be a massive event, as big as the football World Cup is in your part of the world, and I’d love to be a part of it,’ Langer said.

Bangladesh will play Kenya in three one-dayers in Nairobi in mid-July and not earlier, according to a new itinerary released by Cricket Kenya (CK) officials on Tuesday.
   The Bangladeshis will arrive in the country on July 18 and will play the first match in Nairobi on July 21. The other two games, which will also be played in the Kenyan capital, will be held on July 23 and 25.
   Bangladesh, who will be making a nine-day stop-over in Kenya en route to Zimbabwe, have already named a 19-man squad to assemble on Thursday for training ahead of the African tour.
   Most of the players in the team featured in the four-match one-day series against Kenya in March and the following matches against world champions Australia which they lost 3-0 in April.
   Both Kenya and Bangladesh were awarded one-day international status by the International Cricket Council in 1997. But while Bangladesh were granted Test status in 2000, Kenya were demoted to being an associate member last year.

Bangladesh continued their good run in the 37th Chess Olympiad when the men’s team stunned powerful Iceland 2.5-1.5 in Turin on Tuesday.
   In the ninth round, Grand Master Ziaur Rahman led the way against the 27th-ranked opponents by defeating fellow GM Stefansson Hannes Hlifar. IM Reefat Bin Sattar beat IM Kristjansson Stefan and IM Abdullah Al Rakib drew with GM Olafsson Helgi. IM Enamul Hossain Rajib’s loss against GM Hjartarson Johann, however, took some of the gloss off Bangladesh’s fantastic result. The men now have raised their tally to 20.5 points.
   In the women’s section, Bangladesh earned a draw also against Iceland.
   IWM Rani Hamid drew with WGM Ptacnikova Lenka, Zakia Sultana drew with WFM Thorsteinsdottir Gudlaug and Tanima Parveen drew with WIM Gretarsdottir Lilja.
   They have collected a total of 13.5 points at the end of the ninth round.
   Armenia are leading the men’s section with 26.5 points while Ukraine dominate the women’s event with 21 points.

Rajshahi and Khulna raised their hopes of reaching the final of the Dhaka Bank Under-19 National Youth Cricket Tournament as both the sides posted a challenging total on the first day of the two-day semifinals against their respective opponents on Wednesday.
   Rajshahi racked up 288 runs before being all out in 88.2 overs against Narayanganj at the Mirpur Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium riding on a century from Mizanur, who plundered 102 off 158 balls. Rubel (34) and Zahid (32) were the other two run-getters. Nazmul picked up highest four wickets for Narayanganj giving away 60 runs.
   At the Dhanmondi Cricket Stadium, Khulna finished their stipulated 90 overs on 273-9 against Barisal thanks to a half-century by Atiq, who was unbeaten on 73 when the bails were drawn for the day. Adnan also scored 38 runs. Mashud and Monir shared six wickets between them for Barisal.
   The final, also a two-day match, will be held on June 3 and 4 at the Mirpur Shere-e-Bangla Stadium.

Bangladesh volleyball team whitewashed Nepal in the three-match series winning the last and final Test by 25-16, 18-25, 25-20, 25-20 points at the Mirpur indoor stadium on Wednesday.
   Bangladesh spikers earlier won the two Tests comprehensively. The two teams will now play two exhibition matches at Narail and Jessore on June 1 and 2.

Never ones to miss an excuse for a beery booze-up among friends, Germans and their guests will take to the streets during the soccer World Cup to watch matches at thousands of open-air venues.
   Soccer fans without tickets need not worry about missing out on the action as towns and cities across the country set aside parks, squares and public buildings to host openair parties.
   Even landmark buildings in the German capital of Berlin will not be spared from football fever, with the famous Brandenburg Gate becoming the backdrop for a huge TV screen and dance stage.
   ‘The Berliners, as you will notice, like to be outside,’ said Hans-Friedrich Mueller, a spokesman for the Berlin mayor’s office. ‘In the Tiergarten, in the summer every day is like a barbeque with or without the excuse of the World Cup.’
   On the fringes of the Tiergarten, Berlin’s equivalent of Central Park, families lounge on the grass on sunny days, playing frisbee and grilling meat. Organisers of Berlin’s FanFest want to capture this spirit for visiting football fans.
   ‘We wanted to use this tendency that the Berliners have towards being outside and offer them an opportunity to watch football somewhere other than on television.
   ‘This is going to be the biggest public viewing platform in Germany,’ Mueller said at the press launch of the enormous openair viewing area in the centre of Berlin last week.
   The venue will have capacity of 70,000 to 100,000 people a day, stretching from the Brandenburg Gate—once the symbol of divided Berlin—along an arrow-straight boulevard through the Tiergarten to the Siegessaeule or Victory Column.
   Offering a 60-square-metre video square at the gate itself, as well as a further three huge screens along the length of the park, the venue aims to create some of the atmosphere which has made lesser-known sports like beach volleyball such a success.
   In 2002, crowds of 5,000 were packed in at a popular public viewing area at Potsdamer Platz for almost every match of the World Cup broadcast from Japan and South Korea.
   In the words of its mayor, Klaus Wowereit, Germany’s federal capital is poor, but sexy—begging the question of who is stumping up the 5 million euros ($6.39 million) said to be needed to host the party.
   Battling a budget crisis and an unemployment rate of around 20 percent, Berlin is determined to nevertheless put on a decent show for the thousands of German and foreign fans without tickets for World Cup matches.
   In addition to the party in the Tiergarten and at the Brandenburg Gate, a huge stage has been erected in front of the Reichstag and the famous globe-shaped lump on the city’s television tower has been turned into a giant football.
   The other 11 German cities where matches are being played will also host their own parties, laying on giant screens, artificial beaches with cocktail bars, massage tents for tired fans and test-your-speed goal-shooting alleys.
   While many Germans gear up for the event, which begins on June 9, not everyone has been moved.
   Some have criticised the government for having come too close to private interests in allowing German sportswear and soccer boot maker Adidas to erect a huge stadium on a square in front of the seat of parliament.
   ‘The state has a duty to keep this public space public,’ said Klaus Staeck, the president of the Berlin Arts Academy, recently, dubbing the stadium the ‘cheapest profanity.’
   Talk of terrorist attacks has also loomed over open-air events, revived after a magazine cited a leaked Crime Office report which suggested that at least 21 matches, including ones involving the US, were at a theoretically high risk of attack.
   Berlin’s officials say that with a secure fence encircling the Brandenburg gate party area, they have taken the necessary steps to ensure that the open-air event in the middle of the city is as safe as the stadium.
   ‘All the security measures have been taken,’ Mueller said. ‘It will be similar to the security measures at the stadiums but obviously there is no need for tickets.’
   Those measures should also keep out other troublemakers, officials say, after another threat raised its head in recent weeks—that the World Cup could become a target for right-wing extremists intent on targeting foreign fans.
   There are fears that demonstrations organised via internet forums and aimed at open-air events could spring up during the tournament, when police are most stretched.
   ‘During the World Cup, the police are not in the position of being able to ensure the security of such events,’ Konrad Freiberg, head of the police force union, told Spiegel magazine.

Brazil still need to improve ahead of the World Cup, according to coach Carlos Alberto Parreira.
   Parreira said he was mostly satisfied with the world champion’s performance in Tuesday’s 8-0 rout of Swiss club FC Lucerne but that the squad still wasn’t at top form.
   ‘We still need to improve for the World Cup,’ Parreira said. ‘Today was only our eighth day of preparation, it’s a short period of time to expect perfection.’
   Adriano and Ronaldo each scored two goals, and Kaka, Lucio, Juninho and Robinho added one each in the match played in Basel, central Switzerland.
   Parreira said the team still needs to work on some areas of its game, especially when it doesn’t have possession.
   ‘It was another step toward our main goal, which is to be ready for the beginning of the World Cup,’ he said.
   Parreira said Brazil chose to face weaker opponents ahead of the month-long competition in Germany to focus mainly on the team’s development, not on results.
   FC Lucerne have just returned to Switzerland’s first division. They gained promotion after winning the second-flight title this year.
   Parreira played most of the match with his World Cup starters - including the ‘magic quartet’ of Kaka, Ronaldinho, Adriano and Ronaldo. His first substitutions came only in the 66th minute, when Brazil was already up 5-0.
   ‘We can’t analyse the final score, we have to study how the team behaved on the field,’ Kaka said.

Livewire forward Lionel Messi lifts the team whenever he comes on, coach Jose Pekerman said after Argentina’s 2-0 win over Angola in a World Cup warm-up on Tuesday.
   ‘Messi gives the team a leap upwards when he comes on. He’s getting more and more adapted to his team-mates,’ Pekerman said of the teenager on whom Argentina are pinning their hopes of a third world title.
   ‘What he did was important,’ Pekerman told a news conference in this southern Italian city after Argentina’s last outing before their World Cup opener against another African team, Ivory Coast, in Hamburg on June 10.
   Messi, who has just recovered from a thigh injury, came on for the last half hour.
   The 18-year-old was involved in one of the best moves of the match, setting up Maxi Rodriguez for a shot which hit the underside of the bar and bounced down without crossing the line.
   Pekerman was pleased with his team’s tactical variations in a match they dominated against tough but modest opposition.
   ‘We have plenty of options and that leaves me relaxed. We have a lot of variety in attack and that allows me to plan different things taking into account how the matches look,’ Pekerman said.
   ‘From zero to 10, we are on six points, this team can grow a lot,’ he said.
   ‘We defended well in situations that in other matches had complicated us. We also kept a clean sheet which is always good.’
   Turning his attention to Angola, Pekerman said, ‘They took the field in a way that complicated our initial tactics. They’re a team who are better than what they showed. They’re an attacking team but they surprised us with a defensive game plan.’

Germany’s hopes of World Cup glory were given a reality check by Japan as tournament favourites Brazil, Argentina and England warmed up for the finals with contrasting victories Wednesday.
   World Cup hosts Germany needed two goals in the final 14 minutes to avoid what would have been an embarrassing defeat against a stylish Japan, who had led 2-0 until late in the game at Leverkusen.
   Miroslav Klose and Bastian Schweinsteiger spared Germany’s blushes with goals in the 76th and 80th minutes after Bundesliga-based striker Naohiro Takahara had strike twice early in the second half.
   ‘We gave them too many chances and that is something we need to discuss,’ admitted German coach Jurgen Klinsmann, who has less than 10 days to sort out his side before their tournament-opening match with Costa Rica on June 9.
   ‘I do not think it is too late to cut out mistakes. On a positive note we showed great spirit to come back and the body language of the players was always good.’
   Japan coach Zico was delighted with the Asian champions’ encouraging performance. ‘There are not many better teams in the world than Germany and we pushed them all the way,’ said Zico.
   Brazil run riot
   Japan’s first round opponents Brazil, who are playing only one international before the World Cup begins, against New Zealand on Sunday, got in some useful target practice in a game against Swiss second division side Lucerne.
   The world champions romped home 8-0 winners against hopelessly outclassed opponents in front of a crowd of 30,000 in Basel.
   Strikers Adriano and Ronaldo scored two each while Robinho, Juninho Pernambucano, Kaka and Lucio weighed in with one apiece.
   Afterwards Brazil coach Carlos Alberto Parreira singled out the contribution of Ronaldo, playing his first match since suffering a thigh injury for Real Madrid in early April.
   Ronaldo has faced persistent criticism over his physical conditioning but Parreira talked up the centre-forward’s unerring eye for goal.
   ‘Ronaldo played a match tonight for the first time in 52 days and he scored two goals,’ Parreira said. ‘Ronaldo’s aim is exactly that, scoring goals, and that’s why he is in the Brazilian team.
   ‘We have to have a little patience with him. Ronaldo has scored goals in every training session and in this match he scored two more. I hope he will also score in the World Cup.’
   Argentina 2 Angola 0
   Brazil’s South American rivals Argentina were also pleased to welcome back the return from injury of talented teenager Lionel Messi, who has not played since tearing a thigh muscle in March.
   Messi appeared as a second-half substitute as the Argentines eased past African minnows Angola 2-0 in a friendly in Salerno, Italy.
   First-half goals from Maxi Rodriguez and skipper Juan Pablo Sorin settled the encounter in Argentina’s favour.
   Ivorians hold Chile
   Argentina’s Group C rivals Cote d’ Ivoire meanwhile served notice that they are not likely to be easily intimidated when the World Cup gets underway after a bruising 1-1 draw with Chile in Vittel, France.
   The Ivorians Didier Zokora was sent off in a match that saw six yellow cards and one red, both sides scoring goals from the penalty spot.
   ‘We saw some great things but also some nasty stuff,’ Cote d’ Ivoire Arsenal star Kolo Toure. ‘It was a good warm-up game against a good Chile team.’
   ‘They posed us a lot of problems but their game is close to that of Argentina and we needed that,’ he said.
   England rely on Liverpool Axis
   In Manchester meanwhile, a new-look England were comfortable without being totally convincing 3-1 winners over Hungary, second half goals coming from Steven Gerrard, John Terry and Peter Crouch.
   Two of the goals were set up by captain David Beckham, whose peerless crossing from the right tormented Hungary all night.
   England coach Sven-Goran Eriksson said the Real Madrid star had answered his critics who have regularly called for him to be dropped.
   ‘What do you want me to say about David Beckham that you haven’t heard before? I never, ever understood the criticism of David Beckham,’ said Eriksson, who had experimented with Gerrard in an advanced midfield role in the absence of the injured Wayne Rooney.
   Gerrard said he had revelled in the freedom of the position. ‘The shackles were off,’ he said. ‘The most important thing tonight was that we won and we won convincingly.’

World Cup hosts Germany were left pondering how to stabilise their suspect defence before the finals after Japan carved them open time and again in Tuesday’s 2-2 friendly draw in Leverkusen.
   ‘Klinsi, this shoddy defence only makes the World Cup opponents happy,’ headlined Bild daily.
   ‘The team spirit is certainly there but nine days before the World Cup we have just one more friendly and a lot of problems.’
   Japan took a two-goal lead after a brace from Naohiro Takahara, who plays for German club SV Hamburg, on 57 and 65 minutes.
   It could then have been worse with the visitors denied three times by German goalkeeper Jens Lehmann.
   ‘It was a good job we had Lehmann in form,’ concluded the Frankfurter Allgemine.
   ‘Lehmann produced several big saves. Otherwise Japan could have scored three or four more.’
   Late goals from Miroslav Klose and Bastian Schweinsteiger salvaged a flattering 2-2 draw for the hosts but coach Jurgen Klinsmann admitted there was a lot of work to be done on the training ground.
   ‘We gave Japan too many goal-scoring chances and that is something we will discuss,’ explained Klinsmann.
   ‘We did not close the space down quick enough and were too slow in reacting to shut off the decisive pass.’
   Germany’s defensive problems are not a new revelation and can be traced back to last year’s Confederations Cup when the hosts reached the semi-finals simply by outscoring their opponents.
   A 4-1 drubbing by Italy on March 1 sent the alarm bells ringing again and nine days before Germany’s opening World Cup game against Costa Rica in Munich the doubts remain.
   Arsenal goalkeeper Lehmann looks an assured figure between the posts but the defenders in front of him looked anything but confident.
   Central defenders Per Mertesacker and Christoph Metzelder were caught out of position by Japan’s quick passing.
   The right-back position also remains a major problem too with Arne Friedrich dropped after some shaky performances.
   Bayer Leverkusen’s Bernd Schneider, usually a midfielder, deputised against Japan but he too looked unconvincing.
   There were certainly a lot of negatives to come from the game but Klinsmann, renowned for his positive thinking, chose to look at the plus aspects too.
   ‘On a positive note we showed great spirit to come from behind and the body language of the players was always good,’ Klinsmann said.
   ‘The team deserves credit for getting back into the game when they had their backs against the wall.’
   But there can be no hiding Germany’s shortcomings and if their defence does not improve it is hard to see them fulfilling Klinsmann’s target of winning the World Cup in Berlin on July 9.

Paul Breitner was one of the greatest ever German players. He was also called ‘Afro-Paule’ Breitner thanks to his famous Afro haircut during his active career.
   He was capped 48 times for his country. His football career lasted from 1970 until 1983 mainly playing for Bayern Munich (70-74 and 78-83) and Real Madrid (74-78) with a short interruption in Braunschweig.
   The early peak of Breitner’s long and successful career was in 1974 as part of the winning German World Cup team. The final was played in his hometown of Munich against the Netherlands. A European Championship in Italy (1980) later followed. Breitner is one of only three players ever to score in two World Cup finals (1974 against the Netherlands and 1982 against Italy). Breitner managed this, despite playing a predominantly defensive role.
   During his club career, Breitner won several National Championships with Bayern Munich (1972, 1973, 1974, 1980, 1981) and Real (1975, 1976), the Champions’ Cup (1974) as well as the German (1971, 1982) and Spanish Cups (1975). During his spell with Munich, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge and him formed such a formidable one-two-punch that they were only called Breitnigge.
   To traditional fans in Germany he was widely decried for his ‘revolutionary’ attitude and his tendency for sharing blunt opinions on political and social issues. Yet he could not resist to become rich when he had a chance to. Before the 1982 Football World Cup (held in Spain) former ‘leftist’ Breitner caused a major uproar in Germany when he accepted an offer by a German cosmetics company paying him the – what many Germans regarded at that time as a ‘scandalously high’ – sum of 150,000 Deutschmark if he shaved off his fluffy full beard, used their fragrance and advertised for the company. For a lot of Germans the whole incident – being paid 150,000 Deutschmark for just shaving off a beard – was an obscene thing to do.
   These days, Breitner works as a TV critic and columnist. Unsurprisingly, he is still controversial. — New Age Desk
   Name : Paul Breitner
   Date of Birth : September 5, 1951
   Birthplace : Kolbermoor, West Germany