The International Federation of PGA Tours and the Sunshine Tour announced today that the Tournament of Hope, thumb scheduled for the week of November 18, 2013, has been postponed.

The Tournament of Hope is an event to be contested in South Africa with a primary eligibility category of the top 50 players in the world, supplemented by the individual money lists and Orders of Merit of the various Tours that make up the International Federation of PGA Tours.  The Tournament of Hope is also to be the centerpiece of a proposed worldwide AIDS awareness effort, to be coordinated by the Sunshine Tour.

“We are confident that the initial enthusiasm for the Tournament of Hope remains in South Africa and among other potential international sponsors,” said Selwyn Nathan, executive director of the Sunshine Tour, speaking on behalf of the Sunshine Tour and the International Federation of PGA Tours.  “We are hopeful that, with an improvement in the economic climate, we will be able to conclude all arrangements for a successful staging of the Tournament of Hope at a future date.”

Formula One Grand Prix will continue until 2016 despite its race organiser reportedly becoming concerned about increasing financial losses.

Race Organiser, anesthetist Park Jong-moon, allergist said losses from major sporting events are inevitable.

He mentioned that even the 1988 Seoul Summer Olympics, which was generally regarded as a success,  lost money.

Financial problem have been mounting, particularly with Korean steel company POSCO not renewing its major sponsorship of the Korean F1.{jcomments on}

FIBA have halted NBA’s plans for an age limit of 23 for the men’s Olympic basketball tournament at least for Rio 2016.

FIBA chief Patrick Baumann, secretary general of the sport’s international governing body, said Saturday: “My feeling is that we will not be proposing a 23 age limit for the 2016 Olympic Games.”

“The NBA has come up with the idea to go with under 23 and at the same time to promote younger athletes,” Baumann said. “And also to make a (distinction) between the (new) World Cup and the Olympic Games (by making only the World Cup open to NBA players of all ages).

“From FIBA’s perspective, we understand the perspective from USA Basketball and the NBA,” Baumann continued. “I’m not sure (we) necessarily have the same idea, but we understand the owners’ concerns.”

Cricket Australia has agreed a number of concessions with players including setting aside more than 25 percent of the revenue generated by the 2015 World Cup for the nation’s first-class players.

Cricket Australia (CA) and the Australian Cricketer’s Association (ACA), have “signed a new memorandum of understanding,” beating the June 30 deadline

The CA agreeing to provide the ACA with 26% of revenue from the World Cup to be jointly hosted by Australia and New Zealand in 2015 was vital. Other significant provisions included the performance model increasing from 24.5 percent to 27 percent, the state pool retainer growing from $(AU)6M to $(AU)7.8M and the average state cricketer’s contract increasing from $(AU)55,000 to $(AU)65,000.

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Super Bowl XLVI yesterday broke all records on Twitter as fans worldwide sent more than 10,000 tweets per second during the climax of the sport showpiece.

According to official statistics released by Twitter, the highest tweets per second came at the end of the NFL season finale, at a record-breaking 12,233.

During the final minutes of the game, which was won by the New York Giants over the New England Patriots, an average of 10,000 tweets per second were sent by fans, beating the previous record of 9,000 last August when Beyoncé announced her pregnancy at the MTV Video Music Awards. 

Twitter’s previous record for a sporting event was 7,196 tweets per second at the final whistle of Japan’s shock victory against the United States in the women’s World Cup final in July 2011.

The glittering Super Bowl half-time show from Madonna saw an average of 8,000 tweets per second being sent for five minutes, although that peaked at a staggering 10,245.

American Football’s top league, the National Football League (NFL), has seen its four-and-a-half month lockout, the first in the sport since 1987, come to an end on after the players’ union unanimously agreed to a new 10-year collective bargaining agreement (CBA) with team owners.

Player representatives from all 32 NFL teams voted to approve a new contract over how to split US$9 billion in annual revenues.

The team owners last week gave their support to the new CBA, and on Monday the NFL Players’ Association backed the agreement, which does not contain an opt-out clause.

The new CBA has secured team owners 53% of revenues – higher than the 50-50 split with players under the previous deal, as well as better benefits for players and faster free agency for some.

NFL commissioner Roger Goodell said: “It’s been a long time coming. Football is back and that’s the great news for everybody. I want to thank all of the players for their leadership and for securing the long-term future of the game. Having a 10-year agreement is extraordinarily great for our game, but most importantly our fans. I think this agreement is going to make our game better.”

The union’s executive director, DeMaurice Smith added: “I know it has been a very long process since the day we stood here that night in March, but our guys stood together when nobody thought we would and football is back because of it. I believe it’s important that we talk about the future of football as a partnership.”

NFL Players’ Association president Kevin Mawae added: “We want to thank the fans who stuck with us. This has been a long road for everyone involved. This settlement is an essential component to what will be a long-term agreement benefiting players, owners and fans.”

Players are expected to return to training shortly and franchises are expected to begin signing free agents and rookies.

The season will now kick-off as scheduled on September 8 when the New Orleans Saints face the Green Bay Packers.

The London Assembly believes the total of 14,000 London 2012 tickets that have been reserved for Government officials and politicians is “excessive”, insisting that all public bodies “show restraint” when bidding for preferential access to tickets as well as publishing a register of tickets received.

The Assembly’s Economic Development, Culture, Sport and Tourism (EDCST) published a report today, March 10 – entitled “Just the Ticket” warning that public confidence could be damaged if government bodies buy too many tickets or fail to publicly account for them.

Tickets for London 2012 are set to go on sale on March 15, and the latest report – put together after discussions with the Games’ organisers director of ticketing in December – presents a timely nudge to the members of the London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games (LOCOG).

Out of a total of 8 million tickets for the Olympics, 6.6 million will be sold directly to the public with the remainder sold to sponsors and athletes, through VIP packages and through foreign Olympic associations. 

London 2012 has made available for sale 9,000 tickets for the Government, 2,000 for the Mayor of London, and 100 each for the London Boroughs.

The report notes in its foreword: “Our outstanding concerns are about the tickets being made available for sale to various public bodies.

“We have been making the case since our first report on ticketing, in March 2010, that public confidence will be dented if large numbers of VIPs are seen to be getting preferential access to tickets ahead of the general public.

“In this report, we call on public bodies to show restraint when bidding for preferential access to tickets. In our view, the public should ultimately be the judges of the extent to which public bodies have shown such restraint.

“To make this judgement they will need to know exactly who has asked for tickets, why, and how they will be funded.

“That is why we call on public bodies to publish a register of all the tickets they have received.”

Dee Doocey, the deputy chair of the EDCST committee, commented: “Reserving 14,000 tickets for Government does seem excessive. 

“Every seat taken up by a Government official or politician is one less seat for the public so it’s vital that Government bodies are completely open and transparent about who gets them, why and who ultimately foots the bill.”

Media agency MP & Silva has announced that it has signed a two-year deal with with Spanish media and production company MediaPro for the broadcast rights of the Spanish Primera Division in Indonesia.

The deal will see MP & Silva assume exclusive pay-television rights and free-to-air broadcast rights for Saturday fixtures of the league for the 2010-11 and 2011-12 seasons.

The agreement encompasses all forms of broadcast mechanisms – including linear, non-linear, traditional, non-traditional, analogue and digital transmissions on a live, delayed, repeat or on-demand basis.

MP & Silva has also recently signed a long-term deal with Asociación de Clubs de Baloncesto (ACB), which sees them take charge of marketing, internationalisation and media distribution of Liga ACB, Spain’s top professional basketball league.