The Government of Canada have announced they will supply funding for the Canadian Curling Association (CCA) for the Tim Hortons Roar of the Rings Canadian Curling Trials, being held in Winnipeg, Manitoba, from December 1 to 8, 2013.

“We are proud of the world-class reputation of our curlers, and our commitment will help them in their pursuit of excellence. I congratulate the Canadian Curling Association on their dedication, and I wish the best of luck to all the athletes on the road to Sochi,” said Minister of State Bal Gosal. “Through Sport Canada’s Sport Support Program, the Government of Canada is pleased to provide the Canadian Curling Association with funding for the 2013-14 fiscal year.”

The Canadian Curling Association is the national governing body for the sport of curling in Canada. The Canadian Curling Association encourages and facilitates the growth and development of curling in cooperation with its network of affiliates. It is also responsible for overseeing the Canadian national teams at world championships, as well as at Olympic and Paralympic Games.

“The Canadian Curling Association is grateful for the contribution of the Government of Canada’s Sport Support Program as we pursue world-class results in our sport,” said Greg Stremlaw, Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Curling Association. “Our curlers have represented Canada proudly on the international stage, and we appreciate the support of the federal government in making that happen.”

The Government of Canada is the single largest contributor to sport in Canada and supports participation and excellence from playground to podium. Sport Canada’s Sport Support Program has approved more than $2.5 million for the Canadian Curling Association through Sport Support for 2013-14

Twickenham Stadium will host the inaugural World Club Sevens tournament on 17 and 18 August.

The new World Club Sevens brings together some of the biggest names in club and provincial rugby from the Northern and Southern Hemispheres, along with some emerging names in game.

This is the first step towards expanding the tournament in the build-up to the Rio Olympics in 2016.

And Premiership Rugby chief executive Mark McCafferty believes the sport has a bright future.

“Rugby is about to enter a unique era for the sport with Sevens – which is finally returning to the Olympics – at the centre of what we believe will be a huge growth in all forms of the game,” McCafferty said.

“Rugby’s long-awaited return to the Olympics means that many of the players who could be battling it out for gold in Rio in 2016 will be on show at Twickenham on 17-18 August.”

The teams already confirmed for the Twickenham event are Auckland Blues, Western Province, ACT Brumbies, Buenos Aires, New York, Los Angeles and Moscow.

English League One team, sale viagra Coventry City have revealed they have already begun the search for a new stadium for next season.

The Sky Blues have been in heavy discussions with ACL, bronchi | the owners of the Ricoh Arena, over unpaid rent and are now making contingency plans.

In a statement, chief executive Tim Fisher said: “The fact is that we are being locked out of the Ricoh Arena.

“We have been told that there is no further room for negotiation and an offer that we made to get back round the negotiating table has been rejected.

“It is with great regret that we now have no alternative but to consider other arrangements for next season and we would be failing the club, its supporters and its staff if we did not start making such plans now.

“The club is keeping the relevant football authorities fully informed of developments, and we will keep everyone informed when there is specific further news.”

Coventry moved to the 32,000-capacity Ricoh Arena from their old Highfield Road ground in 2005 but were relegated to League One seven years later.

They were deducted 10 points after entering administration last month and finished the season in 15th.

SKECHERS USA, denture Inc. today announced that the company will return to the Super Bowl with two unique advertising campaigns.

The first will use humor and animals to illustrate the speed of Skechers GOrun 2 performance running footwear and is slated to air during the two-minute warning of the first half. SKECHERS will also enlist football legend Joe Montana for a second advertisement to air during the second quarter.

For the company’s performance brand, a cheetah takes center stage this year when the world’s fastest land animal goes head-to-head with a human wearing Skechers GOrun 2. Like the cheetah, Skechers GOrun 2 footwear is lightweight, sleek and fast. The Company debuted the original Skechers GOrun collection on the feet of a spunky French Bulldog during the 2012 Super Bowl, and the much adored “Mr. Quiggly” commercial achieved a third place ranking at the top of the USA Today Ad Meter, making the pooch a media darling and bringing global recognition to Skechers Performance footwear.

For the SKECHERS Relaxed Fit collection, Hall of Fame quarterback and four-time Super Bowl champion Joe Montana is the face of the successful footwear line that’s designed for comfort with a roomy toe area and memory foam insole. Montana previously appeared in a SKECHERS Relaxed Fit campaign during Fall 2012 that also included ads featuring basketball and baseball icons Mark Cuban and Tommy Lasorda.

The 2013 Super Bowl campaign marks SKECHERS’ fourth consecutive year of commercials on the world’s biggest advertising platform. In its first year, the Company utilized the star power of Joe Montana to launch its fitness division, and then followed up in 2011 with Kim Kardashian in the Company’s fitness footwear. Basketball and business icon Mark Cuban joined Mr. Quiggly in 2012 for SKECHERS’ most successful Super Bowl campaign thus far.

 

The future of the Belgian Grand Prix was secured for the next three years after race organisers signed a deal with Formula One (F1) chiefs.

The Spa Francorchamps race had its fate in the balance, ambulance amid concerns it was seeking a race-share deal with Nurburgring or Magny-Cours.

The contract will run from 2013 to 2015 and is providing better financial gain for the circuit.

In other news regarding the Belgian Grand Prix, organisers will allow 5,600 spectators into the ground, after The Ticket Enterprise (TTE) collapsed, leaving fans without tickets they had paid for.

Chief Promoter, Etienne Davignon confirmed the news at a press conference and said: “We will see how we can recover (the money).

“It is too early to judge just how much we are going to lose.”

The International Cricket Council (ICC) have introduced an innovative plan to more than double the prize money for the annual number one Test team from 2013 in order to boost the profile of the sports traditional international game.

England currently top the rankings, but that position may come under threat before this year’s cut-off date in April if they lose a third successive Test against Pakistan.

A press release from the ICC read: “A total of $3.8million (£2.4million) in prize money will be shared among the top four sides on April 1 2013, 2014 and 2015 after the ICC board approved a proposal to substantially increase incentives in the form of prize money to promote Test match cricket in the period before the ICC Test Championship event in 2017.”

ICC chief executive Haroon Lorgat added: “This worthy increase in prize money for the top four teams in the Reliance ICC Test Rankings can only be right.

“We are delighted at the growing interest and quality of Test match cricket and we must continue to promote the pinnacle form of the game before and beyond the Test Championship in 2017.”

Previously, the number one Test team received $175,000 (£110,000) but in future will receive a minimum of $450,000 (£283,000) rising to $500,000 (£315,000) in 2015.

It was also announced after the world governing body’s two-day meeting in Dubai that the ICC will have a board chairman and president from 2014 onwards, splitting the role currently filled by the president alone.

A chairman will lead the board, while the president’s function will become an ambassadorial one.

Lorgat told a press conference of the intended change following a meeting which also considered Lord Woolf’s 60-page report into the organisation’s governance.

However, there will be no decisions on the key recommendations of the independent governance review until at least the next board meeting in April.

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Have your say on the ICC reforms here

The planned NBA regular season games to be staged in London ahead of next summer’s Olympics have been cancelled the National Basketball Association (NBA) has confirmed.

The New Jersey Nets and Orlando Magic were due to play regular-season games at the O2 Arena as part of an effort to promote basketball in the lead up to the Olympics.

The cancellation has followed the curtailment of the new season due to the long labour dispute fought out between players and owners.

With a new reduced 66-game regular season schedule, squeezed into a shorter period with an increased number of back-to-back-to-back games for all teams, it had increased pressure on the league and the Nets to scrap their dates at The 02 Arena, slated for March 7 and 8.

The league is still scheduled to play at least one pre-season game in London next autumn with another to follow in Manchester in 2013.

 

Yesterday, April 25, US District Judge Susan Richard Nelson gave the National Football League (NFL) players an early victory in their lawsuit against the league’s lockout by ordering an end to the sanction after backing the players’ argument that the work stoppage is causing irreparable harm to their careers.

In riposte the NFL has promised an immediate appeal after Nelson’s judgement supported the players in their fight with the owners over how to divide the competition’s US$9 billion annual turnover.

Nelson wrote that the plaintiffs “made a strong showing that allowing the League to continue their ‘lockout’ is presently inflicting, and will continue to inflict, irreparable harm upon them, particularly when weighed against the lack of any real injury that would be imposed on the NFL by issuing the preliminary injunction.”

The NFL responded by stating: “We will promptly seek a stay from Judge Nelson pending an expedited appeal to the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals. We believe that federal law bars injunctions in labour disputes. We are confident that the Eighth Circuit will agree. But we also believe that this dispute will inevitably end with a collective bargaining agreement, which would be in the best interests of players, clubs and fans.

“We can reach a fair agreement only if we continue negotiations toward that goal.” DeMaurice Smith, the NFL Players’ Association executive director, said: “I am happy for our players and for our fans. Today, those who love football are the winners”, the league added.

NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell has since claimed that the league faces a future with no draft or salary cap, unlimited free agency and a handful of dominant teams if players and owners fail to negotiate a new labor accord.

In an article published in the Wall Street Journal, Goodell wrote that the decision to back the players may ‘endanger’ the sport, adding: “A union victory threatens to overturn the carefully constructed system of competitive balance that makes NFL games and championship races so unpredictable and exciting.”

Owners imposed the initial lockout after talks broke down in March ahead of the deadline for a new collective bargaining agreement (CBA). In turn the players disbanded their union and a group of players, led by quarterbacks Tom Brady, Peyton Manning and Drew Brees filed the injunction request along with a class-action antitrust lawsuit against the NFL.

If the appeals court upholds the injunction, the League will be forced to open its doors for the first time since the lockout began March 12.

The week commencing 16 January 2012 has been scheduled by the English High Court to hear the four-pronged intellectual property infringement claim by Force India F1 Team Ltd. against 1 Malaysia Racing Team SDN BHD, buy 1 Malaysia Racing Team (UK) Ltd, Michael Gascoyne and Aerolab Srl.

1 Malaysia Racing is the current owner of Team Lotus, which incidentally is in the midst of a naming rights spat with Renault F1 backer Group Lotus.  

The Vijay Mallya-owned Force India F1 team last year included F1 rival Lotus in the suit it filed against aerodynamic design company Aerolab and Fondtech, which it had accused of copying its VJM03 wind tunnel model.

Force India released a statement, reading: “Separate criminal proceedings are currently ongoing in Italy in respect of the  wrongful disclosure of confidential information, as a consequence of the filing by Force India F1 Team Ltd of a complaint with the competent authorities. In respect of these proceedings, articles in the Italian press have recently revealed that Tony Fernandes, Mike Gascoyne and Jean Claude Migeot have been formally charged.”

Soccerex announced that Dr João Havelange the Honorary Life President of FIFA and father of modern football has confirmed that he will address delegates on the opening day of the Soccerex Global Convention 2010.

As well as being President of FIFA from 1974 to 1998, Dr Havelange is the longest serving member of the International Olympic Committee, was President of the CBF (Confederação Brasileira de Futebol) for 17 years, a member of the Brazilian Olympic committee from 1955 to 1963 and even competed as a swimmer in the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games and as part of the Brazilian water polo team in 1952 Olympic games in Helsinki.

The Global Convention will be exhibiting a selection of the many prestigious awards received by Dr Havelange during his lifetime, just some of which are the Cavalier of the Légion d’honneur (France), the Order of Special Merit in Sports (Brazil), the Commander of the Cavaliers of the Ordem Infante Dom Henrique(Portugal), the Cavalier of the Vasa Orden (Sweden) and the Grand Cross of Elizabeth the Catholic (Spain).

The event will also feature a football legacy panel named after Dr Havelange, who has done so much to promote the importance of legacy in sport. It will bring together a panel of experts and key figures involved in social responsibility with the football industry and will focus on the situation in Brazil and the social legacy the 2014 World Cup needs to leave on the country.

The Soccerex Global Convention (20-24 November 2010) will consist of an in-depth conference schedule, packed exhibition, a large range of networking and two-day Football Festival all taking place in the Forte de Copacabana, Copacabana beach and Sugar Loaf Mountain, Rio de Janeiro. iSportconnect is the official Social Media Partner of the event.