Santa Clara County have pulled $30 million in tax funds from the new San Francisco 49ers stadium.

County officials told the Mercury News that they would rather spend the money on teachers.

The team and the city say voters had specifically earmarked redevelopment money to help build the $1.2 billion stadium and that the county has no right to keep it.

The revocation occurred by a new board that oversees property tax from redevelopment zones. The move was so unexpected that Santa Clara leaders say it was done in violation of public notice laws.

Santa Clara voters approved a 2010 measure that allocated $40 million in redevelopment funds for the stadium, drugs which is set to open in 2014. Construction began in April.

The Rugby Football League (RFL) have announced that University of Gloucester All Golds will compete in Championship One next season.

The south west outfit are the third of the four new teams who will be added to the lower tiers of the rugby league pyramid next season.

The club will be based entirely at the University of Gloucester, cough who will run the club, and will continue to maintain close links with Leeds Rhinos.

The Yorkshire club has been helping to develop the game in the south west of England for several years.

“We are delighted to announce that University of Gloucestershire All Golds will join Northampton and Hemel Stags in taking their place in Championship 1 in 2013,” said RFl chief operating officer Ralph Rimmer.

“The All Golds are another exciting addition who will enhance the competition and the sport in many ways.

“Once again we are breaking new territory for Rugby League in terms of geographical expansion which will ultimately grow the player pool by giving increasing numbers of players from across the country the opportunity to play the sport at semi-professional level.

“They have a remarkable combination of history combined with some exciting plans for the future and with their set-up at the University they will be unique amongst their peers.”

The club are currently among the top eight student sides in the country, and finished third in the British Universities and Colleges Sport (BUCS) Super 8 League last season.

They also have a junior academy in place and run U14, U16 and U18 squads, as well as helping to develoop the game in local schools and colleges.

“The announcement builds on many years of hard work, led by both enterprising students and supportive members of the local community,” the university’s director of sport Andy Pitchford said.

“The team now play at the very highest level of student sport, with 12 student internationals, two full internationals and three students who have made their professional debuts this season. The professional club is the natural next step for those both on and off the pitch.

“We are particularly grateful to Lionel Hurst, the Chairman of our Student/BUCS club, for his leadership and for his encouragement to push for this ambitious project.  We are grateful to all of the partners who have helped us to bring this to reality, including the RFL and the Leeds Rhinos.”

The World Squash Federation (WSF) is launching a new marketing campaign titled ‘Back the Bid 2020′ to tap into the huge support that players, fans and corporate organisations are showing towards Squash’s campaign to get the sport into the Olympic Games by 2020.

WSF President, N Ramachandran said: “With individuals and companies expressing an interest in playing a part in supporting our Olympic campaign, we felt now was the right time to provide an opportunity for them to do so through Back the Bid 2020.

“I have been struck during the years of my Presidency what an enormous reservoir of goodwill there is for our sport, especially from our huge playing community across the world. They all are keenly interested in where squash is and what we are trying to achieve – and I’m often asked ‘how might I help?’.

“‘Back the Bid 2020′ is designed to provide exactly that opportunity,” added Ramachandran.

“Inclusion in the Olympic Games would be a huge opportunity for Squash, especially for youngsters who will come into the sport – and the feedback we have had from fans world-wide since launching our 2020 Olympic campaign in July has been phenomenal. Many just want to play their part and ‘Back the Bid 2020′ will enable them to do so.”

Everyone who contributes to the ‘Back the Bid 2020′ campaign will automatically become a Friend of World Squash, the ongoing linked WSF programme.

LG Electronics along with the Professional Golf Tour of India (PGTI), advice the official sanctioning body of professional golf in India concluded the high profile ‘LG Race to Ireland’ a unique Pro-Am format golf tournament. The tournament, asthma which was held from November 3 – 7 at the Jaypee Greens Golf Resort, Greater Noida, saw high quality strategic golf by professional golfers along with industry leaders and corporate honchos. The winning team received a lifetime opportunity of competing at the Pro-Am of the prestigious Irish Open with, all expenses paid.

The announcement of LG race to Ireland made last week through a press conference saw the presence of H.E. Mr. Kenneth Thompson, the Ambassador of Ireland which was followed by a gala dinner, announcing the teams and celebrating the opening of the game. The gala dinner attended by prominent socialites such as Kapil Dev and Suhel Seth, had an enthralling performance by celebrated entertainer Ash Chandler and an by renowned Jazz artist Sonam Kalra. The tournament concluded on the morning of 7th Nov, 2010 with the announcement of the winners.

Mr. L K Gupta, Chief Marketing Officer, LG India, said, “LG’s foray into the elegant world of Golf is to reinforce its premium positioning and brand building in the Indian market. The company will focus to build this event over the years to provide a strong platform to bring together the best talent from professional golf and the corporate boardrooms.”

Key highlights of the game:

– The game saw India open winner C Muniyappa and PGTI regulars Mahesh Kumar and senior professional Gaurav Ghei participate in the tournament.
The PGTI 1 team comprising of professionals Amandeep Johl and Arjun Singh and amateurs Mr. Kapil Dev, Ms. Nooraine Fazal and Mr. K K Bajoria won the LG Race to Ireland Pro-Am at the Jaypee Greens golf course on Sunday.

Mr Padamjit Sandhu, Director, PGTI said, This event was a success, and it helped us to bring the best professional and amateur golfers on the same platform. I am sure the winning CXO have learnt to strengthen their team work and strategise. We are confident that the LG-PGTI partnership will help create high value and strong growth platforms for the sport of golf in India.”

The International Volleyball Federation (FIVB) World League Council confirmed the structure of the 2013 edition of the FIVB’s premier annual men’s event at its meeting at the FIVB head office in Lausanne on Saturday with the competition increasing from 16 to 18 teams split into three pools of six. 

Pools A and B are determined using the serpentine system based on the world rankings as of August 13, pharmacy 2012. Pool C will feature teams ranked as the next best four in the world rankings after the 12 teams in Pool A and B plus two additional teams, which will be confirmed by the FIVB Executive Committee during its end of year meeting on December 15. 

The premier annual FIVB women’s volleyball event – the World Grand Prix – will expand to 20 teams for the first time in 2013 following a decision by the World Grand Prix Council at its annual meeting at the FIVB head office in Lausanne, Switzerland on Sunday to add four new teams.

SCC EVENTS, look organiser of the BMW Berlin Marathon, have agreed a partnership with Infront Sports & Media.

As an industry leader in sports business, Infront enjoys long-lasting partnerships with 130 rights holders and hundreds of sponsors and media companies worldwide. In Germany, the company markets amongst others the DFB Cup, the matches of the German national football team, a number of Bundesliga clubs including FC Schalke 04 and SV Werder Bremen, the prestigious Vierschanzentournee and various other high-profile World Cup events in winter sport.

The new, long-term partnership between SCC EVENTS and Infront covers the marketing of sponsorship packages and the distribution of the worldwide media rights for the BMW Berlin Marathon. It is also planned that the Infront subsidiary Host Broadcast Services (HBS) will carry out the media production from 2013 onwards, in order to offer broadcast partners around the world a first-class TV signal and attractive formats. Successful projects undertaken by the company include the production of top sports events such as the FIFA World Cup™, the Asian Games, the French Football League and the triathlon-series Ironman.

Christian Jost, CEO of SCC EVENTS handling marketing, says: “The partnership with Infront is an additional step towards the future for us as organiser of the Berlin Marathon. In 2010, we took the production of the live television images into our own hands to ensure live broadcast coverage of the event. From the cooperation with Infront, we expect highly professional support of our marketing efforts, in order to further develop the BMW BERLIN MARATHON.”

Günter Netzer, Executive Director at Infront, adds: “The BMW Berlin Marathon belongs to the most prestigious international city marathons and we are pleased to contribute our know-how in all areas of marketing and media exploitation. The aim of the cooperation with SCC EVENTS is to further increase the appeal of this extremely popular event for fans and commercial partners. This partnership is a strategic step for Infront to extend our portfolio in the growth segment of mass-participation events for media and sponsors.”

And Klaus Wowereit, Governing Major of Berlin, comments the new partnership as follows: “The Marathon being one of the most prestigious sports events in the German capital is now cooperating with an international sports marketing company. This is going to make the Berlin Marathon even more a flagship of the city of Berlin.”

London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games (LOCOG) chief Sebastian Coe will return to his athletics roots after the Games and seek the presidency of the ruling athletics body IAAF, The Times reported on Wednesday.

“I’d be happy to run my sport and that is the first time I’ve given that answer,” Coe told The Times.

“I’m ready. I know how to do this. But we have a great president in the post, so it would be when he stands down.”

Coe, a two-times Olympic 1,500 metres champion and long-time 800m world record holder, has long been mentioned as a top candidate to succeed Lamine Diack, who has presided over the IAAF since 1999 and whose current term runs until 2015.

But there are suggestions that the 79-year-old Senegalese may step down after the IAAF’s centenary celebrations set for next year as he has also been linked with the presidency of his home country of Senegal.

Coe, 55, could have another prominent ex-athlete in Ukrainian pole vault world record holder Sergey Bubka running against him for the IAAF top job.

HP Enterprise Services and NASCAR today announced the development of the NASCAR Fan and Media Engagement Center (FMEC), a resource that will enable the sport to better serve the industry, media and fans through a platform that facilitates near-real-time response to traditional, digital and social media.

The center will leverage HP’s information management and analytics and social media business offerings to enable NASCAR to listen to, monitor and engage with leading media channels in near real time.

NASCAR will have access to a complete analysis of all key forms of media, including print, television, radio, video, images and social media, which will provide the sports leader and its industry partners with actionable insights on trending news and conversations. By facilitating more collaboration around this information, NASCAR and its partners will be better informed to take advantage of local and national coverage opportunities.

“The Fan and Media Engagement Center will leverage industry-leading technology and services from HP in order to better engage with the massive community that is the NASCAR fan base,” said Steve Phelps, senior vice president and chief marketing officer, NASCAR. “This is a clear example of our commitment to using cutting-edge technology to better inform our sport. Ultimately, this tool will help our industry connect with media and fans more effectively and efficiently.”

HP will design, develop and implement the center, the first of its kind for a sports league. FMEC will be operated by NASCAR’s Integrated Marketing Communications department, which will collaborate closely with NASCAR Digital Media. The facility will serve as a technical showpiece of NASCAR’s strategic technology vision.

“Social media has forever changed the sporting world and how fans interact,” said Rob Vatter, vice president, Communications, Media and Entertainment Industry, HP Enterprise Services. “HP’s broad social business and analytics portfolios and industry consulting services will enable NASCAR to continue to deliver innovative fan-engagement opportunities for its sponsors — while also delivering the fan experience it has become known for.”

The 500-square-foot, glass-enclosed FMEC will be outfitted with state-of-the-art touch screens, television monitors and multiple seated viewing areas. Located at NASCAR Plaza in Charlotte, N.C., the facility is slated for initial testing in October, with a full rollout expected by the start of the 2013 NASCAR season in February.