Tennis Canada have appointed Kelly D. Murumets as President and Chief Executive Officer of the organization.

She succeeds Michael S. Downey who left Tennis Canada in December after nearly ten years to become chief executive of the Lawn Tennis Association in Great Britain. She will take up the position on March 3, 2014.

Ms. Murumets has been President and Chief Executive Officer of ParticipACTION, the national voice of physical activity and sport participation in Canada, since 2007. Prior to joining ParticipACTION, she was a senior executive with two publicly-listed companies in Canada and the U.S. and a partner in a management consulting firm. She holds a Masters of Social Work from Wilfrid Laurier University and an MBA from the Richard Ivey School of Business.

“I am extremely grateful to be given the opportunity to build on Michael Downey’s legacy and be part of the team that will strive to take Tennis Canada and the sport of tennis in Canada to new heights,” said

Kelly Murumets. “The sport in this country is just in the early stages of success with unlimited potential to continue achieving major results and bring an increase in national popularity.”

“Kelly Murumets comes into this position with a tremendous amount of experience, both as a businessperson and as an inspirational leader,” said John LeBoutillier, Chair, Tennis Canada Board of Directors. “We are more than confident that she can build on the strong foundation that is in place at Tennis Canada and continue to grow the sport to heights never before seen across the country.”

A referendum is set to be held whether Oslo will bid for the 2022 Winter Olympic Games as part of a budget compromise.

Carl I Hagen, head of the Progress Party’s bloc on Oslo City Council, said taxpayers in Oslo should be allowed to vote on bidding for the Olympics. Although referenda are not common in Norway, with most of the major decisions left to elected politicians, Hagen’s demand for an Olympic referendum was met to help get the city’s budget approved.

City officials have set aside NOK five million to cover the cost of asking Oslo residents whether they really want to host an Olympics in 2022, with all the new construction it will entail. Some say it will provide the incentive Oslo needs to improve public transport, build new sports facilities, and housing. Others are concerned about the debt it may leave, with future use or need for all the Olympic facilities unclear.

The referendum will be held in connection with national elections being held next fall after Oslo City Council is due to officially decide in July whether to apply for the state funding guarantee needed to host the Games.

A general plan for where arenas and athletes’ housing will be constructed is due in March. Meanwhile city officials have already approved the millions needed to carry out all the preliminary work needed for a prospective application.

The deadline for host cities applying to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) for the 2022 Games is March 2014, candidates will be selected in July 2014 and the host city elected July 2015.

Venyu, a leading provider of business continuity, cloud-based virtualization and battle-tested data recovery solutions, today announced the New Orleans Hornets as their newest customer protecting critical data leveraging a replicated hotsite created by Venyu.

Leveraging Venyu’s backup portfolio, the Hornets now have a comprehensive disaster recovery plan in place to guard against data loss.

“When people think of protecting business-critical data, basketball isn’t necessarily the first thing that comes to mind,” said Tod Caflisch, Vice President of IT at the New Orleans Hornets. “However, protection of data is critical to the survival of our organization — it’s data that drives our business.”

For the organization, collecting and storing information is essential to the day-to-day operations of the business. In addition to the standard e-mail and files, data is used for team logs and scouting materials as well as the real-time funneling of player statistics to various websites.

“We always have to keep the data going,” continued Caflisch. “Whether it’s providing real-time statistics of player performance during the game or dynamically communicating video for scouting, we’d be lost if we didn’t have the right plan in place to backup this critical information.”

The team was initially faced with gaps in their business continuity plan and backed up their data via tape. They soon found that tape didn’t provide the peace-of-mind that information could be recovered quickly in the event of an IT outage.

Caflisch continued, “Tape just wasn’t doing it. Sure we had backup, but we didn’t have a business continuity plan in place to recover the needed data if there was a serious problem. More specifically, if we couldn’t get in the building because of a natural disaster, I’d have no way of initiating recovery.”

Companies such as the New Orleans Hornets leverage Venyu’s business continuity and disaster recovery (BC/DR) solutions to ensure rapid data recovery in the time of disaster or IT disruptions. The tested business continuity and disaster recovery platform replicates all data and systems in Venyu’s secure data centers. This hotsite enables quick and efficient failover of primary systems in the event of disaster.

“At Venyu, protecting data is what we do. Our customers need to know their key information is protected in the event of an outage or disaster. Time and again, we’ve proven to be the market’s ‘go-to’ solution to keep businesses running,” said Scott Thompson, Chief Executive Officer, Venyu.

With the Venyu system in place, the team was able to more effectively implement a solid business continuity growth path. Moving forward, the team is planning on transitioning more systems to Venyu. Caflisch estimates the move could potentially save them as much as several hundred thousand dollars: “Venyu is a great group with an outstanding business continuity offering. With a proven ability to protect our core data; we definitely plan to stick with them.”

Eddie Hearn and Matchroom Sport have announced that Team GB Boxing star Scott Cardle has signed promotional terms with the company.

Commonwealth champion Cardle who recently turned professional will campaign at Lightweight and make his professional debut on the undercard of Kell Brook’s Welterweight showdown with Matthew Hatton at the Motorpoint Arena Sheffield on March 17, live on Sky Sports.

“I’m over the moon to be turning pro and joining Matchroom Sport,“ said Cardle. “It’s been a long time coming, I’ve been training in the gym for four months now just itching to get it sorted, so I’m delighted that I’ve signed with Eddie and we have the first date to aim for.

“Eddie seems as excited as me and he’s showing a lot of faith in me by putting me on the Kell Brook undercard – and I’ll repay that faith. I already feel really settled with Eddie and Matchroom so it’s a great start.

“After coming out of the shock loss to French Champion Alexis Vastine, I really thought I would be going to the Olympics, so it took me a good few weeks to get over it. But I’ve got the love back now and I’m back to the way I want to be and I feel like I’m going to settle into the pro game straight away.”

Cardle joins Matchroom Sport’s growing stable alongside two-time WBC Super-Middleweight champion Carl Froch, unbeaten Welterweight star Kell Brook, World Middleweight title challenger and former undefeated European champion Darren Barker, former World Light Welterweight champion and current European Lightweight champion Gavin Rees, World Light Welterweight title challenger and former unbeaten European champion Paul McCloskey, unbeaten Commonwealth Super Bantamweight king Carl Frampton, former British Welterweight champion Lee Purdy and fellow rising stars, Erick Ochieng, John Ryder, Ryan Aston and Tommy Ghent.

Promoter Eddie Hearn added: “I’m delighted to have secured the signature of Scott and welcome him to our growing team of quality fighters. Scott has a great pedigree through his GB experiences having represented our country at elite level throughout the World. He has impressed me with his ability, focus, hard work and determination and is exactly the kind of fighter we want on our team. I can’t wait for his debut on March 17th and I know that we and our broadcast partner Sky Sports will make a big fuss of his career and progress.”

Matchroom Sport is a sports event promotions company founded by Leyton Orient chairman Barry Hearn.

Ukraine unveiled its Kiev’s Olympic Stadium on Satuday with the structure being the showpiece venue for UEFA Euro 2012 even after plagued development.

Colombian pop star Shakira headlined an opening event that drew 60, doctor 000 spectators to the venue, unhealthy which will host five games at next summer’s tournament, here including the final itself. The road to Saturday’s re-opening has been far from smooth however with the project dogged by construction delays and accusations of corruption. Work was initially scheduled to be completed in June, while costs have soared from a projected Eur110 million ($149.3m) when development commenced three years ago to Eur585 million ($794.2m).

UEFA president Michel Platini even threaten to strip the tournament from Ukraine in April 2010. But Platini’s opinion changed last month when he stated that only “some little problems” remain to be ironed out before Ukraine is ready to stage Euro 2012, praising the “tremendous” progress that had been made over the past year. However, the Olympic Stadium project has continued to prove controversial with opposition figures in the country claiming a lack of transparency in financial arrangements and criticising the cost of the redevelopment.

Their was a clear indication of dissaproval on Saturday as AFP reported Ukraine’s President, Viktor Yanukovych, was jeered as he spoke at the ceremony. “Today the whole country is celebrating,” said Yanukovych. “The new stadium is a gift to all our people, especially the children among whom there are champions of the future. The successful reconstruction of the NSK Olimpiyskiy has become the leading project for Ukraine’s image. I have no doubts that, at Euro 2012, Kiev and Ukraine will welcome visitors from many European states to the very highest standards.”

The new 68,000-seat Olympic Stadium will stage its first football match on November 11 as Ukraine takes on Germany in a friendly.

The FA Group, impotent which comprises the Football Association and the company that operates Wembley Stadium, unhealthy latest financial figures showed the organisation are steadily building with an operating profit of £37 million ($57.4m) in 2010.

The financial results for the 12 months ending December 31, price viagra 2010, the FA Group revealed that turnover exceeded £300 million ($465.6m) for the second consecutive year and distributions to the game again topped £100 million ($155.1m). In 2009, turnover was £314 million ($487.2m) while distributions from the game totalled £103 million ($159.8m). In announcing the results, the FA Group stated that a strong operating profit has enabled it to increase reserves for the first time since 2006.

The Group also stated that net assets increased by £12 million ($18.6m) to £66 million ($102.4m) while total cash balances increased by £10 million ($15.5m) during the year to £75 million ($116.3m). The FA Group did state that the financial report noted “some challenges which include signing new major commercial partners and agreeing new broadcast deals for the 2012-14 seasons”.

Mark Donnelly, FA Group chief financial officer, said: “We are very pleased with these latest financial results and the FA Group are well-placed to deliver stable revenues in the coming years despite a more challenging broadcast and sponsorship market.

“The deals signed this year with both Vauxhall and Budweiser are particularly exciting and we are delighted to have these two global market leaders on board. The FA Group will continue to focus on its core objectives in order to preserve the level of investment into the national and professional game.”

England and Harelquins rugby union star Nick Easter has become the latest brand ambassador for business insurance company QBE, the official partner of England Rugby.

QBE’s partnership with Easter will begin immediately and runs until December 2011.

QBE teaming up with Easter is part of the company’s continuing awareness and business development drive through its rugby sponsorships at both elite and grassroots levels.

Easter will become the face of QBE’s rugby activity and will attend important industry events.

The player had a brief stint as an investment banker before he signed for Harelquins back in 2004.