South American Football Confederation (CONMEBOL), has denied reports that its President, Nicolas Leoz, asked for a knighthood in return for supporting England’s bid to host the World Cup in 2018 after reports were made by newspaper the Sunday Times.

The organisation’s spokesman, Nestor Benitez, said: “The publication in London’s [Sunday Times] is pure fantasy, as well as being sick.

“The South American Football Confederation maintained and confirmed at all times that its votes [during the 2018 World Cup bid process] were for Spain [and Portugal] and for no other country.”

The suggestion came as another blow to the image of the much maligned world soccer governing body, FIFA, after Leoz had claimed that Prince William had invited him to his wedding to Kate Middleton. The Paraguayan maintains this claim and say he had turned down the offer because the event clashed with CONMEBOL’s bi-annual congress.

Prince William’s spokesman Paddy Harverson had claimed last week that no invitations to the wedding had been issued to anyone from FIFA.

Golf New South Wales has announced Andrew Tharle from Canberra as its new Board Member.

Andrew has been a member of Royal Canberra Golf Club for 26 years. During that time he served on the Board and as Vice-Captain. He also spent a number of years on the Finance and Match Committees. This was a critical period for the Club as it was rebuilding its clubhouse and building an additional nine holes.

Andrew is passionate about junior and regional golf development. He said: “I believe juniors and regional golf is extremely important to the growth of golf.” 

He has spent twenty years in public service in a range of management and executive positions with a focus on financial management. He is currently the Head of the Finance and Commercial Services area at the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. This position requires him to show leadership and he is required to set longer term goals. He has also been a member of the Australian Society of CPA’s for almost twenty years.

Three nominations were received for the three vacancies for the positions of Director of Golf NSW. As no further nominations were received, cheap all three applicants were elected unopposed. Andrew and both re-elected Directors Sue Fabian and Jean Moran will serve for a term of two (2) years.

The Golf NSW Board thanked retiring Director and Chairman of Finance John Waanders for his role on the Board and awarded him with a Life Membership. John has been a stalwart of golf in the Newcastle Region, salve serving in numerous roles. He has been involved with the state body for over a decade, abortion served as a Board and Council Member on the Men’s Association before being elected to the Board of Golf NSW in 2010. We are all indebted to John for his contribution to golf in this State.

The nine Directors who form the 2013-2014 Golf NSW Board are Chris Allen (Pennant Hills), Sue Fabian (Pennant Hills), Frank Gal (Richmond), Alan Harrison (Federal), Jean Moran (Shelly Beach), Lynne Ritchie (Lithgow), John Robinson (Elanora & The Australian), Andrew Tharle (Royal Canberra) and Darrell Watts (Murwillumbah).

The U.S. Olympic Committee (USOC) board have agreed to move forward to explore a possible bid for the Olympic Games, according to reports.

The USOC will hold meetings with cities interesting in bidding for a future Olympics, and is promising to streamline the domestic selection process if it decides to bid for the 2024 or 2026 Games.

CEO Scott Blackmun said: “We’re just trying to get smarter and see which cities we might want to have serious discussions with. We’re going to view 2013 as more informational, if you will. We’ll be smarter at the end of the year than we are in the beginning. But we don’t expect to make substantive announcements in 2013.”

The 2024 bidding process doesn’t begin in until 2015.

Blackmun said: “We definitely recognize that we want to have a more cost-effective process this time around that we’ve had in the past. It needs to be a little more informal, a little less expensive.”

USOC chairman Larry Probst added: “I think it’s important to have local, state and national support for a bid. We hope to position this as a national bid for the United States.”

Blackmun said he was willing to sit down with any city that was interested in hosting, and that over the next few months the board will put together a “process paper” that will describe a timetable and other details. But he didn’t guarantee a future bid.

He added: “We don’t know if we’re in a position to submit a bid until we know which city we’d submit.”

Los Angeles, Dallas and Tulsa are expected to express an interest in hosting the 2024 Games. The Associated Press reports New York, Chicago and San Francisco have either bid or expressed interest in bidding in the past, and Salt Lake City, Denver and Reno are among the cities that have talked about hosting a Winter Olympics.

Tokyo 2020 launched its official campaign tagline ‘Discover Tomorrow’, which was chosen to emphasise two key elements of the bid and Tokyo- global inspiration and dynamic innovation.

Japan Sport Council, owners of the iconic National Stadium, announced the launch of an international design competition to update and remodel the venue in preparation for Tokyo’s 2020 Olympic and Paralympic bid (Tokyo 2020).

IOC members may be convinced to vote for the Japanese bid after the quake-tsunami disaster left about 19,000 people dead or missing last year. An IOC source said: “It is a powerful argument, IOC members like a story and also are especially keen on the legacy message.” {jcomments on}

Aston Villa has begun a relationship with CWS Brains, seek a leading mobile content provider in Japan, anabolics in an effort to reach out to the English Premier League club’s fan base in the Asian country.

Japanese fans will be able to download club news, ringtones, wallpapers, screensavers and videos of their favourite Villa players. CWS Brains will also provide breaking news SMS alerts, match day line-up alerts and daily club news on the WAP site, which will offer classic goal videos, match photos and 30-second highlights of Premier League and cup games.

CWS Brains’ Soccer Membership already has 150,000 customers to the subscription service. The service is available across a wide range of mobile platforms in Japan. Villa has joined other top Premier League clubs including Manchester United, Everton and Arsenal in partnering with CWS Brains.

Villa’s head of marketing, Russell Jones, said that the club remained committed to “building Aston Villa’s fan base internationally as well as locally”.

Jones added: “Thanks to the reach of the Premier League, our supporter club network, new sponsorGenting and our participation in the Barclays Asia Trophy, we have seen a very rapid and recent growth in our Asian fan base. We are delighted to have secured a deal with CWS Brains as the partnership will provide yet another platform to engage with our fans in Asia.”

FIFA presidential candidate Mohamed Bin Hammam, sole challenger to current incumbent Sepp Blatter, has admitted that the mix-up which saw him unable to attain a visa to the United States in order to attend the CONCACAF Congress has affected his chances of replacing the Swiss.

Bin Hammam travels on a diplomatic passport yet was still unable to fly to Miami and revealed in a blog on his website that he was unable to attend “due to issues beyond my control”.

It has since been reported that he was in fact refused a visa – and it has now been revealed how that came about after the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) president claimed he was the victim of an “administrative error” on the US side which prevented him joining Blatter in Miami..

Bin Hammam stated: “Yes, I have a diplomatic passport. Unfortunately, I couldn’t attend the CONCACAF Congress in Miami, Florida, because of an administrative error. And I have been definitely affected by it.”

An AFC spokesman went further, adding: “There was an administrative faux pas – not on our side! – when he submitted his passport for the stamping of the US visa. Even diplomatic passport holders like the AFC President sometimes need a visa.”

“When the passport came back, the visa had not been stamped and the book had to be sent back. 

“This coincided with the Easter holidays and before the visa could be stamped he had to catch the plane to the UK and, onwards to, Paraguay.”

Although Bin Hammam’s absence technically reduced his chances of unseating Blatter, CONCACAF President Jack Warner claimed that he would wait to hear from the Qatari before deciding who to back in the elections.

Bin Hammam has now been invited to Trinidad next week at a specially convened alternative summit where he will meet Warner and Caribbean members of confederation.