Events

India's cricket board has withdrawn its threat to boycott major events such as the World Cup and is ready to host next year's International Cricket Council (ICC) knockout tournament, the board's president has said.

Morocco will bid to host the 2010 World Cup soccer finals to be held for the first time in Africa, a Royal Palace spokesman has confirmed.

More than a dozen countries have declared an interest in hosting either of the next two editions of the World Club Championship, FIFA said on Thursday.

Africa?s poor safety record which has seen 50 soccer spectators killed in separate incidents in less than a month could undermine plans to stage the World Cup in the continent for the first time in 2010.

India's government has reacted sharply to a threat by the country's cricket board to boycott the World Cup until the government clarifies playing guidelines.

Italy has moved closer to selling Rome's Foro Italico sports complex, announcing it would auction one of the great projects of Fascist dictator Benito Mussolini "very shortly".

Championship Auto Racing Teams (CART) has forecast total revenues of approximately $75 - $78 million for the year 2001 and a pre-tax profit for the year expected to be approximately 32 per cent of total revenues.

Keynote Systems, the internet performance analysts, have described the NCAA March Madness basketball tournament as ?one of the biggest sports events on the web? - due primarily to people at work logging on to follow teams' results for their office pools.

With the NHL play-offs little more than a week away, ABC has reported lower than hoped for ratings for the three of five broadcasts scheduled for the 2000-2001 season to date.

The city of Nashville is under investigation by the IRS over the issue of $153 million in tax-exempt bonds to fund the construction of the Adelphia Coliseum, home of the Tennessee Titans.

The Scottish Premier League has signed has signed a sponsorship deal with BskyB, reportedly worth over #250,000. The broadcaster has become the SPL?s third associate sponsor and joins the Scottish Daily Express and MacDonalds, while Bank of Scotland remain title sponsors.

Japan ended its dispute with South Korea on Thursday over which name should come first in official documents for the 2002 World Cup by deciding to leave out both of the host countries' names.

British Olympic chiefs are planning a bid for London to stage the 2012 Summer Games, the Daily Mail newspaper has reported.

Car makers may set up their own motor racing championship if talks with German media group Kirch, which owns 75 percent of Formula One broadcast rights' company SLEC, do not lead to a deal, German media reported.

GlobeCast is to host the Salt Lake City 2002 Broadcast Base at its technical operations centre in the host city.

Shares in Britain's bookmakers have fallen after an outbreak of foot and mouth disease threatened the Cheltenham Festival, one of the racing calendar's biggest events.