Events

Continuing the trend towards combined ownership of more than one sports franchise, the owners of Minnesota's NBA and NHL teams are were working on a deal to buy the Minnesota Twins, contingent upon the construction of a new stadium in St. Paul.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair threw open his Downing Street doors to a delegation from world soccer's governing body FIFA yesterday, hoping to convince them to back England's bid to host the 2006 World Cup.

The beleaguered organisers of the Rugby World Cup have criticised ITV's coverage of the event as a "disgrace" according to a report in the UK?s Guardian newspaper.

Senegal lawyer Lamine Diack is present his case today to retain control of the world governing athletics body after the death of International Amateur Athletic Federation (IAAF) president Primo Nebiolo this month.

Bundesliga director Wilfried Straub has described reports that the broadcast rights to the Bundesliga will be sold exclusively to pay TV next season as "premature".

FOXSports.com, the Internet unit of News Corp.'s Fox Sports division, has launched 18 regional Web sites. The new sites mirror the regional approach of FOX Sports Net sites and offer a new vehicle for local advertisers.

The British government said on Wednesday it was scrapping plans to redevelop Wembley stadium to host athletics and would focus instead on upgrading the ground for soccer and rugby league.

FieldTurf Inc. and FieldTurf International, Inc. have announced that they have filed a lawsuit in the US District Court against Southwest Recreational Industries, Inc. the maker of the synthetic grass sports surface known as Astroturf, for unlawful acts of patent infringement and anti-trust violations.

Extreme Interactive and Nirve Sports have formed an alliance over the distribution of sports programming.

The Pan-american Sports Network (PSN), a new, 24-hour, all sports cable and satellite digital television network directed at sports fans throughout Mexico, Central and South America and the Caribbean, will debut on Tuesday, February 15 with the live, exclusive broadcast of Copa Libertadores, the region's most important football event.

The Swiss government has unveiled plans to invest up to SwFr 80m in sporting facilities of national importance between 2000 to 2005.

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) has become the latest to sign up as a rights holder for the KL Commonwealth Games.

Thirty members of the European Parliament have taken the French organisers of the soccer World Cup to court to force them to redistribute hundreds of thousands of tickets abroad.

Two TV networks that lost out in the high-stakes bidding to televise NFL games face major hurdles in realising their ambition to form a new pro football league, according to advertising executives.

NBC has clinched a record NBA Finals rating with a sixth-game overnight score that may also be the top single-game rating in league history.

The English Football Association hopes to collect #12million by selling the rights to sponsor the England football team in the run-up to the 2002 World Cup.