Team Nigeria lists 90 Athletes For Commonwealth Games

According to the Ministry of Youth and Sports, Ninety athletes will represent Nigeria at the Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games scheduled to run from April 4 to 15 as the country will take part in 10 events, including Athletics, Basketball, Wrestling, Weightlifting, Boxing, Table Tennis, Gymnastics, Para table tennis, Para Athletics, Para Powerlifting.

Sports Minister, Solomon Dalung revealed in a meeting the ministry held yesterday with presidents of the 10 federations, whose athletes will be taking part in the Games. Speaking at the meeting, said it was convened to scrutinize and defend the athletes’ participation at the Games, evaluate their prospects and finalize arrangements for the last phase of training before the games. 

A breakdown of the contingent shows that wrestling will be represented by six male and six female athletes, who will depart for Australia tomorrow to continue preparations for the games.

Weightlifting will feature four athletes, two men and two women, but athletics has the largest contingent with 37 stars, including 17 men and 20 women. Three medals prospects, including Divine Oduduru and gymnast, Uche Eke will not be at the championship due to academic commitments. The development means that Gymnastics will be represented by just one gymnast. “Athletics will hold its final training for 10 days while its top 10 athletes will attend the World indoors in Birmingham before arriving on March 1,” the ministry said.

It added that table tennis, which has five male players, would begin camping three weeks before the games, while Para Powerlifting, which will spend one month in the Gold Coast training for the competition, will present two players and two Para Athletes. The Commonwealth Games Athletes Village will open on March 25.

Super Bowl 2018: Philadelphia Eagles 41-33 New England Patriots - Nick Foles brings home the team's first-ever Vince Lombardi trophy

Philadelphia Eagles won the Super Bowl for the first time after beating Tom Brady's New England Patriots 41-33 On a night when records tumbled and the expected norms of an NFL game went out the window, the Eagles - led majestically by quarterback Nick Foles - produced a brilliant offensive display to deny the Patriots a record-equalling sixth Super Bowl crown.

Zach Ertz's touchdown with less than three minutes remaining put the Eagles into a five-point lead, but it took Brandon Graham's sack on Brady just moments later to seemingly put the game beyond the reigning champions.

Even then the Eagles had to withstand a late march downfield by Brady, but victory was finally assured when a Hail Mary attempt came to nothing as the clock ticked down to zero.

Other notable stats from the game include:

• The Patriots became the first team in NFL history to put up more than 600 yards of offense in a game and lose.
• The Eagles set a new record for the highest number of points conceded by a winning team in the Super Bowl (33).
• Brady became the first quarterback in any NFL game to lose after throwing for more than 500 yards, three touchdowns and no interceptions.
• One sack in the game tied the Super Bowl record.
• Brady was appearing in his record eighth Super Bowl and was bidding to become the first man in the sport's history to win six times.
• Brady did at least set a new record for most career touchdowns in Super Bowls, with his three successes taking him to 18 in total
• LeGarrette Blount won the Super Bowl for the second year in succession but with different teams, having been part of the Patriots' victory over Atalanta Falcons a year ago.
• The attendance of 67,612 inside Minneapolis US Bank Stadium took the combined total attendance at the 52 Super Bowls held so far past the four-million mark.
• London-born Jay Ajayi ran for 57 yards for the Eagles as he became a Super Bowl champion just four months after he was traded by the Miami Dolphins.

FINA Implements Strong Anti-Doping Policy Before Budapest 2017

With less than 100 days to go before the start of the 17th FINA World Championships in Budapest (HUN), FINA’s out-of competition anti-doping programme continues to target the top athletes that will attend the competition. 

During the first quarter (January-March) of 2017, over 600 testing missions were conducted on 376 athletes from 38 countries. A mission may consist of various tests and analyses: urine sample, blood sample for athlete passport, or blood sample for the detection of prohibited substances/methods.

Before the beginning of FINA’s showcase event – from July 14-30 in the Magyar capital -, around 2 000 out-of competition missions will be carried out, representing an investment of around US$ 2 million and consistent with FINA's long-standing and determined commitment to protect clean athletes

UFC Secures Las Vegas Deal

The Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) has secured a multi-year agreement which will see the mixed martial arts organisation as a tenant of the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.

The UFC said the deal signed with the venue’s owner, Las Vegas Arena Company – an entity majority owned by AEG and MGM Resorts International - marks the first time that a global sports brand, other than a professional franchise, has been named as an anchor tenant for a sports and entertainment venue.

The terms of the deal have not been disclosed, but reportedly the partnership will cover at least seven years.

The T-Mobile Arena has been open for less than a year, but has already hosted four UFC events, including the high-profile rematch between Nate Diaz and Conor McGregor.

The Golden Knights will serve as the arena’s other anchor tenant as it prepares to enter the NHL in 2017-18 as an expansion franchise in the ice hockey league.

World Baseball Classic Sponsors Revealed

A host of sponsorship deals for the World Baseball Classic 2017 have been revealed ahead of the national team tournament.

Video game developer GungHo, Swiss watchmaker Hublot, Japanese logistics provider Nippon Express and financial services company Nomura Securities have signed up as top-tier global sponsors of the event, which runs from March 6-22 across venues in Japan, Mexico, South Korea and the US.

This year’s event will feature a record number of team partners, with 23 brands to feature on the uniforms of the 12 participating countries.

Any global marketing partners will receive extensive branding opportunities at venues and online

Super Bowl Overnight Ratings Slip

 

The Super Bowl on Monday night turned into a thriller - the first Super Bowl ever to go into an overtime period - but New England’s 34-28 victory over Atlanta actually achieved slightly lower overnight ratings that the listless 2016 game between Carolina and Green Bay, according to the initial results from Nielsen. It may be that Atlanta’s big 28-9 lead going into the final quarter resulted in lost viewers.

Broadcaster Fox scored an overnight rating in the 56 metered metro markets of 48.8, down from a 49.0 overnight last year for CBS and 49.7 the year before for NBC.

Fox said the 2017 game gave the network its best metered market rating ever.

The final audience tally is still to be announced, but the game will presumably fall short of the 111.9 million viewers for the 2016 edition. The 2015 Super Bowl between New England and Seattle pulled the biggest audience in US television history with 114.4 million viewers

Tokyo to Host Asian Baseball Event

The Japanese capital city of Tokyo will host a new baseball tournament later this year.

Japan, South Korea, and Chinese Taipei will contest the inaugural Asia Professional Baseball Challenge, which will take place between November 16-19 at the Tokyo Dome.

The tournament is due to take place every four years, with the concept reportedly first suggested in May 2016.

The tournament will be limited to players who are under 24 and have less than three years of professional experience, but rules allow for three overage players to join them.

Teams will play each other once in a round-robin format, with the top two teams to contest the final.

Baseball will return to the Olympic Games in Tokyo in 2020, after a 12-year absence

China Face One-Year Weightlifting Ban For Doping Violations

China is set to be banned from international weightlifting competitions for one year, after three of its athletes were stripped of their 2008 Beijing Olympic gold medals for failing doping re-tests.

The International Olympic Committee has retrospectively disqualified three Chinese gold medal-winning weightlifters from Beijing 2008.

The International Weightlifting Federation (IWF) stated in 2016 that any countries with three or more failed tests in the re-tests of Beijing 2008 and London 2012 would be banned for a year. The IWF has not confirmed the sanction yet.

Five other athletes have been retrospectively disqualified from the games

UFC Installs Andrew Schleimer as new CFO

The Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) has appointed Andrew Schleimer as its new Chief Financial Officer.

Schleimer most recently worked for Digital Turbine Inc., drugs serving as their Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Prior to this employment, ampoule Schleimer worked for North American amusement park corporation Six Flags.

He will replace outgoing UFC CFO Nakisa Bidarian, who leaves the company to lead a new investment vehicle.

ICC announce ballot for role of Chairman of the Board

 

The ICC Board has agreed that the election of the ICC Chairman by the Board will be held through a secret ballot in late May after all constitutional amendments have been approved by the Full Council in the coming weeks.

The election process will be overseen by the ICC’s independent Audit Committee Chairman and all present and past ICC directors will be eligible to contest the election.

However, candidates can only be nominated by a fellow ICC director who, in turn, will be allowed to provide no more than one nominee.

Any nominee with the support of at least two Full Member ICC directors will be put forward as a candidate for election.

The elected independent Chairman will not be allowed to hold any national or provincial position with any Member Board.

South African Sports Minister bans federations from bidding

South Africa's sports minister has banned the Rugby, Athletics, Netball and Athletics federations from bidding for major international tournaments.

The country's five major sports agreed on targets for transformation but only the country's football federation met it's target.

In a statement he said this was after they failed to create enough opportunities for black players.

South African Sports Minister Fikile Mbalula said: "I have resolved to revoke the privilege of Athletics South Africa (ASA), Cricket South Africa (CSA), Netball South Africa (NSA) and South African Rugby (SARU) to host and bid for major and mega international tournaments in the Republic of South Africa, as a consequence of the aforementioned federations not meeting their own set transformation targets, with immediate effect,"

"I will review this decision when considering the results of the 2016/2017 Transformation Barometer."

The SARU released a statement in response to the news just hours after it was made public

Jurie Roux, CEO of SA Rugby said: “We understand and support the Minister’s urgency in addressing the issue of transformation,” 

“There is no question that we have more work to do and we could be moving faster, but our sport has undergone a major overhaul in how we do business and how we measure ourselves in the past two or three years and we have definitely made great progress.

“Transformation is a key strategic imperative for SA Rugby to remain competitive and to survive in the sports landscape in our country.

“Our barometre for 2015 shows that we have achieved our target in 11 out of 13 dimensions as agreed with government."

World Flying Disc Federation announce CBS deal

The World Flying Disc Federation (WFDF) has announced that the WFDF 2016 World Ultimate Championships from London will air on CBS Sports Network.

The  two-hour program will air twice across North America on June 25 (same day delay).

In addition to the CBS Sports Network telecast, WFDF will be live-streaming over 20 games throughout the week leading up to the finals on Saturday.

“We are very excited to be working with CBS Sports Network for the North American telecast of our premier championships,” stated Robert “Nob” Rauch, WFDF President. 

“For WFDF, this is our most significant major network coverage to date reflecting the growth and recognition of the sport and it is a key element in our strategy to raise the profile of the sport as we continue our search for a global brand sponsor.”

NFL decides not to stream London games

The National Football League has decided against live streaming its three London games next season, choosing instead to focus on streaming its Thursday night games on Twitter, a spokesman told Reuters.

The league has been experimenting with live streaming games as more consumers are watching shows online and cancelling their cable subscriptions.

Last year, the NFL partnered with Yahoo Inc to live stream a London game as part of an effort to gain more international viewers.

The league, which had an estimated annual revenue of $12 billion last year, did not rule out live streaming London games in the future.
"We’ll continue to evaluate options to put our games on digital platforms, making them as widely accessible to fans around the world as possible," the spokesman wrote.
Given the NFL's interest in expanding its international reach, it is likely the league ultimately will live stream those games in coming years, said Marc Ganis, president of Chicago-based consulting firm Sports Corp, who has worked closely with the NFL.

Hong Kong to host biggest ever sailing event

Hong Kong will be hosting the Volvo Ocean Race for the first time when the event visits in February 2018 during the 13th edition.

In a press conference today, Volvo Ocean Race organisers announced a unique collaboration with the Hong Kong Sailing Federation to bring the race to Hong Kong’s Victoria Harbour.

It will be the largest world-class sailing event ever staged in Hong Kong.

The world’s premier offshore race will transform the old airport in Kai Tak, and introduce residents of Hong Kong to a wide range of race-related activities geared to educate as well as entertain both existing fans and newcomers to the race.

An in-port race, will also be held in the port before the boats leave for the next leg.

Anthony Day, Council Member of the Hong Kong Sailing Federation, said: “This will go down in history as a milestone event for Hong Kong sailing and will provide a wonderful platform for us to engage more Hongkongers in the sport of sailing."

Antonio Bolaños Lopez, acting CEO of the Volvo Ocean Race, added: “I am thrilled that the race is visiting one of the most beautiful ports in the world for the first time. We are delighted to welcome Hong Kong to the Volvo Ocean Race family and know that we will have a stopover that will be one of the highlights of the 2017-18 edition."

Guinness the top Sports Sponsor in Ireland

 

Guinness has topped the league of Ireland’s most appealing sports sponsors among Irish adults so far in 2016, while the level of new deals activity reported has slowed this year, according to the quarter 1 Irish Sponsorship market review by sponsorship advisors ONSIDE.

The latest ONSIDE QSR notes that since January, sixty-four different sports sponsors competed to varying degrees for the admiration of the Irish adult public, with 3 in 10 adults identifying either Guinness or Heineken sponsorship as best in class this quarter.

The next line of stand-out sports sponsors identified by ONSIDE’s Sponsorship Tracker for Q1 2016 included 3 Mobile as sponsors of Irish Football and Rugby, provincial rugby sponsors Bank of Ireland and AIB, whose GAA support peaked in March with the Club championship Finals and their ground-breaking TV initiative ‘The Toughest Trade

New eSports tournament to mirror Olympics

A new eSport tournament will take place during this summer's Olympic Games in Rio.

The eGames will be run by the International eGames Committee (IEGC).

Britain, Canada, Brazil and the USA are confirmed entrants with more to follow.

 Each country will have a national squad (eTeam) of gamers (male and female - over 18 years old) playing in team and individual games

In line with other globally established sporting events, the eGames will be a medal only competition, with no prize money, but the opportunity to take home gold for your country

UAE stripped of the FEI World Endurance Championships 2016

The FEI Bureau has stripped the UAE of the FEI World Endurace Championship.

The Bureaus have stated they believe the UAE NF is "not currently in a position to guarantee that horse welfare would be fully protected" at the Championships.

As a result, the Championships, will undergo a bidding process to find a replacement venue outside the UAE.

The deadline for receipt of bids is 18 May and the allocation to a new host will be made during the Bureau teleconference on 14 June.

It is expected that the Championships will now take place in September or October.

NFL signs Twitter Live-Stream deal

The NFL have announced a new partnership with social network site Twitter. The league has reached an agreement with the social media outlet to live-stream Thursday night games this season, according to multiple reports.

Twitter, with its 800 million users, has been a second-screen destination for NFL fans virtually since its inception and now will become a single-screen source for games as well as commentary, video highlights and fan chatter.

Commissioner Roger Goodell shared the news in his first tweet since September 2014.

“Twitter is where live events unfold and is the right partner for the NFL as we take the latest step in serving fans around the world live NFL football,”

Team England renews Kukri Partnership ahead of 2018 Commonwealth Games

Team England has renewed its official partnership with Kukri to supply competition and delegation sportswear to the whole of Team England’s teams for the next two years.

The partnership has been announced with exactly two years to go until the start of the 2018 Gold Coast Commonwealth Games..

The partnership sees Kukri continue to supply sportswear to elite athletes across 18 different sports following on from the successful 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow and 2015 Youth Commonwealth Games in Samoa.

As part of the agreement, Kukri will supply product to over 600 England athletes and coaches competing in the Gold Coast 2018 Games, as well as the next generation of English athletes competing at the 2017 Commonwealth Youth Games in the Bahamas.

Speaking to iSportconnect, Paul Blanchard, Chief Executive of Commonwealth Games England said: “

“Our partnership worked phenomenally well last time around, it’s difficult to get the organisation of sports kits right and if you multiply that by around 17 sports, it’s an enormously complicated business."

“There were a number of parties interested but we’re glad kukri came out on top”

“Kukri ticked all the boxes, the kit ad design has gone very well over the years especially as it’s a huge operation"

"And in terms of financial model – the offer was a very good one and when you add it all together it was the best offer on the table."

    

Baseball Will Highlight Obama’s Cuba Visit

U.S. President Barack Obama will throw out the ceremonial first pitch and join Cuban counterpart Raul Castro to watch the Tampa Bay Rays of Major League Baseball take on the Cuba’s national team in Havana on Tuesday afternoon.

The Rays players arrived in Cuba on Sunday in a delegation of 85 people led by principal owner Stuart Sternberg with team sponsors along for the special occasion. Tickets for the game at the 45,000-capacity Estadio Latinoamericano are sold out. The game is the first to be played by an MLB team in Cuba since 1999, when the Baltimore Orioles visited the island.

MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred, MLB Players Association Executive Director Tony Clark will be at the game along with Cuban Baseball Federation President Higinio Velez and Cuban Baseball Commissioner Heriberto Suarez.

Among the Rays players is only one player who is not on the 40-man roster for the MLB season starting in two weeks. He is Dayron Varona, who left Cuba three years ago and signed a minor league contract with Tampa Bay last year.

A delegation of former MLB stars attending the game will include Luis Tiant, who started his career in the Cuban League before leaving in 1961.

Havana’s sports venues will be the scene of more festivities this week when the Rolling Stones play a free concert at the 15,000-seat Coliseo de la Ciudad Deportiva. The event on March 25 is promoted by AEG’s Concerts West and Musica Punto Zero.