Players at this year's women's World Cup, trying to settle a lawsuit against FIFA, will play on artificial turf as long as the final matches are on natural grass, their lawyer said.
Women's World Cup officials and sponsors expressed concern over the corruption scandal swirling around world soccer's governing body.
Canada took a deep breath on Thursday and prepared for their moment in the Women's World Cup spotlight.
Scandal-plagued FIFA have turned to the man who helped the International Olympic Committee (IOC) out of their corruption crisis, appointing Swiss Francois Carrard as chairman of their reform committee.
The Women's World Cup stopped to take a breath on Wednesday following an opening round of games that produced a little bit of everything.
Canada, which is hosting the 2015 FIFA Women's World Cup, will not support incumbent Sepp Blatter in Friday's presidential vote at the FIFA Congress, the head of the Canadian Soccer Association said on Thursday on his official Twitter account.
FIFA secretary general Jerome Valcke has dismissed allegations of gender discrimination over the decision to play the women's World Cup on artificial turf, saying the surface could also be used for the men's tournament in the future.
Running highlights from FIFA's congress. World soccer's governing body has voted on a series of reforms and will elect a new president later on Friday (all times GMT): 13.30 The voting process is proving a long, drawn out affair. After an hour's voting, we have crawled to L for Latvia with little to get excited about apart from the brief appearance of Davor Suker, Golden Boot winner as the top scorer at the 1998 World Cup, as he cast Croatia's vote. Time then for a reminder that for a candidate to be elected in the first round, he must obtain at least 138 votes, two-thirds of the 207 votes cast. If this does not happen, a second round is held. This time, a simple majority -- 104 votes, which represents more than 50 percent of the votes -- is sufficient for a candidate to be elected. If no candidate gets that majority, the one with fewest votes will be eliminated and a new round will be held. This continues until one candidate obtains a majority. 12.45. Having begun his speech by promising to "die with my boots on", Sexwale ends it by withdrawing from the race, "I have got a surprise for you. My campaign ends today and I suspend my participation. With only four people it is your problem now." Markus Kattner, FIFA general secretary then reminds delegates of the voting procedure, reminding them not to photograph their ballot papers.
India's Leander Paes and Rohan Bopanna crashed out of the Japan Open following a straight set defeat against Ivan Dodig and Marcelo Melo, in Tokyo on Thursday.
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