Tax-fraud allegations against Lionel Messi

A Spanish judge on Monday rejected a prosecutor's request to drop charges of tax fraud against Lionel Messi and ordered the investigation into three cases of suspected unpaid taxes to proceed. A court statement said there was "sufficient evidence" to believe the Barcelona and Argentina star "could have known and consented" to the creation of a fictitious corporate structure to avoid paying taxes on income from his image rights. The statement was issued by the court in Gava, Barcelona, that was initially called on by prosecutors to investigate if there was a case for Messi and his father to answer.

In June, Messi's public relations firm said a prosecutor had agreed to drop the tax fraud case against the player and his father. Messi's father, Jorge Horacio Messi, is under investigation for an alleged 4 million euros ($5.3 million) in unpaid taxes from 2007-09. Messi's father made a payment of more than 5 million euros ($6.6 million) in August 2013 to cover alleged unpaid taxes, plus interest. Monday's statement said it was not necessary for Messi "to have full knowledge of all accounting or corporate transactions or the exact amount of the fraud" for him to have had a clear idea of an intention to defraud.



Once the investigating judge finishes his deliberations, he will give the Tax Office and the State Prosecutor's office 10 days to come up with a strong case against Messi or a final decision to dismiss the case. Should the judge, backed by a new decision from tax and prosecution authorities, rule the case against Messi must go ahead with an indictment, the Barcelona star would have to appear in court to be questioned. Spain has been cracking down on tax evasion as it fights to repair the country's public finances after a prolonged recession triggered by the collapse of its once-booming real estate sector. Finance Minister Cristobal Montoro warned footballers they should make sure they were "comfortable" with their tax affairs.

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Messi: Really sad day for the football community

Argentine national team captain, Leo Messi expressed his condolences to the loss of AFA President, Julio Grondona on Wednesday.



Messi, who is currently on holiday following the 2014 World Cup, posted a message via his official facebook to mourn the passing of the president.

“Really sad day for the football community, for Argentina and for me. Our AFA President, Julio Grondona, has left us. I want to send my condolences to the family and friends of the beloved.

- LIO”

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Woodstown boys soccer goalie Tom Brady making name for himself

He gets it on the athletic field, in school, from friends and even from strangers. He can’t escape it. And he probably never will. When you share your name with one of the best NFL quarterbacks of all time, it just comes with the territory. Tom Brady is the quarterback of the New England Patriots. The Tom Brady we are talking about, though, is the starting goalie for the Woodstown High School soccer team. The senior Wolverine hears about his famous name all of the time. And he means all of the time. “Every person I meet,” Brady said sternly after a Gloucester County Summer Soccer League game earlier in the week. “It’s bad.”
However, he’s learned to deal with it and roll with the punches — and punchlines. Brady has even taken the light-hearted stance that the New England QB shares a name with him and not the other way around. Oh, and Brady is a ... Giants fan. While he can’t escape the jokes, Brady the soccer player is making a name for himself in the Tri-County Conference and throughout South Jersey. Last year, his first on the varsity team, Brady set the school record for wins in a season with 20 and recorded seven shutouts as the Wolverines captured the Diamond Division title and reached the NJSIAA South Jersey Group I final.

He was named to the Diamond Division First Team and got consideration for earning all-South Jersey honors. At the South Jersey meeting where coaches voted for the team, having the same name as the Patriots Super Bowl winning QB may have even helped his cause.
Each coach gets the chance to make a case for their player, but it goes by alphabetical order by school. So that means Woodstown head coach Darren Huck is one of the last guys to voice his opinion. Wondering if anyone was still listening when it was finally his turn, Huck got up and said Tom Brady threw for over 5,000 yards and for 42 touchdowns.

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Conservatives freak out after mistaking soccer jersey for ‘Muslim prayer rug’ left at border

Adding to unfounded worries that immigrant children attempting to enter the U.S. are reintroducing a panoply of diseases such as Ebola and dengue fever, conservatives grew more agitated yesterday after “American security contractors”  found what they believed to be a “Muslim prayer rug” abandoned near the Arizona border. According to Adam Weinstein at Gawker, the “rug” is actually a diamond-patterned Adidas soccer jersey. A spokesperson for American Patriot, Three Percent — a self-styled militia patrolling the Mexican/U.S. border — contacted Breitbart.com  and relayed the discovery of the ‘rug’ Monday night, just south of Sierra Vista in Coronado national forest.

According to  the spokesman,  Matthew Leber, the “patrol” was walking through a wash when he spied something on the ground. “That’s when I saw this thing laying around. And I was like, ‘What the hell is that?’ We walked over there and I didn’t really want to pull at it not knowing what was on it, ” Leber said.  “I poked a bit at it with a stick and noticed some of the Arabic writing and was just like, ‘Oh boy.’ I snapped a couple of photos and then went on our patrol.” Leber did not indicate whether he considered picking up the ‘rug’ and turning it over to Homeland Security. As Weinstein notes, a quick glance at the picture sent to Breitbart by Leber clearly shows a sleeve and the distinctive Adidas three-stripe logo.

Conservatives have recently become alarmed as conspiracy sites like World Net Daily have reported that Mexican drug cartels have formed partnerships with Islamic terrorist group ISIS, leading some to believe the cartels are helping sneak terrorists into the U.S. via Mexico. Breitbart recently reported that the same militia group told them that the U.S. Border Patrol had  picked up six “Special Interest Aliens” near Laredo, Texas, each one carrying 60,000 Iraqi dinars apiece. 60,000 dinars is equal to $51 in U.S. currency.

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Soccer team's octopus-themed jerseys are weird and amazing

Second division Spanish side CD Lugo has five kits. For the fifth kit, they chose to go with an octopus tentacle. AN OCTOPUS TENTACLE.
It’s already hard to imagine why a team would need five different kits. It’s even harder to imagine why they’d choose to put an octopus tentacle on the fifth one.
There’s also a strange alternate fourth kit. CD Lugo is sponsored by Estrella Galica beer, so it seemed only logical that they screen print and actual beer beneath the already prominent Estrella logo.

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The Big Ten soccer kits you've been waiting for

Ale Asylum would've made for a pretty sweet sponsor, but these concept Big Ten soccer kits are great.

You might've seen some mock-up SEC soccer kits making the rounds on Twitter over the last week or so. They're right here by Kevin Ives (@AUPPL), in case you missed them or would like another look. Walmart sponsoring Bret Bielema's Arkansas team is just so, so perfect. There are also some Big XII concepts here.

Even better, though, are the Big Ten kits Ives has since designed:



Drawing an insurance company as your sponsor is pretty boring, though it's also probably the most plausible for Wisconsin. Michigan's kits are also pretty great, considering the university's ties to Domino's Pizza, while Maryland naturally has some horrendous state-flag varieties.

Elsewhere, Rutgers' color scheme here looks pretty great, though these kits do highlight the insane number of Big Ten schools with red as a primary/secondary color. C'est la vie.

Which are your favorites? Let us know in the comments below. Bonus points for hilarious alternate sponsors.

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Newcastle Jets reveal new kit for 2014/15 season

The Newcastle Jets may have lost Golden Boot Adam Taggart and Josh Brillante for next season but on the other hand they've gained a new playing kit. The Hunter outfit took to Twitter to unveil their home and away jerseys for the 2014/15 A-League campaign. While the home jersey retains the red and blue colours worn by the Jets at Hunter Stadium for the past three seasons, there are a handful of changes. The jersey is predominantly blue, with thin red stripes and a red back panel for numbers and lettering.




It also features gold trim on the right shoulder and right sleeve in acknowledgement of the colours worn by the Jets during the formative years of the Hyundai A-League competition. The popular emerald green and cinnamon brown heritage jersey returns for the upcoming season after being selected by Jets members as the club’s away jersey for the 2013/14 campaign. The jersey adopts the City of Newcastle’s official colours, which were also worn by Newcastle KB United as the first Newcastle team to compete in the National Soccer League back in 1978.

Also, unique to both jerseys is the placement of a special 10 Year Anniversary Logo on the back collar celebrating a decade of the Newcastle Jets’ participation in the A-League. The kits, produced by the club’s official apparel supplier BLK, feature durable, yet lightweight material and mesh side panels to ensure a breathable and comfortable fit during the summer months while the Hyundai A-League competition is played. BLK, will also be producing playing jerseys, training gear and merchandise for the Jets A-League and National Youth League teams through to the end of the 2016/17 season. Now it's over to the fans for their verdict.

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FIFA 15 Release Date: Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo, Luis Suarez, James Rodriguez Player Ratings Recently Leaked?

The FIFA 15  player ratings of some top football players could have been leaked. A picture of what seems like ten top soccer players — Ivan Rakitic, Andres Iniesta, Neymar, Luis Suarez, Lionel Messi, Toni Kroos, James Rodriguez, Karim Benzema, Gareth Bale, and Cristiano Ronaldo  — FIFA 15 Ultimate Team player cards is available on the web.



If the information is accurate, it seems like Messi and Ronaldo are join best players in the game with 94 overall ratings. Luis Suarez gets a four-point boost from FIFA 14, and now has a 90 overall rating. New Real Madrid player and World Cup 2014 star James Rodriguez gets a three-point jump to 86 overall. Of course, the picture, which has no source, could be totally unreliable. It is not inconceivable that it is a very good Photoshop picture of current player cards with updated ratings. One tell-tale sign is that all of the players’ photos are identical to their FIFA 14 versions. While EA Sports does reuse some photos, the top players normally get an updated photo. So it is highly suspicious that despite his big move to Barcelona, Luis Suarez appears to be clad in the red of his Liverpool jersey.

Another sign that this could be a fake lies in the design of the player cards, which remain unchanged from their FIFA 14 iteration. Since Ultimate Team was launched, EA does update the player card designs in each year’s version of FIFA. Eager fans do not have to wait too long to put their favorite players in action, however, since FIFA 15 is slated for a September 23 release. The soccer simulator will be available on the PC, Xbox One, Xbox 360, PS4, PS3, PS Vita, Nintendo Wii, and Nintendo 3DS. Check out the minimum and recommended system requirements for PC here.

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German soccer team jerseys doing good business

BANGKOK, July 21 -- Sales of German national football team jerseys carrying the ‘Adidas’ brand logo and 'Made in Thailand' are impressive now in Germany after the national team won the FIFA World Cup 2014 on July 13 in Brazil, according to Suchitra Thanomsap, director of the Thai Trade Promotion Centre in Frankfurt. Ms Suchitra said German team jerseys embroidered with three stars as the German national team won the World Cup three times earlier before the 2014 tournament were also good and were offered at discounted prices just before the tournament ended.

But sales picked up sharply again after the German national team won the World Cup crown and a new lot of jerseys was ordered from Thailand and will be available on the German market on August 8, she said. The first lot of new jerseys carrying four stars was sold out within an hour on July 14 in Germany, Ms Suchitra said, adding that a new purchase order was then placed with Adidas in Thailand.

The Frankfurt Stock Exchange manager interviewed on radio on July 14, said the German soccer team victory would persuade people to spend money, while deposit interest rates offered by the European Union--now on the decline-- prompted Germans to believe it is unnecessary to save money for tomorrow as they want to enjoy life today. Many more German people celebrating by dining out and Thai restaurants there are also benefitting.

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Peru's soccer jerseys hailed as "best of all time"

Peru’s soccer successes have been few and far between, but they sure know how to dress.

The world cup blog in the online edition of the American magazine The New Republic described Peru’s soccer team uniform as the best World Cup uniform of all time.

“Was this the best World Cup uniform of all time?” Miles Kohrman mused in his blog. “If there was a trophy for dressing well, Peru would walk away with it.”

Besides the traditional World Cup awards, the World Cup blog “Goal Posts” has decided to grant another award, for the best World Cup uniforms of all time.

“Peru’s red sash is a thing of beauty. Really, just look at it. Simple, elegant, timeless, regal, polished, sashed,” Kohrman noted.

Likewise, the blog’s followers can check out two photos of the national team; one at the 1970 World Cup in Mexico, and a more recent photograph featuring Claudio Pizarro, Jefferson Farfan, among other soccer players.

The said design was first used at the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games, after three different variations of the uniform in the early 1930s.

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U.S. soccer jersey is suddenly haute fashion for fans

Soccer is suddenly hot in the United States, and so is the U.S. team’s official jersey. “It’s been hard to keep them on the shelves,” said Allan Rojas, a spokesman for Academy Sports + Outdoors. The red, white and blue jersey, sometimes likened to a Bomb Pop frozen bar, was created for U.S. Soccer by Nike and unveiled in April. Worn with red shorts and red socks, it’s the away uniform of the U.S. men’s and women’s teams.

The companion home uniform — which the U.S. men are wearing for today’s World Cup game against Belgium, has a collar and resembles a golf shirt. Academy, headquartered in Katy, started stocking $90 jerseys before the World Cup started. Many stores have since sold out, Rojas said.

“I think the U.S.A. jersey resonates with the country, so customers feel a sense of pride when they wear it,” Rojas said. Will sales soar even further if the Americans beat Belgium and advance to the quarterfinals this afternoon? Will the jerseys be moved to the discount rack if Team USA loses? All Rojas would say in response was, “At this point, we’re really looking forward to today’s game.”

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