Soccer Shorts

A round-up of today's soccer news in brief

Gascoigne in hot water yet again 

FORMER ENGLAND footballer Paul Gascoigne has been charged with drink-driving, sources said yesterday.

The former Newcastle United and Tottenham Hotspur midfielder was arrested last month after an incident at a takeaway in Leeming Bar, North Yorkshire. The 42-year-old will appear at Northallerton Magistrates’ Court on April 16th.

Gascoigne was also charged with driving without insurance and driving without a licence.

Fan ownership on for Rangers' boss

WALTER SMITH believes Rangers should not rule out the possibility of fan ownership after the Rangers Supporters Trust confirmed plans for a potential takeover of the club.

The fans’ group have submitted an “exploratory document” to the Glasgow club with the aim of taking over David Murray’s majority shareholding.

Any RST plan would involve some degree of fan ownership, which is the ultimate aim of the Trust, albeit a takeover of the club, who are €31 million in debt, would need to be underwritten by either a wealthy individual or consortium.

“I think everything at the present moment is worth looking at,” said Smith. “That situation seems to be in place at a fair number of clubs across Europe.

“To be honest I don’t know a great deal about it. The reports in the papers this morning were rather sketchy in terms of what it fully entails. Like everything else at the moment, you can’t rule anything out. It seems to work at a lot of places, big clubs across Europe.”

Van Nistelrooy brews up storm

HAMBURG COACH Bruno Labbadia has defended his decision to substitute Ruud van Nistelrooy after the Dutchman stormed off the field during Sunday’s 1-0 Bundesliga defeat at Borussia Monchengladbach.

Van Nistelrooy, a January signing from Real Madrid and one of the club’s biggest earners, was clearly not happy to be replaced just after the hour mark.

But Labbadia said: “(Van Nistelrooy) has hardly played for six months and you could see that he was lacking freshness.”

Labbadia was bitterly disappointed with the loss, which left his side four points behind rivals Werder Bremen in the race for a place in Europe next season.

Only a few weeks ago, the HSV boss was talking up his side’s chances of catching the top three and qualifying for the Champions League. But now they have a challenge on their hands to clinch European football at all.

Italian footballers demand a hard line against racism

RACIST INCIDENTS at Serie A games must be stamped out by authorities, the Italian Footballers’ Association (AIC) urged after Clarence Seedorf and Jonathan Zebina suffered at the weekend.

AC Milan’s Dutch midfielder Seedorf was the target of racist chants from Lazio fans in a 1-1 draw in Serie A, which led to the Rome club being given a €15,000 fine.

Zebina, meanwhile, blamed racism after being slapped in the back of his neck by a supporter of his troubled Juventus side after a 2-1 win over Atalanta.

“The Italian Footballers’ Association expresses total solidarity and support for Jonathan Zebina and Clarence Seedorf, who were hit by despicable incidents of racism on Sunday,” the body said on Monday. “In firmly condemning these shameful acts, the AIC hopes that all elements in football will work with concrete actions to combat these expressions of incivility by a violent minority that must be isolated and silenced at all costs.

Eriksson excited about Ivory Coast

SVEN-GORAN Eriksson has spoken of his excitement at being appointed as coach of the Ivory Coast for the World Cup and of his dream of meeting England in the final.

The 62-year-old former England and Manchester City manager is confident that the class of players in the Ivory Coast squad can see them qualify from the “group of death” and make a real impact in the finals in South Africa this summer.

Brazil, Portugal and North Korea are the Ivory Coast’s rivals in Group G, and if they do qualify the Elephants may also have to face Spain the first knock-out phase.

In his first interview since being appointed to the job, Eriksson said:

“I am extremely happy and very excited. The Ivory Coast is a good football nation with a lot of good players – it couldn’t be better.”

Ukraine delay a concern for Platini

FEARS OVER whether Ukraine will be ready in time to co-host Euro 2012 have been expressed by Uefa president Michel Platini.

Work has ground to a halt in Lviv, one of the four host cities, and the stadium due to host the final in Kiev is still behind schedule.

Platini, speaking after a meeting with the European Commission, said he will travel to Ukraine next week to see for himself the scale of the problem.

“I am worried yes. I am worried because the stadium in Lviv has made no progress whatsoever, not by an inch,” he said yesterday.

“If the stadium in Kiev is not finished then we will not go there and if there is no Kiev then no Ukraine.”

Preparations by co-hosts Poland remain on time, however, and Platini added: “Everything in Poland is going well, so congratulations to them.”