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As ever, if you can make the argument that FIFA's regulations amount to abuse of a dominant market position or an anti competitive agreement, you could basically ignore them within the EU. That's not going to be a can of worms UEFA would be willing to open though - turkeys and Christmas etc

Rupert Lowe claims to detest far-right ethnonationalism and neo-Nazism. Yet a string of extremists have been out campaigning for Restore candidate Marlon West ahead of Thursday’s Greater Manchester mayoral election.

Which reminds me, how is that Swiss investigation into the corruption around Qatar 2022 going?

UEFA and its member associations should have boycotted the World Cup when it was announced that Qatar 2022 would be played in the winter. If they don't show their strength now, I don't think they ever will. www.bbc.co.uk/sport/footba...

Having it hidden away on TNT is just nuts isn't it?

Women's experiences of roads and transport networks are not always fully reflected in the evidence used to inform road safety policy and planning. A new study aims to better understand women's experiences of travel and road safety across Greater Manchester www.manchester.ac.uk/about/news/w...

Can economists please stop confusing "there is a surprising dearth of research on X topic" with "economists have not looked at this yet". www.theguardian.com/science/2026...

Bistecca fiorentina....

Surely bans on BBQing in particular areas or at particular times is a better approach? All BBQs can start fires and a ban on disposables will disproportionately hit poorer inner-city households. Also, build municipal BBQs in public spaces that are less prone to fire risk.

Finally, congratulations to the fifteen over-65's who received football banning orders this season, thereby smashing records of all previous years.

Broadly, football policing operations should be congratulated for holding their nerve in the face of the post-pandemic uptick in disorder. Continuing good practice (of course there is always some bad practice) has led to the problem in E&W coming under control in contrast to many other countries.

Arrests for racist chanting, pitch incursion, and use of pyro are now below pre-pandemic levels. Touting arrests remain ludicrously low. Arrest rates remain at 4 supporters per 100.000 (pre-pandemic levels). Bans remain higher than since 2012, but this largely reflects the post-lockdown disorder.

Public disorder is up 11% but more serious violent disorder is down 17%. This does not seem to tally with the increase in "serious incidents" in the Reported Incidents Statistics, hence my reservations about relying, at this time, on those incidents stats for season-by-season trends.

The arrest stats support a trend of football disorder returning to pre-pandemic (very low) levels. *Taking away new offences*, arrests are still 15% higher than pre-pandemic, but they are 28% down on the first season after lockdown (when we saw a worldwide uptick in football disorder and violence).

We must always be careful trying to measure criminality/disorder through statistics of police action. The new Reported Incidents stats should in time be a better measure, but the discrepancy in this season's picture suggests they are still bedding in and not yet ready to be used for judging trends.

Happy Annual Home Office Football Arrest and Banning Order Statistics Day. Hope you are all able to spend this magical day with your loved ones. Commentary to follow. www.gov.uk/government/s...

TBF, even the Venerable Bede knew the earth wasn't flat. And that was in the 8th Century in darkest Northumbria

The fact that the club sacked half their ticket office staff as a cost-cutting measure has made this mess a whole lot worse. www.bbc.co.uk/sport/footba...

Nimes is wonderful. A criminally underrated Roman gem. Have fun.