World Cup

SYDNEY — The task of building on the huge success of last year's Women's World Cup will fall to a region that has never staged it before when Colombia and a joint bid from Australia and New Zealand vie for the 2023 hosting rights in Thursday's FIFA vote.

The 2019 World Cup in France was hailed as a watershed for global interest in the women's game and FIFA President Gianni Infantino personally drove the campaign to increase the field to 32 teams from 24 for 2023.

The Japanese Football Association announced on Monday that Japan is withdrawing its bid to host the 2023 Women's World Cup, just days before football's world governing body holds a vote to determine the successful candidate.

Colombia's soccer chief and the head of South American football confederation CONMEBOL have written to FIFA complaining of "erroneous and discriminatory conclusions" in the assessment of the country's bid to host the 2023 Women's World Cup.

The Colombian proposal to bring the tournament to South America for the first time received the lowest score in an evaluation of three bids to host the tournament carried out by world soccer's governing body ahead of next Friday's vote.

And then there were three. On Monday, Brazil withdrew its candidacy to host the 2023 Women’s World Cup, leaving Colombia, Japan and a joint bid from Australia and New Zealand as the remaining contenders before the final FIFA Council vote on June 25.

CAPE TOWN — Thursday marks 10 years since South Africa hosted a World Cup highly charged with symbolism but dogged by questions about the wisdom of spending billions on a sports event that might have been better used elsewhere.

Hosting the first soccer World Cup in Africa was seen as a coming of age for the embattled continent.

But the month-long tournament, which had a $3-billion (USD) price tag, also came at a time when the country faced an enormous backlog of social needs such as housing, hospitals, water and electricity.

MILAN — Italy defender Giorgio Chiellini admires Uruguay forward Luis Suarez for biting him during a heated match at the 2014 World Cup, he said in his autobiography.

Suarez, who escaped punishment during the game, was later banned for four months plus nine internationals — but Chiellini said he bore no grudge towards him.

"Malice is part of football, I wouldn't call it illegitimate. To get past a rival you have to be smart," the Juventus captain said in the book "Io, Giorgio".

"I admire his cunning," he added. "If he lost it, he'd become an ordinary forward."

MANCHESTER, England — The head of Qatar's 2022 World Cup organising committee has vowed to ensure the tournament remains affordable for fans despite the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the global economy.

The gulf state will host the 32-nation tournament in November and December 2022 and while Hassan Al Thawadi, head of the Supreme Committee for Delivery and Legacy, is hopeful the public health situation will be vastly improved he acknowledges the ripple-effects for the economy will be a challenge.

BERN — The hosts for the 2023 Women's World Cup will be chosen at an online meeting of the FIFA Council on June 25, the global soccer body said on Friday.

FIFA will choose between Brazil, Colombia, Japan and a joint bid from Australia and New Zealand in what it said was the "most competitive bidding process" in the event's 29-year history. None of the bidding nations have staged the event before.

The hosts were originally due to be chosen at a FIFA Council meeting in Addis Ababa in June but that was postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic.

There’s not a lot of information to go off apart from this Netflix tweet that features Julie Foudy, Mia Hamm, Michelle Akers, Joy Fawcett, Kristine Lilly, Briana Scurry, Carla Overbeck and Brandi Chastain, but a film that covers the USWNT’s journey to the 1999 Women’s World Cup is coming to Netflix.