Richard Scudamore of the Premier League has not been the most popular footballing figure of the last few weeks. The executives overseeing football in favoured destinations for his plan of playing Premier League matches abroad, such as China, Thailand and the USA, have lined up to express their objections, as has the President of world football's governing body, FIFA. However, not every land that loves football comes under FIFA's aegis. Scudamore might be able......

Last year Arsenal won everything in sight, a clean sweep of domestic and European trophies. Manager Vic Akers was delighted to secure four triumphs from four competitions. We are, of course, talking about the Ladies team who tonight take on Everton at Leyton Orient's Matchroom Stadium to defend the first of that quartet of titles, in the FA Tesco Women's Premier League Cup Final, kick off 7:35pm. The game is also live on Sky......

On the day the Premiership announces plans for its clubs to play matches in far flung destinations Ruislip Manor FC would settle for seeing out this season on their own patch. The club, who play in the Molten Footballs Spartan South Midlands Premier Division, effectively eight levels below the likes of Chelsea and Arsenal, have spent the last few weeks staring extinction in the face, culminating in a dramatic fight for life last Wednesday......

This weekend 670 swimmers from 21 countries will converge on the Tooting Bec Lido to take part in the international Winter Swimming Championships 2008. The event, which always takes place in an unheated outdoor pool, is being held outside Finland for the first time ever. Olivia Brown, a member of hosts the South London Swimming Club and entrant in three of this weekend's races, took time out from training to tell Londonist why she's......

Just in case there are any 2012 sceptics left amongst you out there (it’s gotta be good, right?), Ken is sending his Olympics PR machine out to get you. In what is actually quite an inspired little scheme, a series of three perky little igloos in jaunty, hard-to-miss shades will be hitting your high street, town square, playing fields or municipal car park real soon. All 33 boroughs in 3 months, starting off in Trafalgar......

Four years, countless consultancy fees, umpteen broken promises and many millions of pounds later, Clissold Leisure Centre in Stoke Newington is finally re-opening this weekend. For those who've not followed the saga, here's the story in brief. In 2000 the Centre opened amidst a brass band's worth of pomp and publicity, the very model of a modern, major, New Labour endorsed Lottery-funded Millennium project. Come early 2004, the facility was closed, having accumulated a......

Fancy getting sporty next summer? Two day athletics beano planned. Thames Gateway staff turnaround. Don't suppose it will be the last. Peckham's Universal Church of the Kingdom of God is praying for a financial revelation. Daffy immigration rules hit football. 2012 budget in the news again: this time it's security issues. Image taken in St James' Park yesterday courtesy of daveograve@ via the Londonist flickr group.......

Reginald Perrin rides again. A canoeist who vanished 5 years ago has surfaced alive and well. Car free London = care free. And popular apparently. Sporty Londonist readers should check out the London Sports Awards. Dial-a-parking-space out of order. Temporarily. Celebrities are worried about Camden Market. The internet is a wonderful thing, but apparently not for matters of the heart. Rail IS getting exciting. Now they are planning trains from Heathrow to Paris. Singers......

In Los Angeles, LAist most definitely celebrated Thanksgiving like no other. After all, one has to keep up all the energy to keep on walking the line at the Writers Strike and fighting the unfortunate return of the wildfires in Malibu, which single handedly destroyed over fifty homes within the first 24 hours. National outlets may be covering the fires, but CNN also found it is easier to buy a gun than fruit and......

This weekend, Rowan Walker wrote in the Observer of her torturous but strangely addictive experience of training at the Islington Boxing Gym to raise awareness of the fierce campaign to get female boxing recognised as an Olympic Sport for the 2012 Games in London. According to the International Olympic Committee, "Boxing ranks among the Olympic Games' most illustrious sports" yet only for men, to date. As Walker's article indicates, the number and calibre of......

Londonist got the big scoop of the week with what may be the first images of notorious street artist Banksy in action. They also got on a runaway train without an operator provoking a response from the transport authorities. Elsewhere, London's answer to Central Station is about to open for business, and Londonist got a sneak preview. Meanwhile, spooky goings-on beneath London Bridge, where a cache of skeletons provided an apt story for Hallowe'en.......

The bane of touring indie rock bands has become so pandemic that it now plagues sports teams. The Arsenal Women’s Premier League squad had several items burgled from their dressing room while playing at Watford yesterday. Passports, cash and credit cards were among the possessions nicked from the dressing room, which of course begs the question of what one does with someone else’s passport. The match between Arsenal and Watford was abandoned before the......

Tonight marks the climax of nine months' eager anticipation since we broke the news to you that the NFL was coming to town. Two days ago we secured a ticket via the final sale we mentioned last Tuesday and we can't wait for the action to begin at 5pm. If you're catching the game on TV (Sky Sports live, or BBC2 highlights at 10:50pm), you're in plenty of company. The game is being carried......

As Sunday evening's "home" fixture at Wembley for the Miami Dolphins against the New York Giants edges ever closer we interview Brian Tennent, Londoner and chairman of DolFan UK, the only UK-based Miami Dolphins fan organisation officially recognised by the club itself. What first attracted you to the NFL in general and supporting the Dolphins in particular? When it was first regularly broadcast on Channel 4, it looked more exciting and glamorous than UK......

Dick Maxwell, who retired last year as the NFL Senior Director of Broadcasting after almost thirty years with American Football's governing body was Wednesday night's guest lecturer in the seminar series organised for students of the MSc in Sports Management and the Business of Football at Birkbeck, University of London. Nowadays an NFL consultant in the areas of television and instant replay, Mr Maxwell kindly fielded a few questions for us after his well-received......

Hot on the heels of basketball and ice hockey, the third of America's big four sports has begun its landing on our shores. The advance guard for Sunday's NFL encounter between the Miami Dolphins and the New York Giants consists of just one man. Albeit a very big one. Pictured above is the specially commissioned twenty-six foot high animatronic statue of Dolphins defensive end Jason Taylor which is touring London and the South East......

Hands up who remembers Kriss Akabusi running though Greenwich with the torch a few years back? Us too. We also remember thinking it would have been great fun to have a go. It appears that if we were still at school, me might have just got that chance. Secondary schools from all over the city can nominate pupils to carry the torch through London for the 2008 Beijing Olympics. The torch makes its way......

A glimpse of the future for London rail travel was unveiled today at Hitachi’s depot in Ashford. (And this dumb-broad Londonista thought they just made tellies and stuff). We are to get a bullet train (which some droll spark has named the ‘javelin’ in honour of the Olympics – geddit?) as of 2009. The aim is not only to whisk sports spectators from downtown St. Pancras over to the main-goings-on at the Olympic stadium in......

It's entirely in the nature of ducks that they can fly under the radar, but only in fairy tales do kings arrive unannounced. Nevertheless, even those who would count themselves fans of ice hockey may be surprised to learn that the O2 Arena this weekend hosts not just one, but two clashes between a pair of North American professional teams. And not just a pre-season slapabout, mind you. These are the opening fixtures of......

If you've been wanting to join the cycle revolution but are put off by all that aggressive, unpredictable and dirty traffic out there then maybe this weekend's Hovis London Freewheel, which will trundle through nine miles of traffic-free town on Sunday, will help you get on your bike. The number of cyclists on London's streets has apparently increased a stunningly impressive 83% in the last 12 months. Unfortunately, it's too late to register to......

And so to our final rugby watching venue post with just 4 teams remaining to accommodate. Italy play Portugal tonight in Paris, 7pm Bar Italia - where else? Japan crunch with Wales tomorrow in Cardiff at 8pm. We didn't think Japan would be the hardest nut to crack but our badgering and internetting and random contacting of Japanese people hasn't turned up a definitive option. So, we'll give you a unconfirmed one. Sirocco London......

Londonist has learnt with relief that London’s Community Wardens are to be taught to smile. Well, they are at least to be taught stuff other than marshalling resentful kids, scribbling reports on graffiti and harassing shopkeepers who infringe on the pavements 1cm too far. The London Development Agency is to train 200 or so of our boys (and gels) in blue (and red and black and yellow) to be nice to tourists, with a......

Protest over national vs. regional chains, the never-ending debate over the place of cars and bicycles in our metropolises, professional sports scandals, remembering a solemn day, and being issued a search warrant - it all happened across our sites this week! Another banner week at Chicagoist started off with daily reports from food writer Lisa Shames on her attempt to eat only locally grown and raised foodstuffs all week as part of a farmers market......

18. The Cheetah Of Shooter's Hill Over the years many ‘flaps’ of ‘big cat’ sightings have hit the headlines, from the so-called ‘beasts’ of Exmoor and Bodmin, to the more recent Bluewater leopard Bexley ‘big cat’. However in south-east London during the early 1960s, the Shooter’s Hill ‘cheetah’ scare was on everyone’s lips – back during a time when such cats were considered extremely mythical and were often misunderstood and wrongly identified, but were......

Finding venues for Friday and Saturday's fixtures was a piece of cake compared to this! But no nation should be left out - what with the world being in union and all that. Fiji v Canada Sunday 16, 13.00 UK time from the Millennium Stadium, Cardiff. Canadians! Seek the Maple Leaf. Drink Molson. Forget hockey. Fijians - listen up. We have important news for you and your Polynesian rivals below. Meet us one paragraph down.........

Peaceful protest: there's a lot of it about. This weekend brought news of demonstrators occupying Wembley Park Sports Ground, campaigning against plans for a City Academy to be built on the land. Faced with recent threat of eviction, the tent city teachers and other protesters are taking to tree houses to extend their occupation. The protest has already established 30 tents and a colourful garden (attracting lots of bumble bees) on the site which......

This time last year Fred Pappoe, Vice President of the Ghanaian Football Association (middle of picture) declared in the wake of Ghana's 2-0 victory over Togo in Brentford that "London is one of our favourite places away from home." One year on and they're making good on his words as they play another friendly here on Tuesday night, 21st August at 7:45pm against Senegal at Millwall's New Den stadium. Talismanic captain Stephen Appiah (pictured......

Chicagoist is gearing up for this weekend's annual Air & Water Show along the lakefront. In what's becoming an annual tradition around there, staff member Todd McClamroch even got to fly with one of the participants. Chicagoist's decidedly opinionated readership was also appalled that one of their staffers found a popular local brewpub to be a great place to bring a kid. They also think that an unlikely activist for immigration rights should just take......

There is a white wall between Chalk Farm Tube and the Roundhouse that must see more graffiti turnover than anywhere outside Shoreditch. The recent work by Jef Aerosol, the punk lady and some cruder efforts by Cartrain, were recently whitewashed over. The Banksy maid was preserved, of course. Banksy has attained a level of establishment respect that gives his stencils some kind of listed status. Not everyone appreciates his efforts though. The maid now......

The third of our interviews with the Tory candidates for London Mayor. Previously, Victoria Borwick and Andrew Boff. Warwick Lightfoot has, no doubt, spent a lifetime tolerating jibes about his Tolkeinesque name. He's also acquired an outstanding CV that includes stints as Mayor of Kensington and Chelsea, Special Advisor to the Chancellor and 20 years experience as a councillor. Most impressively of all, he's the first Tory candidate to admit to vomiting on the......