While the world's soccer fans have known for years where the top national teams would be headed for the 2022 World Cup, it's taken until now to nail down where their digital counterparts would be playing. 

Electronic Arts and FIFA have signed a licensing extension that will continue a relationship that’s been in place for two decades. The new agreement has FIFA and EA paired up until the end of 2022, VentureBeat reports. The partnership has paid off handsomely for both brands: every week, about 65 million FIFA video game matches are played.

“Our relationship with EA Sports is of high importance to FIFA,” said Jérôme Valcke, FIFA Secretary General, in a release. “The FIFA videogames are a key experiential component in our work to communicate the FIFA brand and its values all over the world. This is highlighted by the 2.5 million football fans that have competed in this year’s FIFA Interactive World Cup, which is just one example of the power of our partnership with EA.”Continue reading...

Nike has routinely shelled out millions to athletes to wear its swoosh and use its equipment during competition. On Monday, the company made its next big play. Following months of rumors, the global athletic brand announced it has signed the world's No. 1 player, Rory McIlroy, to carry Nike forward.

The deal is reported to be worth up to $250 million for McIlroy, 23, over a decade.

The first opportunity McIlroy will have to show off his new Nike duds in a tournament will come on Thursday as he joins fellow Nike big-bucks endorser Tiger Woods to kick off the Abu Dhabi HSBC Golf Championship.Continue reading...

To many, soccer makes the world go round and, if this is true, the country of Qatar is poised to take advantage of the situation. In 2022, Qatar will be the first Arab country to host the World Cup, the world’s most-watched sporting event, and it is building innovative, air-conditioned stadia that will be partially disassembled after the event and sent to less wealthy countries.

Meanwhile, the television-news network owned by Qatar, Al-Jazeera, is using soccer in a different way.

Reuters reports that Al-Jazeera, the most-watched channel in the Arab world, is “racing to launch a new French channel in early June in time for the European Football championships, offering a service for about 11 euros per month.” To get ready, the network has trademarked the channel’s name, beIN Sport, across the globe.Continue reading...

If there is one thing a soccer fan likes to have at the match, it’s a beer. And if there’s one thing that big-event organizers love to have, it's major corporate sponsorship.

The former is what led FIFA to inform the next two countries scheduled to hold the men’s World Cup to “drop restrictions on beer sales in stadiums,” according to the Los Angeles Times.

"Alcoholic drinks are part of the FIFA World Cup, so we're going to have them. Excuse me if I sound a bit arrogant but that's something we won't negotiate," FIFA General Secretary Jerome Valcke commented at a press conference in Brazil, the BBC reports.Continue reading...

When Qatar was awarded the first World Cup to ever take place in the Middle East, some eyebrows were raised because, well, it’s going to be 110 degrees Fahrenheit in the shade when the games take place during the summer months and the country only has one stadium that was deemed worthy enough to use.

Still, the country has until 2022 to work out these problems. Part of its bid promised that it would build nine of the most gorgeous stadia you’ve ever seen. They will be air-conditioned to ensure the good feeling and health of the players and fans alike. Also, some are promised to be modular so that they can be taken apart after the Cup and sent along to developing countries so they can enjoy them along with their Texas Rangers 2011 World Series champs T-shirts.

So who is going to build these lovely places? The BBC reports that “over 90% of Qatar's workforce is made up of foreign migrant workers, many of them from South and East Asia,” and several labor unions argue that the workers are not being treated humanely and that, in fact, it's a modern-day form of slavery.Continue reading...