South America

A Rio 2016 official has said the local organising committee has made “incredible progress” following International Olympic Committee (IOC) criticism regarding preparations for the Games in Brazil.

International sailing squads will test the water quality at the controversial sailing venue for the Rio 2016 Olympics at the Games’ first official test event this week.

The Brazilian Olympic Committee has pledged to spend a record $600m (€441.1m) in a bid to nearly double the country’s medal count at the Rio de Janeiro 2016 summer Olympic Games.

Match Services chief executive Ray Whelan has surrendered to a Rio de Janeiro court following his alleged implication in an investigation into the illegal resale of VIP tickets for the 2014 Fifa World Cup in Brazil.

Rio de Janeiro’s Mayor, Eduardo Paes, has pledged to offer free tickets to the 2016 Olympic Games in order to attract more diverse crowds than those that attended matches at the 2014 Fifa World Cup in Brazil.

The Brazilian police have said that they now consider Ray Whelan to be a fugitive after they arrived to his hotel to re-arrest the chief executive of Match Services, a partner company of football’s global governing body Fifa.

International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Thomas Bach has backed organisers of the 2016 summer Olympic and Paralympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil to overcome the delays that have affected preparations for the event.

Gilbert Felli, executive director of the Olympic Games for the International Olympic Committee (IOC), has stated that the smooth running of football’s Fifa World Cup in Brazil has improved confidence over the country’s hosting of the 2016 summer Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Ray Whelan, the chief executive of Match Services, has been arrested by Brazilian police investigating allegations of illegal ticket sales for football’s Fifa World Cup.

Football’s global governing body Fifa has been ordered by a Brazilian labour court to introduce mandatory breaks for players during World Cup matches played in high temperatures.

The International Triathlon Union, the sport’s global governing body, has added a new event in Colombia to its 2014 World Cup schedule.

Football’s world governing body Fifa has insisted that corporate clients are not responsible for the empty seats seen at World Cup games so far in Brazil.

Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff has moved to defend spending on preparations for the 2014 World Cup, while Fifa has denied that it is making major revenues from the football showpiece at the expense of the Brazilian people.

This third annual survey of global sports media consumption by Perform, KantarSport and TV Sports Markets takes our research wider and deeper than before. Wider, because the number of territories covered has increased from 10 to 14, with the inclusion this year of important growth markets such as India, Indonesia, Japan and Turkey. Deeper, because we have asked questions designed to burrow down into new areas, such as consumers’ second-screen activities, that have not been properly examined until now.

This second annual survey of global sports media consumption by Perform, KantarSport and TV Sports Markets confirms many of the trends highlighted in the first report in 2011 and brings into even sharper focus some of the changes in consumer habits that anybody working in the sports media industry needs to be attuned to.

Rio de Janeiro’s Mayor, Eduardo Paes, has conceded that the city will not keep its promise of cleaning the polluted Guanabara Bay in time for its staging of the 2016 Olympic Games.