Yet according to Belounis, as well as several human rights groups, several players and thousands of construction workers who will be building the infrastructure for the World Cup have been abused, denied their wages and trapped in a system that they cannot escape from.
The so called Kafala system — which ties employees to a specific employer — has, according to Human Rights Watch and the International Trade Union Confederation, been open to systematic abuse and created a de facto form of slavery for the more than one million migrant workers living within its borders.
“Qatar has been quite successful at giving off a progressive image when, in fact, the [labor] system is exploitative,” said Nicholas McGeehan of Human Rights Watch.
“It is the same old story. The Kafala system, the confiscation of passports, the illegal charging of exorbitant agent fees, the inability for workers to access the courts for redress.
According to the piece, most of the migrant workers are from India, Bangladesh and Pakistan. Good grief.
This is the video footage of the Champions League draw for Real Madrid.
Check out the look on Steve McManaman’s face when he drew the Manchester United ball. As far as I’m concerned, it’s a return for Cristiano Ronaldo to the club where the fans faithful still sing about him.
![Well today is Manchester United’s first match of the season (against Everton) and I’m excited to see the man pictured above, Robbie van Persie, and Shinji Kagawa on the same squad alongside Wayne Rooney, Ashley Young, Tom Cleverley, Michael Carrick, Nani, Antonio Valencia, Danny Welbeck, Chicharito, Paul Scholes, Ryan Giggs, Nemanja Vidic, and I think you understand what I’m doing here with this run-on sentence.
However I’m not excited by all of the defensive injuries. With Rio Ferdinand now out for three to four weeks and Evans, Jones and Smalling injured, Manchester United are left with one experienced center back for the today’s match. It is likely that Sir Alex Ferguson will play Michael Carrick at center back and though I love Michael Carrick as a midfielder, this means that Everton’s Naismith and the man who can’t seem to stop scoring, Nikica Jelavić, are going to have some very good looks at De Gea’s goal.
This was Friday’s squad sheet according to The Guardian but that has changed with Rio Ferdinand’s injury. For those of us in the United States of America, the match begins at 3 pm EST.
It has all of the pieces to be a great match with a lot of goals. In any case, I’ve been drinking green tea all night so I’m pumped. I missed football, life just isn’t as sweet when I’m not tense and yelling at a television during the early hours of the morning or on the verge of stabbing anyone that mentions that the team I’m rooting for lost. Good f***ing times.
[Image via Manchester United’s Facebook]](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m91yyiWmGG1qzs6yjo1_1280.jpg)
Well today is Manchester United’s first match of the season (against Everton) and I’m excited to see the man pictured above, Robbie van Persie, and Shinji Kagawa on the same squad alongside Wayne Rooney, Ashley Young, Tom Cleverley, Michael Carrick, Nani, Antonio Valencia, Danny Welbeck, Chicharito, Paul Scholes, Ryan Giggs, Nemanja Vidic, and I think you understand what I’m doing here with this run-on sentence.
However I’m not excited by all of the defensive injuries. With Rio Ferdinand now out for three to four weeks and Evans, Jones and Smalling injured, Manchester United are left with one experienced center back for the today’s match. It is likely that Sir Alex Ferguson will play Michael Carrick at center back and though I love Michael Carrick as a midfielder, this means that Everton’s Naismith and the man who can’t seem to stop scoring, Nikica Jelavić, are going to have some very good looks at De Gea’s goal.
This was Friday’s squad sheet according to The Guardian but that has changed with Rio Ferdinand’s injury. For those of us in the United States of America, the match begins at 3 pm EST.
It has all of the pieces to be a great match with a lot of goals. In any case, I’ve been drinking green tea all night so I’m pumped. I missed football, life just isn’t as sweet when I’m not tense and yelling at a television during the early hours of the morning or on the verge of stabbing anyone that mentions that the team I’m rooting for lost. Good f***ing times.
[Image via Manchester United’s Facebook]
![Palestinian soccer player Mahmoud Al-Sarsak waves to people upon his arrival in Gaza City July 10, 2012. Israel released the Gaza soccer player on Tuesday in a deal to end his intermittent four-month hunger strike after he spent three years behind bars without being put on trial, officials said.
I don’t know all of the details about why he was held but being the hardcore football enthusiast that I am, this is great. Of course, the bad news is that those are three formative years that he’ll never have back but the good news is that he’s still young (24/25) so he can still play football for years to come and hopefully he does.
It should be noted that plenty of people within FIFA (including Sepp Blatter), UEFA, FIFPro, former footballing legends and others were pressuring Israel to free Mahmoud Al-Sarsak. [EI]
The Guardian has a video at this link. [The Guardian]](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m6yayfANdE1qz7wpso1_1280.jpg)
Palestinian soccer player Mahmoud Al-Sarsak waves to people upon his arrival in Gaza City July 10, 2012. Israel released the Gaza soccer player on Tuesday in a deal to end his intermittent four-month hunger strike after he spent three years behind bars without being put on trial, officials said.
I don’t know all of the details about why he was held but being the hardcore football enthusiast that I am, this is great. Of course, the bad news is that those are three formative years that he’ll never have back but the good news is that he’s still young (24/25) so he can still play football for years to come and hopefully he does.
The Guardian has a video at this link. [The Guardian]
In honor of the Euro 2012 quarterfinal match between the same nations, Monty Python’s football match between Greek and German philosophers.
The commentary post-Sokrates goal,
The Germans are disputing it! Hegel is arguing that the reality is merely an a priori adjunct of non-naturalistic ethics, Kant by the categorical imperative is holding that ontologically it exists only in the imagination, and Marx is claiming that it was offside.”
Brilliant.
A young Ukrainian fan looks on nervously before a bit of magic by 35 year old Ukrainian legend Andriy Shevchenko changes everything.
Ukraine, one of the two tournament hosts, is playing in their first European championship tournament and have been largely written off by many in the press, thus making the 2 to 1 victory over match favorites Sweden all the more sweeter.
Old Meets New: Fans of the Portuguese national team display their national flag with tablet computers. Could this be the start of a new trend?
