For Franco Carraro, 2006 was a rollercoaster. He resigned as president of the Italian Football Federation because of the match fixing scandal in Italian football last summer. Then Carraro , an IOC member and member of UEFA and FIFA. was banned from sport leadership for 4.5 years. But appeal after appeal diminished the punishment and now the IOC Ethics Commission has also given him a clean bill of health.

In this speech to the conference 'Play Fair with Sport' held at the Council of Europe in Strasbourg on 29 September 2006, director of Play the Game Jens Sejer Andersen suggests that the international communiy founds a “Global Coalition for Good Governance in Sport" to fight the growing problem of corruption in sport. The new body should be organised along the lines of the World Anti-Doping Agency.

What issues deserve strong international attention when 3-400 media professionals, academic sports researchers and sports officials meet this autumn in Reykjavik, Iceland, for the next Play the Game world conference?

Athletes in former communist Czechoslovakia were subjected to a secret state-controlled doping programme with grave consequences for their health. In contrast to the situation in the former East Germany, however, the Czechoslovakian programme has not been described in any detail yet but a report is expected in 2007.

Traditional news media that want to cover sport events on their websites are coming under increasing pressure from sports federations. Right now the World Association of Newspapers (WAN) are negotiating with the International Cricket Council and the International Rugby Board to keep their respective 2007 World Cups open for traditional print media.

As our present News Coordinator Kirsten Sparre has decided to explore new paths in her professional life, Play the Game seeks her successor to begin as soon as possible.

Two American sports journalists who face jail for refusing to name the source of leaked grand jury testimonies about top athletes’ use of steroids in the Balco case, get support from many corners of American society but should not expect much from official anti-doping bodies such as WADA and United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA).

Who is in charge of football in Kenya? Well, the answer differs depending on who you ask. FIFA has just backed the Kenyan Football Federation (KFF) and its attempts to re-launch a national league. Kenya’s sports minister on the other hand refuses to have anything to do with KFF officials and KFF has also been renounced by twelve of its own branches.