Funeral for Ex-England Manager Sven-Goran Eriksson Held in Sweden 

Funeral of Sven-Goran Eriksson - Torsby, Sweden - September 13, 2024 A photograph of Sven-Goran Eriksson on display at Fryksande church. (Jonas Ekstromer/TT News Agency via Reuters)
Funeral of Sven-Goran Eriksson - Torsby, Sweden - September 13, 2024 A photograph of Sven-Goran Eriksson on display at Fryksande church. (Jonas Ekstromer/TT News Agency via Reuters)
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Funeral for Ex-England Manager Sven-Goran Eriksson Held in Sweden 

Funeral of Sven-Goran Eriksson - Torsby, Sweden - September 13, 2024 A photograph of Sven-Goran Eriksson on display at Fryksande church. (Jonas Ekstromer/TT News Agency via Reuters)
Funeral of Sven-Goran Eriksson - Torsby, Sweden - September 13, 2024 A photograph of Sven-Goran Eriksson on display at Fryksande church. (Jonas Ekstromer/TT News Agency via Reuters)

The funeral of Sven-Goran Eriksson, the first foreigner to manage England's national soccer team, was held on Friday in the small Swedish town where he grew up before embarking on a career that would span many decades, countries and trophies.

A soft-spoken but determined coach, Eriksson guided teams in Sweden, Portugal and Italy to major trophies in the 1980s and 1990s before taking on the England job in 2001, managing stars such as David Beckham, with whom he formed a close bond.

Eriksson announced in January that he was terminally ill with pancreatic cancer and spent much of the ensuing months reconnecting with many of the places and people central to his career before he died last month.

The funeral took place in Torsby, a rural town of less than 5,000 people near the border with Norway, and was attended by several hundred people inside the church, including Beckham.

Others followed the service on a big screen set up outside and the funeral was given blanket coverage by Swedish media.

Tributes flowed in from prime ministers, clubs and former players on news of his death while national teams including England and Sweden played with black arm bands during the recent international break.

Eriksson, known in Sweden simply as "Svennis", led England to the 2002 and 2006 World Cup quarter-finals, and to the 2004 European Championship, managing a golden generation of players that besides Beckham included stars such as Frank Lampard, Wayne Rooney and Steven Gerrard.

He began building his international reputation when he guided Swedish club IFK Gothenburg to the UEFA Cup title in 1982 and went on to win silverware as coach of Portugal's Benfica and Italian clubs AS Roma, Fiorentina, Lazio and Sampdoria.

Unable to end England's trophy drought, he left the helm of the national side in 2006, going on to coach Manchester City and Leicester City as well as Mexico and Ivory Coast and clubs in China and the Philippines.



FIFA Opts Not to Suspend Israel but Will Investigate Palestinian Claims of Discrimination

(FILES) A sign of FIFA is seen at the football's World governing body headquarters  on December 17, 2015 in Zurich. (Photo by FABRICE COFFRINI / AFP)
(FILES) A sign of FIFA is seen at the football's World governing body headquarters on December 17, 2015 in Zurich. (Photo by FABRICE COFFRINI / AFP)
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FIFA Opts Not to Suspend Israel but Will Investigate Palestinian Claims of Discrimination

(FILES) A sign of FIFA is seen at the football's World governing body headquarters  on December 17, 2015 in Zurich. (Photo by FABRICE COFFRINI / AFP)
(FILES) A sign of FIFA is seen at the football's World governing body headquarters on December 17, 2015 in Zurich. (Photo by FABRICE COFFRINI / AFP)

FIFA stopped short of suspending the Israeli soccer federation on Thursday, but asked for a disciplinary investigation of possible discrimination alleged by Palestinian soccer officials.
A senior FIFA panel overseeing governance will separately investigate “the participation in Israeli competitions of Israeli football teams allegedly based in the territory of Palestine,” soccer’s governing body said after a meeting of its ruling Council.
The Palestinian soccer federation has consistently asked FIFA for more than a decade to take action against the Israeli soccer body for incorporating teams from West Bank settlements in its leagues.
The compromise decisions came more than four months after Palestinian officials had urged FIFA to suspend Israel’s membership at a meeting in May.
The request to FIFA's congress in May also cited “international law violations" in Gaza during the Israel-Hamas conflict and directed the soccer body to its statutory commitments on human rights and against discrimination.
FIFA delayed making a decision in May until after a legal review scheduled for July, then pushed back the issue two more times until the meeting Thursday.
“The FIFA Council has implemented due diligence on this very sensitive matter and, based on a thorough assessment, we have followed the advice of the independent experts,” FIFA president Gianni Infantino said in a statement.
The latest process follows a pattern — under Infantino and his predecessor Sepp Blatter — of Palestinian requests for FIFA to uphold its legal statutes and the question then being steered toward ad hoc panels and other committees.
FIFA gave no timetable Thursday for the investigations it has not requested.