JERSEY CITY, New Jersey (Ticker) -- A congressional commission in Honduras will investigate rumors that its national soccer team players took bribes to lose a 2002 World Cup qualifying match against Mexico, a spokesman said on August 2.

"A motion was unanimously approved for Congress' sports commission to investigate and anti-corruption authorities have also been asked to open a probe into the elimination of the team for the 2002 World Cup," said Congress spokesman Geovani Castro.

Antonio Flores, a deputy from the ruling National Party, called for a full investigation to be carried out, names to be published and those charged to be tried and punished if found guilty.

Honduras failed to qualify for the World Cup finals after losing 3-0 in Mexico on November 11 last year. Prior to the match, the Central American nation had one point more than Mexico and needed a win to qualify for the tournament in Japan and South Korea.

WORLD NEWS: Scottish football remained in crisis this week after 10 clubs again threatened to quit the Premier League. The clubs, including Aberdeen, Dundee United and the Edinburgh sides, declared they will hand in their resignation after failing to agree with Old Firm rivals Rangers and Celtic over plans to change the voting structure.

The decision came about despite the fact that all 12 clubs had agreed to a new television deal with the BBC earlier last week.

Bryan Jackson, administrator at Premier League outfit Motherwell, said "The 10 SPL clubs do intend to resign in the next 24 hours."

The 10 clubs are making their move before the new season begins on Saturday, August 10 as the Scottish Premier League (SPL) constitution states that there must be a two-year waiting period before resignations can come into effect. Any delay would have had the effect of giving the Old Firm teams another year.

Should the clubs not all agree, the SPL will be dissolved in two years' time and be immediately replaced by a new league with new rules set by the 10 clubs. Celtic and Rangers would be likely invited to join it but only under the other clubs' terms.

Rangers and Celtic had earlier joined the 10 other Scottish premier league (SPL) clubs in agreeing on a new television deal, just days before the start of the new season. The deal with the BBC will be worth 17.5 million pounds ($27.41 million) over two years.

North Korea has agreed to send its team to South Korea for a friendly match in September as part of the sunshine efforts to promote inter-Korean ties. The match will mark the first time in 12 years that the North and South have met on the soccer pitch. South Korea has called for the match in the Seoul World Cup stadium on September 8. The rival Koreas, who have never officially ended their 1950-53 War, last played each other in Seoul and Pyongyang in 1990. The Stalinist country boycotted the World Cup hosted by South Korea and Japan in June. ...

Nielsen Media research has released figures which show that the World Cup was seen on television by a combined 1.5 billion viewers in 18 countries. Among the 18 nations polled by Nielsen, Thailand led with a combined total of 269 million, followed by co-host South Korea (266 million) and China (263 million).

The United States was sixth at 85 million, but that figure included only English-language viewers on ABC, ESPN and ESPN2. An additional 80 million Spanish-language watched on Univision and Telefutura.

South Korea had the highest rating at 16, followed by Malaysia and Singapore at 12. The rating is the percentage of television households tuned to a broadcast. The only European nations included were Sweden (44 million viewers/ 8 rating), Finland (19 million/ 7) and Ireland (12 million/ 6). No South American countries were included.

Brazil's 2-0 victory over Germany in the final on June 30 was viewed by 63 million in the 18 nations. FIFA, soccer's governing body, has estimated that the 1998 tournament was watched by a cumulative 37 billion worldwide, including 1.5 billion for host France's win over Brazil in the final. ...

Australian accountant Basil Scarsella has been elected president of the Oceania Football Confederation (OFC) for the next four years. The 47-year-old was elected at an extraordinary meeting of the OFC in Auckland on August 3, beating Vanuatu's Johnny Tinsley-Lulu in the vote.

Scarsella, the Adelaide-based chief executive of the South Australia Electricity Utility Company, has been acting president for 18 months after the resignation of long-standing Oceania president Charlie Dempsey. Dempsey quit following his controversial abstention in the vote to decide the venue of the 2006 World Cup. His non-vote handed the host rights to Germany and not South Africa, the choice of his confederation.

NAMES AND NOTES IN THE NEWS

ARGENTINA: Lens striker Esteban Fuertes is headed back to his native Argentina on loan to River Plate. Fuertes, under contract until 2004 with Lens, spent much of last season on loan to Tenerife. River Plate has an option to buy the 29-year-old if he impresses.

ARMENIA: Argentinian Oscar Lopez has been named Armenia's new national team coach. The 64-year-old Lopez, who led Yerevan side Pyunik to the national title last season, succeeds Andranik Karamyan, who resigned following Armenia's failed bid to qualify for this summer's World Cup.

BRAZIL: Romrio, left out in the cold for the World Cup, has signed for club Fluminense. The 36-year-old was left off the roster by Luiz Scolari for Brazil's triumphant World Cup campaign despite massive public support for his selection. Fluminense won the race to sign him chiefly over Flamengo, a club close to Romario's heart as he had a four-year spell there in the late 1990s. Romario added that he hoped to be ready to play for Fluminense in their opening league match against Cruzeiro on August 11

Speaking of Scolari, whose future as coach is in doubt, the World-Cup winning manager will lead Brazil when they meet Paraguay in a friendly on August 21 in their first game since the 2-0 World Cup final win over Germany last month. The man known as "Big Phil," who in only 13 months led Brazil out of the doldrums to World Cup glory, has not yet decided whether he will stay in the job.

"Coach Luiz Felipe Scolari will have at his disposal all the players who took part in the World Cup," said the CBF in a statement on their website. "The coaching staff of the Brazil team will be the same. The Paraguay team will bring their main players." The statement said that the match would be played in the Northeastern city of Fortaleza...So Caetano dumped coach Jair Picerni two days after they suffered yet another final defeat, this time in the Copa Libertadores, the South American club championship. Picerni lead the modest side from the outskirts of Sao Paulo from the second division to two Brazilian first division finals and the Copa Libertadores final, but paid heavily for the club's inability to actually secure a title.

ENGLAND: England will warm up for their Euro 2004 qualifying campaign with a friendly international against the tournament host Portugal. The match at Villa Park on September 7 will be England's first game since losing 2-1 to Brazil in the World Cup quarterfinals in Japan...Swedish midfielder Jesper Blomqvist has joined Middlesbrough on a one-year deal. Blomqvist, 28, left Everton in May after a comeback season at the club. He had joined Everton from Manchester United last year after recovering from a knee injury that sidelined him for two seasons West Ham United has signed the Republic of Ireland's out-of-contract World Cup defender Gary Breen. The 28-year-old center-back, released by Coventry this summer, produced several impressive displays for the Republic at the World Cup. Manchester City goalkeeper Peter Schmeichel will miss the start of the season after suffering a bad knee injury in a July 30 friendly win at Preston. The former Danish international and Manchester United keeper, 38, came off after 21 minutes, having been injured in an earlier collision... Birmingham completed the signing of Crystal Palace striker Clinton Morrison. Birmingham declined to disclose the fee paid for the Republic of Ireland international, believed to be 4.25 million ($6.7 million). Manchester City's Bermudan striker Shaun Goater could miss the first month of the campaign with a broken toe. Republic of Ireland star Robbie Keane has pledged to remain with Leeds after a summer of uncertainty: Keane officially turned down a move to Sunderland Brazilian-born Francisco Filho is joining Manchester United as Under-17 coach after spending 29 years at the French Football Academy in Clarefontaine where he helped develop the likes of Jean-Pierre Papin, Thierry Henry and was involved in the creation of the World Cup winning side of 1998. He will join Carlos Queiroz, another well-known player developer as United manager Alex Ferguson attempts to revive homegrown talent in his first team. Since the era of the late 1980s, which spawned Ryan Giggs, David Beckham, Paul Scholes and the Neville brothers, only Wes Brown has enjoyed a lengthy first team run. Middlesbrough has been granted a work permit for new Brazilian signing Juninho. Coach Steve McClaren had appealed against an earlier British Government's Department of Employment decision to refuse the 29-year-old World Cup winner a permit as he had not played in 75 percent of his country's competitive fixtures over the last two years. But an appeal hearing ruled that Boro can go ahead with a 6 million ($9.4m ) deal to buy Juninho, who has 42 international caps, from Spanish side Atltico Madrid. It will be the diminutive star's third spell with the English Premiership club, including six months on loan from Atltico two seasons ago. Leicester City released midfielder Dennis Wise on Friday following an incident that left one of his teammates with a fractured cheekbone. The English club said in a statement that the 35-year-old had committed "an act of serious misconduct" on the club's preseason tour of Finland last month. Wise joined Leicester in June 2001 from Chelsea but made just 16 starts for the club.

GERMANY: Hamburg's Bosnian striker Sergej Barbarez could be out for up to six weeks after tearing a knee ligament during a 1-0 friendly win over Manchester City on August 3 Brazilian Marcio Amoroso, who starred in Borussia Dortmund's run to the Bundesliga title last season, will miss the first three months of the season with an Achilles tendon inflammation. Amoroso scored 18 times in the league last season as he finished joint-top marksman with Martin Max of 1860 Munich Bayer Leverkusen coach Klaus Toppmller looks set to stay with the German first division club until 2005. Toppmller, whose contract expires at the end of the season about the start, "should sign for at least two more years in the next few days," Leverkusen commercial manager Wolfgang Holzhaeuser said.

GREECE: Out of favor Ajax midfielder Richard Knopper has gone on a one-season loan to Aris FC. The 24-year-old player failed to hold down a place in the Ajax first team last season, and is clearly surplus to requirements in Ronald Koeman's squad which the manager admits is too big. Knopper made his debut for Ajax in November 1997 and was chosen as talent of the year by Ajax supporters two years later. Moroccan midfielder Said Chiba has signed a one-year contract to play for PAOK Salonica. No terms of the contract were announced by the club, which may be extended for another year on agreement by both parties, but local press reports said the 32-year-old player would pocket up to E 300,000 ($300,000) should PAOK win a place in next year's Champions League. Chiba was a member of the Moroccan national team 57 times and participated in the 1998 World Cup in France. He played last year for PAOK's city rivals Aris.

ITALY: Despite fears that the season's start might be delayed by a dispute over television rights, Italian soccer officials issued a schedule that called for the opening games on August 31. Italian soccer officials are thinking about delaying the season because eight of the 18 teams don't have television contracts, including Brescia and Chievo. The current schedule calls for the season to end May 25. To create more time slots, two games will be played each Saturday, starting at 6 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. (noon and 2:30 p.m. EDT), five games will be played Sunday at 3 p.m. (9 a.m. EDT), and two will be played Sunday night at 6 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. AS Roma captain Francesco Totti has injured his left knee which will keep him off the field for at least the next month, sports daily Corriere dello Sport reported on August 5. Totti, instrumental in leading AS Roma to their first league title in almost two decades in 2001, feared at first that he had suffered serious ligament damage during a friendly August 4.

PORTUGAL: Portuguese international striker Nuno Gomes has returned to his former club Benfica after a two-year stint at debt-ridden Fiorentina. Gomes, 26, was presented to a 50,000 crowd at halftime in the Luz stadium during a friendly against Brazilian side Grmio to unveil Benfica's new lineup for the 2002-03 season. Capped 29 times for Portugal, Gomes signed a four-year contract with Benfica for an undisclosed fee.

RUSSIA: Moscow's CSKA has signed Russian international keeper Ruslan Nigmatullin on a six-month loan from Italy's Serie B Verona. The Red Army club's press spokesman Andrei Bogush said that the deal may later be extended for another half-year. No financial details of the deal were disclosed. Verona president Giambatista Pastorello promised to release Nigmatullin, who failed to win a place in the starting lineup, after Verona failed to avoid relegation from Italy's Serie A last season Spartak Moscow's Ukrainian defender Dmitry Parfyonov will be out at least for the rest of the year after breaking his leg in two places. Katulin said that the 27-year-old Ukraine international will undergo surgery on August 6. Parfyonov suffered his injury in the Moscow derby against Dynamo after colliding with Vitaly Grishin with five minutes left in the game.

SCOTLAND: Celtic has completed the signings of Scandinavian duo Magnus Hedman and Ulrik Laursen. Sweden goalkeeper Hedman has signed a four year contract from Coventry with Denmark defender Laursen arriving at Celtic from Hibernian on a five-year deal. Both will be eligible for the Champions League qualifying games with either Swiss outfit FC Basle or Slovakians Zilina Livingston released former Argentine international Sergio Berti on the grounds of gross misconduct. Media reports alleged the 33-year-old midfielder, who only arrived in Scotland last month under the Bosman ruling, spit at a teammate during a pre-season friendly against English minor league side Morecambe.

SOUTH AFRICA: The premier league will delay the start of its new league season by a fortnight in order to redraft the program after two clubs went out of existence on July 29. Premier league officials said on the start of the season would be postponed until August 16 to allow a new draft of the fixtures. On Monday, the premier league bought the franchises of two clubs, Free State Stars and Ria Stars, for an estimated 16 million rand ($1.58 million) in order to trim the size of this season's top flight from 18 to 16 teams...Ephraim Mashaba has been appointed as the coach of South Africa on a two-year contract. The 51-year-old was formerly coach of the under-23 side which represented South Africa at the Olympic Games in Sydney two years ago and becomes the third man to take charge of the senior team this year. Mashaba replaces Jomo Sono, who was coach of the South African side that went to the World Cup finals in South Korea in June. Sono had been coach for five months after taking over from the Portuguese trainer Carlos Queiroz. Mashaba, who will be assisted by former Lesotho coach Styles Phumo, is to take charge of South Africa's qualifying campaign for the 2004 African Nations Cup finals in Tunisia. They play their first qualifier away at the Ivory Coast on September 8.

SPAIN: Burgos are in danger of relegation from the Spanish second division after failing to raise enough capital to convert themselves into a limited company. The Spanish Sports Council turned down an appeal from the club for more time to raise the funds late on July 29 and the Professional Football League (LFP) are likely to respond relegating Burgos to the third division. If that happens, then Levante will stay up after being relegated at the end of last season. Real Oviedo and Las Palmas, both in the second division, also have serious financial problems. Both need to raise money to pay their playing staff by the end of the month or they too could face relegation.

SWEDEN: A 26-year-old man who died August 2 from injuries sustained in a brawl became Sweden's first fatality related to soccer violence. Tony Deogan was severely beaten and kicked in what police believe was an arranged clash of rival hooligan groups before a Jul 29 match in Stockholm between home team AIK and IFK Goteborg. About 50 people, most of them AIK supporters, were involved. The brawl took place in a park 3 miles from Rasunda stadium where the match was played, police spokesman Ulf Goeranzon said. Deogan, an IFK Goteborg supporter, was taken to Karolinska Hospital with severe skull injuries. No one else was injured, Goeranzon said.

SWITZERLAND: Grasshoppers coach Piet Hamberg will leave the club when his contract expires at the end of June next year, the Zurich club said on July 29. "Hamberg decided to terminate his activity with the club after his three-year contract," the club's official website said. The 48-year-old Dutchman took over from English coach Roy Hodgson in 2000.