International Roundup

Marseille in doldrums after third home loss

MARSEILLE, France (Reuters) -- Olympique Marseille slumped to their third consecutive home defeat on Wednesday and the ambitious French ligue 1 club are now far from certain of securing a European berth next season.

In-form Monaco, inspired by striker Dado Prso, snatched a 1-0 victory -- their first in 23 years at the Stade Velodrome -- to join Sochaux in the League Cup final.

Marseille, who completed the first part of the season at the top of the table, have been gradually losing ground on their rivals in the title race since.

Their losses to arch-rivals Paris St Germain and giant-killers En Avant Guingamp have left them third in the table trailing leaders Olympique Lyon by four points with five matches to play.

These poor performances have worried coach Alain Perrin as his team have only scored two goals from their last four matches.

"We are suffering from a lack of efficiency. We are scoring too few goals and we are conceding too many at the moment," Perrin said.

"Against Monaco we could have avoided conceding the goal. We have not found our way to the net once over our last three outings," said Switzerland midfielder Fabio Celestini.

The defense, widely considered the main strength of the team during the first part of the season, often looked slow and clumsy.

Towering libero Daniel Van Buyten seemed less at ease when partnering Johnny Ecker as veteran captain Frank Leboeuf was absent because of a painful knee.

"It's always bad to be on a losing run. But we must hang on to avoid ruining all the effort made since the start of the season," said Celestini.

Marseille will know more about where they stand after they have visited Racing Lens on Sunday.

Azerbaijan says federation to blame for ban

BAKU (Reuters) -- Azerbaijan's government attacked the head of the national soccer federation on Thursday over the country's suspension by world soccer governing body, FIFA.

The ex-Soviet state's Youth, Sports and Tourism Ministry said federation chief Fuad Musayev had consistently thwarted its attempts to help end two years of chaos in Azeri soccer through dialogue between the federation and the clubs.

"Driven by his own ambitions, Fuad Musayev...disregarded the interests of millions of fans and de facto contributed towards the FIFA ruling to impose sanctions on the Azeri soccer federation," the ministry said in a statement.

Azeri soccer has been in turmoil since 2000 when leading clubs accused Musayev of corruption. In May 2002, 10 of 11 premier division clubs quit the national championship to form a breakaway league.

Musayev told a news conference on Wednesday the federation would write up a new charter, elect a president and restart the national championship in a bid to overturn the suspension.

FIFA said on Tuesday that the Azeri federation had been suspended over "severe and unacceptable levels of external pressure in recent times."

Azeri clubs are due to meet on April 20 and the championship could restart by April 25.

UEFA, European soccer's ruling body, has banned Azeri clubs from European club competitions as a result of the country's domestic football problems.

Besiktas defeat opens up Turkish title race

ISTANBUL (Reuters) -- Besiktas lost their first league match of season on Wednesday, going down 1-0 at Diyarbakirspor to hand the initiative in the Turkish title race to Galatasaray.

Besiktas clearly missed the influence of suspended Sergen Yalcin in midfield and Saffet Akyuz scored what proved to be the winning goal for Diyarbakirspor in the 31st minute.

Despite their first defeat in the Turkish super league for almost a year, Besiktas remained top of the league on 64 points but a revitalised Galatasaray are now only one point behind with seven matches to play.

The two clubs will meet at Besiktas's Inonu Stadium in their penultimate match of the season.

Ankara's Genclerbirligi, who are third on 60 points, had mounted a strong push to become the first club from outside Istanbul to win the league since 1984 but fell off the pace after a thrilling 3-3 draw with Fenerbahce at the weekend.

Besiktas host Fenerbahce this weekend and will need a win to keep ahead of Galatasaray, who meet relegation candidates Goztepe.

Toppmoeller in talks with Shakhtar Donetsk

BERLIN (Reuters) -- Former Bayer Leverkusen coach Klaus Toppmoeller has held talks with Ukrainian champions Shakhtar Donetsk about taking over as coach.

Toppmoeller left Bayer Leverkusen, who are struggling to avoid relegation from Germany's Bundesliga, on February 16 after a disastrous string of results, according to German agency SID.

The previous season he had led the club to the finals of the Champions League and the German Cup and to second place in the German league.

'Toppi' has also been linked to Fenerbahce in Istanbul and there are reports of offers from the English premier league.

Donetsk, top of the Ukrainian premier division with a four-point lead over rivals Dynamo Kiev, have been looking for a top European trainer for the 2003/04 season and held talks with former Leverkusen coach Christoph Daum.

Daum eventually settled on a job at Austria Vienna.

Lithuania name squad for Romania friendly

VILNIUS (Reuters) -- Lithuania shocked Germany and Scotland in recent Euro 2004 qualifiers and coach Algimantas Liubinskas targeted another big scalp on Thursday when he named his squad for a friendly against Romania later this month.

Liubinskas was appointed national coach in February and has made an impressive start, leading his team to a 1-1 draw with Germany in Nuremberg and a 1-0 home victory over Scotland at home in qualifiers on March 29 and April 2.

Lithuania are tied with Germany and Scotland for first place in Group Five with seven points from five matches, but Germany have a game in hand on Scotland and two in hand on Lithuania.

Liubinskas, who this week resigned as coach of FC Sviesa Vilnius to focus on the national team, will be hoping his side can keep up their excellent run of form when they host Romania on April 30.

Squad:

Goalkeepers: Gintaras Stauce (Fostiras Athens), Eduardas Kurskis (FC Kaunas)

Defenders: Nerijus Radzius (Zaglebie Lubin), Ignas Dedura (Skonto), Rolandas Dziaukstas (Saturn-REN TV), Tomas Zvirgzdauskas (Halmstad BK), Andrius Skerla (Dunfermline Athletic), Tadas Graziunas (N/A)

Midfielders: Sarunas Deividas (CSKA Moscow), Tadas Papeckys (FC Kaunas), Tomas Razanauskas (Akratitos Athens), Igoris Morinas (FSV Mainz 05), Deividas Cesnauskis (Dynamo Moscow), Raimondas Zutautas (Maccabi Haifa), Orestas Buitkus (Skonto), Raimundas Vileniskis (Wisla Plock), Darius Maciulevicius (FC Sviesa Vilnius).

Forwards: Robertas Poskus (Krylya Sovietov Samara), Edgaras Jankauskas (Porto), Dmitrijus Guscinas (Holstein Kiel).

Portugal's Farense call off strike over back pay

LISBON (Reuters) -- Players at second division Portuguese side Farense called off a weekend strike on Thursday after club bosses suggested they would look into claims that players had been unpaid for five months.

The Professional Soccer Players Union said in a statement that what would have been Portugal's first ever strike by pro players had drawn attention to "the dramatic situation faced by clubs and consequently their players."

Union officials have said Portuguese professional soccer is in danger of collapse unless a series of reforms are carried out, including trimming back the premiership to about 12 teams from 18 at present.

A stoppage would have cancelled or postponed Farense's away game on Saturday with second division leaders Alverca.

Farense lie 11th in the second division, 14 points behind Alverca.

CSKA Sofia hit with one-game stadium ban

SOFIA (Reuters) -- CSKA Sofia have been banned from playing at home for one match after their fans injured three policemen in fighting during Wednesday's Bulgarian Cup semi-final, first leg against Levski Sofia.

The Bulgarian Football Union (BFU)'s disciplinary commission imposed the penalty on Thursday after CSKA supporters smashed up seats and hurled them at the police. There were 29 arrests.

"After studying in detail the case related to disorders in the stands, we think that this is a dangerous precedent," said a disciplinary commission spokesman, who added that the commission had also fined CSKA 10,000 levs (US$5,602).

"We treat the incident as an attempt to mistreat officials during the game," the spokesman told reporters.

The commission said CSKA were not given the maximum three-game ban because the police had also provoked the fans.

The police said their officers had stormed the stands to stop fighting between two groups of CSKA fans 15 minutes after halftime.

In a statement on Thursday the CSKA management protested against the police action.

CSKA lost 1-0 to visiting Levski, whose winning goal came deep into injury time.

The one-game ban will affect CSKA's premier league match against Slavia Sofia on April 26.

CSKA have a four-point lead at the top of the table over champions Levski.

 

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Both the Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.