The UAE Football Association (UAEFA) and the Deutscher Fussball-Bund (DFB), the German Football Association Monday inked an agreement to promote the sport in the UAE.
The agreement was signed by Yousuf Abdullah, General Secretary of the UAEFA and Wolfgang Niersbach, his counterpart at the DFB.
Both countries will be involved in the development of football at various levels starting with importing the German coaching system, the refereeing system and the administrative system.
There will also be close coordination and cooperation between the UAE and Germany in developing media and public relations, marketing and sponsorship and in sports medicine.
Special emphasis will be paid to the development of a youth training programme that is so popular in Germany.
"This is the only way forward for the sport and we are glad to cooperate and take this to the next level," Niersbach said.
"We can no longer confine ourselves to Europe and we know after winning the right to host the World Cup in 2006 how crucial the four votes from Asia were to us. We have an agreement in place, and now we have to start filling it with life," he added.
[Gulf News]
The president of the German Football Association has questioned the motives behind Michael Ballack's apology to national coach Joachim Low.
The Chelsea midfielder released a statement on Saturday in which he admitted criticising Low's treatment of Torsten Frings and Kevin Kuranyi in a recent interview had been a mistake.
The Chelsea man also signalled his intention to say sorry to Low in person when he had recovered from a foot operation and was fit to travel to Germany.
But DFB chief Theo Zwanziger fears Ballack's actions could be just a ploy to avoid being stripped of the captaincy.
"The apology has taken the edge off the conflict. And at least it has now been clarified that the mistake clearly lay with our captain,'' Zwanziger told the online version of Die Welt newspaper.
"Now we certainly have to face the question: How reasonable is Michael Ballack? Is the apology only tactics or is it really meant honestly?''
Low last week summoned Ballack for one-to-one talks after being "disappointed'' at comments the made in a newspaper interview.
Ballack had suggested to the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung that Low had been disrespectful in his recent treatment of Frings and Kuranyi.
Low was incensed his skipper had used the media to criticise him and threatened to strip him of the national team captaincy.
Zwanziger has spoken with Low and Germany manager Oliver Bierhoff about Ballack over the past few days.
"We discussed what the explanation means and questioned whether with it everything is now sorted,'' he added. "Joachim Low does not see it like that and I also don't see it like that.
"We have to exactly scrutinise what intentions lie behind the statements, and at the end of the talk it has to be guaranteed that nothing like this will happen again.''
The German Football Association (DFB) have dismissed a report that appeared in the UK's Daily Telegraph newspaper on Monday claiming they have been approached by UEFA to step in and co-host Euro 2012 with Poland.
According to the report, the 2006 World Cup hosts had been put on standby to rescue the tournament after planning for work on stadium upgrades in Ukraine fell behind schedule.
However, German FA (DFB) president Dr Theo Zwanziger is refusing to jump the gun ahead of a UEFA meeting in Bordeaux at the end of September.
'We are not getting involved in any imaginary games or speculation about the 2012 European Championships,' he told Tuesday's Bild newspaper.
'Should there be any difficulties, then UEFA president (Michel) Platini will make suggestions.'
After staging one of the most successful tournaments in recent years in 2006, Germany has already been tipped as a reserve host for the 2010 World Cup should South Africa have any problems, or suffer a natural disaster, that would prevent them from hosting the event.
The DFB have already distanced themselves from such reports with Zwanziger recently saying Germany is 'fundamentally not ready for the 2010 World Cup' and that they would be 'barking up the wrong tree' in trying to repeat the atmosphere of the 2006 World Cup so soon.
