LONDON -- A fine of ?1.5 million ($2.34 million) imposed on Tottenham for irregular transfer payments has been confirmed by English Football Association officials.


An arbritration tribunal ruled last week that Spurs should be reinstated in the FA Cup and freed from a six-point premier league deduction, after club chairman Alan Sugar challenged the punishments.


The tribunal concluded it would be "irrational to impose any penalty other than a fine," because the offenses had occured between five and 10 years ago under a previous administration.


A reconvened FA hearing confirmed after a five-hour meeting Tuesday that it had accepted the arbiters' advice.


Sugar decided to fight on after an appeal saw Tottenham's original ?600,000 fine more than doubled, a 12-point penalty halved, and the FA Cup ban confirmed.


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Tab Ramos was well on track as the best player on the U.S team in last summer's World Cup. Then, he was hit by "the train."


In a scramble for a loose ball in a second-round game July 4 against eventual champion Brazil, Ramos grabbed the shirt of Brazilian Leonardo -- and Leonardo replied with an elbow to the head that knocked Ramos unconscious for several seconds.


"There are really no hard feelings. I know the elbow was intentional. You could see it on the film. There is so much pressure nowadays, things get out of control once in awhile," Ramos said from the southern city of Seville. "More than once I've thrown an elbow myself."


Ramos will be coming back from a blow that dented his skull above the left ear and set off bleeding on his brain. He avoided dangerous surgery, but during extensive examinations just after the injury, he was warned that a similar blow to his head might paralyze him.


"One doctor told me if I was a boxer I've have to quit," Ramos said.


Ramos' club Real Betis, promoted last year from the second division, is playing some of the first division's best soccer. Ramos has yet to play in a league match, having been relegated to practice sessions and exhibition games.


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Florence has been called the cradle of Western civilization but it looked more like a battle front last weekend.


Some 1,200 riot police, three helicopters and video cameras were deployed to prevent predicted violent clashes between hooligan fans of Fiorentina and AS Roma.


The strategy worked -- there were no arrests and only one reported injury -- but not without sparking a furore over the security measures, which paralyzed the Tuscan city and drew more attention than the match itself.


"If Florence has to be overrun by police just so we can watch a soccer game then I would just as soon step down," Fiorentina president Vittorio Cecchi Gori said after his team beat Roma 1-0 on Sunday.


Nearly 3,000 Roma fans were frisked in Rome before boarding chartered coaches and trains carrying riot police equipped with semi-automatic weapons, plastic shields, clubs and helmets. Police also carried out identity checks and made sure no ticketless fans travelled to Florence. (Reuters, AP)