Quito (PL) Ecuadorian women's soccer team was catapulted to the World Cup to be held in Canada from June 6 to July 5 next year by a Monica Quinteros's goal with a header in injury time.

The goal of the 26-year player was the only one scored in the two games played by Ecuadorian team against Trinidad and Tobago in the fight for the last ticket to the Canadian finals, as the first ended in a goalless draw.

Berna - Cristiano Ronaldo has been named FIFA''s 2014 Ballon d''Or winner, beating Lionel Messi and Manuel Neuer to football's most coveted individual prize.

Ronaldo has scored 31 goals and contributed 10 assists across 22 appearances in La Liga and the Champions League this season, per WhoScored.com.

Berlin - The Argentinean Lionel Messi and the Colombian James Rodriguez were selected among the best organizers of the 2014 game, said today the International Federation of Football History and Statistics (IFFHS).

Messi and Rodriguez finished in second and third place in the IFFHS ranking, which is led by the German Toni Kroos.

Havana - De Zurda, a program broadcast by Telesur, started on Saturday its second season with a program from Cuba, on which they paid tribute to the leader of the Revolution, Fidel Castro, and the Cuban Five.

Former Argentinian soccer player Diego Armando Maradona and Uruguayan journalist Victor Hugo Morales, the anchors, dedicated part of the program to the relationship between Fidel Castro and Maradona, the return of Antonio Guerrero, Gerardo Hernandez and Ramon Labañino to their homeland, as well as talking about Cuban soccer and the Caribbean island´s collaboration to fight Ebola.

Washington - The Confederation of North, Central American and Caribbean Association Football (CONCACAF) today held the draw for the frst qualifying round for the World Championship of Russia-2018.

The first matches, from March 23 to 31, are scheduled as follows: Bahamas-Bermuda, Barbados-US Virgin Islands, British Virgin Islands-Dominica, Turks and Caicos-Saint Kitts and Nevis, Nicaragua-Anguilla, Belize-Cayman Islands and Curacao-Montserrat.

Havana - Cuba has classified 301 athletes for the Pan-American Games taking place from July 10 to 26 in Toronto, Canada, Cuban sports officials informed today.

So fat, there are 22 disciplines with continental tickets, reported the director of the department of High Performance of the Cuban Institute of Sports, (INDER), Norge Marrero, cited by the Cuban Information Agency.