Federations Roundup -- Blatter, Bin Hammam in FIFA Presidency Battle; Hoops Hall Inductions

Blatter, Bin Hammam FIFA’s Only Candidates

Incumbent Sepp Blatter and Asian Football Confederation president Mohamed Bin Hammam are FIFA’s only candidates for president.

Soccer’s governing body confirmed Monday that no other nominations were submitted by the April 1 deadline.

Chilean soccer legend Elias Figueroa dropped his plans to run last week after failing to be nominated by one of FIFA's 208 member federations. American journalist Grant Wahl, who had been campaigning for a more transparent FIFA, also did not get the required backing of a federation to challenge the Swiss and Qatari.

Blatter, who is seeking a fourth term as FIFA boss, was in London today to attend the SportAccord Convention. He was among delegates at the Association of Summer Olympic International Federations general assembly.

Bin Hammam, meanwhile, is expected to meet Tuesday with Korea's outgoing FIFA vice-president Chung Mong-joon for talks about his FIFA presidential election campaign.

In a Monday blog post, Bin Hammam fired the first shots in the campaign, urging his rival to fight a clean race.

"I will let him know that I see this election as an opportunity for us to prove that FIFA is not corrupt and that the organization is open and democratic," he wrote.

"I will tell him that throughout this campaign we should respect FIFA's Statutes and protect FIFA's integrity by ensuring that there will be no outside interference in the attempt to win votes; the influence of third parties should not be tolerated or accepted.

The race between Blatter and Bin Hammam will be decided June 1 at the FIFA Congress in Zurich.

For all the latest on the FIFA presidency, visit World Football Insider.

New Number Ones for Table Tennis

Chinese players dominate in the latest table tennis world rankings.

Four of the top five men and all five top women in the lists released Monday by the International Table Tennis Federation hail from the paddling powerhouse.

Both men’s number one Wang Hao and women’s number one Li Xiaoxia represent a change from last month’s edition.

Wang, 27, first reached world number one in Dec. 2004 and was back on top as recently as Dec. 2009. He has both a World Cup and world championship title but still lacks an individual Olympic gold after settling for silverin both Athens and Beijing.

Xiaoxia, 23, finished second at the 2007 world championship and third at the 2009 world championship.

To view the complete rankings, visit the ITTF’s website.

Hoops Hall Inducts Olympic Greats

Three Olympic champions are among this year’s inductees into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.

The hoops hall announced Monday its star-studded Class of 2011, members of which boast seven gold medals and three bronze.

Five-time NBA all-star Chris Mullin won first with the U.S. in 1984 and then again with the famous Dream Team at Barcelona 1992.

Teresa Edwards, the first woman to play basketball at five Olympics, won gold with the U.S. in 1984,1988, 1996 and 2000 as well as bronze in 1992. She also worked as an analyst for NBC during its coverage of Beijing’s basketball tournament.

Arvydas Sabonis, widely considered the NBA’s firstgreat foreign player despite entering the league long past his prime, won gold with the Soviet Union in 1988 and bronze with Lithuania in 1992 and 1996. He was selected European player of the year six times and was inducted into the FIBA Hall of Fame last August.

The trio will be formally inducted this August in Springfield, Mass., alongside "Triangle" offense mastermind Tex Winter, longtime Philadelphia University coach Herb Magee, Harlem globetrotter Reece Tatum, Boston Celtics legend Tom Sanders and Stanford’s Tara VanDerveer, who coached the 1996 U.S. Olympic squad to women’s gold at the Atlanta Summer Games.

Top Shuttler Announces Retirement

Lee Chong Wei, silver medalist in Beijing, says he will retire from competitive badminton following the London Olympics.

Speaking to reporters in his native Malaysia, Lee said he wants "to give the young players an opportunity to play and make a name for themselves and the country".

The 28-year old ended Malaysia’s 12-year-long medal drought in Beijing with his silver.

While he’s currently the top-ranked badminton player, he’s never earned the top spot at an Olympics or world championship. He does, however, have four Commonwealth Games gold medals to his name.

Written by Matthew Grayson.