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With just days remaining until the World Cup kicks off in South Africa, football fever is beginning to grip fans around the globe. The Czech Republic failed to qualify this year, but many will have fond memories of the 1990 World Cup in Italy, when supporters from Czechoslovakia were finally able to travel freely to a major soccer tournament.

Czech beer is already being sold around the world in powdered form. Now the Czech research institute behind the recipe is seeking protection in the form of a worldwide patent. It believes the application will help it build on its existing success.

When the artist Alfons Mucha died in 1939, he left his masterpiece of 20 canvasses entitled the Slav Epic, to the City of Prague – but on the condition that an appropriate space be built for it. This has not happened to date and now the city would like to remove the work from the chateau in Moravský Krumlov where it is currently housed and install it in Prague’s Veletržní Palác. The Mucha family, however, is opposed, and is filing for an injunction against the city to keep the paintings where they are until they are given a permanent residence.

As the country’s centre-right parties hammer out an agreement on a future government one message is coming across loud and clear – whatever the deal - it will involve severe cost-cutting measures in the months and years to come. Plans on the table envisage job cuts, salary cuts, halting state investment projects and, where possible, merging departments or ministries.

One of the greats of Czech film and theatre, Ladislav Smoljak, died at the age of 78 at the weekend. As a director, screenwriter and actor, Smoljak, brought his special humour to the stage and screen over more than four decades. He will perhaps be best remembered as one of the creators of the fictional Czech character Jára Cimrman.

The recent Czech general elections saw voters swing away from the established parties in favour of newcomers. One of the traditional parties that got left out in the cold were the Christian Democrats, who received just 4.4 percent of the vote, falling short of the 5 percent threshold required for seats in Parliament. Radio Prague spoke to political analyst Vít Hloušek from Brno’s Masaryk University, and asked him what led to the party’s decline.

Friday is the big day for the group of youngsters selected to present their issue-oriented projects to the Czech Senate. This is the idea of the Citizen Project, the brainchild of the civic organisation Civitas. A while ago I spoke with the executive director of Civitas in the Czech Republic, Ivana Havlínová, to find out more about the project and the children’s political concerns.

President Václav Klaus has tasked the leader of the Civic Democratic Party, Petr Nečas, to try and form the country’s next government, roughly a week after the general election. Despite finishing second, the Civic Democrats – together with newcomers TOP 09 and Public Affairs – have the most realistic chance of forming a majority government. But they will have to make progress quickly: as the president made clear on Friday he expects Mr Nečas to report back to him in two weeks.

Three Czech centre-right parties - the Civic Democrats, TOP 09 and the centrist Public Affairs – on Wednesday signed an agreement to create a centre-right coalition of fiscal responsibility. The move was sanctioned by President Václav Klaus, who has so far held off from naming a prime minister designate.

Good news for Beatles fans – a new exhibition at the Czech Museum of Music opens on Thursday evening featuring the music and the men – the museum’s even borrowed George Harrison’s banjo, one of John Lennon’s shoes, and lots more Beatles memorabilia. The exhibition’s highly interactive however - there’s even a little recording studio where you can try belting out Beatles songs. Earlier we spoke to the exhibition’s curator, Dagmar Fialová.