or: Nothing has changed but the surrounding bullshit that has grown; or: Football’s Groundhog Day. Whatever observers and fans of 1. FC Magdeburg will title this period in the club’s history, it appears that bit by bit the promise of a successful future is once more nothing but a fantasy. It has been highlighted last month (here) that the East German football club was at the centre of speculations according to which a Spanish investor was to spend up to
Clubs in Crisis, pt.2
It has been highlighted elsewhere on this blog that small football clubs are suffering while bigger clubs get ever richer. That process has accelerated with the arrival of pay per view television and heavy marketing of the game at the top level. Yet those small clubs struggling to make ends meet should be the focus of this piece. Read more →
Football on TV
There used to be a time when football games went unnoticed because they were not televised. In England highlights of the First Division were only shown since Jimmy Hill revolutionized TV with his Match of the Day programme, while in Germany ‘Das Aktuelle Sportstudio’ at ZDF, the second terrestrial channel, broadcast the highlights of the first division since 1963. All that has changed in Germany when SAT.1, a private channel bought the rights for the highlights and started their ‘ran’ programme that had an audience in the studio and intended to liven up football presentation in German TV. Britain saw nothing short of a revolution when the Premier League was introduced and TV rights sold off to BSkyB. Read more →
The 12th man or PR gone wrong
Bayern Munich, the best team in Germany have scored a rare own goal last week when they announced to present a new striker, ‘a real bomb’, a player who can ‘always play’, at ‘Barcelona or Manchester.’ Fans of the club were told that the presentation would be broadcast via an Internet channel and had to hit the ‘like’-button on the facebook page of the club. Read more →
Manchester 18 – North London 6
The English Premier League praises itself as the best and the most competitive in the world. While it is certainly a very good and very successful league in terms of revenue and playing, the issue of competitiveness needs to be re-addressed as it appears that the English league is a rather closed shop and the title usually decided between four or five clubs. This however, has changed over the last two seasons and this season it has become too apparent that the title race is a two horse race.
Les Belles de Paris
Rarely has women’s football been touched upon here but a piece in the L’Equipe magazine about the PSG Ladies offered a good intro for the topic. The men’s team are the focus of the media since their take over by the Qatari Investment Authority in May 2011. Read more →
A Trend or Change of Direction?
In November 2011 the future of Brazilian football took a turn for the positive: Neymar decided to sign a new contract until 2014 with his club Santos. This however, has sent shock waves through European football as it was expected that he would move to Europe sooner rather than later. Real Madrid were offering
Paris 0 – Marseille 5
The Cup match between Red Star FC and Olympique Marseille turned out to be a home game for Marseille. Each time they scored one of their five goals in Saturday’s match against Red Star FC, Stade de France witnessed an eruption of joy as the majority of the spectators were supporting l’OM. This is rather surprising as Stade de France is in St. Denis, just on the outskirts of Paris and at the same time it is not surprising at all. Read more →
Coupe de France: Red Star FC 93 – Olympique Marseille 0-5
The hopes of Red Star FC 93 to manifest their aim to become the second Parisian football club experienced a blow Saturday night as they were soundly beaten by Olympique Marseille in front of almost 51000 spectators in the French Cup. Marseille were resting a few first team players but nonetheless controlled the game throughout but Red Star had their chances but were unlucky in the final pass or simply not clever enough. Read more →
Coupe de France: Red Star FC – Olympique Marseille – Preview
Tomorrow will see another encounter of David vs. Goliath when Red Star FC 93 take on Olympique Marseille at the Stade de France in the Coupe de France. Red Star FC, the oldest of the existing football clubs in Paris will feature a player whose career began there and where it is likely to come to an end: Steve Marlet. Between 2003 and 2005 he played over 50 games for Marseille and he is known to English football fans from his time at Fulham 2002-03 while German football fans might remember him from his short stint at VfL Wolfsburg from 2005-06. Read more →