Mihir Bose's Blog, page 83
August 25, 2011
The rise of celebrity culture is changing the face of our beautiful game
Insideworldfootball
The cult of the manager may have been developing since the 1960s, but football now faces a situation that not many could have imagined. This is the age of the manager as a celebrity, with his every action judged to be as important and worthy of highlight, at times even more so, than the players he manages.
This marks a fundamental change in the how the game is perceived. When Pelé described football as the beautiful game, he meant the show put on by the likes of him and his fellow players.
We now have the extraordinary spectacle of not one football event, but two simultaneous ones, where the off-field action surrounding managers, be it Jose Mourinho or Arsène Wenger, attracts as much attention, if not more, than Lionel Messi's performance on the field.
The cult of the manager may have been developing since the 1960s, but football now faces a situation that not many could have imagined. This is the age of the manager as a celebrity, with his every action judged to be as important and worthy of highlight, at times even more so, than the players he manages.
This marks a fundamental change in the how the game is perceived. When Pelé described football as the beautiful game, he meant the show put on by the likes of him and his fellow players.
We now have the extraordinary spectacle of not one football event, but two simultaneous ones, where the off-field action surrounding managers, be it Jose Mourinho or Arsène Wenger, attracts as much attention, if not more, than Lionel Messi's performance on the field.
August 23, 2011
Roy Hodgson: I'd like England job but it's important everyone looks at the big picture
Evening Standard
Nothing much surprises Roy Hodgson. "I am fatalistic," he says. "So many things happen in football that, if you have a long career like I have, they are going to happen to you sometime."
The West Brom manager takes another sip of beer when we meet in the Park Lane hotel, where his team stayed for last weekend's game at Chelsea. But, for all his acceptance of football fate, he is surprised by how things have turned out since he was sacked by Liverpool. "I'm back at a club similar to the one I left for Liverpool: Fulham."
As with Fulham, he was called in to save the Baggies from relegation. Last season's rescue lacked the drama of keeping Fulham up in 2008 when the winner against Portsmouth came in the 76th minute of their last match but, says Hodgson: "It still was a close escape. We weren't fooled that we finished mid-table [11th]. I was no more confident than we were at Fulham."
Nothing much surprises Roy Hodgson. "I am fatalistic," he says. "So many things happen in football that, if you have a long career like I have, they are going to happen to you sometime."
The West Brom manager takes another sip of beer when we meet in the Park Lane hotel, where his team stayed for last weekend's game at Chelsea. But, for all his acceptance of football fate, he is surprised by how things have turned out since he was sacked by Liverpool. "I'm back at a club similar to the one I left for Liverpool: Fulham."
As with Fulham, he was called in to save the Baggies from relegation. Last season's rescue lacked the drama of keeping Fulham up in 2008 when the winner against Portsmouth came in the 76th minute of their last match but, says Hodgson: "It still was a close escape. We weren't fooled that we finished mid-table [11th]. I was no more confident than we were at Fulham."
August 22, 2011
How England bowled out India on a budget
FT
Sport and business may often be uncomfortable bedfellows. The recent problems at Fifa, the world football's governing body, have demonstrated how difficult it is for sport to be run as a business. However, the cricket Test series between England and India demonstrates that sport can provide instructive lessons about how to use money to maximise resources and produce a winning formula.
This series saw England not only become the top Test nation in the world but also humiliate India, winning all four matches. Not even the most optimistic of English fans could have hoped for such a result. Bookmakers, who always have a shrewd idea about such things, were so convinced this was unlikely that, at the beginning of the series, they were offering odds of 25-1 against such an outcome.
The English triumph, and more so the scale of the victory, is remarkable given that India has been the number one Test country since 2009. Only three months previously, India also won the 50-over World Cup, something England has never achieved. The triumph is all the more remarkable because, as has been well-documented, India is the money bags of world cricket.
Click here to read this article in full
Sport and business may often be uncomfortable bedfellows. The recent problems at Fifa, the world football's governing body, have demonstrated how difficult it is for sport to be run as a business. However, the cricket Test series between England and India demonstrates that sport can provide instructive lessons about how to use money to maximise resources and produce a winning formula.
This series saw England not only become the top Test nation in the world but also humiliate India, winning all four matches. Not even the most optimistic of English fans could have hoped for such a result. Bookmakers, who always have a shrewd idea about such things, were so convinced this was unlikely that, at the beginning of the series, they were offering odds of 25-1 against such an outcome.
The English triumph, and more so the scale of the victory, is remarkable given that India has been the number one Test country since 2009. Only three months previously, India also won the 50-over World Cup, something England has never achieved. The triumph is all the more remarkable because, as has been well-documented, India is the money bags of world cricket.
Click here to read this article in full
The Olympic super brands take over London
Evening Standard
London 2012 will be a new experience for one volunteer. Urvasi Naidu, who has been a volunteer for every Olympics since the 2002 Salt Lake City Games, always carries some masking tape in her handbag.
"What I am usually looking out for," says Urvais, a lawyer by profession, "are groups of people wearing T-shirts advertising rival products to the official sponsors. If they are, I first try to get them to wear the T-shirts inside out. If that doesn't work, I use masking tape to cover up the advertisement so it's not visible on television."
It may seem extreme but Urvasi, who has contributed to a book on the subject, says: "Sponsors pay a lot of money, they have a right to protect their investment - other brands are not entitled to advertise.
London 2012 will be a new experience for one volunteer. Urvasi Naidu, who has been a volunteer for every Olympics since the 2002 Salt Lake City Games, always carries some masking tape in her handbag.
"What I am usually looking out for," says Urvais, a lawyer by profession, "are groups of people wearing T-shirts advertising rival products to the official sponsors. If they are, I first try to get them to wear the T-shirts inside out. If that doesn't work, I use masking tape to cover up the advertisement so it's not visible on television."
It may seem extreme but Urvasi, who has contributed to a book on the subject, says: "Sponsors pay a lot of money, they have a right to protect their investment - other brands are not entitled to advertise.
August 17, 2011
Money doesn't always guarantee sporting success
Insideworldfootball
The beginning of the football season always turns to talk of money and how much clubs have spent on the transfer market.
Yet what this misses is the age-old truth that money does not buy sporting success. Spending money can keep the fans happy and raise their expectations for the season, but is no guarantee of silverware at the end of the season.
This is something that Manchester City fans might well discover this season as they finally strive to wrest back some glory from their more famous city rivals. Managers under pressure always talk of how much the opposition has spent, but it is management more than money that matters in the end.
The beginning of the football season always turns to talk of money and how much clubs have spent on the transfer market.
Yet what this misses is the age-old truth that money does not buy sporting success. Spending money can keep the fans happy and raise their expectations for the season, but is no guarantee of silverware at the end of the season.
This is something that Manchester City fans might well discover this season as they finally strive to wrest back some glory from their more famous city rivals. Managers under pressure always talk of how much the opposition has spent, but it is management more than money that matters in the end.
ECB Cricket Podcast: England are number one
ECB Cricket Podcast - Episode 56
England take top spot in the world Test rankings after victory over India at Edgbaston - latest from the npower Test Series with both captains, plus Alastair Cook, Tim Bresnan, Graeme Swann, Hugh Morris, Mihir Bose and Podcast Pundit Mike Gatting.
Mihir and Stephen Lamb discuss India's loss against England in the Series.
(Note: the relevent section starts at 20:00)
Click here to listen or download the podcast in full
England take top spot in the world Test rankings after victory over India at Edgbaston - latest from the npower Test Series with both captains, plus Alastair Cook, Tim Bresnan, Graeme Swann, Hugh Morris, Mihir Bose and Podcast Pundit Mike Gatting.
Mihir and Stephen Lamb discuss India's loss against England in the Series.
(Note: the relevent section starts at 20:00)
Click here to listen or download the podcast in full
August 16, 2011
I lie in bed and think Jonny Wilkinson has done very well, says Toby Flood
Evening Standard
Toby Flood may give the impression he was made for rugby but he never really saw it as a career - it happened by accident.
In the opinion of many rugby experts, England's performance in the 19-9 defeat to Wales last Saturday was not so much an accident as a car crash waiting to happen. But the 26-year-old England fly-half is taking me on a more reflective journey as he talks of why he became a rugby player not an actor.
The stage or screen would have been the obvious career choice. Both his grandfathers were actors, one of them, Albert Lieven, played a German general in The Guns of Navarone and his parents are still involved in the theatre. But Flood says: "It just never appealed to me."
Toby Flood may give the impression he was made for rugby but he never really saw it as a career - it happened by accident.
In the opinion of many rugby experts, England's performance in the 19-9 defeat to Wales last Saturday was not so much an accident as a car crash waiting to happen. But the 26-year-old England fly-half is taking me on a more reflective journey as he talks of why he became a rugby player not an actor.
The stage or screen would have been the obvious career choice. Both his grandfathers were actors, one of them, Albert Lieven, played a German general in The Guns of Navarone and his parents are still involved in the theatre. But Flood says: "It just never appealed to me."
August 13, 2011
England become the number one Test team
BBC World Service – Newshour
Mihir and James Menendez discuss how England has become the number one Test team in the World.
Click here to listen to the program
(Note: Relevent section begins at 0:44:00)
Mihir and James Menendez discuss how England has become the number one Test team in the World.
Click here to listen to the program
(Note: Relevent section begins at 0:44:00)
Riots are elsewhere: so thought Britain, till the hoods came out in London and beyond
Outlook
The riots in Britain, the worst for over a century, have come as a rude shock to the British. Until this week, the British had a cosy, self-satisfied feeling that things in their 'right little, tight little island' were in many ways much better than in other parts of the developed world. The economic downturn may have seen America's AAA credit status downgraded and several European countries in turmoil—this may yet befall Italy and France—but not Britain. The government has imposed painful cuts, but British political leaders have been confident that, in the face of the worst downturn since the 1930s, the country has avoided real trauma. Now that illusion lies shattered like so many shards of glass littering Britain's streets.
The riots in Britain, the worst for over a century, have come as a rude shock to the British. Until this week, the British had a cosy, self-satisfied feeling that things in their 'right little, tight little island' were in many ways much better than in other parts of the developed world. The economic downturn may have seen America's AAA credit status downgraded and several European countries in turmoil—this may yet befall Italy and France—but not Britain. The government has imposed painful cuts, but British political leaders have been confident that, in the face of the worst downturn since the 1930s, the country has avoided real trauma. Now that illusion lies shattered like so many shards of glass littering Britain's streets.
August 11, 2011
The silence of the world's football players in FIFA crisis is deafening
Insideworldfootball
Like the dog that did not bark in the night in the Sherlock Holmes mystery,The Hound of the Baskervilles, one of the most fascinating aspects of the FIFA crisis is that one group has said nothing: the players.
It is astonishing to consider, given all that has been written about the problems of FIFA, that there is very little about what the players think. Their silence has been stunning.
Without the players, there can be no game and the fact that they have had nothing to say about this, the greatest crisis to face the governing body of the world game, shows how sport, for all the talk that it is a business, is not really a business. And why it may prove so difficult to restructure an organisation like FIFA and make sure it is fit for purpose.
Like the dog that did not bark in the night in the Sherlock Holmes mystery,The Hound of the Baskervilles, one of the most fascinating aspects of the FIFA crisis is that one group has said nothing: the players.
It is astonishing to consider, given all that has been written about the problems of FIFA, that there is very little about what the players think. Their silence has been stunning.
Without the players, there can be no game and the fact that they have had nothing to say about this, the greatest crisis to face the governing body of the world game, shows how sport, for all the talk that it is a business, is not really a business. And why it may prove so difficult to restructure an organisation like FIFA and make sure it is fit for purpose.
Mihir Bose's Blog
- Mihir Bose's profile
- 17 followers
Mihir Bose isn't a Goodreads Author
(yet),
but they
do have a blog,
so here are some recent posts imported from
their feed.
