Search: 'media'

The bosses at Major League Soccer in America thought it necessary to spend millions on a new web presence. Ian Plenderleith points out why it has been a disaster

“The days of the 800-word think-piece are over,” a football journalist recently told me as we discussed the state of internet writing. With all that content being condensed into ever shorter formats, readers want easily browsed headlines, Twitter snippets, news-based blog entries that end with a question, controversial quotes and a space at the bottom where they can launch in with their opinions. Those long paragraphs just give us a headache and take up time better spent watching that shaky YouTube clip where the loco ref scores with an overhead kick in a Paraguayan Fourth Division game before taking a out a handgun and opening fire on the crowd.

Read more…

Dear WSC
I was very interested in the letter (WSC 276) discussing the topic of the Duckworth-Lewis of football that is stoppage time. Are there any WSC readers who are aware of stoppage allowance for cheating ball boys? I attended Colchester v Southampton in December 2009. The home side took a two-goal lead before the Saints slowly clawed their way back into the game. However, our momentum was thwarted by a series of ingenious defensive set-pieces that can only be attributed to hours of practice on the training ground. They went like this: ball goes off for a Saints throw or goal-kick, ball boys strategically placed around the ground retrieve the ball in exaggerated slow motion or, if the pressure was really on, then not at all. One very clever set-piece saw the ball rest at the feet of the ball boy. He then sat motionless on his stool causing Kelvin Davis to have to race 20 yards to retrieve the ball. Should the fourth official have added stoppage time to thwart this cunning plan? And have any other away teams been subjected to such coaching genius?
Tony Cole, Leigh on Sea

Read more…

Johanna Breen explains a battle of names, colours and mascots following the bankruptcy of one of Prague's most popular clubs

Observers of the Czech Republic’s Gambrinus Liga will have noticed that two clubs in the Czech league’s top division lay claim to remarkably similar green kangaroo logos and both go by the name of Bohemians.

Read more…

Recent times have taken a drastic toll on football in Luton and south-west London, but things are looking up. After an 18-year gap Andy Brassell returns to Kenilworth Road with AFC Wimbledon

How did we end up here? The last time many of the 1,000-odd Wimbledon fans who made the trip to Luton on February 20 visited was back in April 1992. The home side that day won 2-1 but failed to stave off relegation from Division One, while the visitors went onto become founder members of the Premier League a few months later.

Read more…

More football coverage doesn't necesarily mean any more information. Paul Ramon vents on a pet hate

Jerry Seinfeld has a joke on how it is amazing that the amount of news that happens every day always just exactly fits the newspaper. Suffice to say he doesn’t read the sport sections of the British press. While in the past decade or so the sport pages have multiplied, often even into their own pullout sections, the amount of news has unsurprisingly refused to follow suit. This leaves each day’s few notable events padded out by stories as irrelevant and disposable as an unofficial biography of a teenage pop star.

Read more…