Search: ' youth'

Tub-thumping one minute, critical the next. The English press switches from swagger to insecurity

Wayne Rooney proved irresistible to the tabloids during the World Cup, with his features grafted onto a striking variety of cartoon characters, superheroes, animals and members of the Beatles. When not coloured green and depicted as Shrek, Wayne was gurning menacingly in front of a St George’s cross. Such excesses nothwithstanding, the tone of the England coverage was distinctly different to recent tournaments, albeit not until the games had started.

Read more…

At the 2010 World Cup, England underperformed at a major tournament. Again. Although the same solutions are called for, nothing seems to change

All the stock phrases came out as England staggered through the group stage at the 2010 World Cup en route to a second-round mercy killing in Bloemfontein. The team just needed to step up, the pundits said, play at their best, find their real form. However limp the performances might be, there is still a belief than an England team should be able to compete on equal terms with the best international sides at any given time.

Read more…

A football club set up for asylum seekers in Vienna has found itself pressurised by the Austrian state. Paul Joyce explains

“FC Sans Papiers is a fight against racism and discrimination using modern and elegant means – sport,” explains its president Dr Di-Tutu Bukasa, who founded the side in 2002. Inspired by the French political movement of the same name, the Viennese team offers asylum seekers who lack an Austrian residence permit the chance to play regular lower-league football.

Read more…

As Liverpool approach further financial crisis some very rich men are insulting each other. Rob Hughes is concerned

Never mind Benítez. The real shock at Anfield these past weeks was the open letter that ex-chairman David Moores sent to the Times, addressing his disastrous decision to sell to George Gillett and Tom Hicks in 2007. Moores called on the Americans to step down and save the club from further humiliation.

Read more…

Greg Norman explains why both political and sporting reforms are needed in South America's poorest country

Despite playing at La Paz’s atmospheric Estadio Hernando Siles, the world’s highest international venue, the national team is, at 67, the lowest ranked South American side. Meanwhile, a league whose second most successful team in history is called The Strongest is, unsurprisingly, statistically the continent’s weakest in recent years. The last 16 of this year’s Copa Libertadores featured teams from eight different countries, yet Bolivian teams Bolívar and Blooming finished bottom of their groups with five points between them.

Read more…