Search: 'media'

With uprisings across the Arab world dominating the world press, can change be sparked in football’s most powerful regime?

The popular uprisings in the Middle East are now receiving more coverage than football in the UK press. Even the Arsenal v Barcelona Champions League tie, apparently regarded by some pundits as the most momentous event in the history of the game, couldn’t keep the revolution in Libya off the front pages. So it’s surprising that no one has yet asked the keen Tweeter Jay Bothroyd for his views on the implosion of the Gaddafi regime.

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The Asian Cup in Qatar highlighted the strengths and weaknesses of football in the region. John Duerden was there

You had to feel a bit sorry for Qatar. Despite having over a decade to prepare for the 2022 World Cup after the events of December 2 in Zürich, the tiny nation in fact had just five weeks before it was put on the spot. On January 7, the 2011 Asian Cup kicked off in Doha giving an international media, one that needed no second invitation to demonstrate the extent of FIFA’s madness, the chance to scrutinise Qatar’s hosting capabilities/football culture/traffic and pretty much everything else.

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While the big clubs claim conspiracy, Matthew Barker believes that Verona don’t receive enough credit for a famous title in the 1980s

The popular back story to Hellas Verona’s one and only Championship win, in 1985, tends to focus on the introduction of a new public balloting system for the selection of referees. Claims had been repeatedly made that the bigger clubs would block the use of certain unfavoured match officials. Juventus had just won two controversial scudetti in a row. Surely, the argument goes, it was no coincidence that the one season when referee selection was kept in check, a smaller team were able to take the top prize?

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Andy Brassell looks at a confusing and controversial TV deal for the Conference

It normally takes comedians or cover bands to pack out the bars at AFC Wimbledon and Kingstonian’s Kingsmeadow stadium on a night without a home game. But on a cold Friday evening in January, a few hundred were crammed in to watch live football. Wimbledon were playing at Gateshead and such is the relative obscurity of Premier Sports, the TV rights holder for the Football Conference from this season, that fans squeezed into the hostelries behind KM’s main stand to watch the transmission.

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Ian Plenderleith approves of the attempts to throw off the shackles of British footballing attitudes in North America

A panel of US football journalists arrived at the national coaching convention in Baltimore at the start of this year for a general discussion about media coverage in the States. In the time allowed, however, there was only one topic that interested the few dozen present – the importation of British television commentators, and how it reflects on the state of the US game.

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