Tuesday, September 25, 2012

 

Asian Money Trumps English Traditions

Yellow is a very special color for many Arsenal fans. It is associated with success. In the 1971 FA Cup final, for example, yellow was worn as Arsenal came from behind to beat Liverpool after extra time and secure their first double. 

Eight years later they won the Cup again. Wearing yellow. 

Then there was 1989, Mickey Thomas and all that. Winning the old Division One at Anfield, against Liverpool, they wore yellow shirts.

On the other hand, fans, die hard traditionalists at heart, do not have that have emotional attachment to blue, or white, or purple, which have been used in recent years. Primarily because they are not associated with winning trophies in the way yellow is.

Not that the club seem too worried. This season’s second choice shirt is a purple and black number and it is apparently "selling well." Traditionalists, the old school, are up in arms about it but the club are looking at the bottom line and, especially, the lucrative Chinese market.

Talking to an Arsenal supporters' group recently, commercial director Tom Fox was quizzed about shirt designs, and while he recognized the role yellow has played in the club's history, he inferred that was not as important as the Asian consumer. 

"You want a yellow shirt with blue trim, I get it. There are fans in China that don’t want that," he told the supporters. He went on to say they, and kids in N5, Arsenal’s home turf in London, wanted something more fashionable to wear with their contemporary clothing.

Arsenal have jumped on the Asian bandwagon in the last 15 months or so with tours to China, Malaysia and Hong Kong. But it’s not just about shirt sales. It’s about raising the club’s profile in a part of the world that companies are rushing headlong into. And it’s about attracting sponsors who either want a piece of that action or they are already there but looking to expand themselves.

Watch a Premier League game most weekends and you can see how the clubs, and the league, are bending over backwards to chase the Asian dollar. Or baht. Or ringgit. 

Liverpool, Everton, Aston Villa and Queens Park Rangers have sponsors on their club shirt who are either Asian in origin or have a large presence in Asia while the likes of West Ham United, Wigan Athletic, Swansea City and Stoke City have online gambling sites.

It’s not just on the shirts that Asia is being targeted or showing off its wealth. Take a look at the A boards and you can see a Thai brewing war revolving in front of TV audiences around the world. Liverpool recently signed a deal with Indonesia’s flag carrier while a sports website, strongly and subtly, linked to a major tobacco company, also features prominently.

And there’s more. Queens Park Rangers, Leicester City and Cardiff City are owned by rich businessmen from Thailand (Leicester) and Malaysia. Seeing replica Leicester City shirts on sale at Bangkok’s international airport among the more familiar duty free brands takes some getting used to. And some chicken farmers own Blackburn Rovers.

Cardiff City have of course gone one step further in their attempts to appeal to a new breed of supporter. The Malaysian owned club have ditched their traditional blue shirts in a bid to attract fans in a culture where dragons and the color red carry strong messages of wealth and power, alienating some of their doorstep in the process. For now though it does seem most fans are giving the new owners the benefit of the doubt with the move but how long the honeymoon lasts remains to be seen.

A few years ago nobody in Malaysia would have known anything at all about Cardiff; indeed cynics may say they still don’t. But will a Malaysian owning a little known football club be enough to open the club to people who have already been following English football a decade or more and already have their own teams in red they support?

English fans have long been moaning about the crass commercialism of the game, especially the Premier League and its 'greed is good' policy, and the look east is only causing more consternation as fans who have followed their clubs through thick and thin now find themselves being marginalized by the perceived influx of foreign money. 

There are pitfalls to this easy money. Everton, who have had a long and successful relationship with a Thai beer company, had their fingers burnt when they were due to go on a tour to Indonesia only to find it cancelled at the last minute for reasons that remain unclear but probably revolve around money.

The English Premier League may not be the best league in the world but it doesn’t matter. Had satellite TV been worldwide in the late 1980s or early 1990s perhaps Italian clubs would be the most popular. But it wasn’t. The big English clubs and their players are brands. And like all brands they are there to be exploited. 

A new TV deal will boost the money flowing into clubs, but most of it will likely end up in players' and agents' pockets leaving clubs again scouring the globe for sponsors and revenue sources. With fans already being squeezed by high ticket prices, the most expensive seats for Arsenal v Chelsea later this month are a mind-boggling 123.50 GBP (Rp 1.85 million) and the cheapest at a mere 62.00 GBP, fans cannot be expected to keep bearing the brunt and Fox recognized that recently by saying the club was after 95 percent revenue growth coming from the club’s international business.

Traditions may be nice and may be what brings a club and its support together, but they don’t pay the bills. Expect to see more changes as new owners tinker with their club to attract new support and new money.

First published in Jakarta Globe

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Saturday, September 22, 2012

 

Fergie Strangely Silent On Dodgy Pen

Sir Alex Ferguson has shown himself up for being the parochial, biased, self centered, hypocritical man that he is.

Following his team's 1-0 reverse at Goodison Park in their opening game of the season, Fergie came out and blamed everyone for the defeat. He had a pop at Everton's style of play and intimated the home support had influenced the match officials.

Last week, back in Old Trafford bunker surrounded by his supplicants and gophers, the Scottish manager showed that the Olympic spirit that had temporarily effused the nation had gone.

United were given a penalty that was not a penalty. Except at Old Trafford. The Wigan Athletic keeper can be seen clearly pulling out of the challenge. But a baying home support cranked up the volume and the ref caved on, awarding United just one of many soft penalties they,and to be fair other big teams, will likely receive this season.

Did we see Fergie rush to the media and complain about the justice or morality of the decision so blatantly influenced by intimidating fans? Did he rush to say the ref had got it wrong? Did he offer any sympathy to the beleaguered Wigan manager over the unfairness of the decision?

Nope. He did none of those things.

And why should he? If he feels he can manipulate or intimidate match officials into giving his team the 50/50s then he is going to continue to do so.

The Olympic spirit is all very noce and wishy washy. But it is also patronising and does not win trophies.

# posted by Me @ 1:57 PM 0 Comments
 

Boro End Rovers Unbeaten Run

Blackburn Rovers' fans remain unconvinced. Despite remaining top of the Championship following their first defeat of the season at home to Middlesbrough manager Steve Kean has again come under fire for Rovers' poor showing over 90 minutes.

Victory for Rovers would have seen a four point gap open up over a cluster of teams sitting just below them on 13 points but it wasn't to be for the home team and the defeat has just succeeded in opening the taps of vitriol one more time and for the first time this season the chants of Kean Out echoed round Ewood Park.

Fans are still staying away in their thousands. Just over 13,000 turned up last night for the Middlesbrough game, still 10,000 short of Premier League attendances. The record signing of Jordan Rhodes and his spectacular start had given the club something of a boost but the old antagonisms remain bubbling under the surface as witnessed by the cyber schadenfreude that followed this defeat.

The club owners, chicken farmers from India, have stuck doggedly with Kean since relegation, just one bone of many contentions fans have, and the question is are they tiring of backing their man?

Rovers, with all the disquiet going on in the background, have started the season brightly with four wins and two draws in their opening half dozen games but performances have been less than stellar against opposition from mid table or below. Opponents like Barnsley (18th), Ipswich Town (23rd) and Leeds United (14th).

Middlesbrough on the other hand came into the  game with nothing to show for their first three games. Yet their win propelled them up to 6th place, just two points behind Blackburn, despite boasting a negative goal difference.

Are Blackburn top because they have found the secret of winning ugly against mediocre teams? Have they just had an easy start to the season? Is the Championship a genuinely weak division?

Six games in is too early to assess the strength or otherwise of the division. A better indicator though of how well Rovers match up against the other teams will come on 3rd October when Rovers travel to Nottingham Forest.

The East Midlands club remain unbeaten and have had some serious investment over the summer. A good result there, coupled with a good performance, may convince a few of the sceptics that there is more to Rovers than doggedness and luck.

Defeat there, and a poor result away to Charlton Athletic next time out and that axe could well be being sharpened.

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Tuesday, September 18, 2012

 

New Whines, Old Bottles

First appeared in Jakarta Globe


It’s been the worst of weeks. The transfer window slammed shut last Friday and with international duty occupying many minds headline writers have had their work cut out trying to fill the cavernous spaces the footballing public demand.
In the days of the cold war, old China watchers used to scan the pictures of the political elite looking for what was not there. Without an open press, without leaks or inside sources, governments had to rely on who was featured prominently in the papers and who was not to infer which way the wind was blowing in the secretive communist state. Policy would be dictated by someone’s pose or presence in a grainy black and white photograph.
You can imagine, then, many an editor and writer breathing a huge sigh of relief and offering a silent prayer of thanks to headline magnet, Cristiano Ronaldo.
Ronaldo it seems no longer makes headlines for scoring goals. His brace last weekend made it 114 in 104 games for Real Madrid. Hitting the back of the net with such regularity is no longer enough though to make the news.
What grabbed people’s attention this time was the way the Portuguese striker celebrated. He didn’t. No ripping off his shirt to show off his six pack, no turning cartwheels, no bearing his teeth or punching the air. Nothing.
It was later revealed that Ronaldo was sad. That was enough to send people into a spin. For the vast majority of people struggling with a deteriorating economy the idea of a multi millionaire may be sad would be met with a shrug of the shoulders and who cares?
But this is football. We seem to allow footballers more leeway than businesspeople.
Many rushed to surmise why the poor dear should be so upset and most suggested money be the problem. As if 12 million Euros a year could cause anyone any hardship.
This was manna from heaven for sports writers looking at a quiet week. They put two and two together and decided Ronaldo was either angling for a move or setting out his stall in upcoming contract negotiations; suggestions the man himself was quick to deny.
It didn’t matter though what he said. Everyone was quick to link Ronaldo with clubs like Manchester City or Paris Saint German or any Russian club who could afford to better his current hardship allowance.
Hot on the heels of Ronaldo’s sulk came Cesc Fabregas. He hadn’t played the full 90 minutes yet in any of Barcelona’s opening three games and he went public saying he was unhappy with a bit part role at the Spanish side.
He went on to say that he would take his ‘unhappy’ face home if he had to rather than let his manager or team mates see it. Tellingly he added that he had moved back to Spain to ‘compete, to learn and enjoy, not sit wracking my brains’.
The headlines the next day? Cesc being linked with a move back to Arsenal!
A moan by Arsenal’s French full back, Bacary Sagna, in a French newspaper made it a hat trick of whines to dominate the headlines this week.
Sagna, recovering from a long term injury, said he was upset when Alex Song left the club in the summer. Not Robin van Persie which had been on the cards, but Song. He said that Alex leaving was a surprise saying that he was 24 years old and still had three years left on his contract.
‘In the street supporters sometimes come to see me,’ Sagna was quoted as saying, ‘I can understand they are annoyed. I’m like them. I don’t understand everything.’
Of course he doesn’t understand everything. It’s not his job to understand everything. It’s his job to play football. However having been injured for a long time, and not having the most demanding job in the world it is only natural to wonder what is going on.
Sagna’s doubts have been seized on by Arsenal fans, and the media, haunted by the last couple of seasons when players like Samir Nasri and Robin van Persie were allowed to have their contracts wind down meaning a summer of protracted rumour and he said, she said headlines.
Thankfully, next week the real business of kicking a ball around returns and we can start talking about what happens on the field!

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Everyone Loves A Swan

First appeared in Jakarta Globe


Swansea City have certainly been a breath of fresh air in the sometimes fetid Premier League. Totally unfashionable, lacking in any real football pedigree, coming from Wales. There is absolutely nothing in their DNA to suggest the Swans are anything more than a lower league club with aspirations of a giant killing in one of the domestic cups once in a while.
They flirted briefly in Division One a decade before Sky TV came along and invented the Premier League and, by extension, English football.
Their manager at the time, John Toshack, was a Liverpool legend and he gathered around him a whole galaxy of other former Liverpool legends, players like Ian Callaghan and Ray Kennedy.
The Swans climbed the divisions reaching the top flight in 1981 and even, for a few glorious days, led the table.
It didn’t last of course. It wasn’t a model designed to last. By packing the first X1 with experienced but aging pros approaching retirement there was no Plan B. As the players wrinkled the club withered and fell, ingloriously, back down the leagues and almost going bust.
Now they’re back. And rather than being a retirement home for the aged, who now tend to go into the far safer and far warmer TV studio, they have been able to attract promising young managers who in turn have made this city on the south coast of Wales a far more cosmopolitan place than it has ever been before.
Given their visceral rivalry with Cardiff, just along the coast, it is a sign of the times that the city of Swansea have so openly embraced the new faces that have come to the football club with their new ideas.
First there was the Spaniard Roberto Martinez followed by Paolo Sousa, his compatriot. Then Northern Irishman Brendan Rodgers. And now the Great Dane himself; Michael Laudrup.
It’s all a far cry from the more traditional appointee, the likes of Colin Appleton, Frank Burrows and John Bond; journeymen managers who inspire images of flat caps and cold showers.
Swansea’s first season in the Premier League delighted everyone with their delicious passing and movement. They even beat Arsenal 3-2 at home with a performance that must have even had the usually sour loser Arsene Wenger purring at least inwardly.
Players like Scott Sinclair, Nathan Dyer and Joe Allen impressed. So much so the former is likely to join Manchester City, the latter has joined his former gaffer Rodgers at Liverpool.
Yet the dream isn’t over. Instead, Laudrup has come in and the fans must be rubbing their eyes in disbelief. That Laudrup, perhaps the greatest player Denmark ever produced; the Laurdup who played for both Barcelona and Real Madrid, should have been sold on the dreams of a small provincial club in the south of Wales is nothing short of astounding.
Yet it follows the theme began in 2007 when Martinez came in. Young, eager, innovative managers with a thing to prove who believe in playing football on the ground.
Faced with the departure of Allen and the imminent loss of Sinclair, Laudrup acted quickly to bring in new players. And after just two games one of them, Spaniard Michu, has already impressed with his ability and workrate.
His goal at Loftus Road in the opening day win against Queens Park Rangers highlighted his ability. Latching on to a sublime through ball, he was able to curl the ball past the hapless Robert Green. It was a highlight on a day of highlights.
The win over West Ham United at their own Liberty Stadium highlighted his work ethic. Visiting defender James Collins looked unsure in possession in his own half. Scenting an opportunity, Michu moved in. Collins panicked and played the ball back to his keeper. But the delivery of the back pass lacked power, Michu pounced and it was 2-0.
Despite their fine start, two wins and no goals conceded, Laudrup will admit that the fixture list has been kind to his team. Many challenges lie ahead and no doubt, in fine management speak, he will talk about how his team’s goal is Premier League survival.
Along the way you can be sure they will win many more admirers.

# posted by Me @ 5:33 PM 0 Comments
 

Revolting Rovers Fans


I don’t pretend to know all the ins and outs about the on-going soap opera that is playing itself out at Ewood Park but I do know this. For any fan to take the bold decision to stop following their team; that is one big decision that will not have been taken lightly.
That hasn’t been much to cheer about for Blackburn Rovers fans for some time now. I think many will be comfortable with that. They will recall their third division days as well as their single Premier League success under those few heady days flushed with Jack Walker’s cash.
But nothing lasts forever. Blackburn’s title success came before the Premier League became the massive global brand it is now so there was little impact to their support. Alan Shearer and Chris Sutton did not encourage kids in Singapore or Bangkok to rush out and buy those famous blue and white shirts. The title came five years too early!
Many Rovers fans will recall the days of lower league football. The name Simon Garner will probably mean as much to them as David Beckham does to 21st century Manchester United fans. They know football ain’t all about glory and they probably expect the odd, long, downturn more than another Premier League success.
Then came the chicken farmers. It doesn’t matter where the poultry peddlers came from, they started off with a massive PR cock up by saying they didn’t know anything about football and anyway they wanted to build their own brand.
As opening pitches to get fans/potential customers on your side it takes some beating.
From there on it gets murky. A manager is sacked, another brought in. An agent is operating behind the scenes, pulling strings and considered by many outside the club to be having an undue influence on the goings on. Communication from the club is perceived to be garbled at best, contradictory at worst.
Last season Ewood Park echoed to the sound of Kean Out. A plane flew overhead, trailing a banner saying Kean Out. The team was relegated, the fans still chanted Kean Out.
Teams all over the place lose and fans turn on the manager. It’s part of the job and managers are thick skinned enough not to let it worry them.
But these protests were not just about the manager and poor results. They are about foreign ownership in general. The way in which the Football Association allows itself to roll over and have its tummy tickled anytime some rich foreigner comes over with a thick wad of cash. Money is everything, motives and experience don’t count.
At a time when football clubs are in the news for financial mismanagement, read Portsomouth and Rangers, Blackburn are just being mismanaged. And no one is lifting a finger.
Manchester United are up to their eyeballs in debt and have taken a massive gamble on Robin van Persie. Arsenal rely on player sales to supplement TV and gate revenues. And Manchester City and Chelsea have their own private sugar daddy to push the prices up so only they can compete and anyone else who tries will surely bust. Cardiff City fans have had to see their club badge and club colours change to sate the whims of their investors whose target audience is far from the valleys of south Wales.
None of this seems to matter to the FA, with their head in the sand, who point to continued worldwide interest in the Premier League and say what problems?
During the summer the fans continued with their theme. Kean Out. A global advisor was bought in and he just added to the confusion.
Against this backdrop, many fans decided to take the most extreme course of action available to them. Withhold their cash. A footballing seppuku. Stay away from games. Don’t buy merchandise. Hit the chicken farmers where it hurts the most.
Season ticket sales are half what they were last season and they in turn were down on previous seasons. Attendances in the early days of the new season have hovered around the 13,500 mark. A whopping 9,000 down on last season when they got relegated.
The club also have no sponsorship deals in place. They have no one on their club shirt, which may be no bad thing anyway say traditionalists, and recently a stand sponsor refused to extend their deal.
The club is a mess. This is not just about money. The new owners have splashed some cash and the signing of Scottish striker Jordan Rhodes shows some ambition.
But the fans ain’t buying. They remain adamant they will not return to the club until Steve Kean and the owners have gone.

First appeared in Jakarta Globe 

# posted by Me @ 5:31 PM 0 Comments
 

Fergie's Last Sheikh Of The Dice


Poor Sir Alex Ferguson. He has been so used to getting things done his way over 25 years of unbridled success that the last few months can’t have been easy for him to swallow. Losing the Premier League in such dramatic circumstances when Manchester City came from behind the last minutes of the season at home to Queens Park Rangers won’t have gone down well with a man used to success on his own terms.
Frequently last season Sir Alex commented about his club’s new, straitened circumstances. Manchester City had changed the game with the deep funds from Abu Dhabi sheikhs. United, Fergie whined, could no longer compete.
This from a man whose squad includes players such as Rio Ferdinand, Wayne Rooney and Dimitar Berbatov; there won’t have been much change for 90 million pound on that trio alone.
Then United missed out on a highly rated Brazilian player. You could imagine Fergie, ever the accomplished media conductor, preparing his lines before unleashing with both barrels. Surely FIFA, opined football’s own knighted one, to look at a situation where a football club was paying 45 million pound on a teenager.
Of course when United signed a certain Wayne Rooney from Everton for just shy of 30 million quid there was no mention of FIFA. Fergie was Sir Alex, he was manager of Manchester United and that’s what United did. They spent big because the market demanded it and their fans expected it.
Now the wealth has moved elsewhere, to City and Paris Saint Germain among others, Fergie is finding his new role of pleading poverty a tough one. United are no longer the club the big names automatically gravitate towards and, for Fergie, it hurts.
He is left chasing Robin van Persie. How galling it must be for the great man to have to resort to pleading with Arsene Wenger to sell last season’s top scorer. How frustrating to know that United’s best hope of a big name signing is a 29 year old with a history of injury problems and no resale value.
It remains to be seen whether the van Persie deal is done or not. But you can’t help but wonder whether, in an ideal world where United were still the top dogs, they would have put in so much effort on the Dutch striker.


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Hodgson Follows Same Old, Same Old


Well, that didn’t go according to plan. England drawing 1-1 at home to Ukraine in their first home World Cup qualifier. The euphoria the country has felt in the last few weeks after outstanding performances by the likes of Murray, Ennis, Farah and Wiggins could not be extended by the footballers who earn a damned sight more than their more successful fellow athletes.
Shorn of players like Wayne Rooney, Ashley Cole, Theo Walcott, John Terry and Andy Carroll, the England squad looked very thin indeed going into the game. Players like Livermore, Lallana and Sterling, hardly household names, had to be called up to fill a few gaps on the bench.
It was a point Roy Hodgson was quick to seize on before the match. Liverpool’s Raheem Sterling impressed many with his recent performance for the Reds against Arsenal but he is still 17 years old and has played just seven games. No disrespect to the player but it does seem that he was called up because of his passport and who pays his salary. Little else.
Hodgson knows the pool available to him is small and is getting smaller. The last time the Premier League teams fielded less than one third of the players used were British. Spanish sides, as a contrast, fielded more than 64% Spanish players.
The English premium doesn’t help. West Ham United recently signed winger Matt Jarvis for an estimated 10 million pounds from relegated Wolverhampton Wanderers. The 26 year old winger should be at the peak of his career and has one England cap to his name. Yet Hodgson preferred to call up young Sterling, too young to vote, than recall Jarvis.
Hodgson has proved reluctant to break up the Steve Gerrard, Frank Lampard midfield engine. And for good reason. Lampard has scored three in the opening two World Cup qualifiers including a couple of penalties.
But Gerrard and Lampard have been together a long time at international level and have never really gelled. Yet a player like Mark Noble is not even given an opportunity. Noble is 25 years old and has been a consistent performer for West Ham United for a number of seasons now. Yet that does not seem to be enough to wear the Three Lions.
It does seem that when it comes to calling up players then players at certain clubs do get overlooked. Another West Ham player, Kevin Nolan, has been performing at the highest level for over a dozen years yet has been consistently overlooked by England managers who are content to just look at the big clubs.
Playing overseas doesn’t help get you noticed which is a surprise give Hodgson’s experiences round Europe. One of the few Englishmen earning their trade is Michael Mancienne, a 24 year old defender now in his second season with Hamburg SV in the Bundesliga. But despite having played at every level of age group football, and being called up once to the full squad by Fabio Capello as a callow 20 year old Mancienne, who started his career with Chelsea, has yet to make his full debut.
It is only natural that the best players will gravitate to the big clubs. Arsenal’s policy has long been to snare young players; Theo Walcott and Alex Oxlade Chamberlain are testament to that. Manchester United are following the same road with their summer signing of Nick Powell and champions Manchester City, feeling if it’s good enough for Arsenal and United it’s good enough for them, recently signed Scott Sinclair and Jack Rodwell.
The Premier League giants are also currently thought to be sniffing round young players at Leicester City and Southampton hoping to add to their rosters.
Perhaps the players at the clubs outside the big four, or is it five now, are not as good as those at Stamford Bridge, Old Trafford or the Emirates. But perhaps they are hungrier. Playing at the big clubs, yes they get the regular exposure to Europe but it doesn’t seem to have made our national team any better.
Perhaps it’s time the manager looked beyond the big four club of exclusivity, right and privilege, and stared considering good honest professionals who may feel a bit more pride in pulling in the Three Lions.

First printed in Jakarta Globe

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A Song That Went On...And On


Will the 2012 summer transfer window end as disasteroulsy as last year’s for Arsenal fans? That is the question many fans are asking as the protracted saga of Robin van Persie lingers longer than an unloved soap.
Van Persie’s non move has been written about more than any other saga this summer but there are a couple of other sub scripts bubbling under the surface that will worry Arsenal fans. Defensive midfielder Alex Song was widely derided when he broke into the first team squad but last season was one of the more accomplished performers providing a number of crucial assists for van Persie.
Now he is being linked with Barcelona. Summer wouldn’t be summer without an Arsenal player linked with the Catalans. We’ve seen Marc Overmars, Emmanuel Petit, Thierry Henry, Aleksander Hleb and of course Cesc Fabregas make the journey to the south coast of Spain with varying degrees of success.
The difference between van Persie and Song is stark. The Dutchman is looking back on a phenomenal season in the Premier League but is in the last season of his contract, is 29 years old and has had a career marked by long spells in the treatment room. There is a logic in selling him to the highest bidder possible on the back of one prolific season.
Song on the other hand is much younger, has more scope for development and is under contract to 2015. There is no pressure to sell from a management point of view.
Manager Arsene Wenger is reportedly unhappy that yet another of the players he signed young and developed into a real talent is apparently being touted round Europe’s top clubs. But what does he expect? He has been quick to bring young foreign talent to North London in the past and sell for a vast profit. Does he really expect the best players in the country to attract no interest at all?
One other player being linked with a move away is England winger Theo Walcott. He has been infuriatingly inconsistent since making the expensive move from Southampton as a 16 year old and despite being a regular starter when fit continues to frustrate team mates and fans with poor delivery, so important for a striker, and poor finishing.
Walcott sees himself as playing down the middle and indeed Wenger has said at various times in the past that he too sees him in that position. But it hasn’t happened yet and with the signing of Olivier Giroud the feeling has to be that the manager still doesn’t see Walcott as a first choice striker yet. Which leaves people wondering if not now, after six years at Arsenal, then when?
With Gervinho and Lukas Podolski both able to play wide and Alex Oxlade Chamberlain, a Walcott with a six pack, also adept wide has Wenger’s patience with the one time teenage prodigy worn thin?
Walcott is, like van Persie, entering the final year of his contract and has yet to sign a new one. There has been reported interested from Liverpool but they are no longer the giants of the English game they were in the past.
For Wenger the transfer window opened early with the signings of Podolski and Giroud. The recent addition of Spanish midfield Santi Carzola, who interestingly hasn’t been given a squad number yet, has further raised hopes in the red half of North London.  With those three additions, plus van Persie, Song and Walcott then fans can honestly say they have a squad that can really push for honours.
By allowing these three sagas to drag on so long Wenger risks having a repeat of last season when Cesc Fabregas and Samir Nasri were allowed to leave almost at the last minute leaving the French manager to go on a mad supermarket dash looking for replacements.
Arsenal fans must be hoping history does not repeat.

# posted by Me @ 5:28 PM 0 Comments
 

Hillsborough & Official Lies


For football fans of my age group, we don’t need official acknowledgement of what happened that tragic afternoon at Hillsborough when 96 people never returned from a football match.
We know what happened. We saw it ourselves, week in, week out.
One game sticks in my mind. It was Luton Town away in the FA Cup in 1986. Luton is not that far from London, a short drive or railway ride, and it was expected plenty of Arsenal would make the short journey.
Their Kenilworth Road stadium was small even then. The away end was an open terrace with three enclosures; the farm animal terminology is used advisedly. The Arsenal support had the left hand enclosure, the home support had a smattering on the right hand enclosure and the middle pen was empty.
Our enclosure soon filled up with fans paying at the gate and forcing their way through the entrance on to the terrace. Pretty soon the pen was full. Uncomfortably so. Yet fans were still queuing, still trying to get in. Down at the front, where the pressure was heaviest, some young lads tried to tell the police what was happening but they didn’t care. They kept beckoning fans forward.
Soon, people were shouting at the police, telling them something had to be done, the crush was so great. As they climbed the fences that kept us from the pitch and divided our terrace from the middle enclosure the police prodded them with batons and threatened them with arrest if they didn’t climb down.
There was nothing we could do. We were hemmed in. A snack at half time or a visit to the toilet was out of the question. All the while, next to us was a large expanse of empty terrace that the police would not allow to be opened.
For the best part of two hours we were stuck. We craned to see the action on the field and we yelled abuse at the police and their apathy. That no one was hurt or seriously injured that night says much about the nature of the average football supporter in those days despite how the government liked to portray them.
English football in the 1980s wasn’t the big fluffy thing it is today. Football hooliganism may have been on the wane, due more to a shift in culture than to any government policies or policing strategies and you would never have seen the Prime Minister of the time, Margaret Thatcher, hobnobbing with the big names of the game at Number 10 let alone anywhere else.
Football was for pariahs. It was played by pariahs and watched by pariahs.
Violence had marred the game for years. So many years people had forgotten what had triggered hooliganism off in the first place. Football, the police and the government had no idea how to counter it because they had no idea how the young lads involved felt.
The default reaction to the latest riot was ‘birch them’.
1985 in many ways saw a sea change in the way football was viewed by fans. Many had grown up with punk and its do it yourself mindset that said anyone could form a band and anyone could write about music.
The last day of the season saw serious disturbances all across the country. A young fan died in Birmingham as Leeds United fans went on the rampage. Brighton and Hove Albion fans duked it out with visiting Sheffield United fans on the south coast.
But all that was pushed off the back pages by the horrific fire at Valley Parade, Bradford that claimed 56 lives. That brought into focus the dilapidated state of most stadiums in the country.
Then, just weeks later that tragedy was overtaken by Heysel Stadium when 39 fans, English and Italian, died at the European Cup Final between Liverpool and Juventus. Prime Minister Thatcher was livid at being so humiliated on prime time TV by the sight of Liverpool fans rampaging across the terraces in Brussels and demanded action.
Many football fans had grown up with punk and its do it yourself mindset that said anyone could form a band and anyone could write about music. A thousand photo copied fanzines gave information kids wanted to read about that the mainstream journalists weren’t up to date with. They would write about what the kids wanted to write about and they found a ready audience among the punks, skins and mods of the time who were largely ignored by a media that has been trained to jump on bandwagons and destroy them.
So it was with football. Fanzines started appearing on street corners round the country on match day put together by supporters fed up with the dull as dishwater coverage football received on TV, much less than today but just as bland, and in newspapers.
Fingerpost, Terrace Talk and When Saturday Comes were among the trailblazers and soon a bookshop on the Charing Cross Road became a must stop destination for fans looking for their latest fill of fan fuelled banter.
Fanzines tapped into a psyche. Fans were fed up being tarred with the same brush as hooligans. The logic, in those days, is one many in Indonesia will identify with today. If you go to football, the reasoning went, you are a hooligan. If you are not a hooligan then you are, in some way, still responsible for what happens.
Fine, upstanding folk would elbow each other and exchange knowing looks. ‘He goes to football,’ they would say, ‘he is, you know, one of them. A hooligan.’
That was the initial reaction to the tragedy on the Leppings Lane in April, 1985. And that was how the police and football conspired to have it portrayed. They blamed the Liverpool fans. It suited Thatcher and her merry men to continue the charade even if they were not actually involved in any cover up.
Even though we weren’t there, we knew it was lies. Because we had been there. We had been in similar situations on other terraces around the country and we knew, better than any suit in parliament or in the media how the police treated fans.

 First printed in Jakarta Globe

# posted by Me @ 5:28 PM 0 Comments
 

Clint Dempsey


It was one of those transfers that had seemed preordained. So frequently was Clint Dempsey’s name was linked with Liverpool, for many people it had the appearance of a done deal. Just the formality of a signature on the contract was needed.
But it never happened. Instead, in one of the last deals on deadline day, the American midfielder opted for Tottenham Hotspur.
So what had happened? How did Liverpool allow the free scoring midfielder to slip through their fingers at the last moment?
The 29 year old American international managed an impressive goal every two games for Fulham last season which surely alerted the bigger clubs to his talents but to the American football Diaspora it was just a case of recognition delayed.
Dale Mulholland was one of an earlier generation of Americans who sought to pursue his career overseas. Part of the generation that spawned players like John Harkes (Sheffield Wednesday), Eric Wynalda (1FC Saarbrucken) and  Brent Goulet (Tennis Borussia Berlin). Before settling in Indonesia, Mulholland had played in the USA, Soviet Union, Czech Republic and Hong Kong among others.
Now based in Jakarta where he has his own football academy, Super Soccer Skills, Mulholland says the ‘exceptionally skilled’ Dempsey ‘is the first true footballer to come from the culture of the USA.’ Indeed, he goes on to suggest that he is the best player ‘the United States has produced so far.’
Six seasons with unfashionable Fulham saw him deliver a healthy 60 goals in 225 games. Mulholland feels that a bigger stage was always on the cards. ‘He is the type of player who can play in any top club including Real Madrid, Barcelona, Manchester United or Arsenal and immediately make an impact,’ he enthused.
It seems ironic that Liverpool’s American owners were less than enthused by their compatriot’s talents. Manager Brendan Rodgers only let his 35 million pound striker Andy Carroll go on loan to West Ham United on the understanding he would be able to replace him.
That hasn’t happened. Now, Rodgers and Liverpool have a paucity of striking options. Luiz Suarez and Fabio Borini. That’s it. On the bench against Arsenal was Stewart Downing who had been warned by his manager any future he may have at Anfield could well be at left back.
Rodgers is now forced to look for strikers who are out of contract elsewhere to bolster his paper thin resources and one name being linked is Michael Owen!
With a poor start to the season Rodgers will not be underestimating the size of the task facing him as he sets about rebuilding Liverpool. The trauma of Kenny Dalglish’s largesse lives on and continues to haunt the bean counters at Anfield.
For the sake of three million pounds, loose change in today’s football, Liverpool have missed out on a proven goal scorer with the potential of raising their profile in the US.

First printed in Jakarta Globe

# posted by Me @ 5:26 PM 0 Comments
 

AVB's Off Field Challenge


Andre Villas Boas’ coaching credentials are incredible. Despite never having played the game he worked alongside the late Bobby Robson and Jose Mourinho, earned his coaching badges and won the Portuguese title with Porto.
With that background, Chelsea appointed him as the latest in a long line of successors to Mourinho; no doubt hoping a Jose clone would be able to restore some success to South West London.
It never happened. Rumours were rife that AVB, as he is near universally called, had lost the dressing room and it was inevitable that owner Roman Avramovich, never the most patient of owners at the best of times, would swing the axe.
AVB’s first foray left him bloodied with question marks hanging over his ability to handle big name players but with a far healthier bank balance than when he arrived.
Half a year later and he is back in London. This time with Tottenham Hotspur. Another club who don’t believe in the old adage that patience is a virtue. Harry Redknapp had led the club to 4th place in last season’s Premier League but they still missed out on a Champions League place thanks to Chelsea’s penalty triumph in May.
Despite his fate at Chelsea last season it does seem Tottenham fans are willing to give their new Portuguese gaffer the benefit of the doubt.
It has certainly been a rough pre season with protracted talks with Real Madrid over the fate of Luka Modric, their influential Croatian midfielder. Daniel Levy, the club’s main man, was determined to squeeze every last Euro out of the Spanish champions who played hardball of their own. In the end Real were reported to have paid 33 million pound for their man, some way short of Levy’s valuation.
Following Modric out of the door were Rafael van der Vaart, who returned to Germany, and iconic central defender Ledley King who finally called an end to a career blighted by injury.
Noises coming out of White Hart Lane suggested they were ready to bat in the big league. They brought in Emmanuel Adebayor after a successful loan season last campaign, but hardly a positive influence in the dressing room, and a couple of signings from Fulham; Moussa Dembele and Clint Dempsey.
Also added to the squad were the Icelandic Gylfi Sigurosson after a promising season with surprise package Swansea City.
The signing of French national keeper, and captain, Hugo Lloris was a surprise. Despite being strongly linked all summer, Spurs already had experienced keepers on their books. The confusion deepened when AVB said the new man was not guaranteed a starting place after an inspirational performance by incumbent Brad Friedel last weekend kept Norwich City at bay for so long.
Players who captain their national team don’t take too kindly playing second fiddle to anyone and one can’t help but feel AVB is storing trouble the longer Lloris warms the bench.
Tottenham fans though remain unhappy. After seeing their club linked with names like Willian, Leandro and Joao Moutinho, they felt a bit short changed when it was Dempsey, an experienced US international who hit 23 goals last season for Fulham, who came in at the last minute for an estimated 6 million pounds.
Jermaine Defoe, their striker who recently signed a new contract, has described the pre season in the Tottenham dressing room as chaos. No one knew who would be there from one day to the next. Michael Dawson was on his way to Queens Park Rangers, pushed down the pecking order by another summer arrival, the stylish Belgian international Jan Vertonghen from Ajax, with AVB deeming him surplus to requirements. Then he stayed.
Midfielder Tom Huddlestone was on his way to Stoke City before he came on as a substitute against Norwich, earning a straight red for his cameo (a red that was later rescinded).
Boos echoed round White Hart Lane after the Norwich game. It was the second home game they had seen three points become one right at the death and after three games they had just two points to their name.
The frustration though appears to be mostly aimed at the way Daniel Levy runs the club. He had spent so much time trying to milk Real Madrid on the Modric deal, he was not focused on bringing in the types of players AVB felt the club needed.
They see a broken squad, a legacy of the Redknapp era. Despite finishing fourth last season, the club endured a miserable end of season, winning just seven of their last 19 games, a run that included that debacle away to Arsenal when they saw a 2-0 lead become a 5-2 defeat, and they recognize any new man in charge needs time and funds. Qualities Levy has shown he does not possess.
The fans may, for now, be forgiving of dropped home points but AVB knows that managers’ honeymoons never last long. His fate however may be less linked to how he gets his players to gel on the field but how he handles players like Lloris and Adebayor off it.

First printed in Jakarta Globe 

# posted by Me @ 5:24 PM 0 Comments

Monday, September 3, 2012

 

Do Tottenham Need Four Keepers?


You could sense the feeling of delight that coursed through Sir Alex Ferguson veins after he finally secured the signing of Arsenal’s Dutch striker, Robin Van Persie. He was reminded of his strike force from 1999 when the Red Devils lifted an unprecedented treble of Premier League, FA Cup and Champions League.

That team boasted Dwight Yorke, Andy Cole, Teddy Sheringham and Ole Gunnar Skolsjaer.

Van Persie joins a United strike force already boasting Wayne Rooney, Danny Wellbeck and Javier Hernandez.

Every team needs good strikers if they are going to achieve anything; the more the merrier.

But Tottenham Hotspur’s new gaffer, Andre Villas Boas has looked elsewhere on the field for his foursome.
His signing of French goalkeeper Hugh Lloris means he has an incredible four men contending a spot between the sticks; an embarrassment of riches at a club with demanding fans expecting a tilt at the Premier League.

The current incumbent is the ageless Brad Friedel, now in his 40s and he shows no signs of relinquishing his spot after an impressive performance at the weekend that kept a determined Norwich City at bay until Snodgrass’ late equalizer.

The former USA international has been one of the most consistent performers in history of the Premier League, missing just five games in 12 seasons. That he started against Norwich, at the expense of the new signing Lloris suggests interesting times ahead at White Hart Lane as AVB seeks to juggle his keepers.

Behind him in the pecking order is Italian keeper Carlo Cudicini who has earned himself a more than decent wedge by sitting on benches in England since signing for Chelsea just before Roman Abramovich’s millions propelled them to another level.

No one doubted Cudicini’s ability as he replaced Ed de Goey, he was voted player of the year in his early days, but once Peter Cech was brought into Stamford Bridge the Italian’s days were numbered and it seems he has been quite happy to accept his fate. Now 38, he turns 39 this week, and nearing the end of his career which has seen something in the region of 160 Premier League games over 12 years he seems happy to accept his fate.

Gomes is the fourth keeper in Tottenham’s overcrowded coop. After four years at the club the Brazilian has never really felt like the first choice at a club where they have seen such luminaries as Barry Daines, Miljia Aleksic and Tony Parkes between the sticks in days of yore.

Lloris though comes with a stronger pedigree. He is the first choice keeper of the French national team as well as being captain. He won’t be too happy playing second, or third or fourth fiddle at White Hart Lane.
AVB has been quoted as saying that there is no guarantee in a player’s contract saying they will be a starter and while that may be true it may not be how Lloris sees things.

There is a feeling that during AVB’s short lived reign at Chelsea he alienated some of the more experienced players making his position all but untenable. International captains tend not to enjoy warming benches for their club side and we can be sure if Lloris continues to find his way to being first choice continues to be blocked for much longer, fine form or not, then he will be making his displeasure felt.

It looks like AVB’s early days at Tottenham could well ape his time at Stamford Bridge. And in Daniel Levy he has a boss who is only marginally more patient that Abramovich.


# posted by Me @ 4:17 PM 0 Comments
 

The Madness Of King Kenny


The last few days have been a telling judgement on Kenny Dalglish’s second spell in charge of the club. 

Sacked despite lifting the Carling Cup, Kenny’s legacy lives on and while it may never replace his initial time at the club by the adoring legions on the Kop it may well stand as a cautionary tale for those who believe the answer in football, no matter the question, is to throw money around.

Breaking the mould of England’s big club, Liverpool turned to a young, relatively untried manager, Brendan Rodgers, high on potential but lacking the experience of a club with stellar aspirations, handicapped by a proud past that saw Liverpool undoubtedly the best team in Europe for several years.

Things have changed and a series of ownership tussles have contributed to their fall from the biggest of the big to also rans on a par with Tottenham Hotspur and Newcastle United. Liverpool have never won the Premier League and it must be galling for the faithful to see the likes of Chelsea and Manchester City, flushed with foreign cash, overhaul them at football’s top table.

Dalglish came in to halt the perceived rot at the club but in some ways at least has only made it worse.

Liverpool have spent most of the pre season trying to get Andy Carroll, their 35 million pound misfit striker, off their wage bill. The best they could do was a loan spell at West Ham United where Sam Allardyce is probably the manager best equipped to get the best out of the pony tailed one.

Charlie Adam, an industrious midfield player who had a good season with Blackpool in their single Premier League season, was brought in. One of new manager Rodgers’ first acts in the transfer market was to sell him to Stoke City.

A look at Liverpool’s bench against Arsenal at the weekend should support that old adage that people who spend freely may rue their extravagance at leisure. Stewart Downing and Jordan Henderson were brought in by Dalglish for a combined 40 million pound but even with a straitened first team squad, Rodgers complained he only had 19 players at training on Saturday, they were not deemed worthy of a starting place.

Indeed Rodgers has gone on record as saying that Downing’s future, were he to stay at the club, could well be at left back. This for a winger who famously managed no goals and no assists in his debut season yet inexplicably has 34 England caps to his name.

Liverpool are down to two strikers. Luiz Suarez will always be a handful but the referee during the Arsenal game showed that at least one match official was wise to his antics and the Uruguayan will not get such a sympathetic ride this time around while new signing Borini was pretty anonymous most of the game.

So traumatized do Liverpool’s Americans seem to be by King Kenny’s splurge they refused to sanction the purchase of their compatriot, Clint Dempsey, who had netted 23 goals last campaign for Fulham. 

Apparently they were reluctant to go above 3 million pound which was half Fulham’s valuation of the 29 year old.


# posted by Me @ 4:14 PM 0 Comments

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