Playing for pride is not exciting. At all.

Posted on May 16, 2013 by Michael

This has been a boring Premier League season. I know it’s lazy to say it, but maybe the prolonged lack of entertainment has made me lethargic. Yes, the Football League’s been amazing, the Champions League has had some moments, and the FA Cup had a genuine upset at the end. But, if last season featured the Premier League’s most dramatic climax, this year must be the dullest.

To have the destination of the league title decided by a last minute goal was pretty exciting (for all non-United fans). It was always going to be difficult act to follow; a problem that didn’t deter the broadcasters from milking that cow for far too long. “Aguerrrroooooooooo!” clips have been running pretty much non-stop since pre-season build up began in July. But, what will they have to bombard us with this summer: Fergie retiring, QPR going down with a gazillion pound wage bill, or Mancini being sacked? – KEEP WATCHING  THE PREMIER LEAGUE!

City’s title defence was awful, but perhaps this was appropriate in Ferguson’s final year, because it underlined one his greatest qualities: resilience. Ferguson’s United have always come back for more. No other manager has been able to live with him, or his team, for a prolonged period. It’s as if he and he alone had the magic formula to sustain success, while others were always been corrupted by it.  Continue reading →

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Football photography of the year awards 2012/13

Posted on May 7, 2013 by Michael

Welcome to my inaugural football photography of the year awards. I decided to come up this utterly meaningless award to recognise the best contributions that photography has made towards capturing the beauty of our beloved national sport. I hope that this non-existent prize will become a regular annual event, much like other meaningless award ceremonies, such as the one recently hosted by the PFA. There were loads of entries this year, and after a careful and entirely arbitrary selection process (looking through some old Tweets) I have whittled them down to a short list of six. Enjoy.

6. Mark Hughes, QPR, November 2012.

Mark HughesOne of the few surviving images of Mark Hughes’ reign as QPR manager (Tony Fernandes had the others incinerated) taken during one of his last games in charge, at home to Reading – another team that QPR were unable to beat. Everyone has their own interpretation of what Hughes is thinking here, but I like this photo because it perfectly encapsulates QPR under Hughes in one singe expression.  Continue reading →

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Brentford’s pain

Posted on May 2, 2013 by Michael

brentfordWhen the Football League season begins in early-August the finish line seems ridiculously far away. Lying between August and May is a forty six match season – a campaign so long that large chunks of it end up being rendered irrelevant. In the Premier League, three of four games without a win is enough to have everyone hitting the panic button. In the Football League, a club might go ten games without a win before discovering some form, and find they’ve still got plenty of time to move up the league, because the teams around them are all so inconsistent.

It is a farcical existence, because you can’t really tell how good your team is until mid-March when there’s only six weeks to go. And, if after all that slog, all that up and down, you find yourself in a win or bust decider – well, that’s what makes it all worthwhile, right? People will forever talk about Sergio Aguero’s goal against QPR as the most dramatic finish to a season ever, but I think Brentford v Doncaster Rovers last Saturday beat it. Victory for Brentford would see them promoted to the Championship at Doncaster’s expense; if Doncaster avoided defeat, they would go up, while victory would land them the League One title, too.

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Hunting in Pairs: Jurgen Klinsmann and Rudi Völler, Germany and West Germany.

Posted on April 30, 2013 by Michael

Jurgen RudiBayern Munich and Borussia Dortmund are so hot right now. But, as with so many of the most significant cultural reference points, German football was hotter in the 1990’s – at the 1990 World Cup, to be precise. There was that kit, Der Kaiser as the manager, Matthäus rampaging through midfields and, leading from the front, a pair of absolute badass goal scorers – Jurgen Klinsmann and Rudolf ‘Rudi’ Völler.

It felt like Germany had these two for an eternity. I’m guessing it’s quite rare for one of the top international teams to field the same two strikers as their first choice in consecutive world cups. If you think about all that can happen in four years with loss of form, injuries, or the emergence of new players, it’s a sign of the enduring greatness of these two that Germany relied on the same pair in 1994 that took them all the way in 1990. And, they didn’t let them down, contributing six goals (three goals each) at the 1990 World Cup, and seven (five for Klinsmann, two for Rudi) at the 1994 tournament. Continue reading →

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The ecstasy of the play offs

Posted on April 14, 2013 by Michael

Don’t listen to anyone who says the football league playoffs are agony, they’ve got their emotions all confused. The playoffs are only agony if you don’t like to see your club competing in a match with something at stake. For many, they’re the closest thing to being involved in the final stages of a major trophy.

If you’re fortunate enough to make it to the final, you get to watch your team in a vast stadium, with all the ceremonial fanfare you might expect from the Champions League. The teams are led out by their managers, accompanied by deafening music, and there are fireworks and streamers and everything else. To top it off, the winners get to lift a trophy at the end. Winning the playoffs is better then finishing second, no doubt about it. Second place is first loser in comparison to this hyped up monster.

Sadly, this has resulted in the Championship playoff final being dubbed ‘the most lucrative game in the world’, which suggests the only motivation for success is Premier League TV money. While this may be true for the owners, it’s a very cold assessment. It means more than that for the fans. Unless you support one of Europe’s elite clubs, you will probably spend most of your football supporting life enduring prolonged periods of interminable dullness. Seasons pass and nothing ever happens. Maybe you’ll finish in the top half, maybe in the bottom, but in the end, nobody cares. That’s why the playoffs matter.

People say they’re unfair on the team that finishes third, but if you can’t finish in the top two of the Championship then you’re on weak ground trying to stake a claim for Premier League football. The beautiful thing about the playoffs is that in any one season around half the teams in the Championship have usually got a chance of getting promoted. How else could Nottingham Forest – on their third manager this season – retain a realistic hope going up? And, where the hell did Bolton come from? Barely mentioned all season, they are the form team in the top six, which makes them a huge threat in the playoffs, regardless of their early season struggles. At the other end of the form table, Watford (18th) and Crystal Palace (20th) are losing momentum at the worst possible time, although not quite as badly as Leicester (23rd) who have dropped out of the playoffs altogether.

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