Daniel In The Lion's Den

Pochettino will suffer if Spurs fail again, but Levy's decisions over managers and transfer policy should now be given the same scrutiny

The Napoleonic travails of Daniel Levy go on. Ensconced in the Spurs chairman's seat in 2001, he was just nine years older than the great French general when he overthrew the French government aged thirty.

In the twenty years following, Bonaparte galloped across Europe, Asia and parts of North Africa, with aims of conquering large parts of civilisation, only to come unstuck just over the border in the United Kingdom of the Netherlands, now postal code 1410, with the sign for the crossroads present at the time of battle still planted firmly in the middle of town.

Levy's perplexing criss-crossing all over the Premier League, Europe and further afield in search of domination - or a regular Champions League spot - has long been a point of debate for football fans, journalists and perhaps the growing list of managers he has sacked. It's prompted journalists to ask what Levy wants to see from Spurs and how he intends to achieve it.

Bids this week for Southampton's Jay Rodriguez and Morgan Schneiderlin, both rebuffed by the club's chairman, have also highlighted the carousel-like nature of Spurs' squad in the summer months. This year is no different to any of Spur's previous four.

In 2010 they signed eight first team players. Seven went back out on loan to other, mainly Football League clubs. In 2011 they signed six and let four go. In 2012 Spurs bought eight players and released or sold nine, and last season Spurs bought and sold or released seven players.

Their league position throughout the same dates has ranged from fourth to sixth. There is a spread of just ten points between their best and worst season performances in that time - 62 being the worst and 72 being the best. Even their goals scored and against are remarkably similar, with 55, 66, 66 and 55 for from 2010-2014 and 46, 41, 46, 51 against for the same period. A spread of 11 for and ten against respectively.

Contrast those spreads with Arsenal, their longstanding nefarious rivals, and the picture becomes clearer. Arsenal have improved each season in points gained, with 68, 70, 73 and 79 in consecutive seasons. That isn't the case with Spurs. Their goals for spread is just four, and their lowest goals scored is two more than Spurs' highest at 68.

Their goals against spread is 11 - the same as Spurs - but the 2013-14 season is a case in point: for 31 matches, Arsenal allowed 14 goals. That's less than 0.5 of a goal per game. Spurs by comparison offered 1.34 over the same period.

The lesson from the numbers seems fairly stark - Spurs have hit a plateau in chasing the last Champions League spot. Levy seems to have his French counterpart's quote about lucky generals on the brain - this summer Levy went with the almost unproven Mauricio Pochettino after a fairly decent season over at Southampton to make it four managers in four years. It's probably fair to say that decision owes partly to the wave of talented English youngsters at Pochettino's disposal upon his arrival from Espanyol.

Those Belgian crossroads might be symbolic of Spurs and more particularly Levy. This appears a very definite moment when Levy has, to use the parlance of the businessman, 'gone with his gut' with Pochettino. Because there's no other reason, other than a middling marketplace for management, to have gone with the Argentine over anyone else.

It seems unlikely that, even with a squad full of decent players, Spurs will be favourites for a Champions League spot, as they now have Van Gaal's United, the revitalised Liverpool and a strengthened Arsenal to deal with. But what will Levy's reaction be if they don't reach the Champions League? And what of Levy's apparently ever-changing whims on choice of manager and playing squad?

The emperor that launched increasingly improbable campaigns to reassert his goals and philosophy was eventually cast adrift in the Atlantic, a victim of an ego-driven misadventure. A recognisable fate hangs heavily over Pochettino, but the watching eyes from the terraces should look a little higher.

Picture thanks to the Guardian

Loose Fixtures

Clubs that choose their own fixtures could improve player fitness, reduce injuries and make the Premier League more entertaining

Somewhere, in an office in a quiet suburban backwater, a printer smoothly deposits a sheaf of A4, around a quarter of an inch in depth, into the hand of a man wearing a slightly creased shirt. He has his top button undone.

The man sits back in his chair for a moment, fishing for his cigarettes in his breast pocket with forefinger and thumb, perusing the first page with a slight squint. He is getting older, and this is the nineteenth year he has done this job. A coffee in a coffee-coloured plastic vending cup cools on his cluttered desk. He frowns, exhales loudly and flicks through pages.

Then his eyes stop. He stares, and then checks his watch. Then his diary. There is a small cross and 'LS' is marked next to the date. He checks the sheet again. He checks his diary again. He drops his cigarettes on the desk and turns back to his computer, and opens his email.

Someone has beaten him to it. There is one new unread email in his inbox, and it reads:

'El Clasico - Luis is back!!!'

The man balls a fist and swears jubilantly. Outside, nothing has changed.

That's what you'll get when you leave the idea of the random fixture generator to an overactive imagination, anyway. In truth, whilst it's probably not without its share of quirks, there's probably less smoking and less swearing. And a paperless environment, in modern climes.

So many unfortunate pictures of Luis Suarez to chew over.

But sometimes there's a fixture so good, at just the right moment, that you want to raise an eyebrow at the sheer improbability of it all. It's a fair bet this season's has already happened. In Spain, the first clasico falls on the first day Luis Suarez (above) is allowed to train with his new club after that ban for what's been amusingly dubbed the most expensive Italian he'll probably ever eat.

Irrespective of emotional reactions here, the return of Suarez could probably not be better timed. He may not play as he is not supposed to even train during his ban - but you can bet Barcelona will try to find a way around that particular predicament, even if it involves him training in private, away from the club and staff. Will he get 15 minutes? If he's even halfway fit, and it's a tight contest...

No doubt that it is a coincidence - but is there some merit in considering the unthinkable and letting clubs choose when some of their games are played?

There are plenty of good sporting ones - for one, many European trams, and particularly English ones, are breathing hard as they reach the final sprint of a long season, and fatigue undoubtedly plays a part in deciding outcomes in tight games where previously a draw may have beckoned.

That makes the game interesting. But what about the various flights clubs have to make when making up European games? Teams in the Champions League have to fly to and from countries in the space of 48 hours before weekend matches. The matches aren't going to go away - but what about giving each team, say, three matches they can definitely move once the fixtures are announced?

Each team's decision would be binding - i.e the opposing team would not be able to overrule - and this would be communicated to interested parties in advance (e.g the ubiquitous television networks involved in European football's fixture list sequencing).

This could be particularly useful for those clubs on the accursed Thursday-Sunday routine when midweek European trips to far-flung Greek/ Ukrainian/ Russian clubs mean longer returns and recoveries, especially in midwinter. Teams such as Spurs, who have been on the brink of regular Champions League qualification for the last decade, could utilise the policy to trade in some of their trickier away games for easier matches or even a bye weekend, should the fixture list allow it.

For teams struggling to meet the demands of the Premier League or those facing up to relegation, a canny perusal of the fixtures before the start of the seasons could establish which games to move to give players a break, or breaking a chain of difficult matches to prevent fatigue and low morale setting in after a series of poor results.

 

There could also be a benefit to reducing the number of injuries in teams. Several clubs may benefit from moving games out of the hectic Christmas period, when congestion is common and players carry injuries over into the new year as European competitions start again. Clubs given the opportunity to move these could see players return from injury quicker and pick up less 'niggly' injuries - which seriously hindered Arsenal's prospects last season, for example.

From an entertainment perspective, very little in practice would actually change - in fact it might be arguable that the league may actually get more competitive as all teams would be able to manipulate their performance to some extent, which could produce some interesting results come May. Although Spurs would still probably come fifth.

Picture thanks to Sky Sports

Tangerine Nightmare

 

TEAM: Trialist, Waddington, Trialist, Perkins, McMahon (C), Dunne, Zenjov, Trialist, Trialist, Grant, Trialist.
— Blackpool FC (@BlackpoolFC) July 19, 2014

Blackpool's trials continue courtesy of club owner who took £11m after relegation

The silly season is in swing over at Bloomfield Road. Unfortunately a few of the staff seem to be taking it a little too literally. The club's state lurched from perilous to farcical on Saturday when during a trip to Penrith they were forced to play five trialists.

The are currently eight professional players on Blackpool's books, with the rest of the squad having left due to loan or contract expiry earlier in the summer. A squad with talent and verve during their single Premier League season back in 2010 are now touted as relegation dead certs from the Championship. The villain of the riches-to-rags piece appears to be the man who once saved them from their uppers.

Owen Oyston made headlines for all the wrong reasons when in 2011 he became the highest paid director ever in world football. From Blackpool's Premier League season, when they were relegated at Manchester United, Oyston - the club's owner since May 1988 - pocketed £11 million.



Blackpool's 'squad' warm up for a pre-season at Penrith FC

Oyston paid significant sums to Blackpool when it appeared they might be on the way out of the Football League. When the club's dreams were realised in 2010 and they were promoted to the Premier League, it's alleged they gained the best part of £80 million from the league. That 'they' is deliberately vague, for it's never been really clear who the money belonged to - Blackpool FC or Owen Oyston.

Therein lies the rub for all Blackpool fans, who are furious at the conduct displayed by the club. Or Oyston. It's difficult to tell which is which - and there are numerous goings-on in the background that muddy the waters further. Oyston allegedly uses the money earned from Blackpool to boost his other business interests. He, like many others before him, sees no difference in managing the club like any other business, regardless of how much destruction he wreaks.

Blackpool appear to be the latest instalment in a book on football club owners gone wrong. The title could be Deja Vu: The Sequel, and with a lack of legal efficacy and code of moral conduct around ownership, it's unlikely to be the last chapter in a cruel saga. All around the country men behave badly, and the game's authorities wonder what they can do about it all.

Coventry City now play their home games in Northampton thanks to their London hedge fund owners trying to bounce the council out of the Ricoh Arena by refusing to pay the rent. Consequently they've forfeited income from ticket sales, pushing the club close to administration. 

March saw ex-Birmingham City owner Carson Yeung jailed for money laundering. It remains unclear how much money Yeung really had, and upon describing his testimony, the trial judge accused the businessman of 'making it up as he went along'. Finally, not even a prior conviction for fraud could stop Italian Massimo Cellino from passing a fit and proper test by the Football League before his takeover of Leeds United.

The club's current plight is so bad that the manager, Jose Riga, has cancelled a pre-season tour to La Manga to concentrate on getting some players through the door. He'd identified three. The snag? He and the chairman can't agree over them, and Riga won't sign any more until he gets them.

With three weeks to go until the new season, this hardly seems the best time to play who-blinks-first between manager and chairman. There isn't much left to lose for the club in both the literal and metaphorical sense - and that's mainly down to just one man.

Pictures thanks to Twitter and The Independent

World Cup 2014: Thanks for the memories

A strange and surreal moment occurred last night, early in extra time. Courtesy of the BBC's Guy Mowbray we discovered that Germany had gone unbeaten in 27 matches. Argentina, their cup final challengers, had gone 23 games unbeaten. As this alarmingly meaningless number was burbled over the mic, Argentina's maestro Javier Mascherano executed a perfect sliding tackle on Bastian Schweinsteiger. Which got you more excited?

'The purpose of art is washing the dust of daily life from our souls', said Pablo Picasso. And it's hard to see how football gets more exciting following a World Cup that sought, demanded, emotional responses. A host country that belted out its national anthem that brought tears to the eyes. A classic rock track, retouched by a swarm of boisterous Argentines, just for the occasion. James Rodriguez. There were so many examples of the beautiful game here that the numbers game feels remote. Silly.

Stat after stat was fed by Lineker to Hansen, like Polo mints to a former champion thoroughbred put out to pasture. The first time since 1946 this. The only time in history that. Even FIFA are not immune. They, in their own way, are beginning to compartmentalise a game that burst at the seams here. Their award of the Golden Ball to Lionel Messi felt fraudulent; it was dubbed 'a marketing trick' by Diego Maradona shortly afterwards. When no one can see the point of the award given, it calls into question the legitimacy of that award. Messi performed well, but Maradona, as ever, had his finger on the pulse of the sport's still-beating heart.

The game does not need the bits businesses can't do without. Numbers are the boring half of a story well worth listening to. The World Cup should be like the world's best ever holiday photo collection. Every picture should tell a brilliant story - and there were so many. The aforementioned Rodriguez, a star in the remaking. The Costa Ricans. Tim Cahill's astonishing strike versus the Dutch. Neymar's bravura performance - at times he appeared to be stooped with the weight of expectation.

Perhaps the best example of Brazil's success was the USA. As a team - as a nation - their watershed moment was as authentic as they come; an almost, last-gasp sort of a match against a fancied Belgian side who were on the ropes as the US players summoned unknown reserves and tore into them. They could have won. Even better - millions of people wanted to see them win. And they weren't all American.

Brazil offered so much to so many. It's a spiritual home for the game - a genuinely great choice by FIFA. Its infrastructure, as noted by many journalists, was good, not the horror show many were led to believe. Live television showed matches in airplanes - a brilliant idea, and one that should be implemented for the next World Cup and, if necessary, European Championships. And the fans were everything a major tournament needed to grab the attention undivided.

So FIFA ought not to forget the intangibles when next flinging the merry-go-round for its biggest global moneyspinner. Accidents will happen and mistakes will be made but there can be no doubt this was a huge, huge success for all involved.

So of course - here's my tournament highlights. Where possible I've added some relevant context. Numbers be damned.

Player of the tournament: James Rodriguez

Who else? Golden Boot winner having played two games less than Thomas Muller, it feels almost asinine to point out Rodriguez's emblematic qualities for the most tear-streaked Copa in recent memory. Besides a near-assault by Brazil's hustling defence and midfield in their quarter-final punch-up, Rodriguez did the near-impossible: he took Falcao out of the picture. When you consider the fact that the centre forward was so important to the nation's tournament plans that the president of Colombia went to see him following his surgery, Rodriguez's achievements are all the more amplified. And that goal. Pffffft.

Team of the tournament (playing 4-2-3-1)
Neuer; Lahm, Hummels, Blind, Mena; Mascherano, Kroos; Cuadrado, Robben, Rodriguez; Muller.

Best match

Undoubtedly Holland 5-1 Spain. A watershed moment; the moment everyone knew this World Cup would be different. The Brazil demolition will perhaps live longer in the memory, for its extraordinary historical connotations, but it was essentially a 30 minute match. Van Gaal had dismantled the famous Dutch 4-3-3 and but for some slipshod play from David Silva, Holland very nearly went in 2-0 down at the break. Instead, Van Persie's extraordinary salmon leap (left)past a baffled Casillas, and one of the great solo performances from Arjen Robben cut the Spanish to smart little red ribbons. From that point on all bets, metaphorically speaking, were off.

Honourable mention: Belgium-USA may have unintended consequences for soccer in the States. Billed as a fairly tight match before kick-off, the game appeared to become a 90 minute physical exam for American goalkeeper Tim Howard, who now holds the record number of saves made in a match with 16. For Belgium, everybody bar coach Wilmots tried. Hazard had a go. Orige had a go. Belgium's defence had multiple gos from set pieces. But the man, like Margaret Thatcher but with more animal rights persuasions, was not for turning. To pick the ball out of his goal, you understand.
When two goals did arrive for Belgium in extra time, the Americans simply went for the jugular - and nearly brought the Belgians down. 'Not good for my heart' was all Wilmots said at full time. For millions of Americans, Brazilians and Europeans around the world, the truth was exactly the opposite.

Best dressed manager

Without a shadow of a doubt Louis van Gaal (left) and his backing group of orange-tied note-taking coaching staff. Whoever thought of this arrangement - and the uniform basis has the distinctive style/structure yin-yang of van Gaal's best arrangements - ought to be provided with some sort of fashion medal. Preferably by someone like Kraftwerk, who'd probably love this sort of thing.

Honourable mention: Jogi, Jogi, Jogi. Eternal cool, and now a World Cup winner. The only manager in football who could drink a cognac and smoking Marlboro Reds in the dugout without getting automatically sent off, the man didn't wear a single suit in the entire tournament. Bravo.

Best goal

The shrinking gap between video game goals and real life goals continues apace. Some quite astonishing aerodynamics went into Robin van Persie's airborne header-lob, but people do tend to overlook the cross from wing back Daley Blind that was so accurate van Persie didn't even break stride to befuddle Casillas.
Tim Cahill's crossbar smash-in may prove to be the moment to prompt the paradigm shift between real goals and goals scored on FIFA on X Boxes everywhere. A goal so unique that you (probably) couldn't score it on a computer, it was that good.
But the best still has to be Rodriguez's jaw-dropping effort versus Uruguay. So good, the Colombian commentators went nuts even by their usual standards. And the look on his face - 'did I just do that?!' - is one that should guarantee a place in the greatest of greatest hits.

Best national anthem

Chile. Just listen to this, and feel the hairs on the back of your neck stand up.

Best set piece

Yes this category's mainly included because you'll probably never again see Thomas Muller act so comically in a football match. But there were some genuinely good ones. The USA's straight ball, almost deadpan in tone, from a free kick, right through the Belgian defence at 2-1 down had hearts in mouths everywhere. David Luiz's whomp versus Colombia made every British journalist momentarily re-consider their appraisal of him as 'a bit dodgy'.
But the winner  - sorry, England - is Italy's inspired corner-kick routine from which Claudio Marchisio scored the opening goal. A goal of simple brilliance, with the ingeniously illusory element provided by - of course - regista di tutti registas Andrea Pirlo. Bloody marvellous.

Pics courtesy of The Guardian, 101 Great Goals and Eurosport Australia

The Identity Thieves

This World Cup's most successful teams have shed their national identities in favour of tactical innovations, led by - who else? the Germans

 

To Sunday then, and to two sides who appear to be dressed in each others kit. History counts for much in football, and the cultural elements of Germany and Argentina appear, like their shirts, shorts and socks, to have been jumbled up in the wash and pulled out by the wrong teams.

How, for example, have an Argentina side containing the likes of Messi, Higuain, Lavezzi, Aguero - that is just the forwards - won five consecutive games by one goal margins? They should be playing more like... Germany, who for all their offensive genius - witness that unholy thrashing again and again on YouTube - have looked distinctly average so far defensively.

Don't stop there, though. Pull the lens back further, and it quickly becomes apparent that in a country in revolt before the tournament began, mini-revolutions have happened all over Brazil. The hosts appear a good place to start, with Phil Scolari, arch pragmatist that he is, making a mental note of his creative resources and the psychological pressures on his side and deciding a more aggressive approach over jogo bonito would be the most likely path paved with gold.

He was wrong of course, but Scolari's changes are the archetypal smoking gun. His tactics should not be questioned - the resources at his disposal, in a country of 200 million, most definitely should be. Holland, the Seleção's opponents on Saturday night, didn't so much change their identity as develop multiple personality disorder, with coach van Gaal (below) unceremoniously dumping the famed 4-3-3 of Cruyff's era and deploying whatever suited the situation.

Van Gaal is not a typically reactive coach - he most went with 4-3-3 in his time at Barcelona for example - but in Brazil he flexed and maximised his resources time and again, culminating in the psychological masterstroke of deploying Tim Krul to unnerve the Costa Ricans. Manchester United fans will be salivating at the season in prospect.

Successful change naturally depends on resources - Brazil are clearly the key protagonists here but to witness England's quiet exit at the group stage despite a markedly different approach in their game versus Italy shows you are still only as good as your players and the system they play.

But this was the World Cup when to stand still was to die. Italy and Spain, two of the biggest names in world football, both went out early and Prandelli notably came in for some criticism when he reverted to a traditional Italian 3-5-2 versus Uruguay- and lost, having deployed a relatively successful 4-2-3-1 in the previous European Championships that got them all the way to the final.

As for Spain, their story is entwined with that of the demise of Barcelona, where tiki-taka is on the ropes after an almighty hammering from the Dutch and German powerhouses in international and national football. Down, but never out - they are both too good, and football moves too quickly, for that movement to have died out.

Sunday's final is a victory for the postmodern - bar Alan Shearer's bleating, everyone recognises Germany's reinvention in identity following their 5-1 thrashing at England's hands in 2001. These Germans recognise efficiency can be art, that speed is more beautiful than physicality.

Meanwhile the Argentinians have simply done the opposite of what everyone expected. A goal machine before the tournament, they recognised early that sides would hide away, lock the castle gates, pull up the drawbridge and throw buckets of burning faeces off the battlements, and simply not played in their customary style. Some breathtaking moves against Nigeria aside, Argentina have depended on their defensive triumvirate of Garay, Demichelis and Mascherano to stifle teams when they did venture forward. The result; a most un-Argentinian sequence of results.

What to expect on Sunday then? Unknown. Germany undoubtedly go in as favourites and despite some parsimonious results, the Albiceleste defence was never the strongest in the tournament. Ironically, in a tournament full of identity swaps, Argentina might want to rediscover theirs if their intention is to take the trophy in Rio.

Picture courtesy of Mirror.co.uk

'Football has more power than any one of us thinks.'

Nostalgia comes in many forms, but for football collectors like Péter Pesti, it's always round (and usually has a funny design on it)

Ask any football fan when and why they fell in love with jogo bonito. To the first part of the question, the answers are various - for Romario, World Cup winner and now politician, it was love in Jacarezinho, the Rio favela. For any number of British kids, including Wayne Rooney, a sludgy bit of field, or a cul-de-sac.

But ask a fan why they love the game and the answer always has one constant; the ball. Stars move around it; Pele, Maradona, Cruyff, Beckenbauer are flickering constellations around an eternal sun. And for some, the football is the history of the game; it represents a key to a treasure trove of memories only unlocked by the look, the touch of skin on leather.

There are fabulous stories to be had in the collections of footballs. SZ-Magazin's Lars Reichardt was part of an amazing project to photograph every tournament World Cup ball. For this, the hunt is arguably better than the catch. But for others, it's more complex - and like everything linked to football, it's rooted in the most basic of feelings: a simple love for the game.

 

I caught up with Hungarian football collector Péter Pesti, who owns a replica of every football ever used in the World Cup, as well as owning and managing the premier collector's website worldcupballs.info. Like many collectors, Péter has his own personal reasons for collecting, and like many collectors has had serious setbacks in his attempts to create that feeling for others- as he details below. Péter has assisted both Hungarian national television and the New York Times in documenting the history of football and for YouTubers, the below video is a brilliant historical accompaniment. You can find out more about Péter by visiting his website or watching his very innovative YouTube videos.
 

 

Ill: What sparked your interest in collecting footballs, and World Cup balls in particular?

Peter Pesti: The first Christmas present I remember was a regular 32 panel black and white football, I kept on telling my parents for many weeks before Christmas to buy me this present, a real leather football and I was extremely happy with it. Later I started to play football and my grandpa told me many stories of the old time great Hungarian team and other great teams in the World Cup so I got addicted to it. In high school I started to collect football shirts and wore them all the time but when I graduated and attended to the university, it was no more fancy and attractive to wear football shirts so I finished it. But my love for the sport did not end and I wanted to find another hobby to represent my attention and interest. When I studied one year in Belgium, I made enough money to afford my first Adidas matchball (the recent Champions League matchball) and when I tested it, I hit the crossbar four times out of my first five trials. This made me realize how good these high end balls are and I was looking for other balls to test them. During this procedure I found out that there are many people who not only play with the balls but they rather collect them. So later I decorated my student residence with balls and I became a collector. This happened ten years ago.

 

You've mentioned the Champions League Adidas ball is your favourite to play with - what’s your favourite collectors item and why?

If I could pick only one ball that I would keep forever from my collection, it would be the Tango Napoli ball that has the signatures of all the World Cup winning German team members plus Beckenbauer from 1990. This World Cup was namely the first I have ever seen and Germany is my favourite team ever since. This is the only ball I keep in my bedroom so that I can see it all the time.

 

You had your laptop, camera and other electrical equipment stolen in 2007 in Barcelona whilst you were travelling Europe collecting images of every World Cup ball for your website. That must have been very hard for you to overcome - what inspired you to carry on with your project?

I always knew that because of financial aspects and space limitations I will never be able to keep all the balls that I buy. But I wanted to find a way to preserve the balls and keep them for myself so I created an identical design (with the turf and the black background) and I photographed over 200 balls during the past few years. To share this image gallery with other enthusiast is an external value for the common good. There is no such identically photographed image gallery on-line. This might be the reason that even the New York Times and many other media has published my photographs from all the 20 World Cup balls.

 

You’ve worked with the New York Times and Hungarian national television on the subject. Why do you feel people are interested in footballs and their historical development?

In my opinion football has more power than any one of us thinks. There is no other sport or social event that would make so many people move. And only the balls represent any particular event. The evolution of footballs is a historical look back and a technological improvement as well. If we want to appreciate and understand old time players even better, we have to look at the equipment (i.e. balls) that they had the chance to play with. So it is not only a question of design, if you take a closer look at an old ball or you smell it, you know how it feels, it takes you back into the past and make you understand time more and appreciate the old time heroes even better.

It’s often said that footballers are better in the modern age due to improved kit and technology. Do you think this is true when it comes to footballs, and why?

The game has changed a lot all over the decades. Speed is faster, the players are more powerful and have more stamina. The Hungarian National Team could easily pass the ball at the edge of the penalty area of their opponents and it was more like a chess game, they did not run too much and were not interrupted. In my opinion players are not better because of the improvement of the kit and technology, they are better because of they need to perform better since the style and nature of the game has changed. However, it is true that we could have seen more goals with recent kit and balls if they had been available 100 years ago.

 

Which type do you prefer - the old fashioned laced balls, or the newer valve panel footballs? What’s the reason for your preference?

For the eyes and to decorate the room, the old balls look much better. Recently the matchballs are produced and changed every year (in case of the Champions League twice a year) because of marketing reasons. They did not develop anything but change the design so that they can sell more. However we do not have to blame these companies because they pump a lot of money into the sport. And to play with the latest high end balls are the best, there is no question about it. The leather balls absorbed too much water and became heavy while losing their controls. This disadvantage had to be worked upon.

Which historical footballer would you most like to see playing with the newer Adidas balls?

I would gladly see Ferenc Puskas. He was accurate even with the old balls and was able to hit the crossbar from the edge of the penalty area 9 times our of 10. Let me share you a short story about him: Once he scored a goal from a free kick but the referee made him to repeat it for some reason and disallowed his goal. Puskas became angry and told the referee: "Ok, I will shoot the ball to the same place again!"

 

And he scored... What could he do now?!

The Premier League: A Trans Europa Success

English football does not simply need less foreign footballers - it needs more, and it needs the best, to improve at international level

One hundred and ten! proudly tooted the Premier League at the start of the World Cup. Can you guess what the number relates to? No, not the average percentage of debt to profit ratio for each Premier League club, although good call. It's actually the number of Premier League players involved in Brazil.

 

One hundred and ten. Like a lot of numbers, it feels significant. Assuming each Premier league squad boasts an average 23 players, as per this World Cup, that infers that nearly a quarter of all the players we watch week in, week out on Match of the Day et al are international players capable of playing in the world's biggest and best football tournament.

 

Rubbish, grouches the football traditionalist who's no doubt sick of seeing England getting knocked out early again, and perhaps mutters to himself that the English would do a lot better without these foreign international players clogging up their youth teams.



None of the 2014 Ballon D'or winners play in England

Would they? Nationalism is a funny thing and it has not infected sport in the same way as it has politics and culture in Britain. In England, we love watching Silva, Hazard, Oscar, Aguero, Kompany, Van Persie and Ozil. Football fans in this country are not overtly racist and it would be an interesting exercise to see who the average terrace fan voted for at the last European elections.

It's certainly true to say England has a problem with foreign footballers, but what it really has a problem with, as usual, is ownership and strategy. Of the last eight nations left in the World Cup, 37 players play in the Premier League. That's around 20% of the eight squads - and that figure's significantly heightened by ten French players and 11 Belgians. If you strip those two away, the figure becomes less than 10%. Compare that to the Bundesliga, on 38%, and La Liga, on 33%. Still the best league in the world?

 

Of course, you think, it's natural that if you speak Spanish or Portuguese - as Argentina, Brazil and Colombia do - you'll want to be around people like you. Spaniards, for example. Except that's also not true. Nine leagues are represented in the Brazil and Colombia squads, and seven in the Argentina squad. In England, Spain and Italy, the squads are represented by two, four and two respectively.

 

Travel really does seem to broaden the mind and it appears, superficially at least, there's little doubt that the English are simply too insular when it comes to their football. But the economics, unlike South American leagues, make it hard to resist playing in one league when it could set the player up financially for life.

 

The exception of course is Germany, who have 20 of their players based in the Bundesliga. But there is room to develop youth there, without risk of clubs going through the blender should relegation occur. The '50+1' shareholder model is characteristic of a philosophy which ensures financial fair play is pretty much already in place. In both Italy and Spain there are serious long term debt issues for various clubs - much like the Premier League. This year's Spanish champions, Atletico, are over £100 million in debt over unpaid taxes.

English football is simply a smudge on a broader canvas that reflects the way Britain has relied upon skilled immigration to add value to its most lucrative industries - for example, financial services. For the Premier League, see any building housed in Canary Wharf after close of business, when British citizens can be seen scrubbing at the City's skyscraping artifices.

The difference in football, unfortunately, is that the hired help is often better than the in-house. That has nothing to do with money - that, as can be seen in Colombia's squad make-up, is much more about determination and a strong sense of self-worth. The things an Englishman cannot buy.

Britain needs top foreign talent to improve still further, and a greater focus on buying top-bracket foreign players at cheaper players' expense would still mean great entertainment. But would the inevitable culture change mean a move back to traditional, outmoded English tactics? Moreover, would a change in the number of nationalities reduce the likelihood of Brazilians playing in England? There are many more, but questions like this are important.

 

No one can doubt that the English has improved immeasurably in the wake of David Luiz, Sergio Aguero, Fernando Torres, Nemanja Vidic et al arriving. All have given huge amounts. But if we've learned nothing and simply watched the circus as it passed through town, we have no one to blame but ourselves.

Picture thanks to World Soccer