Columnists Archives - Page 40 of 78 - Inside World Football

Osasu Obayiuwana: Up for Champagne, anyone?

It’s one thing to throw pre-fight verbal salvos or shadow box in the dressing room.

But walking through the political gauntlet and stepping into the ring, especially when you don’t know the opponents you’re competing against, is certainly a huge leap of faith.

That’s what Jerome Champagne, the 55-year-old Frenchman and FIFA’s former deputy secretary-general and director of international affairs, took when he announced his decision, in London on Monday, to seek the most powerful position in football and,

Andrew Warshaw: Stalking horse or a real contender for the crown?

Decent man, strong principles and some seriously sensible ideas for modernising the game. But can Jerome Champagne really become the Comeback King at FIFA?

The more one analyses Champagne’s somewhat poorly structured launch announcement on Monday that he is to stand for president of world football’s governing body next year, the more one has to question not only whether he chose the right place to unveil his manifesto but also his motives and whether there is a hidden agenda.

Mihir Bose

Mihir Bose: Can we please stop this Southampton hysteria?

The astonishing coverage of the Southampton story since Nicola Cortese left may suggest the football world on the south coast is about to collapse. I cannot recall another occasion when the departure of a managing director of a club has resulted in such media exposure. However much of it has been so hysterical and over the top that it is clear that the world of football has not changed, only the public perception of it.

Lee Wellings

Lee Wellings: Heat is not just on Qatar but on prejudice as well

It’s a worrying scenario isn’t it.

A searing sun, temperatures over 40 degrees, players and spectators wilting, the action bordering on farce as it becomes survival of the fittest, not the most talented.

It’s not going to happen with the World Cup in Qatar 2022 though is it? Just ask Jerome Valcke.

No, I refer of course to the Australian Open tennis. You see Melbourne can get quite hot at this time of year.

Massimo Cecchini

Massimo Cecchini: Seedorf, the non-political voice of Berlusconi

Ormai sembra più di un’impressione: scegliendo Clarence Seedorf come nuovo allenatore, il Milan non ha individuato soltanto un avventuroso profilo professionale, ma anche un fedele portavoce di quella filosofia aziendale che fa capo al presidente Silvio Berlusconi, ovvero uno degli uomini più ricchi e più controversi d’Italia.

Non è un mistero, infatti, che il campione olandese originario del Suriname, anche quando era semplicemente un calciatore rossonero, si fosse distinto per la adesione alle posizioni anche extra-sportive del suo datore di lavoro.

Matt Scott

Matt Scott: Bolton and the salutary tale of how to turn gold into lead

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“I am the lord of the philosopher’s stone,” Mammon, The Alchemist, Ben Johnson

Four hundred years after those fictitious words were first uttered on a London stage, alchemy, the fabled process of turning base metals into gold, is of course just as much hocus-pocus as it was then. Even so, it does not seem to have stopped football clubs trying to turn leaden-footed footballers into the latest golden generation.

Osasu Obayiuwana

Osasu Obayiuwana: Do CAF awards dishonour more than they honour?

Having taken a firm position, over a month ago, against the selection of Ivorian midfielder Yaya Toure as the BBC African Footballer of the Year, it would be no shock to regular readers of this column that I am in complete disagreement with his receipt of the official title in Lagos, Nigeria, last Thursday.

The argument put forward in my December 5 piece, “What is an African performance worth?” hasn’t changed a jot.

Archive

David Owen: Is it time to designate permanent homes for the World Cup and Olympics?

I was not altogether surprised on Friday to open my copy of The Guardian newspaper and find that the latest twists in the Qatar World Cup saga had combined with the approach of Sochi 2014 to provoke columnist Simon Jenkins into an elegant tirade.

These mega-events, Jenkins argued, “are about the crudest form of politics, that of national prestige.

“The athletico-military-industrial complex seems to have a mesmeric appeal to world leaders,

Andrew Warshaw: Timing, protocol and the bigger Winter 2022 picture

Let’s put things into perspective. Whilst no-one would deny that Jerome Valcke’s off-the-cuff remarks over a winter World Cup in Qatar were untimely in the extreme, was Sepp Blatter’s right-hand man really telling us anything we didn’t know already?

Stakeholders throughout the game have understandably cried foul at Valcke seemingly jumping the gun before the time frame for global consultation is anywhere near complete.

Insideworldfootball has learned, for example, that the Qatar organisers received more concerned calls over this particular 2022 story that at any time in last two years –

Lee Wellings

Lee Wellings: Saints and sinners. Blaming refs demeans football

The very last subject I’d usually want to talk about is referees.

I mean, have you heard yourselves?

Moaning at the ref, accusing him of bias, pointing to your watches. As if it’s an easy job, as if decisions are not made in the split second under high pressure. As if we actually give credit for the many decisions that are correct.

Archive

INSIDE World Football launched in China with NetEase

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January 9 – INSIDE World Football is proud to announce our new and groundbreaking partnership with NeEase – www.163.com -and its main sports portal where INSIDE World Football will be a daily feature in Chinese. Launched today, INSIDE World football’s daily content is available to some 500 million Chinese users. NetEase is one of China’s most visited websites and China’s largest email services provider.

Matt Scott

Matt Scott: State aid, crippling debts and the gods who shine on the lucky ones

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“You’ll never have me in your grasp, not in this chariot, a gift to me from my grandfather Helios, to protect me from all hostile hands.” Euripides, Medea

When the infanticide Medea, the original theatrical villain, is lifted with the bodies of her murdered children from the scene of her crime by the sun god’s chariot there is a sense of dissatisfaction about the outcome of Euripides play. It’s a bit of a cop out of an ending,

Osasu Obayiuwana

Osasu Obayiuwana: Charting a path for Africa’s future

With roughly five months to the World Cup finals, the burning question of how the African quintet will perform in Brazil and what it might say, about the competitive state of the continental game, will soon be answered.

But what really bothers me, as we begin another year, way beyond whether an African team is able, for the first-time, to reach the semi-finals – as desirable as that is – is when the various countries within the continent will get down to the much-needed business of hammering out sustainable plans for long-term development.

Mihir Bose

Mihir Bose: Why the FA Cup is going the way of the British manufacturing

Time was when the third round of the FA Cup produced excitement, surprise, fun and often a touch of magic to keep the winter blues away. Now all it does is produce moans about how the Cup has been devalued and the competition is not what it was back in the old days. The only surprise is this year the moans began even before the third round matches had been played, ignited by comments of Paul Lambert of Aston Villa that the FA Cup did not mean much to Premier League teams.

Andrew Warshaw: Mickey Mouse? He would have killed to win the FA Cup

Driving back from an English FA Cup game in the pouring rain last Saturday, I was listening to a radio phone-in and suddenly became so incensed by a Chelsea-supporting caller, I gripped the steering wheel even more tightly in the treacherous conditions to avoid swerving into the path of another car in my rage.

The caller, displaying an arrogance so common among Johnny-come-lately fans whose clubs have enjoyed unlimited success and who disregard everyone else,