Today I just want to be a happy football fan and celebrate the efforts of:
- Crusaders FC of Belfast, who virtually have secured the Northern Ireland Premiership title.
- Arsenal, who by beating Burnley (albeit by only one goal) now have a Premier League winning streak of 8 matches.
- Yannick Bolasie of Crystal Palace, who achieved a hat-trick in 11 minutes against Sunderland.
- Mia Jalkerud of Djurgårdens IF, who scored a double hattrick - in one half - in the first round of Swedish top tier Allsvenskan.
- The eleven years old boys of my own team who in good spirits showed up at 7.45 AM for their first Saturday training session this spring.
Yep, that felt good!
Saturday, April 11, 2015
Wednesday, April 01, 2015
All that was needed: Swiss coffee and croissants
The 6th of June is Sweden´s National Day. Television viewers will, as every year, by live broadcasting watch the royal family attend the ceremonies in Stockholm. The 6th of June is also the day when the king of Swedish football, Zlatan Ibrahimovic, may at last win the UEFA Champions League.
While the ceremonies in Stockholm are going on, some 70 000 out-of-city football fans will take the U-bahn or the S-bahn and head towards western Berlin and start filling up the imposing Olympiastadion.Together with me and hundreds of millions other viewers in front of screens of all sizes, they will follow the fate of the players lucky enough, or rather skilful enough, to reach the final of the world´s biggest club tournament. Starting at 8.45 CEST, we will all hopefully witness ninety minutes (and then some) filled with fabulous football and big excitement. May the best team win!
By the time the teams have left the pitch and the stands of the Olympiastadion are emptied, two other nervous teams will be warming up far far away, eight time zones westwards. In Edmonton, Canada, the host nation will face the People´s Republic of China in the opening match of the Women´s World Cup, hopefully in front of a capacity crowd of 54,000. Kick-off is set to 4 pm local time. That´s less than ninety minutes after the final whistle of the Berlin match.
As I´ve written in an earlier post there are signs that 2015 can be a breakthrough year for women´s football. Great efforts are made in marketing the World Cup, and more than 600,000 tickets have been sold by the end of March (link here).
The two most powerful football organisations FIFA and UEFA both talk and write about the importance of supporting the development of women´s and girls´football in different ways. However, with these two matches being played on the same day, a lot of potential attention will be drawn from the match in Edmonton. The Champions League final is a huge, huge match, and there are not many events that would not lose the battle for attention with the build-up talk for a clash between Bayern München and FC Barcelona or between Cristiano Ronaldo and Zlatan Ibrahimovic.
I don´t know which schedule was set first, and it doesn´t matter. If UEFA and FIFA really meant something with their words on women´s football, they could have just sat down and reached an agreement over some coffee and a few croissants. If the 256 km distance between Nyon and Zürich felt too far to travel, they could have settled with one or two domestic calls.
I can easily accept that the Champions League final is played on Sweden´s National Day, but it will be much harder to overcome the lack of decency in not caring for the top athletes of the World Cup. FIFA and UEFA have a lot of work to do if they want some credibility in this matter. For starters UEFA could celebrate Easter by announcing major changes in the prize money structure and the choice of venues for the Women´s Champions League 2015-16, but that´s a totally different sad story.
While the ceremonies in Stockholm are going on, some 70 000 out-of-city football fans will take the U-bahn or the S-bahn and head towards western Berlin and start filling up the imposing Olympiastadion.Together with me and hundreds of millions other viewers in front of screens of all sizes, they will follow the fate of the players lucky enough, or rather skilful enough, to reach the final of the world´s biggest club tournament. Starting at 8.45 CEST, we will all hopefully witness ninety minutes (and then some) filled with fabulous football and big excitement. May the best team win!
By the time the teams have left the pitch and the stands of the Olympiastadion are emptied, two other nervous teams will be warming up far far away, eight time zones westwards. In Edmonton, Canada, the host nation will face the People´s Republic of China in the opening match of the Women´s World Cup, hopefully in front of a capacity crowd of 54,000. Kick-off is set to 4 pm local time. That´s less than ninety minutes after the final whistle of the Berlin match.
As I´ve written in an earlier post there are signs that 2015 can be a breakthrough year for women´s football. Great efforts are made in marketing the World Cup, and more than 600,000 tickets have been sold by the end of March (link here).
The two most powerful football organisations FIFA and UEFA both talk and write about the importance of supporting the development of women´s and girls´football in different ways. However, with these two matches being played on the same day, a lot of potential attention will be drawn from the match in Edmonton. The Champions League final is a huge, huge match, and there are not many events that would not lose the battle for attention with the build-up talk for a clash between Bayern München and FC Barcelona or between Cristiano Ronaldo and Zlatan Ibrahimovic.
I don´t know which schedule was set first, and it doesn´t matter. If UEFA and FIFA really meant something with their words on women´s football, they could have just sat down and reached an agreement over some coffee and a few croissants. If the 256 km distance between Nyon and Zürich felt too far to travel, they could have settled with one or two domestic calls.
I can easily accept that the Champions League final is played on Sweden´s National Day, but it will be much harder to overcome the lack of decency in not caring for the top athletes of the World Cup. FIFA and UEFA have a lot of work to do if they want some credibility in this matter. For starters UEFA could celebrate Easter by announcing major changes in the prize money structure and the choice of venues for the Women´s Champions League 2015-16, but that´s a totally different sad story.
Friday, February 06, 2015
2015 - The Big Breakthrough for Women´s Football?
In July 2013 more than 41,000 people gathered in Solna, just outside Stockholm to watch the final of UEFA Women's Euro 2013. In November 2014 England and Germany attracted a record attendance of 45,000 to Wembley stadium.
In France, the first division is dominated by Paris Saint-Germain and Olympique Lyonnais. In England´s Super League Arsenal, Manchester City, Liverpool and Chelsea struggle. In the top of the tables in Germany and Spain you find household names like Wolfsburg, Bayern München, FC Barcelona and Atlético Madrid.
Perhaps the time has come for women´s football to take the next step towards more attention. The big clubs seem to see the potential value to their brands. If the clubs work together with FIFA and the continental associations in highlighting the achievements of top female players, it could result in more young girls playing and following the game (and buying jerseys and calendars).
I think football can strengthen girls and that girls strengthen football. (Read here about the project "Futebol dá forca" to get an idea of what the further implications can be.)
It´s not that strange that women´s football doesn´t get as much attention as men´s. Whatever the issue is, I think that it usually takes at least two generations to really achieve a change in general attitude. Women´s football has of course been around in some form as long as men´s, but it was not until the 1970´s that it began to wear a somewhat more modern costume, with semi-professional teams in Italy. The first World Cup was arranged in 1991 with just twelve teams. Now another 24 years have passed and we are looking forward to the World Cup in Canada. With a record number of 24 teams the tournament promises to be a success, judging from the U20 World Cup last year which attracted tens of thousand spectators.. Could it be that in the future we might look back at 2015 as the year women´s football got a real breakthrough? I repeat the last lines from my post during the U20 tournament, aiming at Canada 2015:
Hopefully, the media attention will be bigger than ever.
The players deserve it.
Young football-loving girls all over the world deserve it.
We all would benefit from it.
In France, the first division is dominated by Paris Saint-Germain and Olympique Lyonnais. In England´s Super League Arsenal, Manchester City, Liverpool and Chelsea struggle. In the top of the tables in Germany and Spain you find household names like Wolfsburg, Bayern München, FC Barcelona and Atlético Madrid.
Perhaps the time has come for women´s football to take the next step towards more attention. The big clubs seem to see the potential value to their brands. If the clubs work together with FIFA and the continental associations in highlighting the achievements of top female players, it could result in more young girls playing and following the game (and buying jerseys and calendars).
I think football can strengthen girls and that girls strengthen football. (Read here about the project "Futebol dá forca" to get an idea of what the further implications can be.)
It´s not that strange that women´s football doesn´t get as much attention as men´s. Whatever the issue is, I think that it usually takes at least two generations to really achieve a change in general attitude. Women´s football has of course been around in some form as long as men´s, but it was not until the 1970´s that it began to wear a somewhat more modern costume, with semi-professional teams in Italy. The first World Cup was arranged in 1991 with just twelve teams. Now another 24 years have passed and we are looking forward to the World Cup in Canada. With a record number of 24 teams the tournament promises to be a success, judging from the U20 World Cup last year which attracted tens of thousand spectators.. Could it be that in the future we might look back at 2015 as the year women´s football got a real breakthrough? I repeat the last lines from my post during the U20 tournament, aiming at Canada 2015:
Hopefully, the media attention will be bigger than ever.
The players deserve it.
Young football-loving girls all over the world deserve it.
We all would benefit from it.
Monday, December 29, 2014
New challengers - or...?
Lately AFC Bournemouth have continued to impress in the English second tier The Championship, with five straight victories. They will celebrate the new year as league leaders. In the German Bundesliga FC Augsburg are upsetting the top teams, now in sixth place. I love to see new clubs breaking ground. But hey, are these REALLY new clubs in top football?
For most of us our childhood experiences defines normality, whether it concerns sports, politics or technical gadgets. I still think it's a bit odd that the Swedish parliament consists of eight parties and not five. After 25 years, a united Germany is still kind of a new concept to me, since the wall stood my whole childhood. Streaming services aside, I'm amazed by the more than 13 or 57 channels to choose from on television.
When IFK Göteborg were promoted to the Swedish top tier in 1976, I saw them as a new team that probably wouldn't challenge the likes of AIK and Malmö FF. I later realised that this was one of the big clubs with seven championships, and that they only quite recently had been relegated. Of course they stayed up and later won the UEFA cup twice.
Many youngsters today probably look at my favourite English team in the same way. It was only a few years ago that Stoke City reached the Premier League. However, if you read your football history you'll learn that the club was founded back in 1863, and was one of the original league clubs (I'm sorry to say that great victories are scarce, to say the least...).
We need to make our young ones realise that by learning about history, you understand more about the present. As a Stoke fan I can read about the decline of the pottery and mining industry, partly coninciding with the club's years in the third division. Then I can reflect on the success of gambling giant Bet365, coinciding with the re-establishment of The Potters as a PL club.
If you read about Spanish history (e.g. in Jimmy Burns' excellent "Barça - a People´s Passion") you get a better understanding of why FC Barcelona is so much "more than a club". You can read about the shipping trade to get clues on the origins of many of the great European football clubs.
What about Bournemouth and Augsburg, then? Well, Bournemouth would actually be a new club in the top tier if promoted. Augsburg currently play their fourth season in the Bundesliga, so they have to be considered a new challenger. I will welcome Bournemouth to the Premier League and will be happy to analyse the importance of the fact that their hometown´s population has grown by 15% percent since the birth of the Premier League, and that their stadium is sponsored by a "lifestyle concierge services" company.
For most of us our childhood experiences defines normality, whether it concerns sports, politics or technical gadgets. I still think it's a bit odd that the Swedish parliament consists of eight parties and not five. After 25 years, a united Germany is still kind of a new concept to me, since the wall stood my whole childhood. Streaming services aside, I'm amazed by the more than 13 or 57 channels to choose from on television.
When IFK Göteborg were promoted to the Swedish top tier in 1976, I saw them as a new team that probably wouldn't challenge the likes of AIK and Malmö FF. I later realised that this was one of the big clubs with seven championships, and that they only quite recently had been relegated. Of course they stayed up and later won the UEFA cup twice.
Many youngsters today probably look at my favourite English team in the same way. It was only a few years ago that Stoke City reached the Premier League. However, if you read your football history you'll learn that the club was founded back in 1863, and was one of the original league clubs (I'm sorry to say that great victories are scarce, to say the least...).
We need to make our young ones realise that by learning about history, you understand more about the present. As a Stoke fan I can read about the decline of the pottery and mining industry, partly coninciding with the club's years in the third division. Then I can reflect on the success of gambling giant Bet365, coinciding with the re-establishment of The Potters as a PL club.
If you read about Spanish history (e.g. in Jimmy Burns' excellent "Barça - a People´s Passion") you get a better understanding of why FC Barcelona is so much "more than a club". You can read about the shipping trade to get clues on the origins of many of the great European football clubs.
What about Bournemouth and Augsburg, then? Well, Bournemouth would actually be a new club in the top tier if promoted. Augsburg currently play their fourth season in the Bundesliga, so they have to be considered a new challenger. I will welcome Bournemouth to the Premier League and will be happy to analyse the importance of the fact that their hometown´s population has grown by 15% percent since the birth of the Premier League, and that their stadium is sponsored by a "lifestyle concierge services" company.
Saturday, November 15, 2014
Congrats Føroyar!
Wednesday, October 29, 2014
The day the result really, really, really didn´t matter
For totally different reasons the friendly between Sweden and Germany in Örebro this evening became a game where the result mattered next to nothing, at least for most Swedish football fans.
This morning, one of the country´s rare World Cup medalists, Klas Ingesson, passed away after a few years' illness. He was an admired teammate, as a player, coach and manager. It´s just over two weeks since the death of Brommapojkarna´s captain Pontus Segerström (see "A Day of Sorrow"), and just a few days since the events in South Africa. October is very dark this year.
Read more about Ingesson here (The Guardian).
Immensely more uplifting is what happened on the pitch. Two great Swedish records were set. Lotta Schelin of Olympique Lyonnais became the national team´s best goal-scorer in history with her 73rd goal, surpassing Hanna Ljungberg. Therese Sjögran of FC Rosengård made her 200th appearance in the national jersey. This is more than any man, and puts her in top 15-20 or so among women.
This post will not contain any opinion or arguments.
Tonight it suffices to say:
Congratulations Lotta and Therese!
Rest in peace Klabbe!
This morning, one of the country´s rare World Cup medalists, Klas Ingesson, passed away after a few years' illness. He was an admired teammate, as a player, coach and manager. It´s just over two weeks since the death of Brommapojkarna´s captain Pontus Segerström (see "A Day of Sorrow"), and just a few days since the events in South Africa. October is very dark this year.
Read more about Ingesson here (The Guardian).
Immensely more uplifting is what happened on the pitch. Two great Swedish records were set. Lotta Schelin of Olympique Lyonnais became the national team´s best goal-scorer in history with her 73rd goal, surpassing Hanna Ljungberg. Therese Sjögran of FC Rosengård made her 200th appearance in the national jersey. This is more than any man, and puts her in top 15-20 or so among women.
This post will not contain any opinion or arguments.
Tonight it suffices to say:
Congratulations Lotta and Therese!
Rest in peace Klabbe!
Sunday, October 26, 2014
New icons in Central America
We are used to see The United States qualifying, but today I want to bring some attention to Las Ticas. They have copied the achievement of their compatriots La Sele or Los Ticos. If you still need some clues on what I´m going on about, I give you the heroes from Fortaleza and Recife: Keylor Navas, Cristian Bolaños and Celso Borges.
On Friday night Costa Rica perhaps got some new icons when their women´s national team qualified for the World Cup for the first time ever. After a 1-1 draw against Trinidad & Tobago the match went to a penalty shoot-out. Katherine Alvarado, Carol Sánchez and Wendy Acosta all scored while the goalkeeper Dinnia Diaz, amazingly enough, saved three penalties in a row, securing the historic victory.
The come-back from a knee injury that almost made her quit football and the saving of three penalties (quite week ones, but still) in a decisive WC qualifier is more than enough to make Diaz a proper "Heroina".
I hope Costa Rica and its football federation will support the ladies on their road to Canada to give them a chance to upset the big countries like the men did last summer. The game gains from old champions being challenged, and young girls in any country can get strength from the success of female athletes in male-dominated sports.
Viva Las Ticas!
Diaz´s saves (video)
On Friday night Costa Rica perhaps got some new icons when their women´s national team qualified for the World Cup for the first time ever. After a 1-1 draw against Trinidad & Tobago the match went to a penalty shoot-out. Katherine Alvarado, Carol Sánchez and Wendy Acosta all scored while the goalkeeper Dinnia Diaz, amazingly enough, saved three penalties in a row, securing the historic victory.
The come-back from a knee injury that almost made her quit football and the saving of three penalties (quite week ones, but still) in a decisive WC qualifier is more than enough to make Diaz a proper "Heroina".
I hope Costa Rica and its football federation will support the ladies on their road to Canada to give them a chance to upset the big countries like the men did last summer. The game gains from old champions being challenged, and young girls in any country can get strength from the success of female athletes in male-dominated sports.
Viva Las Ticas!
Diaz´s saves (video)
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