Month: April 2021

Just over a week ago, twelve of Europe’s leading football clubs announced the formation of a new European Super League (ESL).  Their aim was to create an annual tournament, that would run alongside the various national league competitions and would rival the existing pan-European tournaments, namely the Champions League and the Europa League.  The two main differences between the new ESL and the existing competitions, were that the ESL would be smaller, with twenty clubs rather than thirty-two or forty-eight, and that fifteen teams would be guaranteed participation in the ESL each year with only five places to be secured through competitive qualification.  The twelve clubs’ goal was to create a competition with greater quality and focus, to showcase the “biggest” teams playing against each other regularly, the “best” players competing against each other all season. 

Three days later the plan appeared to be dead and buried as all six English teams that had signed up as founder members of the ESL withdrew from the initiative, in the face of a storm of protest from other clubs, former players, and groups claiming to representing the “real fans”.  But, if the proposal for a new tournament is off the table for now, it has not gone away for ever.  Just like at Easter, a form of resurrection is possible.  There are two sorts of people who really like the idea, the owners of the top European Clubs – many of whom are from America, the Middle East, and Asia – and the millions of football fans who do not live in Europe.  This alliance – between the super-rich and the mass consumer – is likely to triumph in the long run against the protectionist instincts of those in the middle, predominantly Western European commentators and fans, who care about the preservation of the traditions of the game for their own sake.

Continue reading “Own Goal”

I took my son to the art museum yesterday, for the first time in I don’t know how long. It was a free admission day, but you still had to make a reserved time, and having got there a little early, we got a snack and waited outside. As he ate his chocolate cake lollipop, I checked my email on my phone, and saw a note with the subject line”

“The “racist” and “about … implicit racism” word, “character”, is found throughout the Comprehensive Plan.“

Hmmm, I thought, this is new.

Continue reading “Character”

In my late teens, I had a pointless argument with one of my friends, while sitting in a school minibus on a daytrip to learn about the geomorphology of the Surrey Hills.  Who, we debated, was the more important American singer-songwriter: Bob Dylan or Billy Joel?   Dylan, said I, because his lyrics are more meaningful.  Joel, said my friend, because he has sold more records.  That only goes to show, I said, that Joel appeals to a more popular audience, not that his songs are more important.  It goes to show, my friend said, that his songs are important to a greater number of people.  No, I insisted, for those people his songs are enjoyed along with many other songs by other artists, whereas for Dylan’s fans his songs matter more than anyone else’s ever will.  No, he replied … 

Continue reading “Special”

Moving back to Maine with my son has been entertaining on multiple levels. For example: he is not nearly as outdoorsy as I was when I was a kid, and that proves to be the source of endless mutual frustration. He would much prefer staying in his room, reading or playing a video game or playing with his Legos, to ever going outside, no matter how lovely the day. I admit I was pretty bookish and Lego-ish as a kid too (I just barely pre-dated decent video games), but I also liked hanging out in the backyard, or on the beach, or in the woods – but no, he does not. So on any sunny day, we’ll have a good 20 minutes of argument about getting him outdoors. I find those 20 minutes to be supremely enjoyable, as he uses his eight year old rhetorical skills to try to convince me that fresh air is horrible and cold and awful, and that the real point of being a young man is to play “Roller Coaster Tycoon” or read Diary of a Wimpy Kid or watch cooking shows on the Food Network. He never wins – although in his mind I’m sure he never loses, either – but he never fails to make me smile – although usually for fatherly purposes I have to keep the smile internal.

Continue reading “Foreign affairs”

(with apologies to Fyodor)

I watched him walk through the lobby entrance and take a seat at the top of the horseshoe, and as he sat down, he asked if I knew how to make a Corpse Reviver.  I asked him number one or number two, and he said “you passed, barman” and after the briefest of pauses he said “number two, if you please” and I got to work.  

He was clearly of the retired political type: well dressed, in the kind of suit that isn’t quite tailored, but it’s at least been fitted properly.  Someone who had to look good on television, not just a backbencher type glad-handing the farmers on weekends.  I vaguely recognized him but not enough to remember what for; it nagged at me.

Continue reading “Four rusty nails”