A More Splendid Life

Selling Stadium Naming Rights in England? Surely You Jest (Infinitely)?

2009-11-06T07:42:00.003-05:00

Most of you, or perhaps some of you, or maybe none of you, considering what sort of literary pedigree you'd have to rock to come by here every day looking for something resembling wisdom or insight, have heard of the late American author David Foster Wallace's thousand page plus tome, Infinite Jest.

I'm not sure what genre you'd classify this novel under, magical realism, realist magic, the college freshman's AmLit Bible, I don't know, but the novel is in some measure supposed to be an over-the-top vision for a corporatized future, where even the years themselves have been allocated for sponsorship money ("Year of the Depend Adult Undergarment").

God how we laughed when we read that. How ridiculously delightful, but we all know there are limits, right?

St. James Park has been a football ground since 1880, and the home of Newcastle United since 1892. It is one of the most recognizable stadiums in England.

SportsDirect was founded by ex-sqaush coach Mike Ashley in the late 1970s. It sells bad brand name trainers at discount prices. God only knows what they'll name Stanford Bridge, but Brian Phillips' suggestion has a great ring to it.

The Rafa Benitez Chronicles Part Two

2009-11-05T15:09:00.007-05:00

He headed down the tunnel, avoided a few picture takers, autograph hounds, his own subs wanting to talk tactics. He signaled to them but avoided conversation, winding his way to an executive office and finding a private bathroom.

He looked in the mirror. "The fat Spanish waiter." His palms were still sweaty, so he washed them and then washed his face. He thought of Bill Shankly for some reason. Then Arrigo Sacchi. Then Bob Paisely, riding the bus through Liverpool after Rome. What he'd give to play Moechengladbach instead of this Lyon side.

And then the tactics for the second half clouded his mind, put him back in the room. Normally he could calm himself by knowing he played his players exactly as they needed to be played according to the circumstances. That was all he could do. Yes, Gerrard and Torres are important, but they are important because my position makes them important.

But his nervousness was still there. It couldn't be the mounting losses, the lack of faith and support from the Americans, how everyone was hounding after his transfer record. These things were nothing to him, never had been, as phony as his look of disinterest on the sidelines. What was it?

He walked back the dressing room to face his youngsters. Carragher looked more red in the face than usual. Fine. He wasn't going to give the rousing European speech, not so far from home, not when he couldn't even point to the away supporters. Just tactics.

The second half and he was helpless in the technical area. Five minutes in he knew Voronin had to go in the mid sixties, and he balked for a second before saying the name. "It's Babel for Voronin." Sammy looked up. Rafa noticed his notebook was gone.

"Babel?"

"Yes." Rafa said resignedly. "Babel." The name always struck a chord with Benitez. He was the towering representative of this team, a club sometimes incapable of speaking the same language both on and off the pitch. Babel was the link, figuratively and literally, between two worlds, the old Liverpool and the new, between Gerrard and Torres. He was the living fulfillment of what this post-Istanbul Liverpool was capable of, and he knew, had known for a long time, that it might not be enough. And he knew there was no one else to blame for that but himself.

Benitez wiped his hands against his sides and Babel scored, a goal of immense technical beauty, worked from outside the box. The bench rose, he could hear Sammy swear, so Rafa checked his watch. A few minutes later and Babel wildly missed kick a crucial free-kick. A feeling of deja vu set in. He remembered the words of the announcer from that night in 1977, "you still wouldn't want to put your mortgage on either side."

Then Kyrgiakos fell over and Lyon scored. Sammy said fuck and the whole bench sighed and he could hear the shutters flashing at an accelerated rate. Rafa laughed.

"No Alan Hansen I suppose."

"The boy still has promise." Sammy chipped in.

"I know. Perhaps I do too."

The whistle blew and Rafa took a few more notes, the pencil a bit steadier now. Before walking down the tunnel, his international squad angling to get past, Rafa turned again to the marvelous blue-lit pitch, almost too perfect, as if the game never happened. He thought of Garnier, of Just Fontaine, of St. Etienne and "Allez les Verts!" and the tragedy of Platini, that someone as lovingly rebellious on the pitch, the sort of player that drove Benitez mad, could be so bureaucratic off it. He smiled and thought they might not be so different.

Then he turned to face the press.

The Rafa Benitez Chronicles Part One

2009-11-05T08:01:00.008-05:00

He had already memorized the team sheet, memorized the formations and counter formations in case Lyon went a goal up in the first twenty-five minutes, where he would slot Voronin in case the first Lyon goal came after the first half. But this, different: the sweat on his palms, the trouble he had gripping his pencil as he jotted notes in the tunnel while Lee said whatever it was he felt needed to be said to the dressing room.

And then out. The beauty of Stade Gerlan, Tony Garnier's utopian vision, improved over the years but with some of the original charm still intact. Still, not a proper football stadium, not a crumbling Anfield, a loud and garish Bernabeu. The light on the grass was perfect though, almost blue. It reminded him of some far off field, from probably before his Aficionado days, playing in some field in Madrid under lights for the first time. His first European night.

"If they they put the hurt on Torres, two three defenders muscling him in the air, we'll make sure Benayoun pushes up," he said to no one in particular. He noticed Lee looking at a notebook of his own. This was a new thing, but Rafa was not in a position to ponder the meaning of this change. His players were warming up.

He thought of the lights at Anfield. When he first arrived there he'd asked about the boot room, but the steward said it was long gone. His English wasn't as manageable then, so he got a few odd looks when he tried to mention he heard Elton John had passed through as Watford chairman. He remembered the steward placing a patronizing hand on his shoulder, "yes, Elton John, good English music. English rock and roll."

Later, he remembered getting taken out on the field and spotting the Kop, instantly remembering the way it shook and swayed as Liverpool fought off St. Etienne in the quarterfinal 1977. He didn't know then he'd see it shake that way again in front of Chelsea, and that bastard Mourinho. Not so long ago. He could remind the press about that.

He asked Sammy, "the away supporters?"

"I don't know. Somewhere back there I think."

But when the whistle blew for kick off, his mind retreated back into into the safety of the tactical layout, observing if players strayed too far from the mark, managed to maneuver in such a way that could feel in the gaps left behind by Gerrard. It was always exhausting; he felt like HAL, his mind going pieces at a time, set-piece by set-piece, corner by corner. The awkwardness of Carragher as fullback, the sullen drives of Gomis. All the while he paced the technical area like a dealer overseeing his corner, knowing at the end of the day's business, everything had to be accounted for.

Then half-time. He jotted down his last few notes, and still, the pencil was awkward to hold, wet in his hands. He turned to Lee: "Could you. Could you please start the team talk? I need to go check something."

"Sure."

"And...what are you jotting down in that notebook?" He asked as kindly as he could, which wasn't very kindly at all. Lee looked a bit caught off guard.

"Um, some ideas. For the end of the second half."

"Ideas."

"They're for me. You know. Not for the players, just so I can remember a few things."

"Okay Sammy. If you'd like to present them, please, just let me know. I'm not a dictator, a General Franco of the bench here. I'll be there in five minutes. Please don't forget to mention the corner incident to Voronin." And so he made his way down the tunnel, not quite knowing where he was going to go.

Part Two this afternoon.

Consider the Provincial Association Websites

2009-11-04T07:36:00.004-05:00

You can learn a lot about an organization from the quality of their website. Fair? I for example am not a design oriented person, although I would like to be. The idea of changing this template for something unique and original by screwing around with code or risking the download of someone foreign layout gives me nightmares. But in the meantime, you get these free, relatively independent-minded and somewhat regularly updated posts. So, neat trade off, even though you wouldn't know this website from Joseph (or the 24thminute) from the look of it. Plus, I'm just one guy working three jobs at the moment.

Yesterday I spent a great deal of time tinkering with my reader feeds, adding new ones, dropping dead ones, and as such I thought it would be good to add some feeds from the various Provincial Association websites. Let's begin with the capo di capo, the CSA website.

Please, and I'm serious here, if you can find an RSS feed for their news section, send it to me. There isn't even a news page as such, just an article with a drop down bar for archived news items. The items aren't categorized, and most of the items with a few exceptions have been covered in more detail elsewhere. There is also a stodgy feel to the site design in general. The CSA isn't alone in the crappy soccer website department (FIFA's is so awful you know the design was awarded to somebody's relative for about 100 million do—Snip! AMSL Lawyers), but it wouldn't take much investment to get a decent designer to come in and wildly improve the thing.

Intrigued by this crappiness, I went on to carefully examine the other provincial websites (all available on the CSA mainpage), most with garish and crowded CSS styled homepages, almost all without RSS news feeds. Some hadn't updated news in a few weeks (the Yukon's, while relatively attractive, hasn't had news updates since March). Maybe there's not much going on, but even if you have to put up a reminder, or a set of important links, websites live and die on up-to-date content.

The winner? Newfoundland and Labrador. Simple Wordpress layout, all pertinent links boringly but obviously laid out on a blue background, RSS feed clearly available, multiple news items dated to November 3rd. That still isn't saying much though; they don't have a proper domain name ('ehosting' still in there? It's ten bucks a year to get your own domain people), there are some pages with almost no content, and registration dates long past relevance, but at least the basics are there.

What does this tell you about the CSA and the Provincial Associations? In my experience, if an organization with major oversight—in this case, associations responsible for overseeing and regulating the most popular recreational sport in the country—can't or don't know how to go about providing decent, updated web content, readable news feeds, and clear site navigation, it means the organization doesn't have the time, or the wherewithal, or the resources to care.

If an organization can't get something like a website right, what does it tell you about their ability to deal with FIFA directives, changes in the player development models, or problems at the national team level? They might not think their websites are that important, but in the modern age if anyone wants to know anything about an organization, they go to the web first. That includes parents, scouts, prospective national team managers, whoever. Surely it would be a good idea for a) the provincial sites to pitch in and agree on a network-type set up, with at least some attempt at streamlining site designs, and b) working to generate better web content. I guess that means c) it will never happen. This is elementary people.

Anselmi on Johnston: We Expected Nothing and We Got It

2009-11-03T09:34:00.002-05:00

Tom Anselmi defended his decision to extend Mo Johnston's contract by saying, and I quote: "Our expectation was to not make the playoffs the first three years. We didn't think we would."

Bra. Vo.

Not expecting Toronto FC to qualify for the playoffs? In a league where half the teams move on to the post season? In three years of play? With a sellout home crowd of 20 000 per game?

Anselmi also said, "I think you have to look at things in context, and the context is that the GM's responsibility is to provide overall leadership and vision for the franchise, to put a roster together, to build the infrastructure [in terms of] coaching, youth academy, scouting and development systems. That's what the job has been about for the past three years, and I think Mo has done a good job."

In other words, that's what Mo was hired to do, that's what he did. But come on, if he'd failed in any of these quarters, he'd be flat out incompetent—he's the General Manager for god's sake. And as far as GMs go, that stuff is the easy part—if it doesn't translate to a competent product on the pitch, what's the point?

The way Anselmi describes it though, describing the mandate of any GM at any start up MLS franchise and defining success solely in terms of meeting that mandate, is a page right out of the CSA playbook. As long as we meet FIFA's mandate for a national soccer federation, job done. On pitch success is a nice bonus, an afterthought.

I fear that the Canadian soccer administrative culture has filtered down to TFC brass.

Some More Thoughts on Toronto FC

2009-11-02T07:16:00.005-05:00

Moving as I do mostly through non-footballing circles, I've been asked, "hey, what's the deal with Toronto FC? Did they make the playoffs? I heard they lost something like 10 nothing to some nobody team in the states."

These post-mortems can get boring, so let me just throw down my two-cents on this club as I see it so we can all move on. I often see games with non-MLS fans, and sometimes non-soccer fans. This is because most of my friends don't really follow soccer (honestly, I think that's the major reason I started this thing so many years ago), but it also gives me a bit of distance from getting so close to the club that I can't see the forest for the trees.

This is one shitty forest. Going back to 2007, it seems, except for a few exceptions, that TFC is only capable of winning games by 1/4 of a goal. It seems that goals were either scored one of the two Double D's, Danny Dichio, and later, Duane De Rosario, or someone else who had no reason to score, like a central defender, or a player who happened to pick up on a sitter from a poorly saved strike.

Toronto FC's play is sluggish. Players take too many touches, afraid to pass. There is not enough movement on the wings. Crossing is poor. Golden chances to score on the break are wasted. Away games might as well be forfeited.

I've heard the thing about passion in the dressing room, dressing room splits, people getting told to get dressed in different dressing rooms, then going on to other clubs and scoring nine hundred goals. I know the stats about how many players have been moved on from this club since 2007. And it's true, there is very much an Anglo-Saxon attitude coming from upstairs, this imitation-Shankly attitude if, "you don't perform, you don't play. Someone is always hunting for your spot, so be afraid at all times. You have to play for this club with pride or not at all."

But pride comes from setting a winning standard. It's nice and all that TFC has such passionate fans, but that alone isn't going to create a situation where players are able to come together and create something coherent on the pitch. Pride comes from some measure of trust from upstairs.

Let's not self-congratulate ourselves into thinking that any competitive coach is going to want to come to this club with the current Sporting Director set-up. We need a general manager on the sideline with an assistant coach. An all-in one package. The Mo Johnston approach is not working. Let's try something else. Three years is enough.

Everyone's Hopped Up on Goofballs

2009-10-30T07:49:00.002-04:00

...and I like it!

Following my weird and wacky vision for a new kind of MLS, which garnered some suprisingly positive reactions, the Canadian Stretford End is pushing the idea for an interim Canadian Soccer League (no, not that CSL) now that Vancouver and Montreal, the two USL-1 finalists, are homeless.

The fact is, localized Canadian leagues have normally operated without a hell of a lot clubs in the past, so notching one or two extra Canadian entrants would probably be enough to sustain MTL and VAN until they restructure in time for entry into MLS proper. And maybe once those clubs leave, you could merge the survivors into the existing CSL, and make it a better shitty league than the shitty league it is now.

These are all ideas, and crazy ones considering where we've come from, but intriguing nonetheless.