Plumb in Front

Rahul Dravid - My tiny story

2012-03-10T13:08:00.002+00:00

There are people I admire, people I aspire to be like and people that remind me that true greatness is not achieved just by doing what you do best but by also making sure that your feet stay firmly on the ground - a quality that many in the public eye do not possess in the smallest measure, when success knocks on their door. For me, Rahul Dravid ticked every box that had to be ticked and more. Unassuming, humble and of course a legend of the game of cricket, Dravid's presence in the Indian cricket team will be sorely missed.

Every Dravid fan will remember him by one or some of his greatest innings. Perhaps he will also be remembered for being the true gentleman that he is. He has played some of the truly outstanding innings of all time. The one that I will treasure though is not one that might come to your mind immediately when you think of Rahul Dravid. The one I'm talking about is his century on the third day of the first Test between India and England at Lord's on July 23, 2011. It did not lead to an India win nor was it Dravid's finest knock by any stretch of imagination. I will treasure it purely because I was there that day to witness the genius in action. Call me a show-off if you wil, but hey, I witnessed a Dravid hundred at Lord's; why shouldn't I boast?

Images courtesy: www.espncricinfo.com

I'm more of an armchair cricket fan. I can count the number of cricket games I have attended, double that number and I'll still have fingers left to count on my hand. Tickets for the Lord’s game were at a premium. In fact, I tried but I did not succeed in getting one. The only ticket I could book in advance was one to the final day of the Oval Test of the same series (when my friends and I were witness to a great knock by Sachin Tendulkar who eventually missed his 100th hundred).

The 22nd of July 2011 was just another day for me. I had got back home after work, when the phone rang. A friend had a spare ticket to the third day's play which he had managed to get at nearly double the original price. Team India in England, first Test of the series, India to bat the next day, Tendulkar on the verge of a hundred centuries. Like any sensible fan, I did not pause to think.

I stood outside the gates at Lord’s with my friend and one of his friends. I realized that they had two tickets and the third was to be given to us at the ground by the person who sold it to them online. We waited... and waited.... the crowd swelled and I was tense. There was no sign of the guy. Calling him only took us to his voice mailbox. Finally, after a number of attempts, he answered. He had arrived at St. John's Wood (the nearest tube station). He had more to say. His ticket had been stolen from his pocket on his way to the ground. We thought we'd been cheated, but at least he did turn up and return the money that was paid to him. Now then, I could not even consider going back home after the excitement which had started building up inside me from the previous night. I had dreamed of watching a Tendulkar century, not just any century, but this hundredth. A huge milestone, one that many cricket fans are still hoping they will be lucky enough to see. After all Sachin is another living legend who I have admired for so many years now. We had no choice. We approached touts who were selling tickets at premium prices. Maybe encouraging ticket touts wasn't the best thing to do. But for just this once, it was. Tickets in hand, we proceeded to our seats. We were late, the game had begun.

Sitting right below the media centre, I took in the atmosphere. I was at Lord’s. Abhinav Mukund was at the crease. As he was from Chennai (the place I relate to in domestic cricket terms), I was quite eager to see how he did. At the other end Gambhir fell to Broad. Dravid walked in to warm applause, from both sets of fans, applause that was also filled with genuine respect. He got down to business as usual. Then Mukund too left the crease for a well crafted 49.

All of a sudden, the noise at the ground reached fever pitch (for Lord’s standards). I got my phone out to capture a video of the great man walking in. The crowd rose to its feet, some sections went slightly mental (me included). The stadium had erupted as Sachin Tendulkar walked in. The ground had been buzzing since the gates opened. Everyone at the ground - English, Indian and people of every other nationality that was there - wanted to see a Tendulkar ton. Now the stage was his. Every run he made was cheered, boundaries were met with reactions normally saved for moments that won matches. Dravid's only duty, from the fans' point of view, seemed to just be to hand strike back to the Little Master. But some sparkling strokes later, Sachin was dismissed. A lot of us felt we had missed out. Will this opportunity come again?

It was after tea. I was only now beginning to truly appreciate - in the middle of all the carnage - the sheer class of an innings being played by Rahul Dravid - a knock of full of guts, sublime technique and unshakeable mental strength. When he ran the 2 runs which took him to his century, Lord’s was on its feet. The applause started. It seemed to never end. Dravid punched the air, showed emotions he not often does and celebrated. An English fan next to me turned to me and said, "Absolute legend. Forget Sachin, this is the guy you Indian fans should be praising to the sky more often". Not the exact words, but definitely on those lines. The applause went on. When he left the field after having played through the entire innings, the crowd rose again to show their appreciation for another truly fantastic innings by Rahul Dravid.

After the day's play, I stood, along with a group of fellow Indian fans, behind the Indian dressing room and managed to catch a glimpse of the man from close quarters. Even after that gem of a display though, most of the screams were for Tendulkar. Everyone wanted to see "God". I proceeded to take a self conducted tour of the ground and was lucky to mutter a few words to Sunil Gavaskar as he left the ground. I sent a text to a couple of friends. It read "Met Gavaskar... unfortunately I didn't know what the hell to say to him". I spoke to a couple of friends. The longest part of the conversation was reserved to mention/boast about my "meeting" with Gavaskar.

Looking back now, that day at Lord’s, summed up most if not all of what Rahul Dravid is about, for me. Rarely was Dravid in the limelight. Rarely has he been given the credit he's due. We took him for granted even though he's not only fancied some of India's greatest wins, but also allowed the team a to take home semblance of respect in devastating defeats like the one in this Lord’s Test.

The man cannot be praised enough. It will be futile for me to try and explain the magnitude of his achievements. Even when he has decided to retire, he didn't announce it one Test match ahead, so the cricket world would focus on him for 5 days and eulogise his career. Dravid retired - like he would do anything else - with class. Plain and simple. Thank you, Rahul Dravid. I salute you. The game of cricket may never be the same again.

Update: If you haven't listened to Dravid speak at the Sir Donald Bradman Oration in December 2011, please do. Every word is worth it.

Investment and sustainable investment

2012-01-08T19:49:00.000+00:00

Dear group members of the Beautiful Game, I'll try my best to be neutral here. I started responding to Anand's post ("Monetary investment is fine in a free economic world") on the comments thread, but as I kept typing, I feared anyone seeing a comment of that size wouldn't bother reading through. So this is for those of you who would have been interested in doing so, presented in the uncluttered environs of Plumb in Front (pretty shameless eh...? So what!). Read on I say...

Before I start on other clubs, I'd like to say that I AM aware of the fact that even the club I support was at one point a benefactor in terms of revenue (rather unfairly, you can say). David Dein, an Arsenal fan who invested in the club was a fanatic and would do anything to see his club at the top. Pre-Wenger he had a huge influence on anything that went on at Arsenal. Dein - after becoming chairman of the Football League Management Committee (FLMC) - along with a few others championed the deal with ITV in 1988 for exclusive rights to home games, that saw the top 5 teams getting a lion's share of TV revenue for a few years. This obviously gave these clubs (Arsenal, United, Liverpool, Tottenham and one more which I can't remember) a significant financial advantage. The formation of the Premier League, meant that these clubs could negotiate better commercial deals (naturally) even though the TV revenue was then distributed evenly once Sky took over. What I'm getting at is that, at the end of the day any club/business will do what (it thinks) is best for itself. Dein and Co., definitely gave the top 5 an edge and its probably the implications of this deal that saw these clubs more successful in the years that followed.

"Monetary investment is fine in a free economic world" - 90% correct.

"Sustainable monetary investment is fine in a free economic world." - is 100% correct, as far as I'm concerned.

At a time when the world's markets are plunging, football seems to be (actually is) thriving in a different solar system. It's unsustainable and it should stop. It will stop. At least that's what I think.

I accept that for a club outside the previous Big Four, the ONLY way to get in amongst them was to spend BIG. The dominance of these clubs would have otherwise definitely continued and we wouldn't have reached this point at which we are witnessing an exciting league with no real big four any more.

While I acknowledge that there had to be spending to give the traditional big teams a run for their money, the manner in which this has been carried out is what makes me give no importance to the success (that may be) achieved as a result. The methods employed by City and in years past by Chelsea astound me for the short termism in decision making. Chelsea's mad spree started in 2003-04 (am I right there?), yet almost a decade letter, I'm not sure they can say they've built up a club that is envied by anyone. Trophies yes. What else? How many managers have stayed there for more than... a year? Can they say they're completely stable? What if Abramovich decides to pack his bags and leave to invest in a kabaddi team in 2019 (assuming we have the Indian Kabaddi League set up by then)? How many players have they invested in from a very young age by buying them at a reasonable cost (sorry but £50m is not reasonable)? How many outstanding players have come through their academy? In my mind, the commercial clout and everything else that Chelsea gained after the first few trophies started pouring in, should have been made use of sensibly, to build a long term plan, a plan that should have considered becoming even more successful by forming foundations that would have seen them dominate, not through further spending sprees, but through an excellent system supplemented by intelligent purchases in the transfer market. I don't see that kind of system in place. After almost of decade of a foreign investor coming in, there are just too many uncomfortable questions.

From what we've seen from Manchester City in the last two years, they seem to be heading down the same path, although this made me 0.0001% more interested in what they're trying to achieve. Even if I was a Man City supporter, I would have been utterly flabbergasted when I heard about the scale of losses that were posted last year. Only one word comes to mind. Unsustainable. A trophy at the end of such massive spending is a minimum requirement and won't be a truly great achievement. Anything less would be a complete/utter disaster. In fact their exit from the Champions League in the group stages is already for me the flop of the season.

I actually hope they win the domestic league in a way, because I'm curious to see how they will build on that. A successful team will financially strengthen the whole club. The question that remains is, will trophies be used as a platform to build on or will it just be the start of a never ending obsession to win-at-any-cost(£££)? That for me will determine whether they're class or classless. This is not aimed at the fans but just at the way this/these club(s) is(are) run.

As a football fan, I'd like my team to win things, but that doesn't look likely in the current climate. Trophies would be great, but it's not an obsession - which it is for many - for me. Arsenal may not win anything this year (Champions league maybe.. heh) or the next year or the year after that, but Arsene Wenger will continue to be a genius in my mind, for the culture he's cultivated at the club; someone who has ensured that this club will be in good stead even years after he eventually says goodbye. Arsenal for me will be a successful club as it is now. We'll be back in the reckoning for silverware when the football bubble bursts. It surely will. Ciao!

Wenger's "failed" youth project

2011-12-17T21:14:00.003+00:00

Three months and a decent revival later, Arsenal have now well and truly gone some way to establishing themselves at the right end of the league table. The nightmarish start to the current campaign, although not yet a distant dream, has now been replaced by a string of solid if not elegant performances. There is still no guarantee that we will finish in the top four this season, but then, it looks like we've given ourselves a bloody good chance. The added experience in the squad has no doubt played a huge part in the resurgence with the likes of Gervinho, Arteta, big Mert and Santos adding some steel and calm to a flamboyant and young team. There seems to be a notion doing the rounds though, that Wenger's investment in experience, has meant his youth project of many years has failed and that he has abandoned his youth policy. I'm not quite sure about that.

Let's take a look at the Gunners' squad. Arsene has entrusted a 20 year old, Wojciech Szczesny with the responsibility of being Arsenal's number 1. At right back, while we have Bacary Sagna as first choice, his immediate back up was the unheralded Carl Jenkinson, who was just beginning to impress people like me with his pin-point crosses from the right flank (although a long way from being close to the class of Sagna in defence), before he was attracted by the comforts afforded by Arsenal's brand new state of the art medical facility. At left back Kieran Gibbs who joined us at 17 is still only 21 and was the preferred starter before another injury allowed Santos to take his place. Djourou joined at 16. In midfield we have Jack Wilshere (not starting only because of injury), with Deeeeench Frimpong and Coquelin who have stepped up this season and are making sure Alex Song (who also joined Arsenal as a teenager) stays on his toes. Aaron Ramsey has been first team material for a while now. Upfront we have Theo Walcott who joined at 16 or 17 and is now a regular starter. Ever injured Diaby joined at 20; is another player who would have played a lot more regularly if not for his injury record. Also not to forget are new signings Oxlade Chamberlain and Miyaichi. Add to this list, some of the reserves who are on the fringes such as Benik Afobe, Ozyakup, Eastmond, Sanchez Watt and Ignasi Miquel (a few starts this season too!) just go to show the number of young players we have who are either first team or very close to being in the first team.

While I have already acknowledged that Arsene has invested in some experience this season, I would argue that he has always bought players who have played at a reasonable level, even if in some cases they weren't always established in the true sense of the word. He has bought players like Vermaelen, Koscielny, Hleb, Lehman, Rosicky, Arshavin, Chamakh, Gallas, Kanu, Gilberto, Sol Campbell, Sagna, Wiltord and more in the past who were by no means teenagers. The players he added this term have undoubtedly more experience than most or all of the players mentioned above at the time of joining Arsenal, but you also have to factor in the departures of Fabregas and Nasri which would have discouraged him from buying people who needed a long time to adjust to the English league.

All Wenger's dealings in the transfer market have also been within reason, taking a path different to certain other teams. The fact that the media and a lot of pundits see this unsustainable spending as a measure of "ambition" is laughable. Anyway, there's no time to go into that now.

I don't think Arsene Wenger will ever abandon his policy of giving youth a chance, and rightly so. The lack of silverware has probably contributed to the "failure" theory but if that's the only measure of success in your mind, I think I've failed and will always fail to make you see the my point of view. As far as I'm concerned the people who think his youth project has ended or failed are either blind and deaf or have their brains located in some place other than their heads. The word failure is not an exaggeration here, its just false. Arsene knows (better than most).

Pleasant Hangover

2011-11-01T09:56:00.001+00:00

Most of us Arsenal fans are still gloating over the 5-3 victory at Stamford Bridge and quite a few others have been asking us not to get carried away. You know who? The people who got carried away themselves after Arsenal lost by that unmentionable scoreline at Old Trafford. In any case, for the record, we're not getting too excited as we very well know there's still almost 30 games to play. We know.

Others have been joining Alan Hansen in crying out loud about the sloppy defending from both Chelsea and Arsenal. While there is a little truth in that claim, after a great game that kept you on the edge of wherever you were sitting, with some decent attacking football, if the only thing you can talk about is the bad defending, you must be a really sad kind of character who fails to enjoy the good things in life.

Arsene Wenger was not one of those people and he was quite chuffed about the "big win". On being asked about the performance of his players he said, "We played a very technical game. Normally we drop a bit physically and mentally in the second half. This time we did it in the first half. That's how we fooled them."

So what was said in the dressing room at half time?

"I don't want to comment on what was said. All I can say is we had enough petrol for the second half, which Chelsea didn't know about."

What did you think of the Chelsea defence?

"I thought our defending has been little bit shit, but today we saw that others can be shit too. Like John Terry."

Should Szczesny have been sent off? That could have changed the game.

"Should Joey Barton have been sent off in our first game? That could have changed little bit our position in the league table."

Talking about slip ups, I remember a couple of years ago, in the Arsenal - Man United Champions league semifinal, we conceded the first goal when Gibbs slipped and provided Ji-Sung Park with an easy opportunity which he duly buried. Wenger was crucified by the usual suspects, who claimed incidents like that were a result of inexperience in the back four. I wondered at the time, how someone slipping on the turf could be equated to inexperience. John Terry has so much experience and has had so much time in that Chelsea back four that he even got to know and bed his mates' wives. Anyway, I think you get my point.

In other news, Robin van Persie has not got a nomination for the Ballon d'Or, which is surprising. Even though he was out for a long time before January, his form ever since definitely merits a nomination. Looking at it in a different perspective, it makes sense. If he was nominated, it would mean FIFA made a sensible decision, which conveys the wrong signals. Now that they haven't, at least we have continuing proof of their "clownsmanship".

Diwali, Coonoor and BSNL make my day!

2011-10-26T15:02:00.000+01:00

25/10/2011

It feels good to be back at home after a seven month gap. Seven months is well short of a million years, but at the same time it’s long enough to make you yearn for all things “local”. It’s only natural for anyone from any corner of the world to feel at home, only at home. It wouldn’t make sense otherwise. It’s like the TV people advertising HD/3D television as an experience that is almost like being at the actual venue. Yes, it’s almost LIKE it, but it’s not it.

After a couple of days in Bengaluru – the latest in the list of awkward sounding Indian cities – I arrived in Coonoor, where my folks had no idea I would turn up. My father was a bit shocked. He didn’t speak for a few seconds; he looked like a subdued Man City fan just after the 6-1 win over United – stunned, but in a good way. Being a Gooner, I just had to squeeze this into my blog considering I've been on the receiving end of those 8-2 jokes for 4-3 weeks now, so if you didn't like it or you think its not funny which isn't my intention in any case, well... move on. Anyway, it was nice to give everyone a surprise and luckily so far every single response I've got has been quite positive. In other words, no one has been left paralysed by news of my arrival. The only negative response has been from my stomach – surprising – which hasn’t warmed to the occasion. The less said on this topic, the better… no really… you don’t want to know.

26/10/2011

The internet at home is down while I type this. Devastated is not the most apt word to express how I feel without it, but I think you get what I mean. Not knowing what happened in the latest round of Carling cup games last night is a big enough disaster, but that’s only a starting point. Other crucial things I’m missing include checking @mentions on Twitter, marking the usual quota of at least 3 emails on my Gmail account as Spam, blocking updates from a few souls on Facebook, using the comments section on The Guardian’s anti-Arsenal blogs (I read them to convince myself that the media is baying for Wenger’s blood – it’s true you know) to praise (read as defend) our self-sustaining business model (which is becoming quite tedious), checking out music on Grooveshark and of course engaging in football chat that makes no difference to the world of football with a few friends on a private group on Facebook called “The Beautiful Game”. The mod who christened it is an Arsenal fan, so the name is no surprise. Isn’t that how football should be played? Hmm … discussion for another day.

Back to my internet woes and I dial the BSNL “helpline” number to find out what’s causing the internet to be down. Considering it’s Diwali and that BSNL is one of the many synonyms for "Indian Government", I’m hardly expecting anyone to answer the call but to my pleasant surprise a guy picks up the phone. The relief in my head is soon replaced by irritation and anger as a result of the operator’s superlatively unhelpful tone.

Me: “Hello… BSNL Dataone?”

Operator: Hello.. …. Enna pa.. enna prachana? (“What’s the problem” but sounded more like “Why do you have to call this early in the morning?”)

Me: “Nethu lendhu internet down anna… (The internet’s been down since yesterday)”

Operator: Appadiya.. phone number kudu.. (“Is it? Give me your phone number.”)

Once I gave him my number,

Operator: Seri… check panraen (Ok, I’ll check)

I was about to ask him if he knew any details, but he’d already slammed the phone down. “Customer is king” is a modern cliché that’s thrashed around often – even when not relevant. Not for BSNL.

I call again two hours later and I guess no one else called before me because the guy recognizes my voice immediately and seems quite irritated by having to attend as many as two calls in two hours. “Anga ennamo fault Sir. Naaliku thaan varum internet” – (“Some fault in your area. Internet will be back only tomorrow”). Again, the phone hangs up instantly. This time I’m a lot happier. He called me “Sir”, told me there is a fault and also gave me a time frame. What more can a customer expect? If that’s not good customer service, I don’t know what is.

My father walks into my room half hour later and asks me about the internet. I tell him what happened and he says, “Well, let me just see if it’s come back on”. I just smile as if to say, “It’s BSNL, they said it’ll be back on tomorrow, so I fully expect that it will be back on next week.” He switches on the PC and the next time I look up, he’s got his online mail box opened up. He gives me a smile suggesting he's somehow fixed it and I smile back suggesting it fixed itself. We both know it's bloody boring and in vain to argue about it. We both are men of few words you see, in one word - WISE.

Anyway since the internet is up and running a lot earlier than expected, I have no complaints. I'll head out on to the terrace to get a feel of the Diwali buzz/flavour that doesn’t seem to have been dampened by the continuous drizzle. See you later...

Van-tastic Pitch-side View

2011-10-16T21:47:00.000+01:00

Courtesy: The Telegraph

I've spent a good deal of money on The Arsenal. It certainly does not compare to what most avid Arsenal fans spend, going to every other game. Yet, after quite a few trips to the Emirates, I felt a sense of entitlement to see the REAL Arsenal. By that, I mean some flowing passes, good possession, and as a bonus - a victory. I got most of that today. Every single penny I spent was worth it (this is compared to my previous visits ONLY of course), mainly due of the genius of Robin van Persie. A flowing move for the first goal before some of the Emirates faithful had even warmed their seats, a sublime chip that came off the post and a brilliant late free kick again from the skipper sealed a deserved win. It did for a long time look uncertain after a nicely taken free kick by Seb Larsson, which I didn't see in real time to be honest.

I've been on a barren run in terms of victories for the teams I support during 2011, but the tide seems to be changing. Very very slowly, mind you. On the cricket and football front it's been dreadful, so for starters I hope India knock the living daylights out of the Poms in the remaining ODIs, after a solid start. Speaking of Arsenal, I'll be a little more cautious, considering the kind of run we've been on. Anyway a win is a win and today I felt really good after the game unlike my experience at the Swansea game when we got a nice helping hand from the visitors.

Talking about the game itself, it looked like Arsenal bossed it (at least from where I was sitting), except for a few minutes before half time when someone accidentally pushed the Arsenal self destruct/handbrake button. I didn't realise Sunderland had scored until the only noise in the stadium was from the 'away' section made me look up from what I was doing (I was busy taking this picture of the skid marks made by Robin on the turf while he celebrated the first goal... yeah... I know!). Sunderland came out in the second half, clearly looking for a draw (strange) and that made Arsenal look better.

Couple of observations/thoughts during and post-game.

1. Why did Arsenal have different people taking every free kick? Surely it's got to be either RvP or Arteta. I know nothing about Andre Santos to be perfectly honest, but Theo Walcott? No. No. No. THAT should never happen. Maybe it's something Arsenal are working on during training, but personally I've never felt Walcott could be good with free kicks. With reference to Walcott in general, this comment I read somewhere made me chuckle - "His deliveries are worse than a blind Royal Mail postman."

2. I'm not whining but it's pretty obvious that we're very reliant on van Persie. If the number of times I've mentioned him on this piece is any indication, he's the only one that seems capable of propelling us towards a top 4 or close-to-a-top-4 finish. Another sterling performance from him means that the papers of course will NOT be talking about it as they will sell more copies if they keep harping about his contract. It's too early to say, but if I was the manager (first of all we'll be relegated to division two) I'd let him run down his contract i.e. if he didn't want to sign a new one. It's very different from the Nasri situation we had. We bought Robin for something like £3 million and he's now been with us for 7 years (with amazing service). He'll also be 30 in 2 years. Make up your own mind on that. Oh, and in response to all those reports of him putting his house up for sale, I read in today's official Matchday programme where in his interview van Persie laughed it off saying the incident happened ages ago and was not even remotely related to his club future. He's settled into another beautiful house... yes... in London. Hopefully when he retires, he's still living in that house.

That's about it then from me in this "match report". My next game at the Grove will probably be Arsenal v Dortmund which will be special as I have a friend coming down to watch the game all the way from Germany. Hopefully I'll be the one calling the shots at the end of it while we down a couple of lagers. Have a great week ahead everyone.

PS: Some extras for you from the ground - One , Two, Three - Trust me. They're worth it.

Need it Here, Now, Today!

2011-10-02T11:14:00.004+01:00

I was guzzling down a pint of beer on Friday evening and engaged in a casual conversation on football, cricket and rugby with my boss. He's been having a great few months with England thrashing India in the recent Test and one day series, Wales faring well in the ongoing rugby World Cup while also taking pleasure in reminding me (maybe once too often) of the not-so-pretty performances of the Indian team and of course Arsenal. We've never got to the point of aiming blows at each other, so it was all in good spirit. We wound up the discussion quickly and soon I was on the train, heading home and all I could keep thinking of was about the way the world of sports has been transformed in the past decade or so. What I'm referring to could have happened earlier, but of course I'm speaking from personal observations and whether I'm right or wrong, I think you'll agree with me on some level.

Every sport undergoes changes but I'm referring not to the sports themselves but to the way in which fans consume sports. Sports persons and sports teams have always been under pressure to perform and of course to win but I don't think there has ever been a time - like now - when only winning would satisfy people (although I don't deny winning is important - I'm not stupid you see) and when winning is the know all and do all of following a team. This leads me to the thought that sports fans are becoming more and more like ordinary consumers. While the relationship between a sports fan towards his/her team is more emotional, that between a consumer and a mainstream brand that sells products/services in more transactional. The sports fan and the ordinary consumer manifest themselves in all of us (who follow sports), but it seems to me that the former manifestation is moving uncomfortably closer to the latter.

The modern sports scene seems to me to be engulfed in ridiculous "short-termism" with instant results expected and patience being considered a not so virtuous route to success. Fans want results, which is fine, but things have reached a point where everything else that distinguishes sport from any other "product" is being overlooked. It's almost like saying, "I'm paying to watch you play, so I'm entitled to expect you to achieve this or that as a minimum" just like saying "I paid for my broadband, I now expect it to work". I wonder sometimes if it was the same earlier and just less evident because of the limited number of outlets for fans to express it through. To a large extent social media has made it possible for every Jack and Jill to vent out frustrations in the way they see fit and this has led some people to shape the opinions of many others. I don't believe that social media is the root cause though.

I feel the mainstream media has played a major role here. There are hundreds of newspapers, magazines and websites competing for our eyeballs and they are willing to write absolutely anything to get our attention. Responsible journalism does not exist any more. Opinions are formed and discarded in the blink of an eye, one day someone's a star the next day the same person's a total failure. For example Phil Jones was being compared to Beckenbauer and 3 weeks later he was being criticized for his failings. My immediate thought was "Come on, the fellow is 19 years old. Give him a little time." Similarly Alex Oxlade Chamberlain, another exciting prospect after scoring on his Champions League debut, has been praised endlessly. I won't be surprised if we see a "The Ox in Crisis" blog sometime soon. The causes of this trend are many and this space is definitely not enough to go into detail but it's just a thought that I wanted to put out.

People will say almost anything to "sell" their opinions and too many fans take the bait. I'm well aware that I might be looking at this through Arsenal tinted glasses and also after looking at selected sources but I still think its definitely a trend that is present at some level and one that could ruin the essence of sport which is about the lows as much as it is about the highs. I'm in a world of my own and a full blooded encounter on a football pitch is enough to set my mood up (or down) for a weekend. I'll let it continue like that rather than fret too much about the rest.

Time to get geared up for the derby game then. Oh and whoever wins, it will not signal any shifting of the scales to one side of North London. It's October for God's sake. That can only be decided at the end of the season. Here's hoping that RED is the colour that dominates this afternoon. Speak later!

Of Number Crunching and Joey Barton

2011-08-27T12:45:00.002+01:00

It's that time of the weekend. Premier league games are going to be hitting our TV screens in a few hours. It's about now when Twitter time-lines start filling up with previous match-ups between teams, win-loss records, goals scored against this opponent, goals scored by Mr Soso etc. While a lot of these statistics are quite interesting and give us a way to use up some time before the actual games begin, this number crunching has gone way too far nowadays that sometimes I find that some of it, actually most of it, is just useless.

Stats are good, but at the end of the day they're just stats. I'm not completely blind to suggest that all stats are useless, but the thing about this overdose is that now we have stats not based on actual events, but even on hypothetical situations, that are probably playing out in some parallel universe. The irritating part is that you can manipulate these numbers to make a good situation better, a bad situation worse or basically any way to prove a point that you want to prove. Now if you ask me why I'm coming up with this anti-stat rant it's because I started thinking about it when I saw this USELESS stat that I'm going to talk about.

Now I think we are all aware of the fact that Arsenal are in some deep shit. Well not so much as before the game against Udinese, but there's still some stuff to worry about. My worry is that many people want to make us believe that this shit smells worse than it actually does. I saw a tweet the other day that said something like, "If the Premier league were to start after THAT Carling Cup final when Arsenal snatched defeat from Birmingham, Arsenal would now be in 15th position with just 13 points" after (conveniently for these stat gurus) starting the actual new season with a draw and a loss". Now don't quote me on the exact numbers, because if I was serious about it, I would've either remembered it or at least bothered to check again before I told you. Doing that would also defeat the purpose of my argument that too much of this stats stuff is a health hazard.

Going back to the one I was talking about, now why do we need to know Arsenal's position in an imaginary league? No, seriously... We all know the season starts in August and ends the following May. In that case I can bring up my own stat and suggest that Arsenal have won the league every single year for the season that starts in mid May and ends mid August. Yes, you're right, that's when nobody is playing football in England. So what? Whatever it is, mathematically, or alphabetically rather, Arsenal will be top of the league forever, unless we get relegated or of course if someone like Alsager Town, Appledore, Andover New Street (these are real teams, I didn't make them up) or one of those with a better thought out name make it to the Premier League. Okay, I get it that I've given you nonsense instead of a useless stat but hey, that's what useless stats are too - NONSENSE.

Anyway moving on, a more interesting topic. Thuggery or in simple terms, Joey Barton. Rumour has it that he's already penned a deal at QPR. I have to say that I'm quite disappointed that he's decided to move there. Not that I care about him. It's just that Arsenal will now have to play against him two more times, meaning the chances of our players being sent off is enhanced. So we'll easily exceed the 6 Red Cards we picked up last season (there you go, a useless number). I'd suggest that Arsene Wenger buys an extra body in the team who will cover for suspensions, maybe SuperMario or Superman like someone said on Twitter. These guys of course can play in any position and therefore naturally possess the super, super quality that he's after.

Time will tell, I suppose. I'll leave you with that. I'm going to spend the rest of my day watching Barton's Twitter time-line to see when he confirms more misery for Arsenal, along with a saying from his book of a million quotations.

Thoughts from inside the Emirates + Arsene still Knows Best

2011-08-21T13:32:00.001+01:00

Walking into the Emirates yesterday, to watch the first home league game of the season, my emotions were a mix of cautious excitement and of course like a lot of Arsenal supporters, a feeling of anxiety which has surrounded the club over the last few months in particular. Wenger's dealings in the transfer market, or the lack of it, have left a lot of fans disgruntled, and this was evident as the match wore on or rather as Liverpool edged closer to sealing the three points at the end.

It all started quite brightly, to be honest, and the atmosphere inside the stadium was great, although it wasn't extraordinary. The announcement of Nasri in the playing eleven invited a few boos (as expected), but I think the majority realized that the team needed him there (and he proved that with a very good performance), with the squad being stripped to its bare bones through injuries and suspensions. The first half didn't inspire a great deal, apart from a couple of chances on either side. Frimpong was having a great little spell and he seemed to be really up for it. He got a great shot on goal, then turned around to all of us in the stands and egged us on to make some noise. The crowd reacted and there was suddenly a wave of loud support. There was a genuine sense of appreciation for the Arsenal as they headed off into the tunnel at half-time, for the fight they had put up with the resources at their disposal.

The red card for Frimpong in the second half of course changed what could have been a well deserved draw to an unlucky defeat. We were not shown replays of the tackle and to us it just looked like they had run into each other. I think most of those who watched the highlights on MOTD would have realized that it was in fact a bad challenge. The goals for Liverpool heightened the sense of frustration around the Emirates, and a section of the crowd broke into the "Spend some F***in money" chant. I don't see a place for this during a game, when you have 11 men playing their heart out for your club. Such chants while it might not affect the players too much doesn't help them either. The encouraging fact was that it didn't gain momentum and a couple of those in front of me who started chiming in, stopped as soon as they realized that most of us weren't interested in joining. Another section of the crowd then brought back the "We love you Arsenal" chant which garnered more support and that was good to see. It was a bit disheartening to see a number of people leave before the game ended but then for all of us who stayed back, it was a chance to applaud the team for putting up a spirited display and show them that we were behind them.

While the defeat hurt, I liked what I saw of Arsenal's young guns. I know a lot of you might say we have to spend and the usual lets sign Cahill/Samba/whoever the media links us with. I too am not blind and do realize we need a few reinforcements but I have a lot of faith in the manager and at the end of the day I think he knows what he is doing. We can go on and on about what has to be done, but I'd rather have Wenger decide what's best for the club. The man is an absolute genius and immortal IN MY OPINION.

I dream of a day when Arsene Wenger has his hands aloft with a trophy in hand, after having won it with a team that was made with his vision, and those who wrote him off running around the streets naked with their unmentionables covered (I don't want to see that bit) with print outs of all their criticisms of Wenger/Arsenal strung around their waist with a piece of thread. I really hope it can happen soon, not for the sake of Arsenal winning a trophy, but because I want to see that joy on Wenger's face for all that he has had to face in what has been his most challenging time at the club. Whether that day comes at the end of the current season or a few seasons later, I'm prepared to wait and continue to support this great club. If it does miraculously happen this season, remember, you heard it here first.

Defence of the Arsenal Defence

2011-08-17T14:29:00.003+01:00

In case you missed the CL qualifier, I just want to start off by saying that Arsenal actually won the match against a relatively fancied Italian opponent, clean sheet intact and all that, although some newspapers might have you believe that winning nowadays is not the point. The media have been banging about on how Arsenal just escaped, how SZCZ's saves barely rescued us from embarrassment, how frail the team was and so on. It seems to me that most of these nut-cases who wrote these reports had started with an already planned agenda before even watching the game. Now, while I acknowledge the fact that there is frustration in Gooner world around Arsene Wenger's reluctance to splash the cash in the transfer market, those wearing the Red and White on the pitch did a lot to lift our spirits and gave us a win.

Some articles suggest we just got away while others said that if not for Chesney (can't spell his name) it could have been a disaster. I wonder if giving credit to an Arsenal outfit has gone out of fashion or something. Okay, the Arsenal defense needs strengthening and we all know that. Still, negative vibes continue to engulf the Arsenal back four which is partly if not mostly created by the media. This, to the extent that it seems opposition teams should not even be allowed to have a shot at goal, for the defense to be appreciated. If a few minutes of thought are put in it will be quite easy to remember that during the match the sub who came on to replace an injured left back, had to be subbed, and a former league 1 defender came on and played on the opposite flank to the one he's used to, in his first ever competitive appearance for the club. Despite all this the clean sheet remained in-tact and so please allow me to salute the Arsenal defense. However bad they might have been in seasons past, they've kept two clean sheets. Credit where it is due. If they fumble, we'll give them a hard time when it happens.

Speaking on this topic, I just remember Arsenal v Man City last season. Arsenal tore their defense on a number of occasions that day, hit the post twice I think and forced some very good saves. In the post match reports though, the Man City defence wasn't shit, it was the Arsenal offense that was shit. Imagine, Man Utd winning their next trophy on the last day of the season (1-0) perhaps with De Gea making some spectacular saves and then waking up the next morning to read a headline, "Man Utd scrape through to take title in-spite of defensive blunders". Yeah, just imagine, because it ain't gonna happen. Man Utd winning could happen, but you're more likely to read something like, "Character shines through, Utd win the title" or "Magnificent De Gea epitomizes the winning mentality at Manchester Utd". Ah well...

Anyway now for some news. Seems Kenny Dalglish is looking for a new left back. The new guy was doing the "kick-ups" at his unveiling and the ball dropped after three touches. Dalglish is therefore not happy and he's on the market again. Meanwhile Fabregas passed the "kick-ups" test admirably and has since been given a thorough induction at Barcelona (despite already possessing the DNA). I heard that diving, peeking at the referee through fingers to see if a card was given to the opponent(while clutching face), public speaking (to tap other players who have Barca DNA) were all on the agenda plus an added e-learning module on "How to behave like a cunt". So prepare to see him engaging in the same kind of cunt-ery that we've got used to from Barca, in the near future. As much as a lot of Gooners like him, I'm afraid he's one of them now, which is sad, but true. He used to be skipper at Arsenal and probably part of Plan A, B, C and any plan that existed for the last few years. Now he's plan B (Bench perhaps?) at Barca. At least I hope that bench has a nice cushion or something.

Salute to last night's Arsenal defence again.

Please let the football begin

2011-07-21T21:28:00.002+01:00

Aren't we all fed up with all this transfer talk? I don't know about fans of other clubs, but if you're an Arsenal fan who sees a blog on Fabregas, Nasri or even Wenger or Gazidis you probably just go - Oh no, not again! Maybe we should just have like a social network for clubs to conduct their business and make it public for the whole world to see. Now that would be fun. Okay, not so much for football journalists, who'll have to actually think of something creative to write about when there is no football on, but it would benefit the footballing society in general.

It should be something like a combination of Facebook, Ebay, YouTube, Twitter and emm... okay let me throw in Google+ as well, just so that it doesn't feel left out. It should be made mandatory for all managers, players, coaches, scouts etc. to join (yes, even Arsene Wenger will need to create a profile even though he prefers to do his transfer business privately in a dark cave in the French Alps).

Imagine how happy Man City would be with this kind of idea. I can see this kind of a reaction from them - "We no longer need to scout for players, we don't do so now either, but then everything being public online will make our work easier. We will follow players being scouted for by the top teams and then make sure we bid anything from 50p to £1m more than what they offer to sabotage their deals. Our current scouting team will probably be fired. It's a highly sustainable business model." On the other side Arsenal would probably be devastated by such an innovation. They would hardly use it as they rarely buy players and therefore might constantly forget their transaction password when they actually do want to buy.

Doing all negotiations online will only cust down costs for clubs. Imagine for example Barca's phone bills the last 3 years that they've been after Cesc, constantly calling Wenger and Gazidis, calling media contacts to publish 'Cesc-y' stories, phoning their own players asking them to tap up Cesc. Bloody expensive. With the new technology, they could just "Poke" Arsenal FC and then their players could give it a 'Like' or '+' or the equivalent so that everyone knows what's happening and who's interested in whom. Fans of course would only be able to view, as if they could comment then there would be too much bile for people like Xavi, however deserving it may be. Talking of Xavi, here is an interesting read on his love for Cesc.

And if you haven't been following the Cesc-Barca saga, and want just a summary, this is how @ArsenalGent sees it and probably sums it up quite nicely.

"I have sent the chauffeur to buy a new car. I have told him to FIGHT TO THE END for it.

The chauffeur is at the showroom. Despite telling the owner that we would really like the car in question, he is insisting upon a payment!

I have told the chauffeur to tell everyone in the village that the car has Gent DNA.

I intend to get a substantial discount on the car as I used to own the chassis and the transmission eight years ago."

Now if you're a Gooner, go straight to Twitter and follow this guy, because he is a legend according to me. If you're a Chelsea, Barcelona or Tottenham supporter run in the opposite direction as you will soon realize he's a prick, unless you want jokes that you won't find funny filling your time line and want to spend a good portion of every day trying to get back at him and to tell him that he's a prick. But if you're as funny/sarcastic as he is and want to engage in a conversation, let me know as I'd be happy to waste some more of my time on Twitter.

I'll try and find something a little more interesting next time I post. Till then, think about a name for that football transfer social network. Then we'll propose the idea to Blatter.

Show Me the Money

2011-06-17T23:45:00.006+01:00

Moneyball

I hear a lot of talk that is ridiculing Arsenal's refusal to budge when it comes to player wages. Samir Nasri is of course the subject of this speculation. He tells us through his Twitter feed not to believe the papers, but we all know the truth don't we? He wants some extra cash and based on his performance in one... err.. sorry half a season, he thinks he has somehow earned it. He's an excellent player no doubt, but now the situation is quite dicey. I still think he'll stay but his image has been tarnished. Even if he stays he'll find it extremely difficult or impossible to get into the good books of Gooners again. Anyway if he can perform, thats all we would really care about.

A lot of fans (especially opposing fans) are saying "Oh, just give him the little extra cash and get him to stay". But this view does not consider the larger context in which it must be seen. The amount of money Nasri seems to be demanding is in no way unaffordable for Arsenal Football Club. But again, there's more that needs consideration and its by no means rocket science. Lets look at this in a slightly broader perspective, shall we?

First of all, we are not owned by some Russian mafia with a bottomless pit of money or a Sheikh who - like Arseblog puts it - can offer every player a spaceship (or 2... or 3) in addition to his wages. Arsenal have a rigid pay structure and their financial stability is unmatched by any other club. If you disagree with this point you'll probably disagree with everything I say from here on, so you should try and find some other tosh to read. Even with their self sustaining model, Arsenal's expenditure on player wages increased by £4.5 million between the 08-09 and 09-10 season (This is not a random number. I've lifted it from Arsenal's financial results). Now couple this with the fact that Arsenal make over 40% (figure from Deloitte's Money League) of their annual revenue through matchday sales which clearly indicates that a good portion of any increase in operating costs will have to be transferred over to the fans.

So if Arsenal were to say "Chuck it! Have your extra money Mr. Nasri, we need you at any cost", what is the guarantee that more players will not be encouraged to make similar demands. If that happens what are the long term consequences? Who does it affect? The fans of course. I personally cannot claim to be a very faithful fan (in terms of attendance to games) as I have attended just one home game. Even then, as I was a student at the time, I felt the pinch after coughing up (there was blood if I remember correctly) almost £70 for the game against Man Utd which we proceeded to lose quite handsomely. I watched Ivan Gazidis' recent interaction with a few hundred Arsenal fans and I was absolutely in awe when I heard this fan who was from Cornwall (300 miles from London), said he travelled to every single home game. A comment (this one maybe a slight exaggeration) from another fan went something like this - "I chose to get be an Arsenal season ticket holder rather than having another child. Now it looks like bringing up a kid might have cost me less". This year ticket prices have gone up 6.5% and fans like him are seriously considering not renewing their season tickets. So I think we need to be more measured when we ask the club to throw out some extra cash as any over the top spending will result in the fans suffering. If the fans stop turning up, there goes the revenue. Simple eh?

I do want Arsenal to win trophies and have great players but not at the cost of it leading to financial suicide. It is true Arsenal have not spent much in last few seasons but I think the people in charge have long term stability in mind as well. So when Arsenal's rigidity in the wage structure is criticized, lets take a step back to think of the bigger issues. If Nasri wants to sign the contract before the July 1 deadline, well and good. If not, well then goodbye Sir. Thank you, but you're not bigger than Arsenal FC. We'll find someone else.

Thoughts are welcome, though I'd appreciate if random stuff like "Oh you don't have a trophy to show for all this" is not thrown around here. If you want that, I'll make arrangements another day (I won't be there of course as I'll have to track back 6 years to the last trophy which will be quite painful). Cheers.

Needle in a haystack

2011-06-11T11:17:00.000+01:00

Wake up in the morning nowadays and all you see in the papers, at least in the football section, is about which player/manager might be going where, what fee is expected, what fee/wage is on offer, players' wage demands and then you'll see some of these players emphasising the fact that they were moving for "footballing reasons". Yeah right! The was precisely the reason why, in my previous post, I said I was flabbergasted when it was reported that the Hiddink-Chelsea deal was finally down to money. Of course, it was down to money. If Chelsea were to offer significantly less than what Hiddink was being paid in his role as Turkey national coach, I have no doubt that he would at least see out his contract before thinking of the next job. This is not to undermine Hiddink's integrity or his lack of interest in the Turkey job. It is just the way football works these days and is just one of a million examples.

Another story that has consistently been in the news for the last couple of weeks is the Nasri situation. It is turning into one of those protracted transfers that helps no one, least of all, us fans. Whether he will begin next season in a United or Arsenal shirt remains to be seen, though I am quite convinced that Wenger will not let one of his best players leave to a top, rival team. Nasri and his agent are just looking for that extra cash and if he does leave I am pretty sure it won't be to United. One good (half) season and he has demands. When Cesc says he wants to leave, or wants a pay rise, its understandable and as a fan you feel he has served the club well and has been loyal. For his age he's shown great maturity and handled the Barca situation extremely well over the last two seasons.

Amid these kind of dull, depressing and monotonic stories of wages, transfer fees and football agents, a story where someone pledges his future to his club, even though he has another job offering double the salary and funds to invest in the transfer market at a club with European ambitions, it is a breath of fresh air. Roberto Martinez is truly a needle in a haystack. As clichéd as that might sound, that is precisely what Martinez is. I've always had a great respect for the guy and the way he handled situations. On the last day of the season just gone by, I was just hoping with all my heart that Wigan stayed up. Not because I was a fan (being an Arsenal fan Wigan normally brings back memories of THAT game when they beat us from 0-2 down in the last 10 minutes) but because I have huge respect for Martinez. I hope for his sake that Wigan have a great 2011-12 season.

On a related note, I just watched Carl Jenkinson's first interview at Arsenal and it was pleasing to see an Arsenal fan who has progressed to now becoming a player for the club. He and his family are life long Arsenal fans and he says his dad has been a season ticket holder for the last 40 years. A proud dad he will be now. I'm happy for Carl and hope he becomes a legend. I know nothing about his skills to be honest, have never seen him play, but one thing is for sure. He loves the club and has his heart at the club. I'm pretty sure he's going to be a great servant to the club, provided he is not a terrible player (surely we wouldn't have bought him if he was) and Arsenal have to sell him on.

Martinez and Jenkinson have given something that is normally missing in the transfer window and that has made my week. Now my mind is on hoping Arsenal win the games I choose to go to this next season because I've just signed up for membership and the only two games I've been to until now have resulted in 3 goals being scored against us and therefore of course losing, both times to Manchester clubs (once at home-Utd and once away - City). I have been glued to Arsenal Player (which is awesome) watching old highlights and interviews since last night and probably will be for most of the weekend. So on that note, ciao!

Truths, untruths and things in-between

2011-06-08T23:32:00.002+01:00

Have any of you heard of the quote "Nobody ever sees truth except in fragments"? Well I haven't either. And I'm not an ultra creative person, who can whip out a funny or thought provoking line in the blink of an eye and therefore I can confirm it's not mine. I relied on Google and found this one after a search that lasted approximately 0.23 seconds which fits nicely into what I'm going to harp on for a little bit. Now just look again at the quote as I'm quite sure you've forgotten what it was in the middle of all the drivel that has followed it.

Lets start with Robin van Persie shall we? So we heard that he asked the players of Spain and Chelsea to concentrate on football and stop complaining about the referees. Well not exactly in the same manner as I, but using some of the English language's choicest words. Then we had some of the Chav blogs reacting instantly, some obviously saying that RvP was a c***. That is expected of course and proceedings were fun for a little while on Facebook, Twitter, blogs and even some otherwise boring news websites. Then all of a sudden Robin comes out of the closet and says he never said anything like that in the first place, spoiling all the fun in the process. So someone said he said it, he says he didn't, we believe the version we feel is best suited to our egos and life goes on with the episode registered in memory for use in future discussions with opposing fans.

Next up, Samir Nasri. Oh how we Arsenal fans loved this guy for half a season. Then for the next half he was anonymous. Now all of a sudden he's open to moving to United and that too fighting over a few thousand quid a week. Finally he comes out on Twitter that we fans shouldn't assume anything and that he would let us know. Like @Arseblog put it, just some fire-fighting after the initial speculation just in case he stays at the Arsenal. Oh okay Samir, do let us know but I guess we'll know before you tell us. If you stay at the club and play well I personally and most Arsenal fans will forget all this nonsense like it never happened. Otherwise good luck to you when you visit the Emirates. Sometimes we fans are just dummies in this whole transfer speculation circus. Actually it's all the time. I must credit Arsenal FC though at this point as they normally remain tight lipped on every deal until there is something concrete to talk about.

Finally we have Rio Ferdinand who denied having tapped up Nasri as the media had us believe, by saying he made those comments long before all this speculation started (What a horrible profile picture he has on Twitter by the way!!!). Well Rio, as much as I'd like to believe you, I'd rather not. You see, I'm an Arsenal fan and I'll believe the version that suits me the best. It just makes it more interesting for me, so I can say things like you Man United players learnt nothing from meeting Barca in the CL final apart from the art of tapping up our players before any official interest was expressed by the interested club. The media are the biggest culprits in all these instances and more, but they are not going to listen to us when we ask them to shut up as they're quite thick skinned and very few messages reach them if any. So I guess we'll all just feed on the fragments we get and choose what we want to believe.

On a totally different note, I just remembered a headline in The Guardian today which read something like "Hiddink deal is down to money in the end". Why? Was it peanuts or horse shit the deal was about earlier? Get a life. If it wasn't about money, he would just finish the job he's doing at the moment and not speak in the media about his interest in England. So yeah that's it from me for now. I'm going to go away looking for another set of fragments and decide what I'll have as the truth. Later.

Nothing you didn't know

2011-06-04T18:49:00.006+01:00

It's that time of the year. There's not much football on and life is well, not boring but then there are time slots on weekends that need to be addressed. Since doing something constructive with my free time does not come naturally to me, hours and hours are spent reading things of very little importance on the internet. Thankfully I have a job now, which takes up my time during the week.

Image Courtesy: Vetty Pictures

It's a time for reflection, especially since I'm an Arsenal fan. Think of how things could have turned out last season, how things could turn out next season and how things could turn out in the season after next when the next one doesn't go to plan. This is also a time when I get excited about any shred of transfer talk related to the club. First I read an article, then try to find at least three or four more to try and validate whether the first one was pure garbage (which it is nine times out of ten) and then think why I read it in the first place. When I'm tired of doing that, thoughts go to the upcoming season and a renewed, over optimistic sense of hope sweeps across me before it all comes to a grinding halt. That's when I suddenly remember that what I'm going to witnessing at the end of July will be a bunch of unheard of players with un-pronounceable names taking to the Emirates pitch for the Emirates cup wearing the Emirates, sorry Arsenal jersey, playing to rules that increase our chances of winning, then winning and finally pledging that THIS is going to be THE season.

Speaking of the Emirates cup I've been thinking of going this time round to watch The Arsenal taking on the Red Bulls, for which tickets still seem to be available - I am shocked by that fact. Why miss out on witnessing our main trophy hope of the season? Anyway I really want to go as I am yet to watch Arsenal winning a game (only two attempts made so far) and with the Emirates Cup there is a high probability that we will win a couple of matches and the trophy all in one weekend. Hmmm... why is there no major trophy where we could win two games and walk away with some silverware? Never mind, we might still bottle it if there was a competition like that.

On another note Brad Friedel joined spurs and therefore lost all the respect I had for him. Not that he would care, but anyway he's joined the Spuds, so from now on he deserves no more than what the rest of them get from the better side of North London. It's good in a way because if Arsenal want a new keeper who fits the Arsenal goalkeeping philosophy Gomez would be a like-for-like replacement for Almunia. Bringing him in will ensure we'll have a shot at the 2012-13 Europa trophy. On the topic of respect, Barcelona deserve every bit of it for the kind of football they played to destroy United but the superiority of their players doesn't extend for even an inch off the pitch. The only thing they seem to be interested in other than playing mesmerizing football is coaxing Cesc to "join us". The latest quote is from David Villa - "Having him(Cesc) would be a great joy and I'd be happy for him because he deserves it, and I'd be happy to have him as my team-mate." Only he can say what he would enjoy so much considering that if Cesc does go, his backside would mostly be stuck on the bench. Most Arsenal fans, me included hardly care whether or not he leaves now as long as it is at a good price and the money is used on another quality player. Oh alright, that won't happen.

The last few days though have been interesting with van Persie giving Chelsea and Spain his best compliments, the Chavs getting offended (it's only natural isn't it, their blogs full of the news) and then Mr. Glass legs denying that he ever said such things. Whether or not he said it hardly matters does it? Keeps the fans engaged and riles people up until the next insignificant incident. In other news Jack Wilshere had a shave last week and posted a picture of himself on Twitter and it brought about 500 comments in the next hour (figures courtesy @ladyarse), Rooney had a hair transplant to cover the gaping hole he had where his brain was and I was luckily standing outside the clinic to get a picture of his new look.

Okay I've had enough. I'm going to go back to doing nothing. Later...

What made you support your chosen club?

2011-05-20T23:19:00.001+01:00

I come from a country where cricket is a religion. Oh wait, there is another way to say it now. I come from THE country whose cricket team are currently the World Champions. While cricket has been, still is and will be a big part of my life, I consider myself a bigger football fan than cricket fan. To be more specific I'm an Arsenal fan (those few souls who read this blog probably know by now). Until a few years ago, a lot of my friends looked at me like I was an alien when I said I supported a club team which I was in no way associated with geographically or otherwise. As the years rolled by a lot of the very same people are as passionate about their own chosen football club team.

My fascination for Arsenal started with the advent of cable television at home (I say home because it was only a few years after cable television entered India, before it became a standard norm in many Indian households like mine) and the fact that Arsenal were there or thereabouts when it came to winning championships. The English league was the most televised at the time (it still is) and I developed a taste for it, as I already had a deep inclination towards sports.

It is true though that the factors that influence the decision making process of which club to support are different for different individuals. For local football fans, geographical affiliations or 'ancestral pressure' (not sure I found the right phrase there; but you get what I mean) make it a straightforward choice as to which team they support. For some foreigners, when one of their favourite players from their country goes on to play for a foreign club, that can become a starting point for him/her to follow the player's new club.

We (a few Indian football enthusiasts) had a little discussion on the topic of why and how people choose specific teams to support, on the football group we have on Facebook. We all support different teams, mostly English teams; well mostly Manchester United. Considering that almost all of us on the group are of Indian origin, the question on my mind was, "Why do Manchester Utd fans outnumber the rest in our group?". The answer is one word and is straightforward - SUCCESS.

The success of a sports team is definitely one if not the biggest factor when it comes to choice of team. Even for fans who support a team based on say geographical affiliation, success or the lack of it, does make a deep impact (now the definition of success is another story altogether, its different for different clubs). This is not just a tall claim; I have evidence. In a study I conducted, I found on an Arsenal FC fan forum that in a thread that talked about the team's chances in the following season, 63% of the posts mentioned past winning teams or the names of players involved in those triumphs. Although failure to win cannot convince these fans to switch allegiance (called brand switching in the mainstream business world) to another club due the high level of emotional attachment they have with their club, their psyche can take a big blow. Therefore it comes as no surprise that Manchester United based on their tremendous success for well over a decade command undoubtedly the biggest fan base in a country whose own league is well.... never mind... let me not go into that.

This topic deserves further discussion, but it would be better to know what you think and it's probably one worth further discussion. So, when and why did you start supporting the club you support?

It's IPL time again.... Yawn

2011-04-17T01:41:00.000+01:00

The latest installment of the IPL is a week old as I write this, and we Indians haven't even had the time to gloat over a famous World Cup win. I have yet to watch a full game and the credit (of course I'm being sarcastic) goes to some of our favorite commentators, all back after being rested for the World Cup. Laxman Sivaramakrishnan says, "Oh yes! Happy to be back. Had to keep myself fit for this one. That's why I opted out of the World Cup sponsored by Money Gram International, Reliance Communications, Castrol, ESPN Star ....... ", all this hoping that at least a few of the brands would pay him a few Rupees for mentioning their names on live television. It's hard enough for cricket fans, having to many times miss the first and last ball of an over because of a commercial break and now we have these dimwits at the mercy of advertisers playing out the audio versions of the commercials almost every alternate ball. LS can be excused because that's probably as close as he'll get to featuring in a TV commercial.

Mandira after failing the IPL commentary test

Navjot Singh Sidhu's exuberance at the pre and post match shows for the WC on Star Cricket either caught the IPL eye or he threatened to stab someone with a cricket stump if he was left out. I pity Sanath Jayasurya who as it is looks like a character in those old "Caught in the wrong job?" Monster Jobs adverts. What a contrast to the on-field Sanath. A tweet I saw posted by someone last week truly summed up Sidhu's domination of events in the Set Max studio, "After five dot balls, Sidhu takes a single and retains the strike".

And how can we forget Arun? Some of my friends like to call him Arun LOL. For those of you who don't know him, I cannot help but think how lucky you should feel. Ignorance in this case is truly bliss. Then there is also Danny Morrison and I have to say he's as bad a commentator as the rest, repeatedly indulging in the advert hungama albeit with a Kiwi accent. I wanted some alternate commentary and I happened to come across Pitch Invasion and unfortunately I was still left disappointed. They seem to have only three people on the team now (2 Tamils and a Bengali guy, so quite a few Tamil PJs) but their tweets seem to suggest they'll get more firepower added. If you can't be bothered to check, I'll keep an eye on developments and let you people know if it's as funny as we already get on TV.

Even with all the comic relief, the usual buzz around the IPL is missing. I confirmed this fact when a certain Santhakumaran Sreesanth (check out his latest hairstyle here), picked up a wicket in his first over, in front of his home crowd and didn't leave his team mates embarrassed with a noisy celebration. In contrast did anyone see his face after the World Cup final? After a terrible spell that almost cost India the game, he had a huge smile on his face at the end which became bigger when he noticed that Harbhajan Singh was crying. "Never mind that those were happy tears," he says, "At least I had to be slapped to start crying. Look at him!"

Oh, and yeah Lalit Modi is missing. If he was around there would have been some corruption allegations and fake money talk flying around. Now that the politicians are back in charge, we still have all that, but unfortunately these men are proven masters at brushing things under the carpet.

In some breaking news, un-related to the IPL, Ashish Nehra announced that he will be hanging up his boots with immediate effect. Wait, there's more. He's opening a bowling academy called 'Spray it like Ashish'. The pitches will be made favorable for bowling, and with 10 stumps instead of three to aim at, at each end. Nehra was quite candid responding to a query regarding his ignorance of the rules of cricket saying, "If batsmen have the luxury of hitting to any part of the ground, we should at least be allowed to bowl all over the pitch". And I'll leave it there on that emphatic note.

I say, “KOP-y this”!

2011-02-08T12:04:00.002+00:00

Now that all the hype over Fernando Torres' move to London has died down it's time to shift focus to another interesting development concerning one of English football's biggest clubs. Liverpool FC now has an online version of ‘The Kop’, which is a development in the social media sphere cannot be ignored, especially from a sports marketing angle. It is a proper social media hub developed by a football club just for their fans and it is the first of its kind that I've known of. It is interesting from a marketing perspective, for the club and other football and/or sports clubs and organizations and also for the fans.

Looking at it from an internal marketing point of view, creating their own branded closed space for fans and bringing them together as a community, gives Liverpool FC a chance to capture information about their fans and get to know them better, therefore giving them direct access to their fans without depending on a third party network. This will also let them easily shape conversations around Liverpool FC. Most of the top Premier League clubs now have a presence on Facebook, Twitter or both, and this has allowed them to get closer to their fans and also gave clubs an idea of how many people were actively following them online. Also, since the Premier League’s popularity has become global, a social media presence allowed clubs to get a rough idea of their following outside the UK and actively monitor what was being said about them. Even after these advancements, there are certain areas that are lacking. It is common now to see fans commenting on clubs’ Facebook posts, but the level of interactivity between fans is minimal if not non-existent,

in other words it is a dilute kind of the conversation. The reason for that is simple. A football club or any brand that uses these social networks for that matter is only a tiny part of the larger picture which is nothing but Facebook itself. So a fan commenting on say, Liverpool’s Facebook page is still essentially on Facebook to interact with his friends and not fellow Liverpool supporters. A football club is not like any mainstream brand as the level of emotional involvement of a supporter has for his/her team is something most mainstream brands can only dream of. Therefore, with its own social network, Liverpool FC has taken care of that primary motive of a user signing up. The intention of a user is naturally to engage and interact with fellow supporters of Liverpool.

There’s a lot of good stuff on ‘The Kop’ for the fans too. What makes ‘The Kop’ different from a football forum is that it is multi-dimensional in nature compared to a forum. There is no variety in the type of content on a forum. On ‘The Kop’, fans can upload photos, videos and for those who like being a bit wordy, they can start their own blog on this site as well.

When I studied a football forum in detail early last year I found that members had a genuine desire to be noticed by other members of the forum and to gain a level of respect for not only their knowledge of the game but also as ardent followers of the respective team/club. Therefore an online community or social network like ‘The Kop’ enables members the opportunity to show their affiliation towards the club in many different ways. It is quite early to go into an analysis of how this particular development at Liverpool has fared, as it does take time to build “social capital” which James Coleman (American Journal of Sociology, 1988) defined as the resources that were accumulated as a result of relationships between people. But I expect that the ‘virtual resources’ available here will be richer than any club can obtain from any other forum or third party social network. This is a step in the right direction and it will be something I’m going to be keeping my eye on and something more football and/or sports clubs might want to look at or “Kop-y”. If you want more proof head over to The Kop.

If Arsenal were to Win the Premier League...

2011-02-07T09:12:00.002+00:00

This is a preview to what you can expect to see, read or listen to from certain sources (not necessarily the ones I've mentioned) in the highly unlikely (or impossible) scenario that Arsenal win the Premier League this season or actually any season for that matter.

So first lets go to a certain newspaper. Here is an extract from an article that I hear they have already prepared a rough draft of, in case Arsenal do win.

"One of the most entertaining Premier League seasons in recent times has a winner and Arsenal have managed to end a six year wait after their fellow title contenders made it easy for them by dropping points at crucial junctures. While the Gunners celebrate, it is also important to put this victory in perspective. Arsenal must consider themselves lucky that they have the crown. Fellow contenders not playing to potential and inconsistent refereeing definitely helped Arsenal's cause and in general it is also fair to say that the overall standard of football this past season has been below par. It is therefore not a time to celebrate the victory of sublime attacking football, but a time to reflect on the decline of the sport in this country. How can a team win the League with three different, substandard goalkeepers and a defense that leaked goals?
It is this point we need to focus on now. Arsenal's victory has just gone on to prove that the biggest prize in English football is not that difficult to win after all." If that did not mean anything to you, well I'm afraid that is a sample of what you will see. There will then be some flowery words that mean nothing again before the conclusion which will go something like, "Can Arsenal think of winning the league next season? Certainly not."

In summary there will also be a "Four things we learned from the Premier League this season" section, as always capturing insightful snippets from the season that no one, absolutely no one would have noticed.

1. Manchester United did not win the Premier League.
2. Chelsea did not win the Premier League.
3. Chelsea were not able to defend the League title.
4. Arsenal won the Premier League after 6 years.

There are no prizes for guessing which newspaper I'm referring to.

Later on the same night we will witness the season review on a certain TV channel.

GL - "Arsenal have finally ended their trophy drought. Alan, your thoughts?"

AH - "I don't see them winning the League next season. They are such a good team to watch, but in some games you just get the feeling that they're going to throw it away."

GL - "But Alan, they've won the League today. Don't you think they have played really well?"

AH - "It's difficult to say. Their attacking play was sometimes just brilliant to watch. There's still a lot of work to be done on the defensive side. They are going to be the biggest challengers for the title next season, but I still think Arsenal might come up short."

GL - "Don't you still think that Arsene Wenger deserves some credit for having developed this team from scratch, considering a lot of the other teams have spent over the odds?"

AH - "Certainly. Wenger is one of the best managers in the world. He has proved his critics wrong, although its been a long time coming. But Arsenal are just lacking in a few areas, which is why I consider Man Utd to be top contenders for the title next year."

GL gives up, and ends the show with a recap video of the whole season, emphasizing Chelsea's dip in form and Manchester United's 'unlucky' moments.

Andy Gray will also probably share his views on Arsenal's trophy win but he won't be heard as he prefers tucking the microphone into you know where. So that is that, until someone can find the Keys to get it out.

Lessons for Mainstream Brands from Two Sports Celebrities

2011-01-16T20:09:00.002+00:00

I am not going to use superlatives to describe two individuals who I greatly admire, as no amount of it will be enough to express their greatness. It will also definitely not make sense to compare the exploits of Roger Federer and Sachin Tendulkar on the field of play either as they both are masters at sports which are as comparable as chalk and cheese. This article just aims to point out a couple of simple points on their social media presences, which are useful for businesses.

Both Federer and Tendulkar have an enormous fan following (Sachin, probably to a lesser excellent due to the not-so-global reach of cricket) across the globe. They both handle the celebrity status with the utmost humility and they're both wonderful human beings who set excellent examples for those who look up to them. Being a fan of both Sachin and Federer, I follow them on Facebook and therefore I check for updates from these pages. Tendulkar has a Twitter account too, which I follow. When it comes down to how they fare on Facebook, I think Federer has an edge over the little master. I'm not saying that this will cause Tendulkar any distress, as he and also Federer for that matter, have better ways of getting people to talk about them. Federer has 5.7 million 'Likes' compared to Tendulkar's 1.9 million, but these statistics hardly mean anything and cannot give a more inaccurate reading of the number of admirers they have.

So what is it that I think is important here? Firstly, the content on Federer's page keeps the devoted fan up close with their icon. Regular photos, updates on what he's been up to when off the court along with pictures from tournaments he plays in keep fans tuned in all the time. All of the updates mentioned are up close and personal which is what is lacking on Tendulkar's Facebook page. Whether or not Federer actually posts all the updates himself is not the question here. In all probability he doesn't, but a Federer fan gets a lot of personal content from the page. The most important factor though is the exclusivity of the content. Most of the photos shared on Federer's page will be hard to find anywhere else and this makes fans feel a lot closer to a celebrity and enhances the interest level of the fan. For example, I happened to see this picture as soon as it was uploaded, a few weeks ago. You can see the amount of engagement it generated in just one minute.

Tendulkar's page on the other hand falls short a little. It is well designed with Tendulkar Opus (who also manage the page) being the focal point. Therefore it seems more marketing driven rather than engagement driven. The page is still probably doing its job which I presume is to promote Tendulkar Opus, but it might not sustain the interest of fans on the page for too long. In the last few weeks, updates, even though having a great amount of engagement, make it look like a live Team India scorecard. Tendulkar's Twitter account though, is a lot more personal and it does not look like the little maestro has outsourced tweeting to someone else.

There are lessons to be learnt from here, though not for either Federer or Tendulkar. They will certainly survive without social media, by letting their skills on the field of play do the talking. The lessons are for any business venturing into social media which is that there needs to be good relevant content that is exclusive/original on social media pages. If not, any initial interest is sure to fade out with time. The other important point is that a social media page should not be setup just to promote one particular product or event. While this kind of tactic might generate interest, the end of the promotion is usually the end of new content on the page which will only negate the efforts that were made to get a following in the first place. The existing following will therefore effectively become new customer acquisitions during the next social media effort rather than remaining as existing/potential customers and possibly advocates of the brand.

Graeme Smith Reveals Retirement Plans

2011-01-03T01:17:00.003+00:00

Graeme Smith, at a press conference after the first day of the deciding Test match between India and South Africa, has announced that he will be retiring. There was a twist though in store for everyone. As we all know some players have in the past retired from one form of the game or other as they wanted to devote more time and effort to their preferred format be it ODIs, Test matches or more recently T20 cricket. Smith though went one step ahead when he announced, "Well ya, I have decided to quit from all matches which will feature Zaheer Khan in the opposing team. Ya, this will help me focus on bowlers who I am more comfortable against" after having being dismissed by Zaheer for the 11th time in his career.

Saurav Ganguly when told about this development gave his customary look of disbelief by batting his eyelids at the rate of three times per second. "If I had retired from matches played in Australia, South Africa, New Zealand and West Indies, my average would have been much higher. This is not right. Soon you might have people retiring from short pitched bowling" he said, suggesting that he might have considered various kinds of retirement plans to suit his batting average.

On Ten Sports' post match show, Charu Sharma asked Arun Lal what he thought about these developments. Before the camera could shift to focus on Arun, he had fled from the studio. Apparently poor Arun was too embarrased, knowing very well that no amount of retirement planning could have increased his batting average in Tests or ODIs significantly beyond 26.03 and 9.38 respectively.

In other news, India's best and one of the world's top commentators Laxman Sivaramakrishnan, has become a potential candidate to endorse brands such as MRF, Karbonn Mobiles, Citi Group and DLF before the start of the 2011 installment of the IPL. All these companies are in a tug of war trying to get his signature after LS's performance in the commentary box last season. DLF are reported to be in the lead quoting the highest pay rate of 2 paise for every time he says "DLF maximum". But there is tough competition from Citi Group who are prepared to offer him a bottle of coconut hair oil for each mention of "Citi moment of success". Danny Morrison, Aamir Sohail and Arun Lal have all expressed their interest too, so fans might be better off using the mute button more often this summmer.

Disclaimer: The post almost entirely false. The only accurate piece of information you can take from here is Arun Lal's batting average (Courtesy www.espncricinfo.com)

"We do all of these things" @VodafoneUK

2010-12-23T20:52:00.003+00:00

A couple of months ago, I was doing some groundwork on the social media strategies of some of the top brands in the mobile phone operator market. I was initially looking through each of their social media pages. There were some of the questions I wanted to try and get answers to. Does the brand have a specific strategy on a particular channel that is identifiable from interactions on the page? Is there two way communication or is it just the brand shouting in to deaf ears? What is the brand trying to achieve through their presence on these social channels?

One of the brands I happened to be looking at was Vodafone. I landed on the @VodafoneUK Twitter page and found it interesting. There were the names of the staff designated to handle the interactions on the page and a quick look at the page would have told any person that Vodafone were basically answering their customers questions and issues they were experiencing with the service. The page just screamed "customer service". Nevertheless, I decided to scroll down through almost a week's tweets just to make sure I wasn't missing anything obvious. At the end, I just confirmed my initial assumption that the page was being used primarily as a customer service channel.

Then I read what they had mentioned in the 'Bio' section. It mentioned that the page was meant for promotions/offers, competitions and product news. It didn't say a word about customer service. I found that strange and decided to ask them.

It's probably a good thing that Vodafone were saying they were doing just what their online audience was demanding of them. Still, I wasn't entirely convinced because when you have a majority of the tweets answering customer queries and complaints, something related to customer service ought to be part of the bio section.

The company's headline on the page is what a lot of people would look at when they started to 'follow' them. If people just looked at the tweets they would in all probability think just like I did and send tweets if they were having trouble with their services. So its no wonder that they had to do "what people ask us" as those who didn't read the Bio section will look at the tweets and say "Well, looks like we can just ask them about that problem we're having over here". What I found even more puzzling was that they had a separate account called @VodafoneUkdeals that was meant for deals and online exclusives which now has this headline.

After my tweet to them, I kept visiting the @VodafoneUK page once in a while to see if there was a change but for a few days it didn't happen. Recently, I happened to check back (I was trying my luck on their #mademesmile campaign; that's another story if you're interested) and I did see something different this time.

Vodafone probably realized that they had made a mistake. The 'Bio' now is a lot more generic and does not spell out anything specific that they aim to do on Twitter. So it was either just oversight that caused the mistake or there was a flawed social media strategy, wherein they were not exactly clear what they wanted to use Twitter for. I think it's the latter, as they still don't seem to be entirely sure if they should use it for multiple activities or just customer service. This is true for a lot of brands who are just "there" on social media websites but are still very unclear of what they aim to achieve out of that presence.

I don't want to claim here that I prompted the change on their Twitter page, but when asked they didn't acknowledge the fact I was pointing to and then changed it in course of time. What does that say? Well, I'll let you make up your mind on that one.

"Salman Butt caused Old Trafford defeat" - Wenger

2010-12-17T10:58:00.003+00:00

In a shocking revelation almost a week after Arsenal’s loss to Manchester United, Arsene Wenger has finally admitted that the actual reason for his team’s loss was not the Old Trafford pitch. After being criticized for blaming the pitch in sections of the media and by a lot of Arsenal fans (me included), Wenger obviously had to come up with a better excuse.

At a press conference today, Arsene was put under the microscope again regarding the loss by the media and with an uncharacteristic slip of the tongue said, "I believe that Salman Butt.. err... Cesc Fabregas could have played better". Cesc Fabregas was thought by us all to have come on to substitute Tomas Rosicky in the 64th minute of the game. As it turns out it was actually Pakistan cricketer Salman Butt! Wenger then owned up to the fact and then in his usual factual way said, “I firmly believed it was just that Csec lacked a little strength, technique, togetherness (and 5 more of his keywords) on the day. Then I discovered it was not Cesc when he disappeared after the game." Butt had escaped to a posh hotel in London. Wenger continued - "If it was actually Cesc we would have won 3 or 4 nil”. He was obviously forgetting that United had scored a goal in the first half itself. When a journalist in the room pointed that out, his reply was, "From where I was sitting I could not see it. I will have to look at the replay and see if it was a goal." Another journalist in the room who also happened to be an Arsenal fan was about to fling a microphone at him in disgust before he was reined in by his colleagues. In those few seconds Wenger showed that he is as good as his players when it comes to being silky and slid out of the room.

Apparently, it all started when Wenger was boarding the flight to Manchester, saw Butt, and thinking he was Fabregas asked him why he came even though he was injured. Butt replied, “I just have to play this one game for my team.” Wenger, obviously happy with his ‘captain’s’ commitment took him on board. Little did he know that Butt was talking about a totally different 'game' and 'team'.

Undercover reporters from The Guardian newspaper, desperate to publish some news that criticizes Arsenal, have since released a video from a hidden camera which was placed in Butt's hotel room, in which he is seen receiving a bundle of cash for what his 'team' called a "match-winning" effort. When asked about the game Butt responded with the same lack of confidence that you see in his footwork when he’s batting. Biting his nails he said, “I am completely innocent. I just wanted to win the game for Arsenal and I think that I have performed to the best of my ability.” On further investigation, it was found that Salman Butt had made plans to go to Old Trafford about a week before the match. His 'team' then asked Butt to run on to the pitch during the game assuring him that a bet on the incident will have high stakes. Butt was to receive his share of the payoff if he managed to stay on the pitch longer than one minute. Butt couldn't believe his luck to be on the actual team and wanted to use the opportunity to get some much needed match practice which is impossible when playing for the Pakistan cricket team. "Once I'm on the field, I concentrate on getting settled and staying there for the 'team'. The pitch was turning a lot (now we know why Arsene said "bad pitch") but I fought hard to stay there", he said. He was nervous but of course aware that he could escape by getting back home to share his earnings with who else but the PCB, so that they could in turn blindly claim that England had fixed their football World Cup match against Germany to divert attention.

The real Cesc Fabregas wasn't available for comment as he was busy on Skype. Yes, his friends in the Barca team are reportedly using the new group video chat option to lure him to the Nou Camp in January itself. Sam Allardyce who wasn't even asked to comment came forward to say, "Well, these are not valid excuses. I can do much better than that" hinting that he might be interested in the Arsenal top job that he will never get, after his sacking by the new Blackburn owners who think the best way to start "great things" at the club is by removing a manager who was not doing too badly midway through a tough EPL season.

Disclaimer: As you have definitely figured out by now, the post is entirely false. Just a rant from a frustrated Gooner who cannot take more lame excuses for Arsenal not winning the BIG games. For the record, I still am and will always be an Arsenal fan and I still think Arsene Wenger is one of the best managers in the world. I also have Cesc's squad number on my Arsenal shirt, so there's no question about the great admiration I have for his game.

Credits: Thanks to @vikasgowda20 of Buffering Brain fame for sharing this link which inspired the post. So its not me who originally thought Butt and Fabregas look alike. I obviously do see it now though. Do you?

An Online CV With a Difference

2010-12-05T12:30:00.008+00:00

In my last post I talked about people's inclination to grab others' attention through Facebook status updates and also at the end talked about how employers nowadays were looking at job applicants' social pages to form a first impression (Germany do have restrictions now). You can argue endlessly with regard to the merits of using online behaviour to judge an applicant before even meeting the person but since it is already prevalent that is a pointless argument . Ever since my interest in Web 2.0, social media, SEO and related areas grew a few months ago I have been discovering and learning new things and also experimenting with tools that I might not have otherwise noticed.

Going back to the point about getting people's attention, for a job seeker, its of course employers whose attention is desired. I happened to come across a couple of websites/tools that I think might be extremely beneficial from a job-seeker-point-of-view. I've just started experimenting a bit with one of them called Flavors.me. It is just a platform where you can create an entire page which you can then use to do the talking - for you and about you. The demo video on the website is great and captures pretty much everything that can be done using Flavors.

Picture Courtesy Themecraft

The great thing about this tool is that the entire page is just about you. On online searches too, there is a good chance of this page being found, and from here you can direct anyone to all you other social, professional networking pages, blogs etc. As my professional interests are in the internet space, my CV would be incomplete if I didn't include links to my presence on these social pages. For starters a platform like Flavors will save some space and allow me to say a bit more about myself in the other sections of the CV!

An account upgrade at US $20 will give you access to real time stats, more layouts and fonts, the option of including a contact form and a listing on the Flavors directory. An option to also buy a domain is in the pipeline. These options could be extremely useful for freelance professionals and small/home businesses who/which may not have the time or technical know-how to set up their own website.

The second website is called About.me which seems to be a similar kind of platform. It has not been fully launched as yet. It will be interesting to see how different it will be from Flavors and what extra features it might have. I've reserved my URL, so hopefully I'll be getting confirmation that I can start using it very soon.

If you're still reading I assume you are yet to try these so give it a shot and let me know what you think. Before I conclude this post, if you haven't already heard of a 2010 Business Management graduate named Kyle Clark you might want to take a look at how he got himself the job he wanted.

Update: (Dec 13, 2010)
I just read an article (courtesy @beastoftraal) related to people who have used innovative job search techniques. Whether good or bad, they surely are different.What are your opinions?

And by the way I've also just added the Disqus widget below which allows you to comment using Twitter, Yahoo etc. so there's a few options for you! :)

The Facebook Status Update Syndrome

2010-11-23T00:26:00.003+00:00

Facebook status update syndrome is a disease that has affected and is currently affecting a lot of people. Being a Business Management graduate I am aware of the fact that the phrase - 'a lot' means nothing. Do I mean 70% of Facebook users or one in every five users? I’ve not taken a survey or done too much market research to prove the point either. I'm sorry I don't have any stats so let me just say 'a lot'. If you think differently please feel free to do so (although I think that might be a sign that you’re one of the ‘diseased’!! Ha Ha Ha!!!)

Courtesy: www.CartoonStock.com

I was actually writing a post on Facebook users in a broader context but then I thought I feel more passionately (in the negative sense of course) about these mundane status updates which some people tend to post, that no one (or very few) in the world is interested in. It’s become such a mess and the people who I refer to sometimes seem to have completely lost the plot.

The people who dump all their dirty laundry on the status update box are the ones I see a lot. Drama Queens (DQ) is the word that describes them (I copied it from another blog due to a temporary lack of imagination). Examples of DQ posts are “I’ve just been dumped”, “I just found out that I’m terrible at my job” and worse ones that I’d rather not mention here. The hilarious part is there will be people to ‘Like’ these posts and then pose the million dollar question “Oh how sad! What happened?” to which sometimes you can expect a reply like, “Will tell you when we meet in person” from DQ. Why put up something that you actually don’t want to share the details of with the whole world on your online status?

Next we have Devdas alias Servant of God (SoG). The updates you will see on Devdas’ profile are nothing short of philosophic jargon. Most of these are of course copied. I have yet to see an original Devdas on Facebook (one who can write his own crap). Of course this is just another attempt to garner some attention as SoG knows no better or constructive way of doing that. It's okay to have favorite quotations and to post something that's interesting but at least give the audience some breathing space and give a little credit to the guy who actually said it.

The Son of a Gun (SoG2) is the third and final category. SoG2 is a perfect fit for the famous quote, "Where ignorance predominates, vulgarity invariably asserts itself", by I-don't-know-who-said-it (hmmm... example of ignorance!). SoG2 is without doubt the king of status updates. Just as the above cases, posts are very rarely meaningful and therefore mostly useless and then their winning (or losing) formula is the addition of a more than generous dose of expletives. A post for SoG2 without the vulgar stuff is like an Indian curry without the garnishing. The curry(post) seems wonderful(terrible), but without the garnishing(expletives) you feel its good and not excellent(bad and not outrageous). Either these people are inebriated when they post or just plain stupid.

I wonder what prompts people to share such updates - insecurity, just a desperate need for attention, or what exactly? Now you might wonder, so what? Well, a professor of mine at university said once in a class that what we post online nowadays on social websites is a "digital footprint" that is tough if not impossible to erase. I totally agree with that point as more and more companies look at prospective employees' social media pages before hiring them. So even if you are not 'diseased', there sure is a need to clean up your act, if you've been putting things that do not present a pretty picture, at least for your sake.