The Afterword

Musings on the byways of popular culture

Menu

Navigation

World’s Oldest Football Record

by 41 Comments

Hi, I am a first time poster but a long time record collector and thought I would kick off my account on TAW with a question. Does anyone here have an older football (soccer) related record? The reason I ask is because I would love to know if one exists older than the one I found a few years ago and just showing the disc here may interest other collectors to get in touch. I found it in an auction lot a couple of years ago and it dates from 1907. The audio on the link is an Englishman doing the commentary on a Scottish match on a one sided 78 that was reproduced in German 115 years ago! Curious facts include Celtic referred to as The Celts on the label and that radio football commentary didn’t start until 20 years later. I hope someone has a similar old football related record and even though I have quite a few I am always pleased to see others I don’t have.

View post on » Continue Reading.

The big game, eh?

by 92 Comments

England vs Germany I have no idea what is going on, apart from a flurry of yellow cards, but it’s a big event. My daughter is all for Germany, my friends in the stadium are England fans. Anyone watching (with an smidgen more knowledge than me)?

Women’s Euro 2022

by 24 Comments

Anyone watching? I went to the first game at Old Trafford (to my amazement I didnt burst into flames when I walked in), and to the Netherlands/Sweden game at Bramall Lane (with my brother in law and our daughters).

No, it isnt the same standard as the men’s Champions League. But good games, and great atmosphere. My (mostly) Scottish niece was delighted to be able to wear an England shirt without criticism. The Dutch and Swedish crowds all seemed to be in national shirts, including men wearing shirts with women player’s names. And of course, it is fairly rare that you can celebrate an English team winning 8-nil (8 bloody nil! smashes clock from fireplace) (and of course I would rather talk about that than my lot losing 4 nil to Manchester United).

Viva los loboshamptos

by 20 Comments

Being in the happy position of neutrality when it comes to English football, I am able to just watch the rise and fall of teams dispassionately.

I must admit to some pleasure however at seeing the return to the top tier of Wolves. They just seem to me to be a team with a rich history and it seems fitting that they are back there.

Their current manager Nuno Espirito Santo comes across as very impressive but it’s bigger than any individual.

Also – their ‘old gold’ strip is fantastic.

For similar reasons, I’d also like to see Leeds back in the PL, although I appreciate this may be a more contentious view!

World Cup Competition

by 1 Comment

Hi – at my school my form and I are running a competition to raise money for our year charities (Alzheimer’s and Meningitis).

For a quid, you choose four teams – one from each pot. As the tournament progresses each of your teams earns you: 3 pts for a win, 1 for a draw and 1 point for each goal scored (with the exception of penalty shoot-out goals – a shoot out win at the end of a 0-0 draw would earn you 3 pts for the victory, but nothing for the goals).

The top three entrants win vouchers – Amazon, X-box, whatever. If a number of entrants tie for first place three names are drawn from a hat.

Anyone fancy a go?

Pot one: Russia (hosts), Germany, Brazil, Portugal, Argentina, Belgium, Poland, France Pot two: Spain, Peru, Switzerland, England, Colombia, Uruguay, Mexico, Croatia Pot three: Denmark, Iceland, Costa Rica, Sweden, Tunisia, Egypt, Senegal, Iran Pot four: Serbia, Nigeria, Australia, Japan, Morocco, Panama, South Korea, Saudi Arabia

Warning – Football Cartoon Alert

by 5 Comments

Not sure how many of you are football fans, let alone how many like cartoons. One of the most consistent things I’ve found recently (from the recommendation of friends) is the David Squires cartoon column in the Guardian. Brilliantly drawn, very funny, and full of references not only to footy, but also to various bits of pop culture. This week’s (about West Ham, which is quite a depressing situation) is superb and well worth a look.

https://www.theguardian.com/football/ng-interactive/2018/mar/13/david-squires-on-west-hams-chaotic-cauldron-of-infighting

Wretched Europe

by 35 Comments

For the first time since…

No – for the first time… I really don’t care how England get on at a major tournament.

The England team are not the problem, they’re actually quite good. Europe is the problem. Things are falling apart. I’m a “remain” voter and now I worry even more than I did before that a “leave” vote by the UK will spell serious social unrest and inflame existing divisions in other EU countries. Civil wars in the near future seem a genuine possibility to me now.

I can’t remember disruption and violence this bad at a European Championship finals or World Cup finals for a long time, if ever. It’s just not worth it. The real football fans who are there, with their face paint, spongy hats and good faith, must be very depressed. Unless they’re German or Spanish or Italian, of course, and have a realistic chance of winning the thing.

Wake me up in 2025 when the Apocalypse has blown over.

Anyone else feeling hopeless and vulnerable?

When Saturday Comes and Football Fanzines

by 34 Comments

When Saturday Comes recently celebrated its 30th anniversary with a special edition that contained a facsimile of its first issue (the ugly cut & paste layout reminding you long ago 1986 was).

I didn’t read WSC#1, but I remember staring to read it in the late 80s, when it was the most prominent of the football fanzines that you would find outside football games as well as in record shops and other places. WSC and a few competitors covered the national scene (in Scotland we had The Absolute Game). But the most interesting thing about the scene was how each club would have at least a couple of fanzines fighting for prominence.

The whole thing would make a decent case study for an MBA student. Was First Mover Advantage always important for a club fanzine, or could you be disrupted by a later competitor with a better cartoonist and access to a colour photocopier? Were consumers loyal to their club’s fanzines or would they read well-regarded zines from other clubs? (I always enjoyed Aberdeen’s The Northern Light despite being a Celtic fan, but I drew the line at reading one that covered the other lot). The fanzines were crude, » Continue Reading.

Your examples of Constructive Self-Sabotage please

by 5 Comments

Sometimes we all need protecting from ourselves. And sometimes we are the best people to do the protecting. So this afternoon, as on many Sunday’s, I made myself look at the football scores to prevent any temptation to watch MOTD2 instead of going to bed at a sensible time to start the working week with half a brain.

Your examples of Constructive Self-Sabotage please, and a catchier name to describe this too would be good.

Those Americans just aren’t the same as us!

by 14 Comments

We’re on our hols in the US and In the past couple of days I’ve been to two very odd sporting events. The first was a football match. It was my very first MLS match and, due to a combination of the ticket prices, number they’d sold and snippets of MLS matches I’ve seen on television, I was expecting the standard to sit somewhere in between the bottom of the Premiership and the top of the Championship. In the end, over 60,000 people turned up to watch two fairly poor (approximately equivalent to the bottom of the Championship) teams have an occasional shot. The really weird thing was that, among those 60,000 there was no (apparent) away support. Some of the loudest booing came when a clearly offside goal was disallowed. The cheering for a ‘goal’ went on for a while when the ball had been blasted into the side netting. I always think it sounds horribly patronising when commentators say the crowd is “knowledgeable” but I’d never sat among so many people people cheering for decisions when so many of them (I should make it clear though that I don’t mean all of them) had very little idea what » Continue Reading.

Caveats aside, Super Sunday can be wonderful

by 7 Comments

Spoilers Alert!!!

Have one half of today’s Super Sunday to go.

Arsenal’s late late winner against Leicester’s ten men, followed by Liverpool’s turkey shoot against poor doomed Villa, followed by the heavyweight clash of City v Spurs.

Yes yes money blah blah but at least we’re getting absolutely top quality coverage.

Thierry is super cool but Carragher is brilliant. Really sharp insight. Possibly underrated as a pundit due to an accent thicker than a Mersey fog. Seems a top bloke as well.

The Confidence Conundrum

by 13 Comments

Jamie Vardy playing like Leo Messi in a Leicester City team playing like Barcelona.

Absolutely fantastic to witness.

Long may it continue, but who’s to say that next season Vardy won’t be able to buy a goal?

When you’re up, you feel you can’t miss. When you’re down, you can’t hit the proverbial coo’s arse wi’ a banjo.

But there is absolutely no doubt now that Leicester City are genuine title contenders this season, and how remarkable and wonderful is that?

Top Skillage In The Village!

by 28 Comments

In 1978, Frank Worthington scored one of the greatest ever goals. The ball came to him, he controlled it with one touch, flipped it over his shoulder, spun and shot.

Yesterday, Dele Alli did something remarkably similar. This sublime piece of skill left Roy Hodgson grinning from ear to ear. With Jack Butland, Fraser Forster, John Stones, Ross Barkley, Raheem Sterling, Dele Alli, Jamie Vardy and Daniel Sturridge (if he can stay fir for more than 10 minutes), maybe, just maybe, there is a half decent future for English Football?

Leicester City

by 10 Comments

Not a fan, but isn’t it nice to see them top of the Premier League this far into the season? Or any club outside of the big 3/4/6. You might even think it was a competitive league.

Your inconspicuous footballing hero?

by 49 Comments

I’ve just been reading a book by former Leeds Utd striker Ian Baird, who in the mid to late 80s was my footballing hero – along with his teammate, John Sheridan. He didn’t hit the heights of the top league for any great length of time, and never with Leeds, so he isn’t exactly a household name. The book is called ‘Bairdy’s Gonna Get You’, which I remember was the title of a chant the Leeds fans used to sing in his honour. He was a no nonsense kind of player, but scored loads, and I mean loads, of goals. I liked him as you always got the sense that he was playing the game like it was his last – he’d literally run himself in to the ground every match. His energy levels, particularly for that era of the game when it was still a few pints, fish ‘n chips after the match (and I’m talking the players, not fans), was fairly remarkable. Aside from the obvious, George Best, Kenny Dalglish etc, who was your inconspicuous footballing hero?

View post on imgur.com

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bairdys-Gonna-Get-You-Baird-ebook/dp/B00EU7PFIQ/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1447615893&sr=1-1&keywords=ian+baird

The Hudson derby

by 4 Comments

Interesting article on the fast-developing rivalry between New York City FC (founded 2013) and New York Red Bulls (founded in 1995 as New York / New Jersey MetroStars).

They have only played each other three times, but in four short months the New York derby has become one of football’s great rivalries. New York Red Bulls’ 2-0 win over New York City in Major League Soccer on Sunday had all the hallmarks of a game between long-standing foes. Unfurled banners, bragging rights, social media one-upmanship and, as unsavoury as it was, even fighting in the streets.

As long as the fundamentals of the game are not changed*, I’m all for football making continued inroads to the US. There’s something quite tantalising about the idea of a New York derby.

*although even then I’d be open to persuasion, especially given the wholly dispiriting stewardship of the world game by FIFA and UEFA in recent years…

Not my team, but this makes me happy

by 9 Comments

I love Henrik Larsson. So it makes me very happy that his son is looking like he could follow in his dad’s footsteps. Jordan Larsson – only eighteen but scoring goals for Helsingborg with proud dad/coach cheering. I don’t want them to win the league, but it still makes me happy to see. Any other sons or daughters of great athletes on their way to possible greatness?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6mndh3sbDNU

Norway 1 England 2

by 30 Comments

Anyone see that Women’s World Cup match? Crikey, the ladies’ game is still a little tame, from what I’ve seen so far [haven’t watched Germany, I have to admit].

Cracking second England goal from Lucy Bronze, though [ace name too].

Well Done, Chelsea!

by 59 Comments

I am not a fan but they are easily the best team this season. They have won most matches, lost fewest and have the biggest goal difference.

Jose Mourinho is a born winner. He bought well (Fabrigas and Costa) and he sets his team up properly. Everyone knows their job. There is no confusion over tactics, even though he changes them from game to game.

Hats off to them and their manager.

Which football team do you support and who is their musical equivalent ?

by 53 Comments

When new people join my company inevitably within the first few hours someone will ask “which team do you support” (even the blokes get asked this). So it struck me that I’ve seen relatively few footie related threads on the Afterword site – hope Im not transgressing something in the small print ?

For nigh on fifty years Ive followed my home team Rotherham United through good times and bad (cue the cliché joke). I go through periods where my interest is cursory and since moving south in the mid 70s, whilst I don’t get to see them very often, I generally manage at least a couple of games a season. At the moment following two promotions on the bounce including a memorable play off victory at Wembley last year (are there any Orient fans out there ?) and now struggling to keep our heads above water in the giddy heights of the Championship the fervour is most definitely high.

So it got me thinking (as only Afterworders do) who is the Rotherham United of the musical world ?

Got to be someone who has been around a good while but generally under the radar; unbelievably unfashionable; an honest » Continue Reading.