June 2011
5 posts
Women's Hour: Germany and England's starts at the...
Germany 2-1 Canada
I said I would write more. Sunday saw the opening of the 2011 FIFA Women’s World Cup, and Germany’s performance was predictably efficient. If Silvia Neid’s team are feeling the immense pressure which is being piled upon them by a comfortingly expectant nation, they failed to show it on Sunday evening. Despite a certain lack of surety to their play in the first and last ten...
Germanic Girlpower and the unchanging Abramovich.
The Women’s World Cup in Germany.
The poster advert sums it up quite neatly: “Dritte Plaetze,” it reads “sind was fuer Maenner!”. Third place is for men. A light hearted take on the comparisons frequently made between the Men’s and Women’s games, and one which bears a clear message: women’s football is something to be proud of - particularly if you’re German.
There is, after all, an...
Ballack's exile and the Redknapp Renaissance
A potted and biased history of Michael Ballack.
Rarely can there have been a more ruthless press announcement than that of the DFB this week. With truly Stasi-esque coldness, German football’s governing body informed the nation and the world that national coach Joachim Loew “has no more plans for Ballack”. An era is over - or rather, the age of a captain who spanned two eras is over. Michael...
The right honourable Roberto Martínez and the red...
Roberto Martínez’ rejection of Aston Villa.
“Is this the most honourable man in football?” cries the Independent Sport this morning, next to an inappropriately sinister picture of Roberto Martínez grinning like a Mafia boss. Well, there’s a simple answer to that: no. Of course there are more honourable men in football; the gracious humility of Pep Guardiola, the modest integrity of Bobby...
Swiss Toni's lesson to England and Germany's kids.
Germany’s lesson to the world…again.
It is difficult to know whether it was with pride or envy that Lukas Podolski observed that Germany’s pool of young talent was larger than that of its neighbours. The forward who won the Young Player of the Tournament award at the 2006 World Cup on his home soil now finds himself as a more experienced member of a Germany team which is now...
