This year, the World Cup will be more than welcome. Norwich City’s rebuilding job after Premier League relegation can be put to the back of minds for just a month and attentions can turn to the fun, excitement and drama in Brazil.
This is probably not the first article of this type you have read. You probably know by now that every football fan has a particular World Cup that they consider to be their ‘first’ – not literally, but the first tournament to capture their imagination and the first to live on in their memories. For me, this accolade belongs to 2002.
As the World Cup began in 2002 I was a few months short of my 10th birthday. With the tournament being held jointly between Japan and South Korea, the time differences meant that matches started early in the mornings here. Before breakfast time. My school must have been very generous because for England matches we were allowed to stay at home and watch before coming into school afterwards, and if your parents were not able to keep you at home for an extra hour or two then the match was played in the school hall on a delay. I can clearly remember heading into school after England had drawn 0-0 with Nigeria and giving a smug-looking smile to my fellow pupils who were having to sit through it not knowing the goalless outcome.
In literal terms, of course, my first World Cup would have been USA ’94, but as I was not yet two years old I can say with some confidence that I remember nothing about it whatsoever. I was also a late developer in becoming a football fan. I grew up in a family of football fans but much preferred watching cartoons until I was about 8. I can remember laying on the living room floor watching England’s famous 5-1 win over Germany in September 2001 and being utterly inconsolable after Norwich lost the play-off final against Birmingham the following May.
The 2002 World Cup did not go too badly for England in the grand scheme of things. David Beckham scored a penalty to beat Argentina which made up for his red card against them in 1998 (see video above) and we made it to the quarter finals before a fluke of a free kick from Ronaldinho went over David Seaman’s head and we went out 2-1 to Brazil. I can also remember The Sun, which my dad had delivered every Saturday, putting their cartoon character Hagar the Horrible on the front page as a preview to England playing Denmark. The Brazilians went on to win their 5th World Cup with a comfortable win over Germany in the final.
To think that ‘my first World Cup’ is now 12 years ago was an eye-opener. 2002 was not a vintage World Cup, but it was my World Cup. As much as I am club before country when it comes to football, the World Cup is such a brilliant tournament that for four weeks every four years I indulge myself in it and revel all the colour and celebration that it has. Inside, it makes me feel warm to think that, to some young boy or girl out there, Brazil 2014 will be their first World Cup.
Perhaps you will read all about it before the kick off in 2026.
The West Indies beat Sri Lanka by 36 runs in Colombo to take the 2012 World Twenty20 title.
The West Indies are a side who for so long can be seen to be in great decline but always show the potential to pull off a shock. As it turned out, their triumph at the World Twenty20 in Sri Lanka wasn’t so much of a shock as a well deserved victory for the best team in the tournament.
Before the competition began, this blog picked Australia to be the champions, defeating the hosts Sri Lanka to win the tournament in Colombo. I was close – Australia lost to the West Indies in the semis, who went on to pip Sri Lanka to the title.
It was a tournament that did struggle to get going with the very odd format of having three teams in each group. This meant that poor old Zimbabwe were out, having lost to both Sri Lanka and South Africa in the space of three days, before a lot of the teams had played their first game. This was simply a way to almost guarantee the top Test nations would progress and not be eliminated by an associate team pulling off an upset. Sadly, this meant there was a few dead games at the end of the group stages.
The Super Eights were where the tournament got going – except for England. England didn’t really mount much of a defence to their title won in the Caribbean in 2010. Dogged by the ongoing saga surrounding Kevin Pietersen, they thrashed Afghanistan in their opener before being pummeled by India and beaten by the West Indies in a game that had Eoin Morgan – who scored 71 off 36 balls – been sent in earlier they would have won. Victory over New Zealand kept their hopes alive but their inability to play spin in subcontinental conditions meant they were knocked out after losing to Sri Lanka.
The crowds tended to wait for the latter stages of the tournament before making an appearance – a lot of the early games were played in front of almost no one inside the grounds and that was with the cheapest ticket being just 14p. Yes, 14 pence. Their interest grew when the big guns took each other on and when the Asian sides were in action. There was a wonderful atmosphere at the Sri Lanka v Pakistan semi-final.
The rain didn’t help either. The fact that this event was played in the rainy season in Sri Lanka left a few pundits wondering whether the ICC were here for the cricket or for the cash. At this time of year in that part of the world the rain tends to stay away until the evening – so what did the ICC do? Schedule the matches for the evenings of course. This meant the TV revenue could be maximised, but meant that more than one match was ruined by the weather – most notably Ireland were eliminated without getting a fair crack at the West Indies when the rain brought a premature end to the game and to their tournament.
The West Indies have had internal struggles recently but no one can deny they have a frightening set-up for Twenty20 cricket. Chris Gayle, who is far more than just a slogger, showed his class by averaging 44 over the 7 matches he played, including a wonderful 75 not out carrying his bat in the semis against Australia. Marlon Samuels carried on his great form for 2012 – not least with 78 off 70 balls when his team were struggling in the final. They do tend to rely on the batsmen to build a massive total though – their bowling wasn’t the best and only spinner Narine was in the top 5 bowlers in the tournament.
The World Twenty20 was a quick tournament for the game’s shortest format. It’s a bit of fun that isn’t taken too seriously, but means a lot to the players involved. For the West Indies supporters, who have had nothing to cheer since the ICC Champions Trophy victory of 2004, this will have come as welcome relief. We’ll do it all again in Bangladesh in two years’ time.
FIFA is winning the annual battle of virtual football. The EA Sports title upped its game for the 2010 edition and has since become the game of choice for professional players and the wider public – FIFA usually holds the top spot in the gaming charts for months after release. Today, gamers had the chance to try out the latest version for the first time, after weeks of teasers, previews and press events. Is FIFA 13 up to the job?
Before we get to the match itself, there are some minor details to note. Before you get into the main menu, we still have to pick which language we want the game to be in. This has annoyed some players, who feel it would be much easier to just select a language once and have it saved to remove the need for this button press. As I said, it’s something minor but it is still there. The game starts with a little live action piece showing Lionel Messi, the game’s new cover star, firing a shot into a net. We’re then asked to press start.
If you haven’t played the demo before, it will ask you to sign in or create an Origin account. This is just the fancy new name for an old EA account so previous players of FIFA should have one to log in with. After that’s out of the way, you can sort your controller settings out and pick your favourite demo team.
We’re then into our first match, powered by the new Matchday feature. I went in as Arsenal against Borussia Dortmund. The first evidence of the Matchday feature I had was some players not being available through injury, so Vito Mannone was standing in for Wojciech Szczesny. Other players had their overall rating altered to fall in line with their recent form. So, into the game we go.
The match ended 0-0, as I was still trying to feel my way into the new game, but in the event of a draw you do have a penalty shoot-out. I lost the penalties, hitting one too hard and hitting the post. The penalty system is, however, unchanged. The match itself was quite impressive, with an added hint of randomness. The ball can cannon of a defender’s shinpads and disappear into the stands for a throw, last ditch tackles are more reckless, and there are a lot more deflections – it seems that this year at last it’s possible to have a shot deflected into the net.
There was a great sense of relief when I discovered that the referees have been sorted finally. No longer (I have now played six games) are perfectly timed tackles penalised with a penalty kick and a red card. In fact, the refs are quite lenient. The free kick count went right down, and I don’t think I got one in a shooting position, so I haven’t been able to try out the new tactical free kicks.
Skill games are more than just something to pass the time away, they’ll actually help you get better in matches. In the demo the skill games manifest themselves in the loading screen when you’re waiting to kick-off a match. I had a dribbling game, lob passing, ground passing, free kick and penalty challenge in my few matches so it seems there is a good range of different games to master.
So, the Fifa 13 demo looks like it’s shaping up to become the full game that will occupy our evenings for yet another year. It’s well worth pre-ordering and it has made the best of the engine it has. Next year we should get some really exciting advancements with maybe an early build on a next-gen console.
There’s a lot involved in the demo, and I can’t cover it all here, so if you have a question then feel free to ask in the comments and I’ll see what I can tell you.
If you fancy giving this football sim a try, take a look at Origin for the PC, the Xbox Live Marketplace or the PlayStation Store. The full game is out on 28th September.
The World Twenty20 is the product of the modern era in cricket. T20 was launched in 2003 to boost attendances and interest levels in the English county game, but few could have expected the format to take over quite as much as it has. The first international match took place in 2005 – between Australia and New Zealand – and there are various domestic leagues that have been set up all over the world, most notably the Indian Premier League, which is as much about the money as it is about the cricket.
In 2007, the first World Twenty20 was held, and was a breath of fresh air. The 50-over World Cup earlier in the year had been a disaster, with dead games, crowds muted by overzealous officials, farcical administration and a ridiculous six-week format. The World T20 in South Africa was completed in 13 days and won by India, a country that had previously been skeptical of this new idea. There were shocks. Bangladesh knocked out the West Indies in the group stage and the hosts fell in the Super Eight stage. We were treated to a showpiece final featuring old rivals India and Pakistan, and India won the trophy in the last over. There was no doubt that the World T20 would be a regular event from then on.
The International Cricket Council decided that the World T20 should take place every two years, instead of the four years we often see between international tournaments. Twenty20 came home in 2009 with England playing host. There was plenty of drama here too. Ireland edged out Bangladesh to make it to the second round. England were beaten in the opening game by the Netherlands but recovered to make it through. Australia were dumped out at the first hurdle having lost both of their group games – the beginning of what was to be a miserable summer with the Ashes to be taken off them later on. The holders, India, lost all three of their Super Eight games. England lost to the West Indies in a rain-affected match to crash out at the Super Eights again. The final once again featured two Asian sides – this time it was Sri Lanka and Pakistan. Pakistan made up for their failure two years before by winning the final by eight wickets.
Cricket is not the most organised of sports, and just ten months after Pakistan had won the World Twenty20 at Lord’s, the top cricketing nations were gathered in the Caribbean to do battle once more. This was a result of the need to correct the cricket calendar. The ICC Champions Trophy – “the mini World Cup” – had been postponed in 2008 because of security concerns in the host country of Pakistan and it was decided to make the 2010 event into the World T20, in order to create a two year gap between the 20 over and 50 over tournaments. This one will live long in the memory of supporters over here as it was won, perhaps surprisingly, by England. There were no particular shocks in the group stages, but the tournament was given a boost by the introduction to top level cricket of Afghanistan. Once again, India were defeated in all three of their Super Eight matches to be sent home, but there was a familiar line up in the final with old enemies England and Australia taking to the Barbados pitch. England won by seven wickets, to take their first ever ICC event.
So, more than two years after England’s triumph in the Caribbean, the team are about to defend their title in the 2012 World Twenty20 in Sri Lanka. The format matches the 2010 edition. Who can we expect to flourish in this one?
England will be looking to defend the title they won in the West Indies two years ago.
Group A
England: the champions, but not the favourites going in. It’s been a difficult summer for the England cricket team with the Kevin Pietersen saga, who was not selected in the squad on the back of the drama. That will be a loss but they do often seem to just get it right when it comes to Twenty20, and could pull off a surprise. I think semi-finals.
India: need to get back on track in this tournament after poor showings in the last two. They will feel more at home in the Sri Lankan conditions, but I don’t think they’ve got enough to win the whole thing. For me, semi-finals.
Afghanistan: much will be made of the remarkable achievement in just getting an Afghanistan team to the tournament with all the troubles the country has faced in the past decade, but they won’t be looking for sympathy. They will be aiming for an upset. I can’t see them getting one though, and so it has to be the group stages for them.
Group B
Australia: when they crashed out of the 2009 tournament having lost all their group games, captain Ricky Ponting made it sound as if the format was not at the forefront of Australia’s priorities. That changed in the West Indies, though, when they made the final. They’ve got plenty of power players and they could well go far. I think they might just make the final.
West Indies: you never know what to expect from the West Indies. They are capable of brilliance but at the same time able to play some utterly dire cricket. To pull anything off here they’ll have to be on top form. Chris Gayle and Kieron Pollard are capable of huge sixes, but the conditions might not favour them. Let’s see them make the Super Eights.
Ireland: the Irish are the dominant force in associate level cricket, and have impressed in the last two 50-over World Cups, also making the Super Eights of the last World T20. Sadly I can’t see them getting out of this group, so it might just be group stages for the Blarney Army.
Group C
Sri Lanka: the hosts are pretty good at this form of the game and have that added advantage of playing in familiar conditions in familiar surrounding. The 2009 finalists will, in my opinion, join Australia in the final.
South Africa: the new no.1 side in Test cricket, but have never quite excelled in Twenty20. They’ve got some great players but I don’t think they can be consistent enough to win here. It’s the Super Eights for the Proteas.
Zimbabwe: after international exile Zimbabwe are slowly making their way towards a return to Test cricket, but they are in such a tough group here it is hard to see them doing anything. They’ll be gone in the group stages.
Group D
Pakistan: the winners in 2009 will enjoy the conditions in Sri Lanka. They do, however, always seem one game away from an embarrassment and I fear that could happen here. So it’s a Super Eights exit for me.
New Zealand: a very good side, but always the bridesmaid never the bride in big tournaments. I think they’ll struggle with the Asian conditions and end up crashing out in the Super Eights.
Bangladesh: the Bangladeshis might well fancy an upset against New Zealand, but I can’t see them getting out of this group. Group stages.
According to my predictions, we’ll be seeing Sri Lanka play in a home final against Australia. It’s a real tough one to call. Home advantage can only count for so much and Australia have looked increasingly good in Twenty20 over the last year or so. I think I might just give Australia the nod to add the World Twenty20 to their collection of ICC trophies.
As with the European football championships earlier this year, sport has a tournament that will hold interest and a format short enough to keep spectators wanting more. So what does the governing body do? Announce their intention to expand the tournament next time around to increase the number of dead group games and add to the number of thrashings handed out to inexperienced associate sides by Test playing giants. That’s right, the 2014 World Twenty20 in Bangladesh will feature 16 teams.
The 2012 World Twenty20 starts on Tuesday 18th September.
The relationship a football fan has with their club is unique. There are few other sports that can directly influence the moods and emotions of its followers like football. Weekends are made or broken by the result. The outcome of a local derby can make work on Monday morning joy for the victor, and misery for the loser, with no end of a ribbing to come. Also, who else would travel hundreds of miles to stay just a couple of hours before turning round and heading back? Would the average supporter make the trip from Southampton to Sunderland to see a boyfriend or girlfriend, for example? It’s a topic that fascinates and intrigues.
I am of the opinion that you do not choose who you support, your club chooses you. There’s a certain feeling you get when watching your team. You just know that these are your boys. It can make you look up with pride when they are mentioned on the TV and make the most tepid goalless draw an edge-of-the-seat thriller.
How does a club ‘choose’ you? It could be the team nearest your home, nearest your birth, the team your parents support. It could even be one particular match that captured the imagination. For me, it’s all four. I was born and raised in Norwich – the best city in the world, of course. My mum stood at the Barclay End of Carrow Road in the 1980s, and my dad skipped school to see City play in the FA Cup semi-final of 1959. It was already nailed on, then, that I would be a Norwich City supporter.
The match that ‘got’ me was the play-off final in May 2002. I was a few months away from my tenth birthday. Norwich had been grinding away in division one since being relegated from the Premier League eight years earlier, and at last they had the chance to get back to the big time. The fact it wasn’t automatic promotion made it tremendously exciting. We had to get past Wolves over two legs before we made it to the final where we would play Birmingham City at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff.
My dad rose in the middle of the night to travel to Wales on a minibus with some friends. I was to stay at home and watch the match on TV. Iwan Roberts put City a goal up. Birmingham equalised. The match ended 1-1. There were no goals in extra time, and it went to penalties. When Norwich lost the shootout – which was apparently always going to happen anyway – I knew I was a fan for life. I knew because I bawled my eyes out. To be fair, I was nine years old!
I love the feeling I get from supporting a football club so strongly. There’s a great sense of unity every other Saturday, when I go to Carrow Road and there’s 26,000 other City fans there. Having had a season ticket since 2008, we all know each other well by now.
Make a note of it because this Saturday, 15th October – two months after the football season kicked-off – Norwich will play their first home game at the traditional time of 3pm on a Saturday.
City will be playing Swansea City, a fellow promoted team, and as neither of us are lucky enough to be playing FC Unknown in the Europa League on Thursday nights or deemed interesting enough by broadcasters to be shown live on television, we’re starting at the usual time.
Our previous home games – there have been four in all competitions – have come in the shape of two 1.30pm Sunday starts, a Monday 8pm and a Tuesday 7.45pm kick-off.
What I’m not going to do here is go down the route of saying that Sky is evil. It is not. I loathe seeing people substitute the word ‘Sky’ for ‘Murdoch’ as if the elderly Australian personally decided to move Norwich’s home game with Tottenham back a day.
Sky have pumped millions, maybe even billions, into the sport since the Premier League began in 1992 and do it a fantastic service with the best coverage around. It’s hardly a bad thing when your little club gets a bit of national TV exposure either.
The fact is, it is against the law for football to be shown on TV between 3pm and 5pm on a Saturday. This is to protect the lower leagues and to keep their attendances up. After all, I don’t know who would want to see Dagenham & Redbridge against Southend United when you can stay at home and watch Manchester United v Liverpool on the telly. When the kick-off is moved for TV coverage, it’s not Sky or ESPN meddling, it is them complying with the law.
Sky and ESPN have paid a lot of money for the rights to show Premier League matches. The rights are sold in a number of different packages that contain certain kick-off times – Saturday 12.45pm, Saturday 5.30pm, Sunday 1.30pm, Sunday 4pm and Monday 8pm are some of them. The broadcaster who owns that particular package then picks which games they want to show, and this is usually done well in advance of the game so fans can make arrangements.
I think the Saturday 3pm kick-off is a bit outdated now. It’s just people wearing their rose-tinted specs and clasping on to tradition that want to retain it so desperately. In the early 1900s, and the days of the Industrial Revolution – in fact, in the early days of NCFC – most working men did their jobs for five and a half days per week. All day Monday to Friday and then Saturday mornings. Sunday was the holy day, so the only time football was good for most men to get to was on a Saturday afternoon. Time’s have changed! We live in a 24/7 world now.
How do you solve a problem like Beckham? The world’s media was pondering the answer to this question back on that cold Monday in March, and I was too.
I concluded, with the frenzy over the former Manchester United midfielder’s achilles injury still fresh, that he should call an end to his international career with England and move back home to get fit and see himself into retirement with a Premier League swansong.
An awful lot has happened between the middle of March and the end of May. Beckham says he’s trying to be back playing in November – just after England kick off the Euro 2012 qualifiers – and has shown no signs of even contemplating calling it a day. Has he even read my article!?
My suggestion as to his replacement landed with Aston Villa’s James Milner. In my bigging up of the ex-Leeds man, I completely forgot about the flying Arsenal winger Theo Walcott.
When England played a friendly against Mexico at Wembley recently, Milner played in a more central role and failed to impress. Walcott played the first half on the wing and made a number of threatening runs with no end product. In the second half Aaaron Lennon of Tottenham came on and was largely ineffective. Walcott gave himself the best possible chance to start against the USA on 12th June.
Beckham himself will also be in South Africa – in a coaching role! This unexpected situation arose when coach Fabio Capello offered the ambassador of English football a special position within the squad. This just weeks after being the man chosen to submit England’s bid book to host the 2018 World Cup.
David Beckham last night, going down in a heap after suffering Achilles damage that will force him out of the World Cup. The injury could mean the end of his 115-cap England career.
Laying in bed this morning, semi-conscious minutes after being woken up by the BBC Radio Norfolk newsreader, I felt a sudden sadness when I learned that David Beckham would not be going to the World Cup. I felt sorry for him. He never strikes me as being the most intelligent of people – a friend of mine at school used to love telling me Beckham once answered an interview question with the phrase ‘I wasn’t teached that way’ – but then he doesn’t need to be. Not in the academic sense anyway. From what I have seen of him on the TV, Beckham is a genius with a football. He is unrivalled when it comes to crossing or passing the ball. Not to mention his mesmerising free kicks, works of art in accuracy and precision. Some say his legs had gone, but an England squad with David Beckham in it is better than one without.
Hard work is something that Beckham doesn’t shy away from either. He was Sven’s England captain, but Steve McLaren had the guts to leave him out of the team (others might argue this was just another of McLaren’s misguided actions). ‘Becks’ earned his way back in, and was it not for his pin-point crosses England’s Wembley defeat to Croatia that made certain of their no-show at Euro 2008 would have been even more embarrassing.
The much more masterful Fabio Capello omitted Beckham from some of his squads too, wary of the quality of football the ex-Manchester United midfielder was participating in at the Los Angeles Galaxy. Far from admitting defeat as he approached his mid-30s, Beckham was prepared to strain his club relations for the sake of his country, organising a spring loan move to AC Milan. Don’t let the cynics make you believe that this was purely because his Spice Girl wife Victoria wanted a taste of fashionable Italy. Beckham moved to Serie A to keep his World Cup dream alive.
Now into his second spell at San Siro, it hasn’t been perfect for the 34-year-old. He has never been the leading star, often being forced to settle for substitute appearances, but when he came on Beckham still oozed an aura of class. This was a player not to be taken lightly. This was a player who commanded respect. In the last month he was put into the shade by the future of English football itself, Wayne Rooney, but on current form anyone would be. It wasn’t as much of a ‘that was the old, this is the new’ showing as some pundits are warbling on about. He had his own doubts about his chances of boarding the plane for South Africa this summer, but the general consensus was he would be there, and he had earned the right to be there.
It turns out, unfortunately, that these talking points are ultimately trivial. Last night Beckham broke down playing for Milan against Chievo. His manager Leonardo said the Londoner ‘knew immediately’ that his Achilles tendon was torn. TV pictures confirmed this, showing Beckham signalling a tear to the bench. Today, the injury that means he won’t be fit for the World Cup is headline news here, and heartbreaking news for Beckham himself.
Who will replace David Beckham?
James Milner, of Aston Villa, is my ideal choice to fill David Beckham's boots.
Not only does Beckham have to rethink his plans after last night’s events, so does England manager Fabio Capello ahead of the World Cup, and possibly for after the tournament as well. Thankfully, there are a number of options. The obvious choice, Aaron Lennon of Tottenham, is facing his own injury battle and should he be fit, he might not be match-ready for the immense pressure and intense pace World Cup finals matches bring. Another possibility, one utilised by Capello previously, is Manchester City’s Shaun Wright Phillips, though his stuttered contract talks with the club he loves have been playing on his mind of late. Personally, I would punt for Aston Villa’s versatile James Milner, who has had a season to remember as one of the outstanding players in Martin O’Neill’s strong outfit. Still quite young, Milner’s career has seen him face tough times at Leeds United and Newcastle United, so he is more mature than most. A talented and strong player, not afraid to try a long shot, Milner looks to me to be the ideal midfielder to fill the sizeable void left by Beckham’s absence.
Questions have now moved on to whether or not this would signal the end of David Beckham’s career. As I type, he is undergoing surgery in Finland to correct the injury. This would have been Beckham’s fourth World Cup – no Englishman has played at that many tournaments. It seems he will have to settle for three after all, a record to be proud of – only Bobby Moore and Peter Shilton have also played in as many World Cups for England as that. The swiftness with which Beckham has headed under the knife suggests he has not given up on his glittering career yet.
Not that I am at all qualified to tell him what to do, but if David Beckham asked me for his advice, I would tell him this (and this has come about after some considerable thought). Retire from international football and come home for a swansong. Surgeons appear to be confident that they can get him playing football again. That’s good. I had convinced myself, prior to this awful news, that Beckham would draw the curtains on his career as a whole after this summer’s World Cup. Now he won’t be going, that would be a bad idea. He wouldn’t want it to end like this. It is important that England move on after the summer, though, and their plans in order to progress simply cannot include a veteran. Draw a line under your international career, Becks, and do it before you disappoint yourself trying to make it work again when you are fit.
It would then be up to Beckham to sign off in the best possible way. Come home, back to play in front of the people who love you (the same people who hated you in 1998). I highly doubt Manchester United would take such a step to bring him back. Certainly not with Ferguson in charge. That’s just not how they work. It is without doubt, though, that Beckham could still cut it in the Premier League. How about at one of the clubs currently jostling for the coveted fourth place? Tottenham Hotspur? Aston Villa? Everton? A couple of seasons, dazzling performances, glory achieved before taking a step back as one of this country’s greats. I don’t want to go too far forward, but just in time for a cushy media job at Euro 2012?
LEE PAYNE 