The Ball 2006

The Homeless World Cup is a street soccer tournament involving 32 teams of homeless people from around the globe including: Argentina, Australia, Austria, Brazil, Burundi, Cameroon, Canada, China, Czech Republic, England, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Kenya, Namibia, Netherlands, Nigeria, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Scotland, Slovakia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Ukraine, Uruguay, USA, Wales, Zambia.

This year it will be held in Edinburgh from 20th – 24th July, and The Ball is scheduled to make an appearance as a precursor to the trip to Germany. More information can be found on the Street Soccer website.

Update: sadly, The Ball was unable to make it to Edinburgh… we’d have loved to do something for the competition, but other things intervened, and it just wasn’t possible. Sigh. Roll on Germany 2006

The Ball rolling through China in 2002

Kevin Mitchell, the Guardian’s chief sports writer was so enthralled by the Liverpool v. AC Milan final that he wrote his latest column entitled Magic and hypnotism of the rolling ball based on the question “what is this strange power football has over us?”

One of the answers he provides is that ‘it’s the magic of the rolling ball. You can’t resist it.’ Indeed. Neither can we. That’s what the Spirit of Football has always been about.

I just stumbled across a promo video for the World Cup preparations in Berlin which has a remarkable resemblance to our video from the 2002 trip to Japan and Korea… really nicely (read expensively!) made and worth a look.

Ready for 2006

Sets the standard for 2006, I guess. Enjoy!

When we were in Moscow, on our way to Korea in 2002, Phil and I went to see a game at the Spartak stadium. After the game, as we were wandering around looking for the way out, we stumbled across a sign overlooking the training pitches which seemed to sum up the spirit of our trip.

At the time, Israel and Palestine were going through a particularly confrontational phase, and we questioned whether such sentiments could be put into practice in the region. Well, it seems like an attempt to do so is underway: Street Football World reports that a Mini World Cup Tournament for Palestinian-Israeli youth will take place on 15th April, 2005. It’s being organised by the Peres Centre for Peace as part of their “Twinned Peace Soccer Schools” project.

How about we use a fair-trade football instead?

In a previous post, I wrote about scientists researching the perfect free-kick. Now, with the rebirth of the video-replay debate as a result of Roy Carroll’s shameless lack of sportsmanship in the Man Utd v Spurs match a week or two ago (where he appeared – to the ref at least – to “save” what was clearly a goal) I thought I’d have a little look at some of the technologies which may be part of high-end football’s future.

There are several competing technologies vying for the attention of football’s rule-making body, the International Football Association Board (IFAB), who hold their 119th annual general meeting in Cardiff on 26 February 2005. From a purely Spirit of Football perspective, I’m interested in this issue because it will also determine the nature of The Ball that travels from Battersea Park every four years.

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“This is what we play with. Go and get it!”

That was, apparently, the entirety of the late Brian Clough’s pre-match team talk, once he’d placed a ball on a towel in the middle of the dressing room, according to an article entitled “The Humble Football: A Eulogy” on the British Council’s Football Culture website.

The simplicity and directness of Clough’s message forms the basis for the article, which is worth a read if only because it is the only piece I’ve found which focusses (like we do) on the primacy of The Ball above all else in the game. The author, Pete May, suggests that “next time you see it in action give it a cheer. It is after all, the most important spherical object in the world”.

An article on The Register entitled “Scientists learn to bend it like Beckham” suggests that the sight of our David skying a spot kick over the goal and into the stands may be numbered. “Scientists at Loughborough University have developed a system that will measure a football’s speed and spin, something they say has not been accomplished before”, reports Lucy Sherriff, and suggests that one outcome of this research may be a “perfect penalty-taking cyborg”. Strangely, she goes on to quote a colleague who claims that “in fact the most confusing ball to face, when standing in goal, is one that doesn’t spin at all”.

Well that clears that one up then.

FIFA have announced that tickets for the 2006 World Cup will go on sale on the 1st February 2005. Three million tickets… but just how many people will there be wanting to see the games? A few more than that I expect. Set your alarm on 31st January, folks. Ticket prices in Euros are as follows:

The tickets seem (dare I say it) quite reasonably priced by comparison to the exorbitant sums that were being charged last time in Korea and Japan. Phew… maybe we won’t need VIP tickets like last time. Despite the endless champagne and canapes, it’s actually a lot more fun to be in amongst the fans.

Edit: the original article seems to have gone, but this video shows the process

I stumbled across this article today – about getting a game together in Burundi. It reminded me so much of the children Phil and I saw all the way through Asia on our way to Korea. They would use anything to improve their football skills – we often saw children playing keep-up at the side of the road with balls made from tightly knotted herbs. Though we got no pictures of them (our driver wasn’t too keen on stopping for anything, even other traffic!) my memories are still vivid. So check out Henri’s photo-story for another example of footballing ingenuity.