{"id":447,"date":"2024-08-30T07:07:40","date_gmt":"2024-08-30T07:07:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bibibloomsfree.com\/?p=447"},"modified":"2024-08-30T07:07:40","modified_gmt":"2024-08-30T07:07:40","slug":"the-football-landscape","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bibibloomsfree.com\/index.php\/2024\/08\/30\/the-football-landscape\/","title":{"rendered":"The Football Landscape"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Photo by Pavel Anoshin \/ Source: Unsplash<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n

In 2020, I wrote the following piece. I never published it anywhere at the time, it
was more to let off steam about what I was witnessing in my football workplace at
that time. Unfortunately, two years on, the article hasn\u2019t aged and I still have the
same concerns which have only deepened.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

LET\u2019S STOP PLAYING GAMES AND LET\u2019S START PLAYING FOOTBALL<\/p><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Years back, when I was about to embark on my adventure as a football translator\/interpreter,
someone said to me, \u201cYou don\u2019t come here to make friends. I have no friends here,
it\u2019s all strictly professional.\u201d I remember thinking at the time how sad and cold that
had sounded. How could someone think like that about the people they spent
most of their time with? I don\u2019t think this person can really say they haven\u2019t made
any friends in the business, no matter how cut-throat it may be. But you see,
there\u2019s the word that changes it all, \u201cbusiness\u201d. When did we lose track of what
football is about? And when did we begin to forget how football clubs were
formed?<\/p>\n\n\n\n


Our football club was formed by some friends in a local gym in 1906, who went on
from playing friendlies to taking it seriously and competing. Sunday games were an
event where families, friends and neighbours gathered to watch and cheer on their
city\u2019s team, which was mostly made up of local talent. With the aim of beating your
weekend rival came the need to spend or invest money on players, equipment and
its maintenance. As times rapidly changed, so did the sport and consumer
demands; yes, I used the word consumer, because that\u2019s what we are now.
Players, staff, and fans became numbers, and a football club became a business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


The idea of a football club being run by a community who want their city to be
represented by its sporting values and accomplishments has long been forgotten.
People no longer cooperate for the club to run as smoothly as possible because
where there is money at stake there is greed and a thirst for short-term results to
please their egos. Just like gold mining companies, they dig away to grab as much
of the jackpot as they can, with no consideration on the effects this is having on
the football landscape and on its workers. As the years go by, even the good
miners find it hard to avoid some sort of hazard that can affect their well-being.
You see, managing a football club with \u201cgold miners\u201d at the forefront contaminates
the working environment and changes the morphology of the game.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


The business of football, as we know it today, is unsustainable. Other industries
are beginning to adopt a \u201cSlow\u201d philosophy which in the words of Canadian
journalist, Carl Honor\u00e9, is:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

\u201cA cultural revolution against the notion that faster is always better. The Slow
philosophy is not about doing everything at a snail\u2019s pace. It\u2019s about seeking to do
everything at the right speed. Savouring the hours and minutes rather than just
counting them. Doing everything as well as possible, instead of as fast as possible.
It\u2019s about quality over quantity.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Perhaps we should be taking note and extrapolate this idea to the football industry
and the way clubs are managed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


I have no idea when the bubble is going to burst, but what has become clear in the
past decades is that a football club cannot be run by diggers. It\u2019s time to repair the
landscape and begin to plant, and this can only be achieved by gardeners; people
who have a holistic and long-term mindset, who are not looking for personal gain,
and who are willing to set their differences aside for the greater good.<\/p>\n\n\n\n


I know, this all sounds very na\u00efve. But despite seeing and experiencing lots of
negativity, I have seen and met many genuinely good and wonderful people who
carry out great work. I hope it\u2019s these people that find the will to carry on plodding
through the dirt, pollinating their values so that they begin to flourish and prevail
over the current trend.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As you have read, I ended the article practically calling myself na\u00efve, others will
politely say \u201ca romantic\u201d, however, after reading the book \u2018Radical Football\u2019 by
Steve Fleming, especially this excerpt written by Pippa Grange, England\u2019s
psychologist, I feel less ingenuous and alone with the idea that we have to start
changing the landscape of football; basically, I\u2019ve found my tribe and purpose in
these pages and the work of Common Goal<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In 2020, I wrote the following piece. I never published it anywhere at the time, itwas more to let off steam about what I was witnessing in my football workplace atthat time. Unfortunately, two years on, the article hasn\u2019t aged and I still have thesame concerns which have only deepened. LET\u2019S STOP PLAYING GAMES AND LET\u2019S START PLAYING FOOTBALL Years back, when I was about to embark on my adventure as a football translator\/interpreter,someone said to me, \u201cYou don\u2019t come…<\/p>\n

Leer m\u00e1s Leer m\u00e1s<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-447","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bibibloomsfree.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/447"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bibibloomsfree.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bibibloomsfree.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bibibloomsfree.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bibibloomsfree.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=447"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/bibibloomsfree.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/447\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":453,"href":"https:\/\/bibibloomsfree.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/447\/revisions\/453"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bibibloomsfree.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=447"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bibibloomsfree.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=447"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bibibloomsfree.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=447"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}