Xan Rice, the West Africa correspondent for Financial Times, has a piece in the most recent issue of The New Yorker (unfortunately you need a subscription) about the sensational, but short, career of the late Kenyan marathon runner, Samuel Wanjiru. The article tells of Wanjiru’s sensational career as a distance runner, his tragically scandalous personal life, and the uncertain circumstances of his death. For those who may not know, on May 15, 2011 Wanjiru fell from a balcony at his home in Nyahururu, Kenya following a dispute with his first wife (who had allegedly come home to find him in bed with another woman) and died. He was 24 years old.
The loneliness of the Kenyan long distance runner
May 23, 2012 By 5 Comments
Drogbacite
May 22, 2012 By 2 Comments
Guest Post by Laurent Dubois
There are some matches that end up seeming primarily the vehicle for one person to somehow attain mythical status. The Champions League final between Chelsea and Bayern was written, it seems now, purely to allow Didier Drogba a form of poetic catharsis worthy of fiction or film. The fact that Chelsea won was itself a kind of oddity, for throughout the game it seemed the most unlikely of outcomes. But as he had against Barcelona, Drogba became the master of the unruly and the absurd: none of what the other team did, not of the great passing and possession and continual shots on goal, mattered in the end. Just Drogba did, his head and then his foot.
The 10 best goals scored by African players in the Premier League
May 13, 2012 By 6 Comments
Ever since Rupert Murdoch invented football in 1992 (see Fivers passim), African players from all over the continent have lit up the English Premier League and helped turn the competition into a continent-wide obsession. (Just last week, Arsene Wenger said he had been “frightened” by the intensity of Arsenal’s popularity in Nigeria and Kenya.) African players have also scored some memorable goals in the process. So while the Premier League was busy anointing Wayne Rooney’s jammy overhead shinner from last season as the official “Goal of the 20 Seasons”–presumably only fans under the age of seven were allowed to vote?–we put the question to Twitter: What is the greatest goal scored by an African in the English Premier League? As the final day of this 20th season begins, here’s the run-down of the 10 biggest goals scored by African players in the Premier League.
Fabrice Muamba and English football
March 20, 2012 By 1 Comment
British football isn’t known for its compassion, and it’s already been an explosive season of racist slurs and handshakes denied. But the recent collapse of Fabrice Muamba, a midfielder for Bolton Wanderers, has shown a different side to both the professional football world, and its supporters, hoping for the recovery of a young player that everyone agrees is ‘a genuine, warm boy’. [Read more...]
‘Banana republic’
March 20, 2012 By Leave a Comment
World Soccer magazine explains Russian football’s anti-racism strategies:
Anzhi Makhachkala have expressed their disappointment over an “idiotic” banana throwing incident involving recent signing Christopher Samba. The Congolese defender had a banana thrown at him from the stands after Sunday’s defeat to Lokomotiv in Moscow. Samba picked up the banana and threw it back. “I hope this incident will become a example of how not to behave for those children who saw it at the arena,” he said afterwards. Lokomotiv president, Olga Smorodskaya, a former graduate of the ‘See No Evil, Hear No Evil, Speak No Evil’ school of public relations, pleaded ignorance of the incident. “There were no incidents at the stadium on Sunday,” Lokomotiv president Olga Smorodskaya said. “I was watching our fans during the match with great attention. They conducted themselves exemplary during and after the match.” Russian Premier League spokesman Sergei Alekseyev said the league would do whatever possible to “change the situation” with regard to the country’s appalling record of racism, but that legal action was not always possible. “The stadium in itself is a democratic environment,” he said. “The police can seize flares, but how can they seize fruit?” he asked.
‘Grounding Air Congo’
March 6, 2012 By 1 Comment
Diamond dealers and mobile phone executives can relax. We’re talking American professional basketball. Josh Smith of the Atlanta Hawks recently dunks the ball on the head of Serge Ibaka of the Oklahoma City Thunder. (Remember Ibaka? The player without a country.) Priceless commentary 38 seconds into the video: “[Smith] just grounded Air Congo.”
Football: The 11 Commandments of Rigobert Song
March 2, 2012 By 4 Comments
When the good Lord handed down the Decalogue to Moses atop Mount Sinai, he limited himself to just the ten commandments. The new boss of Cameroon’s national football team, Rigobert Song, is obviously more demanding.
The Lagos preacher and the football final
February 25, 2012 By Leave a Comment
When it comes to football punditry, hindsight is the easy way out. So while your very own and brave AIAC published a top 10 list of African footballers who could emerge this year way back in early January, pundits, like the BBC’s Piers Edwards, waited until after the AFCON to make the same prediction. But our early or Edwards’ after the fact predictions have nothing on a Lagos pastor who claimed God showed him the final match in its entirety beforehand.
NBA player Serge Ibaka has no country
February 22, 2012 By 4 Comments
Last year we pointed to the fact that sports commentators, statisticians and journalists can’t distinguish the Democratic Republic of Congo (the DRC) from its neighbor the Republic of Congo every time they talk about NBA basketball player Serge Ibaka. He was born in Brazzaville, in the Republic of Congo, normally referred to as Congo-Brazzaville, not the DRC or what used to be known as Zaire (until 1997) and now commonly referred to by its initials or as Congo-Kinshasa. The only thing the two countries share is a river: the Congo (yeh, that river which Conrad fictionalized). Earlier this week Deadspin, the American sports blog, pointed out that ESPN lists Ibaka’s birthplace as “Brazzaville, Zaire.” At least they know that Zaire still existed when Ibaka was born in 1989. But again it is the wrong country. Today I noticed they just deleted his country and his birthplace is now only listed as “Brazzaville.” So now he has no country.
Germany has a version of GQ magazine
February 21, 2012 By 3 Comments
A woman in Germany removes her clothes and poses for a magazine photographer with her famous boyfriend. Her boyfriend’s father happens to be Tunisian and the pictures are reprinted in Tunisia. Three journalists are arrested in Tunis and charged with “violating public morals by publishing a nude photograph.” It would be fair to say that in post-Ben Ali Tunisia, nudity provokes a wide-range of responses. The boyfriend in this story happens to be Real Madrid’s German midfielder Sami Khedira, and the girlfriend is Lena Gercke, a model.
