Chelsea FC Supporters’ Club

July 9, 2010 By 2 Comments

English football is big in Africa. One reason as photographer Eric Lafforque explains–in the text accompanying his image on Flickr of a Hamar young man in rural Ethiopia repping for his club–is the role of free broadcasts of the matches on national TV:  ”…  [H]e can watch Chelsea matches, like many Ethiopians who are crazy about English football because national Ethiopian TV broadcasts all the matches … While I was in deep south Ethiopia, the only news I could ask [for] were “Did Arsenal won?”, and I always [got] the answer: the score, the name of the scorers etc …”

via Naijablog

– Sean Jacobs

Filed Under: PHOTOGRAPHY Tagged With: , , , , ,

The best World Cup commercial?

May 21, 2010 By Leave a Comment

After my praise of Bono earlier today, you must be wondering: No I am not lightheaded.  It’s the World Cup stupid.

Clever commercial by Nike. Probably the best of the 2010 bunch I’ve seen thus far. And it is primarily about football.

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Filed Under: ADVERTISING Tagged With: , , , , ,

Drogbacité

May 7, 2010 By 3 Comments


Didier Drogba is all the rage now–”Time” named him to the magazine’s annual 100 Most Influential People,” largely because of his apparent role  to end the civil war in his native Cote d’Ivoire’s civil war through football.  As a result, Drogba apparently has god-like status in his homeland. So much so that he even spawned a dance and music style: Drogbacite.  At a recent panel on the 2010 World Cup I hosted at The New School that view of Drogba’s influence basically held. Not so quick says my man Siddhartha Mitter, journalist and music critic, who is eminently qualified on matters Ivorian. In the post, below, Siddhartha puts us straight about Drogbacite, particularly Drogba’s claims about the music named for him. The post is worth reading just for the valuable music education.

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Filed Under: SPORT Tagged With: , , , ,

Didier Drogba is ‘Most Influential’

May 3, 2010 By 2 Comments

That’s big in a country where elites (not that “Time” magazine is an elite publication) hardly care for soccer. Didier Drogba, the Chelsea forward and Cote d’Ivoire captain, has become one of the few sportsmen to appear on the front cover of Time magazine. He made their annual “100 most influential people.” You know what I think of such lists, but I’ll make an exception for Drogba.

Other Africa-related folk who made the list: businessman Tijane Thiam, Graca Machel, model Liya Kebede, Valentin Abe and “District 9″ director Neill Blomkamp.

Filed Under: JOURNALISM, SPORT Tagged With: , , , ,

Lagos bleeds Chelsea Blue

April 7, 2010 By 1 Comment

The BBC debuts a new TV series this month, “Welcome to Lagos,”  on the “ingenuity” of poor people in Nigeria’s  commercial capital, Lagos.The Observer‘s acting arts editor, Akin Ojumu, who is also a fan of David Cameron’s ideas about black men and responsibility, likes it. Sokari at Blacklooks, who observes that suddenly a flurry of Nigeria-focused coverage on British TV, does not.

But critics aside, the best part of the film, based on The Guardian’s report of it, is this comment about football by a women interviewed for the film:

” … My best friend, Lati, runs a cinema house next to where I live. We watch Nollywood movies, and all the Chelsea matches. I could never be friends with anyone who supports Manchester United. They are the Red Devils. They are devilish. Maybe they are using their devilish substance to win all the major trophies they have been winning. I hate them. Their nickname is very bad. Up Chelsea! Blues for life!“

Which is when my friend Tony Karon, a Liverpool supporter, reminded me of the trailer for the Nollywood film, “Chelsea vs Liverpool”:

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Filed Under: TELEVISION Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Akon Deserves a Pepsi

March 30, 2010 By 2 Comments

Apparently the video for Pepsi’s “Oh Africa” commercial is the first 2010 World Cup commercial to go viral. (I’ve blogged about it here before.)  So much for Coke thinking its official World Cup sponsor status and numerous videos it is shooting with its designated star, K’Naan, would guarantee it domination among football fans.

Footnote:  I can’t confirm this, but a source tells me that Coke is spending something like $1 billion on their World Cup advertising campaign, that their contract with K’naan allows them unlimited use of the song for a defined period of time (that’s why the remixes), that versions of the song are being recorded with pop stars from every region of the world, and that they are tying the marketing blitz to–irony of irony–clean water campaigns.

Filed Under: ADVERTISING Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Africans Prefer English Soccer

February 2, 2010 By Leave a Comment

These scenes of Angolan football fans at the recent African Nations Cup captured by Al Jazeera may give the impression that Africans still value the continental game.

Actually they prefer English football, argues sports writer Simon Kuper in a recent Financial Times column.

Filed Under: JOURNALISM Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Bono saves the World Cup

January 3, 2010 By 6 Comments

The New York Times has published another of rock star Bono’s stupid “op-eds.” This time some nonsense titled “Ten for the Next Ten.”  The last item on the list is the 2010 World Cup to held in South Africa next summer (actually it will be winter down there then). Anyway, Bono goes on about how it is “… getting easier to describe to Americans the impact of the World Cup — especially the impact it will have in Africa.”

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Filed Under: JOURNALISM Tagged With: , , , , ,

AFRICA’S WORLD CUP?

December 2, 2009 By 1 Comment

Tomorrow is the draw for the 2010 World Cup in Cape Town. Apparently Charlize Theron, the South African actress with the fake American accent will also be there. Can anyone explain that to me?

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Filed Under: FEATURED Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,
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