Two articles in this week's print edition point out how sporting events mirror politics and society. A leader finds wider lessons for India in the latest match-fixing scandal to afflict the country's most popular domestic cricket tournament, the Indian Premier League. And our Berlin correspondent ponders football: what does the all-German final of the European Champions League say about the country's role in the continent?
ESPN, the cable sports firm owned by Disney, is dropping some members of its team. In total, said ESPN on May 21st, it will probably shed around 5% of its 7,000 workers. This is hardly a clear-out, but it has surprised some fans. ESPN is regarded as the most lucrative media company in the world, and Disney’s strongest muscle. Analysts estimate that ESPN is probably responsible for 40% of Disney’s operating income and half of its share price. This month, thanks to ESPN, Disney reported an increase of $224m, or 15%, in the operating profit of its cable-networks business for the six months to March 30th.
So why the cuts? ESPN used to be the only player in the sports-programming game.
ON MAY 25th Yankee Stadium, home of the New York Yankees baseball team, is due to be the stage for a football (soccer) match between Chelsea and Manchester City, two English Premier League clubs. Four days before the exhibition game, the Yankees and the Manchester club announced they were joining forces to create a new soccer team in the Big Apple. New York City Football Club is due to make its debut next year. New Yorkers will probably call it what blue-hearted Mancunians call their own team: “City”.
Manchester City have reportedly been in talks with Major League Soccer (MLS), America’s premier league, since last year.
AS THE second round of the National Hockey League (NHL) playoffs began on May 14th, coaches of the eight remaining teams fighting for the Stanley Cup pounded a common message into their players’ heads: avoid stupid penalties that leave your team shorthanded on the ice. That costs goals and games.
The parents of Derek Boogaard allege the NHL encouraged their son to do just the opposite and much more. On May 10th they filed a suit against the league, accusing it of negligently causing the death of their 28-year-old son, who died two years ago of an accidental overdose of painkillers and alcohol. So far the league has not responded formally.
MANCHESTER UNITED'S record under Sir Alex Ferguson is arguably the best not just in England but in Europe. Today's Daily chart shows how the continent’s ten richest clubs (according to an annual survey by Deloitte, an accounting firm) have fared since 1992-93. None has won as many domestic titles as United. Although both Barcelona and Real Madrid have won more European titles, both Spanish clubs have got through many more managers: Real have averaged almost one boss a year. Sir Alex’s record is even more impressive when compared with what came before.
Our sister blog, Americas view, has an article about the continuing adventures of a controversial former football boss. Read it here.
Our sister blog, Schumpeter, has an article about a smartphone app for football fans. Read it here.
As an article in the Europe section of The Economist explains, one of the most powerful men in German football is in trouble. Read it here.
This week’s issue of The Economist looks at American college sports, a multi-billion-dollar industry with unpaid athletes. Read the article here.
IT WAS, frankly, bizarre. During the second half of a Premier League match between Liverpool and Chelsea on April 21st, Branislav Ivanovic, a Serbian defender playing for Chelsea, fell to the floor clutching his forearm. Video replays showed that Luis Suárez, Liverpool’s Uruguayan striker had bitten Mr Ivanovic. (Mr Suárez later added insult to injury by scoring a last-gasp equalising goal: he is pictured celebrating it.)
Mr Ivanovic was not seriously hurt. But Mr Suárez has form, and his past infractions include biting: in 2010 he bit a player on the shoulder in a Dutch league match and was banned for seven matches.
THE news, at the very start of a new flat-racing season, that anabolic steroids have been found in 11 horses belonging to a leading owner has shocked many inside the sport and many more who follow it. When millions of pounds are at stake in prize money and betting, there is always a risk that people will behave badly. But British horseracing has, by and large, shaken off the reputation it once had for dodgy dealing. Save one or two incidents in the last couple of decades, such as low level trainers instructing jockeys to lose races, the sport has been fairly free of corruption.
The invited guest author is Director of the Centre for the International Business of Sport at Coventry University. He can be found on Twitter at @Prof_Chadwick.
RECENTLY, sport has suffered from a dramatic growth in reports of corruption, from bribery to plain cheating. Examples include Europol’s announcement in February that it was investigating the alleged fixing of 380 football matches, Lance Armstrong’s public confession of doping and the expulsion by the International Badminton Federation of players who tried to lose matches at the Olympic Games last year in the hope of being better placed in the next round.
WHEN an English football team fights its way to a draw, its manager will often express grim satisfaction with a "hard-earned point". Quite how hard earned becomes clear from this week's detailed review of football finances by the Guardian newspaper. It has published the wage bills for each of the 20 clubs playing in the English Premier League last season. Based on the Guardian's figures, we calculate that the clubs paid an average of £1.55m ($2.5m) in wages for every league point they won.
Some clubs scored cheaper points than others, however. Swansea City paid about £740,000 per point; Chelsea over £2.4m.
WHEN Iran and Iraq went to war with each other in the 1980s, Henry Kissinger is said to have quipped: "It's a pity they can't both lose." Watching the playoff for the Masters last night, I was filled with the opposite emotion. It was a pity that Adam Scott and Angel Cabrera could not both win.
How could anyone not warm to Mr Cabrera? For a start, he is a grandfather. In almost any other sport, a paunchy 43-year-old would have no chance of beating the best in the world. But Mr Cabrera, who has won two majors in recent years, fended off his young rival until the second playoff hole.
Second, Mr Cabrera is a wonderful sport.
AMID much fanfare, the 150th edition of Wisden Cricketers' Almanack was published last week. The annual, a mix of statistics and features that not even two world wars could keep from the presses, is ubiquitously referred to as the bible of cricket. So revered is Wisden, in its distinctive yellow jacket, that in 2007 Bonhams, an auctioneer, sold a complete set of what was then 144 volumes for £84,000 ($165,000). The Guardian estimates the price of a full set today at £135,000.
Perhaps the most famous copy belonged to E.W. Swanton, a renowned cricket writer.
Reporting and analysis on the politics, economics, science and statistics of the games we play and watch
Advertisement
Comments and tweets on popular topics
Advertisement
Advertisement
