Category Archives: Football

Are You Watching, Fabio?

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BBC broadcaster James May with Dr Andy Harland of the Sports Technology Institute

The England football team has had a less-than-stellar record when it comes to taking penalty kicks in tournaments in recent years – but TV’s Top Gear host James May recently paid a visit to Loughborough University to find out if science can help improve this!

Filmed for inclusion in an episode of James May’s Man Lab recently broadcast on BBC2, Mr May visited researchers at the University’s Sports Technology Institute who, by using a range of measurement tools and high speed video cameras, captured the precise detail of his own penalty kicking technique before suggesting areas for improvement.

The ultimate aim of the excercise is to prove that an Englishman can successfully take a penalty and score a goal (some chance!!!)

If football is your game – whether as a player or an armchair pundit – the Library is well stocked with a variety of books about every aspect of the game, from its history and cultural aspects to coaching and training techniques. The database SPORTDiscus is also an invaluable resource for further up-to-date research.

If you want to watch this particular episode of James May’s Man Lab, it’s currently available via the BBC’s iPlayer at:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b017jk97/James_Mays_Man_Lab_Series_2_Episode_4/

England fans may doubtless hope Fabio Capello sneaks a look to take a few tips before next year’s European Championship finals…!

Kicking Off the New Season

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Wolverhampton Wanderers' Molineux Stadium, photographed by Tony Evans, taken from Flickr, used under cc licence

The English Barclay’s Premier League kicks off its opening fixtures of the 2011-12 football season this Saturday, with the promise of another exciting year of top calibre football.
 
As usual, pundits remain divided as to who will lift the title next May, currently held by the ever-green Sir Alex Ferguson’s Manchester United. But they face stiff competition from big-spending neighbours Manchester City, as well as the strong London contingient of Chelsea, Arsenal and Tottenham Hotspur, plus a resurgent Liverpool side under the steady guidance of their Kop hero, Kenny Dalglish.
 
But football isn’t just about the Premier League. The League Championship and Non-League football seasons have already begun, and way down in the Midland Football Alliance (some nine steps from the Premier League!!) our own Loughborough University football team has already made an excellent start to their campaign, winning their first two matches. Last season they finished a very creditable fourth in the league against a strong contingient of Midland semi-professional sides.
 
And on September 3rd, the team prepare to launch themselves at the first hurdle towards Wembley glory, with a home FA Cup preliminary round tie against Yaxley or Godmanchester Rovers.  The team will also be competing in the FA Vase, the British Universities and Colleges Sport Competition (BUCS) and the Midlands Universities League.
 
You can follow the team’s fortunes via their homepage here, and can find a comprehensive list of the division’s fixtures here. Why not pop along and cheer them on!
 
And if you’re interested in football – either as a fan or a sports science student – don’t forget that the Library has a comprehensive range of sports databases, including SPORTDiscus and and the Physical Education Index, as well as a wealth of football-related books on our shelves.

Energy and Football – Worthwhile Goals!

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E.ON, one of the UK’s leading energy companies, is at the forefront of a campaign to help amateur football teams up and down the land reduce their costs, after a report which reveals that UK amateur football, as a whole, is likely to be using around a staggering £43m worth of energy in pursuing its activities, with £7m of that total spent by those 2,000 semi-pro or amateur clubs with their own grounds.

According to E.ON, the amateur football sector as a whole could save up to 30% of its total energy bill by installing more modern, efficient and intelligent equipment, such as LED floodlights, timers and occupancy sensors, and by applying better controls, usage patterns and good maintenance.

As sponsor of the FA Cup since 2006, E.ON is no stranger to worthwhile football campaigns that make a positive difference to people’s lives. In the 2007/2008 season its Carbon Footyprint was the game’s first ever green campaign, helping to reduce the environmental impact of the FA Cup by encouraging fans to make simple energy pledges like leaving the car at home or gathering their mates together to watch matches on a single TV.

The Library has access to a wide variety of information about football, the environment, the effect sport has on the environment and its part in helping protect it via our many databases on Metalib, particularly SPORTDiscus and the databases in the Environment section.

To find out more about the campaign, E.ON have set up a Facebook page all about it here.

Football Legends

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Though England’s bid for glory during this summer’s World Cup in South Africa ended as something of a national debacle, there’s still plenty to be proud about of our ‘National Game’! And to reflect this, the BBC Archives have recently released a classic series of radio interviews detailing the lives and careers of some of Britain’s greatest footballers.

Jimmy Armfield, a former England captain himself and now one of BBC Sports’ Radio’s most respected and revered pundits, hosts these trips down football’s memory lane, and includes interviews with such icons as Stanley Matthews, Geoff Hurst, Bobby Charlton and Kevin Keegan, and should prove vastly entertaining and enlightening to football fans of all generations and nationalities. They’re available to listen to through the BBC Archives website here.

Needless to say, as the series focusses on players of legendary status, none of the current England football squad are represented!