Theo Pinnock - Football & PR - That Boy Theo

What will the media coverage be like with England not in the euros?

2008-05-08T15:28:00.000+01:00

Its going to be indifferent this summer during the European championships as the creators of football are not in the tournament. Below are my top 5 things that you will and won’t see or hear during the tournament

What we’ll hear and see from the media

That the Italian player Simone Perotta, was born in Aston-under-Lyne, just outside Manchester
That an English player may win the cup (Perotta again)
Lacklustre coverage and/or commentary (England not there who cares)
Drop in viewing numbers
England players on holiday (Should probably be training together…you know, to play in these tournaments)

What we won’t hear or see from the media

Images of England’s previous tournament heroics (1966 cup win…. That’s it!)
England’s near misses (Missed penalties, scored penalties, lost games etc)
The countries gone “England mad” (no St Georges flags will be around)
Drunken brawls in Austria
England inspired songs. 3 lions will get dusty over this summer!!!

Any thing else i've missed? Let me know!!

Pro “Wii”voloution (My best blog title to date, what word play)

2008-05-08T15:24:00.000+01:00

Saw the Nintendo Wii advert for pro evolution soccer the other day and I though “how un-fun does that look”. All you could see was shapes flying around and I couldn’t understand what was going on! With the sports pack on the Wii you have to actually swing like your playing tennis, block and punch on the boxing and baseball swing for the baseball (obviously). Saying that it does look like one of them that you’ll love it when you play it but it doesn’t look to have that “fun” Wii factor for me.

Im no games engineer but why not make it like that with the football game to. The equivalents to that would be strapping something to your leg and swinging your leg to kick. That would defiantly affect the lack of physical activity by our video game playing youth. Think Nintendo should give me a job!!!

Football is fickled

2008-04-23T00:08:00.004+01:00

Gary Megson:

Liverpool are going to have a massive say in which teams go down. We would hope that Rafa Benitez will retain the integrity of the Premier League with his squad selection

From the man who lost all his by playing a Sunday league strength Bolton side in the UEFA cup. tut tut

More bad press for italian football

2008-04-22T23:33:00.000+01:00

I’ve jus had a quick read of this article from ex Juventus general manager Luciano Moggi. Football does have a very manly stance where strength is everything, such as players shouldn’t dive (Unless your name is Drogba), "it's a mans game" and so on but these comments have raised the bar in discrimination. Have a read of the article here.

I find these comments incredible and disturbing. These points of view are in the same vein of comments were once directed at Black players discouraging them from playing and now these mindsets are deterring more social groups from playing, next there going to say boys with unisex names shouldn’t play!

Italy has had enough problems and this in my opinion is the reason why. Italian clubs have had extensive links with far right leaders, fascist groups, violent fans and all round bad stuff, so should he really be showing himself and his country with these caveman sounding comments. Regardless if gay footballers do or don’t exist no one should be castigated from playing.

However

“homosexuals are very intelligent people"

so they’ll probably forgive him

When football and their public relations goes wrong

2008-04-18T11:21:00.000+01:00

Liverpool’s stories leaked about the board meeting with Jurgen Klinsmann to take Rafa’s job - think they need to read some Maslow articles. Job security goes a long way!

Football is live on... not sky!

2008-04-18T11:19:00.000+01:00

Did you know that it is possible to watch football as well as other sports online? I’m not telling you where or how but by having a good internet connection and a laptop you can watch all the Saturday 3 o’clock kick-offs whilst still in bed and without having to pay a penny (apart from the laptop and internet fee). Obviously it isn’t as clear as watching it on TV but I’m not complaining…

Club communications

2008-04-15T19:00:00.000+01:00

After every football match I receive an email from Arsene Wenger (The Arsenal manager) declaring his opinions on the previous game. Is this really from him though or is it the work of Arsenals communications department? And in addition why do this? Like all organisations do they want to make the receiver feel like they are part of the organisation and I does make you feel important….in a way!

Wish they’d win instead though

Sorry for the wait

2008-04-15T18:46:00.000+01:00

Sorry for wait but all is sorted now im back able to blog again!!!

Wengers Comments

2008-02-28T00:47:00.000Z

As many of you reading this will have seen a rather horrific sight regarding a one Eduardo Da Silva last weekend (23/02/2008). I’m not going to talk about how disturbing it was (it was one of the worst sights I’ve ever seen!!!) but the comments that have come from the incident.

Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger made some very “excessive” comments about the players involved, however later retracted them. I felt that it needed to be done in order to keep the mans reputation intact in the Media. As soon as the comments were made many pundits, fans as well as Ex-Arsenal players condemed him from saying so and questioned his asnd some of his players professionalism. He said the comments were made at the heat of the moment after a difficult and emotional week (Getting dumped out of the FA cup, out playing AC Milan but have nothing to show for it, losing a key squad member for 9-15 months and losing a game due to very dubious refering decisions). However is it just to talk with your heart and not your head when in his situation?

Maybe im looking at this from Arsenal-tinted glasses but I understand why he said what he said. as someone who has seen a similar incident, you have no other emotion but “near hate” for the person opposite to you. The were without a doubt over the top but football a bias game and without that, how boring would it be. All players and fans alike have said the tackle wasn’t malicious and felt sorry for Mathew Taylor who made the inocent looking challenge, add that apart from the Mathew Taylor, no other Birmingham player has had any words of sympathy for Eduardo. They would rather protect their team mate (which is understandable), say Mr Wengers a sore loser, say Taylor shouldn’t have been sent off or that Arsenal were jus in a bad mood…funny to think why they may not be the life and soul of the party aint it!!!

In the end, I just hope that the incident isnt remembered for what was said or not said but that a talented players career lies in the balance <(T)>

Public Relations + Football. Is it needed more now?

2008-02-25T00:00:00.000Z

To answer this…YES!!

The spotlight is there and as we all know they make some pretty big (and sometimes funny) mistakes, and who’s there to pick up the pieces…. the PR teams. Who would have thought that we would have these two things together? Not the players 50+ years ago who used to advertise for social drinking at the local and smoked while the gaffer was giving the half time team talk. But now, if you saw Rooney on a Friday night in the pub…. a tabloid papers dream. However many of them must have switch on the self-destruct button, they’re always up to something bad. If their not sleeping around their dodging tax, going AWOL and such other antics. Are our “model professional” sports men just behaving worse than before, are that the papers are looking for it…. i personally feel it’s a combination of both.

Of course now they are what Hercules was to the Greeks. If they sneeze, the papers will be there faster than a pack of dogs on a 3-legged cat and some people will be interested to know. In a way PR needs football. How many stories are there that need to get glossed over with a swift statement release…. At this rate we’ll all get jobs easy!!!

I feel that people have forgotten that they are just people and as much as PR is needed to keep them sweet with the fans it shouldn't be (we’ll to the extent it is anyway). And besides they’re not behaving any worse than anyone before them…there just getting caught more <(T)>