European Championship in Poland & Ukraine

‘Wilhelmus van Nassouwe ben ik, van Duitsen bloed, den vaderland getrouwe blijf ik tot in den dood. Een Prinse van Oranje ben ik, vrij onverveerd, den Koning van Hispanje heb ik altijd geëerd.’

It’s 1 July 21.45 EET (Eastern Europe Time) and all the fans in the stadium are screaming and yelling after they have heard the national anthem of the Netherlands. Yes, the Netherlands has reached the final of the European Championship but before the start of the tournament there is a lot of negative publicity about the organization countries: Poland & Ukraine.

The UEFA and FIFA decide where the European and World Championship of football will take place but it looks like both organizations are very easy to be influenced. There is a lot incorrect with the organizing countries according to our Western view like: the new stadium in Warschau is not ready yet, racism under Polish football supporters (according to the president of Legia Warschau 15 till 20 percent of his supporters are neo-Nazis) and there are a low amount of facilities for football supporters in the host cities. For example, Charkov (the Netherlands is playing here all of their group matches) as you can see on the pictures, is not a very happy place to stay.

However, we think there is a much bigger problem with the corruption in Eastern-Europe:
“For hundreds of professional footballers in Eastern Europe, their dream of making a career in football has turned into nothing short of a nightmare. They don’t receive their salaries they are physically and mentally abused and have to be on their guard against falling into the hands of criminals.”

This is a conclusion from the FIFPO Black Book Eastern Europe. A shocking result is that by an average football game in East-Europe at least two players are approached to influence the outcome of a game. In addition, more than 10 percent of the football players have to deal with violence and intimidation. Therefore, we wonder how a European Championship can be played in Poland &  Ukraine when there is so much corruption. 

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Football players and how they celebrate their goals

Imagine you’re a professional football player that scores during  a match. Everybody in the stadium is excited and celebrates the goal.  However, you make a  sprint to  the corner flag to celebrate it with a rehearsed movement.

It  appears that more and more football players want to celebrate their goal with  themselves and in their own manner. Why don’t football players celebrate with their teammates? In our opinion  football is a team sport and a rehearsed movement to celebrate the goal is fine but it look likes it’s booming business this moment. For example, the heart sign which is shown by numerous players like John Guidetti when he scores for Feyenoord.

See the movie down below and please let us know what you think about this topic! Maybe you know some nice pictures or movies about football players and how they celebrate their goals? Let us know and we place this on our blog.

For all our Dutch visitors: In 2007 the book ‘Het grote juichen’ was published. In this book is written how players celebrate their goals in the history and nowadays; the evolution of celebrating a goal.

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Money, Money, Money!

The Netherlands is in a recession since this week. The Euro countries are losing their triple A status one by one. However, the last few days there were sport events where a lot of money was involved. In addition we think this is strange because how can whole Europe be almost in a recession when there is so much money involved in sports events in Europe?

For example, a large amount of money is to be found at Anzhi Makhachkala. The football club is managed by some very rich Russians and Guus Hiddink is the new head trainer and vice- chairman of the club. For example, they pay striker Samuel Eto’o 365.000 Euro per week, this makes him the best paid player in the world.


However, this week there were some sport events at which athletes could earn a large amount of money.  In the table below the sport events of the last days are summarized:

 * We are aware that the Champions- and Europe League are no sport events but competitions. However, the amount of money which is involved in these competitions is extremely high therefore we have chosen to add these two leagues.

By looking at this table we can conclude that there is a great difference in sport disciplines. It is very clear that athletes in some disciplines are very well paid but on the other side there are disciplines in which athletes earn small amounts of money. We understand that the popularity of the sport and sponsorships are responsible for the height of the money athletes earn but these athletes are training for the same goal (be the best of the world) with the same labor.

But why are there such big differences in sport popularity and sponsorships? We don’t know and are excited about your opinion. Please let us know in the comment field down below!

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Pre-Valentine's Day: Love = Football!

 (Girls, scroll down for a nice valentine tip! ^^)

After a 2-month break, the UEFA leagues are finally back! This week we can all enjoy many great games from the Champions league (8th final) and the Europa league (16th final).The first game will start on Tuesday 14th of February. For the big football fans among us it doesn’t matter this day it will be Valentine’s Day or does it? The video beneath is a fun commercial made by Puma in 2010 specially for valentine's day...

Two months ago we could never predict which team would actually be in what league; the results really surprised us. Who did ever thought that last-year’s Champions league finalist would play in the Europa league this year? We didn’t, as we neither did expect that Olympique Lyonnais would continue into next round in Champions league at the expense of Ajax.

Fortunately, in our opinion these surprises brings surprisingly good matches and we hope everyone will enjoy them. The program this week will be as following:

Champions League

Tuesday 14th of February

20:45

Lyon  (FRA) – Apoel (CYP)

Leverkusen (GER) – Barcelona (SPA)

Wednesday 15th of February

18:00

Zenit (RUS) – Benfica (POR)

20:45

Milan (ITA) – Arsenal (ENG)

Europa League

Tuesday 14th of February

18:00

Rubin (RUS) – Olympiacos (GRE)

18:30

Braga (POR) – Besiktas (TUR)

Wednesday 15th of February

18:00

Lokomotiv Moskva (RUS) – Athletic (SPA)

19:00

Salzburg (AUT) – Metalist (UKR)

Ajax (NED) – Man. United (ENG)

Plzen (CZE) – Schalke (GER)

AZ (NED) – Anderlecht (BEL)

Lazio (ITA) – Atlético (SPA)

Legia (POL) – Sporting (POR)

21:05

Steaua (ROU) – Twente (NED)

Wisla (POL) – Standard Liege (BEL)

Udinese (ITA) – PAOK (GRE)

Trabzonspor (TUR) – PSV (NED)

Hannover (GER) – Club Brugge (BEL)

Porto (POR) – Man City (ENG)

Stoke (ENG) – Valencia (SPA)

For all the girls who are reading this, maybe this video will inspire you to surprise your football-addicted man…

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The ‘Elfstedentocht’ needs to be on the UNESCO World Heritage

Every year when it’s freezing for a couple of days everybody in the Netherlands gets the ‘Elfstedentocht’ fever. The ‘Elfstedentocht’ (Eleven Cities Tour) is a 200-kilometers long tour where people skate along eleven historic Frisian cities. The popularity of the tour is so enormous that even when you’re a member of the ‘Koninklijke vereniging De Friesche Elf Steden’ a drawing of lots every year decides who may start and who may not if the ‘Elfstedentocht’ takes place. In the history there were 15 ‘Elfstedentochten’ and the last one was in 1997. The clip below illustrates the typical Dutch atmosphere which should be protected by the UNESCO World Heritage (unfortunatly, the clip is in Dutch).

Due to the climate in The Netherlands an ‘Elfstedentocht’ is more an exception than a rule so maybe that’s why the tour is so popular among the Dutch. The tour can only take place when the ice thickness of the route is about 15 centimeters because of this it needs to freeze the whole day during two weeks.

The UNESCO World Heritage exists of property with exceptional and universal nature and/or cultural value. At this moment the Netherlands don’t have a cultural value on the list which is a little bit strange because we believe that there are some typical Dutch culture values which are the building blocks of the Dutch society.

For example, this could be ‘Koninginnedag’ (Queensday) but the problem with this is that not everybody in The Netherlands likes the royal house. Therefore, this couldn’t be a cultural value so another option is the ‘Elfstedentocht’ because it’s an old value of the Netherlands (in the history everybody could ice skate and still everybody skates on ice these days when it’s possible). Another advantage that speaks for the ‘Elfstedentocht’ is the sponsoring of the tour. Since the tour was last skated 15 years ago, the sponsorship policy is outdated and everybody tries to cash in on it. By putting the ‘Elfstedentocht’ on the UNESCO list this would be prevented.

Fortunately, there are a lot of famous Dutch people and politicians who supported the ‘Elfstedentocht’ in their own way. For example, Geert Wilders (politician) said that if the tour takes place this year it needs to be a national day like ‘Koninginnedag’. Jort Kelder (tv-star) said that the tour needs to be on the UNESCO World Heritage because of the sponsorship policy (he doesn’t like the sponsoring of UNOX).

In our opinion the ‘Elfstedentocht’ is something unique for The Netherlands. This was for example illustrated by the huge amount of journalists at the last edition of the tour in 1997 and it is really popular in The Netherlands (everybody talks about it). The typical Dutch feeling needs to be preserved for our grandchildren and their grandchildren so that every foreigner knows what the orange color is feeling and standing for.

‘IT GIET OAN!’

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