Murder on Gdansk Floor

If you read my blog, you likely read it due to the Facebook update. If you are on Facebook, you will have likely have seen some random pictures of me in Gdansk, Poland over the last three weeks.

I left UEFA around 18 months ago, but have been fortunate enough to have been invited to work on some Champions League, Europa League and now the European Championships as an external. I struck lucky in Gdansk with the Spanish in town, a fantastic group of people to work with, and a fantastic city. Gdansk is a cool place, though we actually spent more time in neighbouring Sopot. Both cities are in Northern Poland and are on the Baltic Sea, which means beach time baby. I managed to visit the beach twice. Once at 5am for a vodka-fuelled swim, and another time for a short part of a run which was clearly a bad decision. As a side note, Sopot will host the 2014 World Indoor Athletics Championships and I am sure it will host a fantastic event.

Weather-wise, we were not so lucky. It rained most days and was quite cold most of the time. We had one glorious day of 30c but unfortunately it was Spain v Croatia, and I was wearing the full suit. Not ideal, and with a classic blue shirt on, you have to wear the jacket if you're prone to sweating like me.

Events like this are somewhat unnatural from a work perspective and so much depends on the people you work with. The hours are long, and it can be reminiscent of Big Brother as you spend a lot of time with your colleagues. My team were fantastic to work with - everybody did their jobs, we all had sufficiently decent musical tastes (I did not subject them to Barry or JBJ though), and we had laugh after laugh, picking up a few nicknames along the way which cannot be printed. All in all, a thoroughly enjoyable experience.

What did I learn from Euro 2012?

…..that as much as I tried to dislike Jose Reina and Fernando Torres when we interviewed them due to their Liverpool connections, I could only find them incredibly friendly and normal.

….that as glamorous as it sounds to be working on a European Championships, it is three or four weeks of incredibly long hours and hard work. I am not saying it was not fun, but it is not easy.

….that working behind the scenes with players and coaches is a fantastic experience. I learned some amazing secrets that are not in the public domain….and unfortunately, they will remain that way!

….that some people can deal with pressure and stressful moments, and others cannot in all walks of life, and I am thankful that I generally can.

….that the people of Poland are extremely friendly and fun with Sopot & Gdansk ranking up there on my list as fun places to visit.

….that the Irish fans are fantastic. The results were miserable, but the fans are an absolute credit. They just have fun, simple as that…nothing more, nothing less.

….that Twitter has become the place for breaking news and coverage in sport. It may have struggled to cope with the barrage of Tweets at times, but that is where it is at these days.

….that I have said it before and I will say it again, as much as I have enjoyed the tournament, the quality of it is not as good as the Champions League in my view.

….that Polish vodka is dangerous and should not be mixed with beer. Or Jaegermeister. Or Mojitos. Or anything else.

….that my favourite t-shirt in Gdansk was on that had ‘GERMANY’ printed in bold across the middle, and underneath it read ‘I’m actually Greek but we’re sponsored by Germany’. Hilarious!

The Devil Is In The Detail

I think we all have an optimum way of working. Some folks like to work in complete silence. Some folks like to work on their own. Some folks like to work in an open plan office space. Some folks like to work in the mornings. Some folks like to whistle while they work. That annoys me. Some folks don’t like to work.

Personally, I enjoy working. I made it my mission when I was a fresh faced but spotty boy from Leeds at school to work in something I loved and enjoyed. I saw my parents work so hard, such long hours, doing work that they didn’t particularly enjoy to give me and my sister a good start in life. I don’t like the fact that they had to, but I am eternally grateful. So I made it my mission to do something I enjoy and that something was sport. Football would be the ideal thing, but sport would keep me motivated to work and to work hard for the long forty-plus year slog we all have to make.

When I was young, I pretty much found my optimum way of working. If it was something I was not interested in, I just did enough to reach the next level. My mum showed me my school reports a month or so ago and it was hilarious to read the comments which are as appropriate now as they were twenty years ago. If it was something I was interested in or could tailor to football such as a random poem or story in English, I excelled.

The other thing I noticed when I was young was that I had a tendency to work best under pressure. That usually meant doing work at the very last minute. In some ways I am incredibly organised and meticulous. In other ways, I only produce my best when the pressure is on. During my working life, the same has always applied. I have always sort the high tempo intensity that brings the best out of me and it is what I enjoy.

In terms of working environment, I am not one to particularly revel in working in silence or on my own. Give me an airport, a room full of people, loud noise and music, all kinds of disturbances, and I am able to find my own silence and solitude in my head to work. I am reasonably fortunate to be able to do that. Given the travel and the hectic lifestyle I have often led, it has been the only way to progress.

I was always a nighthawk and still am. I generally produce my best late at night. Maybe it is another case leaving things until the last minute, I am not sure, but it is something I have always enjoyed. Whether I had to write an essay through the night, research and analyse football matches, or general stuff, the night has always been my friend. I sit here right now at 4.30am writing this blog and I am enjoying every moment. If you are reading this any time before 6am, then I apologise and hope you can go back to sleep.

My other place of great thought and contemplation is the loo. I kid you not. Instead of a magazine, try take a problem or issue to the loo next time, and give it some rational thought. It is amazing what you can come up with sometimes on the throne.

Not everything works for all people. HJ is an early bird and gets more done in the first few hours of the day than I get done before 3pm. My way is certainly not the best way, that I am sure. But it works for me. The devil is in the detail and working out our optimum way to work or live is pretty important for me.

Bouncebackability

One trait among athletes and in people in general that I admire the most, is the ability to hold it together psychologically when things are going tough and to fight back. The team that is losing and fights back to get a result, the boxer who has been whipped for 11 rounds and knocks his opponent out in the 12th, the guy down the street who has been diagnosed with cancer and fights through it and survives. The problem however was how to describe the process without too many words – there was no particular adjective to explain it.

A couple of years ago, a new word was introduced into the English dictionary following a campaign on Soccer AM – one of my favourite television shows – and it finally filled the void. Bouncebackability was born.

This was no more evident than on Saturday when HJ and I were on Merseyside for Everton v Man Utd. My boys played quite well apart from some comedy defensive moments, largely due to a poor performance from Sylvain Distan. 3-1 down with only injury time remaining, the Blues somehow managed to bounce back and score two goals in the 92nd and 93rd minutes to draw 3-3. The whole place erupted…or so we heard. I am not proud of this, in fact I am ashamed, but I insisted that we leave on 90 minutes. I was fighting off a cold, and was fed up at 3-1 and figured the boys had no chance with Utd in control of the game. It’s a rule I have always abided by – never leave before the final whistle. However, over the last couple of years, with a fairly fast paced lifestyle, I have developed a rule – I will leave on 90 minutes if there is a difference of two goals or more. Well it well and truly bit my butt this time, and we were victims of a severe case of Bouncebackability.

We experienced another example of Bouncebackability recently. My adorable little niece Mia had her first day at school around ten days ago. The little monkey was so excited about her first day and was having a great first day until she fell off the climbing frame and broke her collarbone. She had a rough day and a half, but then she just seemed so positive and brave about it all. Granted, she was enjoying a sweet and ice cream diet, but I was amazed at how she dealt with it all. She was on good form and she had the ability to bounce back amazingly well. I guess kids have greater recovery powers – I don’t think I would have been so lively as she was.

I would hazard a guess that anybody who has seen the show Soccer AM knows all about Bouncebackability. I would also guess that most folks here in Switzerland and anywhere else outside of the UK have never heard of it. Well, now is the time to adopt it. Throw it into a conversation when appropriate and spread the word.

Scout's Honour

Since the UEL Final in Hamburg last week, I have been in Liechtenstein for the U17 European Championships. It has been an interesting experience, largely due to my first taste of life in Liecht and at an U17 tournament. I have to admit that I knew very little about the country before arriving, but after two runs of 8km and 7km, I’ve covered the entire country pretty much. Everything is 15 minutes away – it is a little bizarre, but very handy when one has to travel between venues and hotels. Switzerland is 15 minutes away. Austria is 15 minutes away. I virtually ran through three countries in two of my runs – I have to admit that I felt like I was a hard core long distance runner even if it was only 7-8km.

The event itself is a fantastic tournament and it is great to see the stars of tomorrow performing against each other. I spent some time with the players and coaches before the tournament began, and while there are unquestionably some cheeky characters, on the whole, they were serious about their football and preparing for life as a professional player. This is almost certainly the biggest event of their short careers, and so everybody is determined to impress.

Similarly with the Youth Hockey tournaments, and most likely most youth tournaments in most team sports, what has caught my eye the most has been the huge number of scouts attending the matches. They are everywhere. I spent some time with an agent at the World Hockey Championships last year. He was scouting young European players, trying to identify future clients. He was one of hundreds of scouts and agents trying to charm players to either become clients, or join their team. Imagine one piece of really good bread made at the best bakery you can imagine, just laying in the middle of a big field. One bird will find it first, but it won’t be long before word has spread and hundreds of birds are scrapping over the same piece of bread. Usually the biggest most powerful bird will be victorious unless a cunning craftier bird who may be smarter and faster can nip in ahead of them. That’s the life of agents and scouts.

I have given plenty of consideration to both areas as potential future activities that I may get involved with. Analysing players and matches is something I enjoy and I am good at doing it. I am confident as far as that is concerned. What I do doubt however is being able to dive in ahead of the other 200 vultures to snare my guy. It is not in my personality and I doubt whether I could be that effective without being so brash and bold as so many of them are. I sense these are not professions where nice quiet guys – I’m not claiming to fit that category neither (!) – can be successful and prominent. It is cut throat to say the least and seeing a couple of scouts at this event and the methods they employed, I would not find that overly enjoyable.

The other thing which sprung to my mind the more time I spent with the players was just how young they are. These guys are anywhere between 15 and 17 years old and it is easy to forget that they are just kids. One or two are valued at millions already, and they have scouts desperately trying to get their phone numbers, meet their parents, tracking their movements. I would guess some of them are unaware of the extent of what actually goes on, but it is a sign of the times when one can see the lengths some scouts go to.

One scout in particular was complaining about how they can only go for players once they are 16 years old, and compared them to tennis players or musicians who could move to the States or Spain for better coaching or opportunities. He also complained at the amount of compensation clubs must play if they do snare a talent – around half a million pounds. His argument was ridiculously lop-sided and irrational, and I would be fascinated to know the view of his club if the roles were reversed and big clubs were constantly hawking around the best players of his team that they have invested so much time, money and effort in.

I read a great article about the migration of young European hockey players – whether they should stay in their respective countries or move to North America at an early age. The one resounding outcome of that report was that the smaller European nations were suffering badly because of the situation. If a kid stays, he receives a lower level of coaching but perhaps more ice-time. If he moves, he may receive better coaching, but it less likely to gain as much on ice experience. Financially, there is no comparison, and that often dictates the younger players to be tempted to North America. What it does mean however is that those players who remain in Europe are not exposed to the quality needed to push their game on and the leagues in turn remain at a lower quality – and then in turn are less likely to produce top quality players in future generations. For those players that leave for North America, they are replaced by cheap and poor alternatives, often ageing North Americans in the twilight of their careers. A similar scenario can be seen in football. If we take the best players out of the Czech Republic for example, how can we expect more players to emerge at a high level?

I cannot fault the kids for chasing their dreams and securing their financial futures. I cannot fault the clubs for chasing the best players. I cannot fault the scouts and agents for ultimately doing their jobs. I do not like however some of the ethics and morals of scouts and agents which are borderline and whose actions are often against the rules. This is something that can be monitored better by the authorities. I know if I was a parent of one of these boys, I would certainly be more in favour of those scouts, clubs and agents who play by the rules and have the best interests of the players at heart. That would be the only way I could play it if I do get involved in scouting or agency, and just hope and pray many parents and players feel the same rather than being sucked into the lure of big bucks.