Cultured Football #162
Cultured Football #162
Super Depor Rise Again. Saudi Flops. Bologna in CL Heaven. Albanian Football. Value of Academies
It had to be him
By for
It is hard to rank where it stands in a season that has delivered plenty of emotionally charged narratives, but Deportivo La Coruna’s elevation from the third tier of Spanish football certainly deserves to be celebrated. Especially as it was driven by a player who gave up playing in the Primera Liga to join his boyhood club in a time of need.
Bonus Pick: For long stretches of the season, it looked as if Las Palmas could push for qualification to European football. A long series of defeats, however, have dragged them all the way down. [By Jamie Kemp for Football Espana]
Saudi Arabia's billion-dollar football league a work in progress
By Haitham El-Tabei for AFP News
The Saudi league and its clubs will soon be at the forefront of world football. Unfortunately for them, that will be less because of what is happening on the pitches across the country and more down to European clubs trying to offload their unwanted squad members for the huge transfer fees that Saudi clubs have come to represent. The Saudi Pro League most definitely has a long way to go if it is to reach the ambitions of those backing it.
60 Years In The Making: The UEFA Champions League Rise Of Bologna FC
By David Ferrini for Forbes
Clubs achieving a surprising qualification to the Champions League is the modern equivalent of those same clubs previously winning the league title out of the blue. It seems impossible these days to think of Bologna as possible Italian champions but they did win the title in 1964. Yet such is the current world of football that Bologna actually qualifying for Europe’s elite competition is reason to celebrate.
Bonus Pick: Few clubs have been as dominant this season as PSV in Holland with their title win re-establishing the credentials of manager Peter Bosz. [By Alex Roberts for FotMob]
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Football in Stalinist Albania: ‘The only 90 minutes when people could be themselves’
By Phil Harrison for The Guardian
I’m cheating a bit here because this is an extract from Phil Harrison’s recently released book Inside the Hermit Kingdom. To this day, Albania is to an extent the country that Europe forgot, still struggling to find its feet economically, after the decades of repressive and authoritarian regime that cut it off from the rest of the world. It is there that Harrison focuses his attention, searching to add colour to a country that is often viewed through a black and white lens.
How Do You Assess The Value of an Academy
By Casey Evans for Analytics FC
“He’s one of our own” That’s what fans sing when a player emerges from the academy to become a star of the first team. Yet, whilst everyone dreams of the emergence of the next Trent Alexander Arnold, Phil Foden or Bukayo Saka, there is greater value to an academy than merely the elevation of stars.
Every Saturday, Cultured Football brings you five great football articles you will enjoy reading.
Last Week’s Most Read: Lopetegui on a manager's life, recruitment, Premier League links
By Sid Lowe for ESPN
My first reaction upon seeing this piece was to tag it along to the previous story. But when this interview with the new West Ham manager Julen Lopetegui starts off with something as left-field as ‘What's that first day at a club like? You turn up, they don't know you. What do you say to them?’, it hard not to keep on reading. An interesting, revealing interview the likes of which is rarely seen with professional sport-people.