Overeducated sports writers log

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
Overeducation - where does it all go?

In Men's Health, mind you!

https://www.menshealth.com/uk/fitne...istiano-ronaldo-became-the-best-in-the-world/

Eight years and one transfer later, even the most diehard followers of St George must acknowledge that Ronaldo, as our national playwright would say, is the stuff that dreams are made on, a footballing phenomenon, blessed with two great feet, a trademark stiff-legged stepover (honed by youthful practice with weights tied to his feet), aerial ability that’s equalled by no-one and an eye for goals unrivalled by all but his Barça bête noire, Lionel Messi.

But, say the naysayers, look at his monumental ego, his frown and wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command, his petulant displays of childishness that speak of an overindulged Madeiran mummy’s boy. The almost inhuman, icy froideur that saw him tell Real Madrid in 2011: “If it wasn’t for me, you’d be 20 points behind Barça.”
 
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Corpsey

bandz ahoy
Is this evidence of

1) too many people going to university
2) not enough jobs existing for people who go to university
3) the media being stacked with eton chumchums?
4) formerly 'low' culture has now been elevated to 'high' acceptability
5) formerly 'high' culture has been lowered to 'low' referenceability
 
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Corpsey

bandz ahoy
Bearing in mind I made similarly high-falutin references in my Wire reviews of Waka Flocka Flame.

What is being communicated here?

'I am writing about football/trap music, but take note - I am CULTURED.'

'You are reading about football/trap music, but don't worry - you are CULTURED.'

Or more charitably - all this stuff belongs on the same plane. Let's break down those old cultural boundaries.
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
Barney Ronay, the Gruniad

‘How dull it is to pause, to make an end, to rust unburnish’d, not to shine in use!” Cristiano Ronaldo has been accused of many things across his impossibly gilded carer, some more serious than others. But his sheer unbending will remains a remarkable source of strength in his late years. Like Ulysses in the poem, returning home to Ithaca from his glorious travels, there is an element of epic glamour about Ronaldo’s presence as Portugal’s captain in Porto for the Nations League final on Sunday night.
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
I expect this is a phenomenon most found in 'clever' publications writing about things that clever people are sort of ashamed of or defensive about liking.
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
BTW i'm not saying this sort of thing is WRONG.

But it's a phenomenon I've observed in the wild and I intend to keep tabs on it.
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
I think I liked to think I fell into the boundary destroyer category. But really I probably fell into the 'look at me' category. Which is true of all my writing, including what I'm writing now.

SOMEBODY PLEASE LOOK!
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
Rooney: superfluous man of Manchester?
Lermontov would have loved football.
Anyway, back to your question... I like it fine. I mean, that first piece of writing I don't like but not cos of what it is, I just don't think that's a particularly good example.

Or more charitably - all this stuff belongs on the same plane. Let's break down those old cultural boundaries.
Basically I do think this.
 

IdleRich

IdleRich
Is it though? I thought that the prawn sandwich thing is about people coming along for the food and not really watching the game or feeling it like a "proper" fan whereas, arguably at least, the person writing about it pretentiously has at least watched it in depth if only to provide themselves with something to analyse. Superficially it looks the same but I reckon hipster fans (or whatever) are different from corporate fans and their ilk.
 

version

Well-known member
The Run of Play was an entire site dedicated to this. I loved it. They had articles like this:

The Death of Socrates | The demon and the daimon,

The Rat in the Engine | ... on the realism of FIFA 12

The Cracked Looking Glass | Benfica and the nightmare of history

Cantona as Anti-Hero | ... on the magnificence of evil.
 

version

Well-known member
I’d posit two states, states of creative play on the side of Eros, and on the other hand, the desire to preserve or return to an earlier state on the side of Thanatos. Barca’s power seems to be in their standing for the former when they are in a position of fame and importance which makes most clubs turn towards the latter. Chelsea are pure death drive manifested as sport: a paranoid machine who’s parts only care about restoring themselves to a time when they were considered the greatest in the world. Sometimes watching someone like Ballack play he looks trapped under the weight of his need to re-become ‘Ballack’, the proper name for the player who dragged along Germany and Munich single-handedly at times, of whom he is now only a simulacrum.
 
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