NFL is way more tactical. Has way more coaches (average NFL team has 15). Part of that is having more players, but there’s also around 150 set plays every game requiring specific formations and play calls.
The Athletic “gutting” British newspapers
- Thread starter Pogue Mahone
- Start date
I'm a subscriber to the Athletic for other sports. 5 or 6 bucks doesn't seem too big a deal for some decent coverage.
No it isnt I used to watch it live every year when I lived there. These play books you lot go on about most teams only use about a 10th of that in a game. Most teams have about 10 coaches. Football would have huge play books if it was stop start too.
The NFL is more tactical because it is stop start and because coaches have more opportunities to directly alter tactics, coaches direct inputs are a lot more important in the NFL than it is in football. Football is a more creative game, there is a solid tactical base but it's not as important as it is in the NFL where portions of games are literally scripted by OCs.
I think rugby is more tactically complex than soccer and NFL. Constantly executing complicated pre-planned plays on the hoof, without the lengthy breaks you get in NFL to call them.
For what it’s worth, I find the detailed blow by blow breakdown of rugby set plays unbelievably boring to read.
For what it’s worth, I find the detailed blow by blow breakdown of rugby set plays unbelievably boring to read.
Yeah, Rugby Union is a totally different game. But funnily enough, with time it's very easy to analyze and very quickly spot patterns and issues, so there isn't as much pretension.
Did no one tell them how tight most people in britain are? We don't even want to pay for brexit mate. We're not going to pay for sports writing.
Same here. The primary reason for that is that in American Football you primarily play for possession and only play for territory when you are on 4th down or long yardage situations. Contrast that with rugby where you are constantly balancing between the two on the fly without direct intervention from coaches.
I predict this will fail.
I don't think enough people will subscribe.
Could be wrong. Kinda hope I'm wrong.
I don't think enough people will subscribe.
Could be wrong. Kinda hope I'm wrong.
They seem to be doing alright but I don't know a single person who subscribes. Even the most pedestrian blogs have the same advanced stats, and the news gets out one way or another. The longform pieces can be cool, I'm sure, but who really cares? I'll stick to the forums.
Seems to be quite a few of them in this thread.
I’ve always been against random monthly subscriptions for stuff. I don’t even have my own Netflix account (use my father in law’s login) but in the last year I’ve started paying a monthly fee to two different Patreon accounts for podcasts I enjoy. One of them I have to pay to access (Second Captain) and one of them I do even though access is free of charge because I appreciate the effort made by the bloke who makes it (Blindboy) Part of the motivation is a kind of personal connection I feel to the providers. I genuinely want them to do well, so am happy to give them the price of a pint each month. That’s a model I can see working very well in the future. I’m less convinced about being asked to cough up money to big corporations like this one. That seems like more of a hurdle, mentally.
Yeah okay Nick Saban
I feel that I executed well enough but I need to continue in the second half and control the clock.
15 yard penalty unsportsman like conduct unneccessary gloating
I just mean in terms of people I actually know. Almost every one of my friends and the male members of my family are rabid fans of at least 2-3 sports and none of us read The Athletic.
I do the same thing on a few podcasts. I'll throw Dan Carlin, Mike Duncan and Daniele Bolelli some money as a nod to the great content they put out, rather than a blunt paywall to access that content.
I really hope this is the model that wins out. Hard to know how lucrative it is but Blindboy has almost 5000 patreons. If they’re all gifting him the price of a pint every month then he must be doing pretty well!
That list of journals offers absolutely nothing to the sport of football on any level. No journalist for that matter does in regards to Sport.
Is anyone bothered?
Is anyone bothered?
It's just rich kids throwing money around the block and trying to buy whatever's the most popular right now, I don't think they'll get anywhere with that list of journos.
Certainly a worrying trend. Daniel Taylor is unquestionably the most talented football writer in Britain, IMO. Nothing against Jamie Jackson, who took over the Manchester clubs coverage after Taylor, but the drop off was noticeable. Ornstein is adored by Arsenal fans for his accuracy. Football coverage is a money maker for the Guardian and BBC, and the knock on effect could possibly affect their critical news coverage for world events, politics, investigative journalism, etc. it worries me because of the proliferation of fake news on matters far more important than football. Of course, when the discourse on here can revolve around the legitimacy of rumors generated by 16 year olds on reddit, I suppose all hope is lost and I, and other like minded souls, should just give up. Meh, Boris Johnson and Donald Trump are going to tank the entire global economy and have the ability to launch nuclear weapons, but the anonymous bloke on Reddit said Bruno Fernandes is signing on Tuesday at 2 PM.
Is athletic even a noun?
One thing I was thinking is that they seem to have recruited journos that have the "inside track" on certain clubs, like James Pearce for Liverpool for instance. But will Pearce necessarily still have access to the same information when he leaves the Echo? Or will his replacement at the Echo simply get fed the information that Pearce currently enjoys, leaving him out in the cold?
I like Daniel Taylor a lot. Enough to be tempted. Theres enough hobbyist newspapers and magazines like National Geographic that i can see some future for it online. Subscription only wont do it many favours, maybe do an offer on the deal around September or December when people might dip in for a month?
As long as Barney hasn’t left, it’s all good.
Don’t really rate any of them any more. The celeb status many of them have now has really gone to their heads. Any of us can spout any old tripe these days and claim to be a “journalist”
If I won the lottery tomorrow I still wouldn't pay to read some sport website. Sports journalism is a farce; there's not a good writer amongst them, and more than a few genuinely bad ones. And they just invent most of their 'news', without fear of repercussion because it's all fairly meaningless anyway.
I read sports 'news' solely because it's right there in front of me. I see this crashing and burning.
I read sports 'news' solely because it's right there in front of me. I see this crashing and burning.
This exactly.
What makes me laugh, usually with pity is that some people absolutely worship these clueless clowns though.
For those looking for a bit more context. This para sticks out:
There isn't an equivalent to L'Equipe here so I'm intrigued to see whether a football-only paywall would work.
I can't see how their exclusives or "inside knowledge" will be as groundbreaking as hinted. Even then that will probably account for say, 20% of the content for the year. Match reports, tactics, etc you can find elsewhere.
It's reliant on 'names', but that shouldn't be a reason to subscribe. If only Hugh McIlvanney was around to give his two penneth worth on this breakaway.
https://www.spectator.co.uk/2019/06...in-is-being-attacked-by-an-american-predator/
There isn't an equivalent to L'Equipe here so I'm intrigued to see whether a football-only paywall would work.
You build contacts as a journalist. Wherever you go, your phone book goes with you. I suspect if there is a story it depends if the 'source' it's a matter of whether they would let their journo friend know or sell the story to another paper.
I can't see how their exclusives or "inside knowledge" will be as groundbreaking as hinted. Even then that will probably account for say, 20% of the content for the year. Match reports, tactics, etc you can find elsewhere.
It's reliant on 'names', but that shouldn't be a reason to subscribe. If only Hugh McIlvanney was around to give his two penneth worth on this breakaway.
Last edited:
I’m no businessman, but as a regular citizen, when I read a direct quote from someone that says “We will suck them dry of their best talent and make business very difficult for them”, I can’t help but hope that that business fails.
Alot of good reporters moved to athletic in usa and its done real well from what I've seen. Its definitely worth the costs in regards american sport, but I've always thought their reporters were better than ours anyway, so it may not have the same success here.
I'd be interested to know the target audience for the content. I know it's an American website, but will the content be aimed specifically at American "soccer" fans, or will it be more global in nature? From my experience (British but living in the US), I find that American coverage e.g. NBC's matchday broadcasts and Rory Smith in the NYT, i.e. coverage aimed at the American market, is sometimes a little dumbed down, perhaps based on an assumption that American soccer fans may be newer to the game and less knowledgeable. That's just the perception I have, but I find it noticeable in the explanatory style of some of the analysis.
I find most football journalism pretty generic to be honest. Every writer desperately trying to meet impossible deadlines in an insta-clickbait environment. Quality is low, with a few exceptions, e.g. Daniel Taylor's pieces on paedophilia. And for whatever reason, twitter seems to have lulled some writers into believing that they're an important part of the story. As much as we love football, there is rarely a topic of such profundity that demands high quality journalism (again, the paedophilia story is a rare exception). Mostly, football is about match reports, transfer speculation, light tactical analysis, and the odd human interest story. It's not rocket science. So it will also be interesting to see if The Athletic's business model enables writers to be less reactionary and less clickbaity -- an HBO or a Netflix effectively. If the idea is that people will pay to read the same journalists writing in the same style, then I think they're doomed to failure. It has to provide something more, something different. I don't know what that is or what that will look like, but I guess we'll find out.
I find most football journalism pretty generic to be honest. Every writer desperately trying to meet impossible deadlines in an insta-clickbait environment. Quality is low, with a few exceptions, e.g. Daniel Taylor's pieces on paedophilia. And for whatever reason, twitter seems to have lulled some writers into believing that they're an important part of the story. As much as we love football, there is rarely a topic of such profundity that demands high quality journalism (again, the paedophilia story is a rare exception). Mostly, football is about match reports, transfer speculation, light tactical analysis, and the odd human interest story. It's not rocket science. So it will also be interesting to see if The Athletic's business model enables writers to be less reactionary and less clickbaity -- an HBO or a Netflix effectively. If the idea is that people will pay to read the same journalists writing in the same style, then I think they're doomed to failure. It has to provide something more, something different. I don't know what that is or what that will look like, but I guess we'll find out.
Asking the important questions here chief
On a more serious note why can't football be sophisticated to the point where there is space for more in-depth articles on tactics and other topics?
Jaysus.
Mainly because one of the best things about football has always been is its simplicity. People love to over complicate it but that spoils what makes it so great (IMHO)
Yeah the company are just providing for what they deem is a demand, no issue there. I was more wondering and presuming that being English/British gives a bit of automatic respect or standing on football matters in America for journalists, more than the body of work of some of them would merit.
I think a lot of people have a mental block, myself included I think, in that once they've been getting something for free they are very resistant to then start paying for it.
Maybe an abstract one like the rich or the poor.
Ah, good point.
Tweet
— Twitter API (@user) date
I agree that football's greatness has partly lied in it's simplicity, but beyond being able to sit down and casually watch a game, there are a lot of wrinkles in the game from a tactical or indepth perspective that if explained in a good way, would make good reading for those who want to go deeper.