London - Day 6

Today was far and away the best day I've had since I've been in London.  I'll try and contain my joy into a single post...

The morning started off with a lecture from Dr. Ben Carrington who is a professor at the University of Texas who deals with sociology in media, culture, and sport.  He spoke on all of those and how they are interwoven in British-ness.  He explained differences in the North and South of England and how ideologies are formed from an idea of nationalism in England.  He showed us videos of pop-culture and how England (imo) much like America, is becoming a melting pot of different cultures.  This has been initially been received with a bit of backlash because of the "idea" of what GREAT Britain is (Notice the GREAT).  One of the videos was particular funny in that comedian Al Murray, plays on America and how great Britain is.  Yet in it, he plays on a caricature of who we expect the typical English person is.  Take a look at the video.  I must warn you, it's English, so it is NSFW.



I was able to speak with Dr. Carrington for a bit after and pick his brain on specifics he discussed in sport - specifically dealing with racism in the game in Europe. It was refreshing to hear his thoughts.

Premier League Offices

After that, we hooped on the tube and headed to the English Premier League (EPL) headquarters. The building itself isn't something you'd think you'd see for a huge league, but inside it is very nice.  They had already won me over in my mind and heart, but when I walked in to the room we were being lectured it, it smelled like choc chip cookies.  Much to my surprise, they had made (warm too) fresh cookies for us and were delicious.  Needless to say, I ate more than Mrs. McGoo would have allowed me to eat (But she's not around).  For those that do not know, I am a huge Arsenal supporter and was really looking forward to hearing about how the EPL is run. We were met by Nick Noble, the Press & Communications Manager who took us through the full gauntlet of how the EPL is run.

It is really different than the NFL in that is does not seek to make profit for itself, but primarily for the clubs. I see similarities of it being like the NCAA in that it is comprised by the 20 clubs to help them run better. Their commercial interests lie within centralizing revenue streams from broadcast rights, title sponsorship and commercial licensing. All of these profits are shared evenly among all 20 clubs. They allow the clubs to take care of their own ticket sales, sponsors,and merchandise. In those ways, you see the differences between the Man U and Arsenal's of the league and the Bolton and Fulham's.

Premier League Logo

I enjoyed the Q&A session with him as I was able to ask some questions that got some positive feedback from my professors and even Mr. Noble was encouraging to me at the end of the session. He sought me out and applauded my interest and questions posed to him. He was extremely nice. The best part was being able to have a long conversation with him about my passions with football in Africa and talked to him in brief about the sports program God has allowed me to start. In doing so, Mr. Noble gave me his card and told him to get in touch with him and he'd see if he could link me up with the individuals that started their "Creating Chances" program.  This completely took me off guard and I was blown away by the chance to share my vision and potentially work with the EPL!!!!  This is like the NFL of Europe.  In a word...HUGE.

Collage of past champions on the wall

After that, I was on cloud nine and decided the best way to handle that was to take in the US Women's World Cup match and headed to a sports bar called the Sports Cafe'.  We went there for our scramble the other day, but this time it was packed with Americans, so it was really cool to be in another country and have all the bar cheering when we scored each time and won.  Afterward, I headed back to the university for a quick chat with Mrs. McGoo and am now heading to bed.

Don't know what this is called, but looked cool

Piccadilly Circle (Times Square of London)

 Going to Lord's Cricket Grounds tomorrow.  While I do not know much about Cricket, I do know this place is the Augusta or Wimbledon of Cricket.  If you take a look at the site, it's pretty immaculate.  So while I don't like Cricket, I can certainly respect going to the best venue for it.  (Kind of like Daytona)