Thirty One Nil - Interview with James Montague

Following on from my review of Thirty One Nil last year, I was pleased to be afforded the chance to interview the author James Montague (@JamesPiotr) with the paperback release of the book by Bloomsbury Sport.

- What is the appeal of travelling to watch football around the world?

Doesn't everyone want to do that?! For me, the highest form of the game was international football. From a young age, before the internet, it was a window on the world. I vividly remember my Panini sticker album from Mexico 86 and it was glorious. The Iraq team! They all had these tremendous moustaches. So I grew up fascinated by the rest of the world and was lucky enough to get a job in the Middle East in my mid 20s, and started going to local games.It all started from that.

- Do you see it as an alternative or escape from the mainstream of Sky Sports coverage?

I can't stand what's happening to the game. The Sky-ification of football. It's an idiotic gentrification that is stripping football of its identity and will, eventually, kill the goose that laid the golden egg. You don't have to travel far to find the game's true soul, but for me travelling to different countries, understanding them through football, shows me that the game as we all remember it, the game we fell in love with, is still out there. It's messier sometimes, and fucked up, but who wants everything to be perfect? 

- What was your total mileage?
Christ knows. But if I wanted to offset my carbon usage I'd have to replant a forest the size of East Anglia.

- Were you afraid of anywhere you did travel to?

Yeah, there were times when I was properly scared. Egypt post revolution. When it was all falling apart. I remember being in Port Said, after the announcement that 20 people were being sentenced to death for their role in 72 Al Ahly fans killed at a  match in the city. Protests broke out there, dozens were shot dead, a curfew had been put on the city. I managed to get in just before the curfew started. It was chaos and terrifying. It seemed so far removed from football, but you have to follow a story all the way. Or you've failed.

- Would you visit these places if there was not a football match taking place (I have the same belief with cricket, would I travel to the sub-continent if a test match was not happening)?

Luckily, we live in a world where a football match is taking place in every country on earth every day. So there is nowhere I could possibly go where a football match isn't going on. Expect perhaps Antarctica.  

- Do you feel the minnows are closing the gap on the world powers, will the extra teams in Euro 2016 close it further?

Yeah. There was a lot of criticism of the expansion, but it has proved to be a genius move. Sport lives or dies on competitive balance so what was seen as a weakening of the tournament has motivated teams to up their games. Every game counts now because every team believes they have a chance. Hope is important. Look at Armenia, Albania, San Marino even. Everyone benefits from this system.  

- Why are smaller nations getting better?

Hope is a big factor. But football is getting smaller. You can watch any game in the world at any time online. Football across the world is becoming increasingly professionalised. That will improve hugely in the next 20 years. But the main reason some countries are making huge strides is money. Iceland is a case in point. They narrowly missed out on being the smallest nation to ever qualify for the World Cup. It would be a record that would never have been broken. They invested heavily on indoor halls, for their harsh winter, and in training up coaches. They are lucky. They are one of the richest nations on earth so can afford it. But it shows what resources can achieve.  

- What are your thoughts on Russia and Qatar hosting the World Cup?

There has been so little scrutiny of Russia's World Cup. There is a very strong case that it should be moved elsewhere given Putin's actions in Ukraine. Qatar is little trickier. I was pleased the Middle East won the chance to host it. it is an important region that loves football. And having lived in the Gulf i wasn't at all surprised they won. Qatar and the UAE have been perusing these mega events for years. What is clear is that there is some very important scrutiny of Qatar including the kafala system. I started visiting worker camps when I lived in Dubai, in 2005. The treatment of humans in them is a disgrace. And the UAE has zero interest in reforming it. Qatar on the other hand has been forced to confront it. It is a far more reform minded place than the UAE or Saudi Arabia. So for that reason alone I hope they don't lose it. Kafalla is one of the world's great evils and if the World Cup can in any way help bring about its timely demise then I can live with a winter World Cup in 2022.

- What are you working on currently?

I'm typing this out in an Irish pub in Macedonia, covering the protests out here. I've moved to Belgrade and working on my next book, about money in football. But first I've got to get out of this god damn pub. They've had the same CD on for four hours now and if I have to here that Ke$ha song again I might kill someone.

Thirty One Nil

When I interviewed James Montague at the tail end of last year in relation to the release of his book, When Friday Comes, my last question to him was, What advice do you have for a young writer? His answer was go out and find the stories. Taking heed of his own advice and endorsing the quote on the front of new book ' The Indiana Jones of football writing', Montague travels around the world from 2011 throughout the qualification period for the 2014 World Cup in Brazil.

Montague travels to all corners of the globe from the now famed American Somoa team (who garnered world attention after being defeated by Australia 31-0) which gives the book it's title. Other outposts visited include Lebanon, Curaçao as well as returning to the Middle East, a place of which he wrote with such authority.

Montague is an affable writer, and by placing himself at the heart of the action amongst such eccentric players and equally fanatical fans whilst experiencing the problems of travelling the globe and being an outsider in a strange land.  Often he had little money, often he is up against the clock; he makes clear that it is not all warm beaches and glamour, the dedication to the craft of journalism is never in doubt.

While some call him Indiana Jones, for me he is Michael Palin - the polite Englishman ever respectful and yet universally liked by all, able to infiltrate previously restricted areas with ease and gaining access and interviewing those who rarely gain exposure from the world media.  Whilst football provides the overall framework for the book, the locations and their residents provide the page-turning material. The final score is not the most important result, more so the bus journey to the ground.

Mixing in top rate observations of new landscapes as well as explaining the sometimes qualifying procedures for these lonely nations; Montague has again written a book that is more travelogue than tome to football.

It got me thinking that if Shakespeare had been born in the twentieth century, he may well have written, 'All the world is football' and with writers like Montague who venture to all corners and continents to cover it with such aplomb, the passion for football will never diminish.

Thirty-One Nil is out on 22 May 2014 from Bloomsbury priced £12.99 for paperback and available on eBook

www.bloomsbury.com

The Stupid Footballer is Dead

The title is not a vendetta, and this is not a knife in the back versus the stupid footballing culture of young men getting lots of money too soon in the career.  Instead this small tome is a nice piece of intellectual and insightful piece of work by a former professional footballer.

Paul McVeigh, is a former Northern Ireland international who played in the top flight for amongst others Tottenham Hotspur and Norwich City.

McVeigh retired in 2010 after making his debut in 1996 at the age of 33.  That might sound a bit too early, yet McVeigh is now a highly respected motivational speaker and media analyst (www.paulmcveigh.co.uk) who is utilised by high ranking sides as a voice of reason and personality to speak to young players who are going through bad times.

Part autobiography, part memoir mixed in with the type of intellect seen previously in Matthew Syed's Bounce and Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers; McVeigh's book looks back on his own life lessons - such as turning up hungover for a reserve game, playing out of his skin in the first half and then hitting the physical wall after half-time.

Unlike present day players it seems McVeigh learnt from his mistakes and this is part of his theory into practice; he believes players need to put into practice mental preparation exercises as well as the physical conditioning and innate talent and skill at their disposal.

Each chapter has a mental framepoint exercise, where McVeigh mixes personal stories with mental exercises, ending with a personal appraisal of a role model. For example, Lesson Seven - Mix Intensity with Control where the author gives examples of Joey Barton, Mario Balotelli and Wayne Rooney as players who give into the red mist of anger from time to time, the role model he selects is Scott Parker.  A player who plays hard in training, and yet is a model professional off the field and like McVeigh has made the most of his ability to become a Footballer of the Year and England international.

McVeigh goes in depth with self-visualisation (which David James lived by) so players should imagine themselves scoring goals or saving them; focus on the game from day to day; by doing mental preparation it will improve your physical play.

My only concern would be when do young footballers get the time to do this self-assessment work on their own performance, players usually train for two hours a day and then go home.  Can they be expected to do this sort of homework when no-one is watching them?  He praises Paul Lambert immensely, and you can imagine Lambert was big on mental preparation for his young side as Aston Villa fought off the threat of relegation.

An especially enlightening story told is how Norwich lost at Leeds United due to a last minute mistake by Fraser Forster (now of Celtic).  Instead of reading the riot act to his side for losing all three points, he praised his side for doing so well and mistakes happen.  Forster felt better immediately, and his play at Celtic last season led to an England international call-up, Norwich then went on an unbeaten seven match run.  McVeigh's point is that by moving on to the next game and not focusing on the negative and instead focusing on the positive led to greater results.  Other managers would have crucified Forster and probably dropped him.

McVeigh says this was due to the time Lambert spent in Germany with Borussia Dortmund.  The perfect player for him would be a mixture of German mentality and technical ability of the Spanish footballers, particularly those from the Barcelona academy.

The Stupid Footballer is Dead is not a critique or an appraisal of the modern day footballer, more a plan of action to change the way footballers prepare for a game and then analyse their game to gain a further improvement. A must not only for football fans, but footballers themselves which is both accessible and riveting.

The book is out now from Bloomsbury Sport in paperback for £14.99

www.bloomsbury.com