When the athletes enter the stadium and the Olympic flame is lit, the whole world watches. Billions will continue to follow the events and to share in the athletes' joys and sorrows for the next sixteen days. Readers of this book, however, will watch forthcoming editions of the Olympic Games in a completely different light. Unlike many historical or official publications and somewhat biased commercial works, it provides -- in a clear, readable form -- informative and fascinating material on many aspects of what Olympism is all about: its history, its organization and its actors. Although public attention is often drawn to various issues surrounding this planetary phenomenon -- whether concerning the International Olympic Committee, the athletes, the host cities or even the scandals that have arisen -- the Olympic System as such is relatively little known. What are its structures, its goals, its resources? How is it governed and regulated? What about doping, gigantism, violence in the stadium? In addition to providing a wealth of information on all these subjects, the authors also show how power, money and image have transformed Olympism over the decades. They round off the work with thought-provoking reflections regarding the future of the Olympic System and the obstacles it must overcome in order to survive.

The governance of international sport is dominated by the SINGOs (sporting international non-governmental organisations). The IOC, FIFA, IAAF and the FIA wield global influence, but how exactly do such complex organisations operate? This important book examines the rise of the SINGOs, their structures, organisational behaviour and their power in the context of modern sport and international politics. Written by two world-leading experts, the book sheds new light on the relationship between these SINGOs and the sports which they govern. It provides a close critical analysis of the policies and practices of the most important international sport organisations, from their historical origins to the present day. Using case studies of key events such as the Olympics and the recent FIFA scandals, it examines the central question of how best to understand the significance of these organisations today. Combining historical insight with original research, Understanding International Sport Organisations: Principles, Power and Possibilities is essential reading for anyone with an interest in the politics of sport, the sociology of sport, sport administration, sport business or sport management.

World football is in crisis. The corruption scandal engulfing FIFA is arguably the biggest story in the history of modern sport and a watershed for sport governance. More than a decade ago, John Sugden and Alan Tomlinson laid the foundations for subsequent investigations with the publication of Badfellas, a groundbreaking work of critical sport sociology that exposed the systematic corruption at the heart of world football. It was a book that FIFA and Sepp Blatter tried to ban. Now re-issued to combine the original contents of Badfellas with new chapters covering the current crisis, this book points to the ways in which FIFA's new administration can learn from the Blatter story. The prequel traces the course of Sugden and Tomlinson's game-changing investigation into FIFA, while the sequel updates the FIFA story from 2002 onwards and provides a chronology of crises and scandals within the FIFA narrative. Demonstrating the vital importance of critical investigative methods in sport studies, Football, Corruption and Lies: Revisiting Badfellas, the book FIFA tried to ban is essential reading for anybody looking to understand Blatter's rise and fall.

Sport is a global phenomenon engaging billions of people and generating annual revenues of more than US$ 145 billion. Problems in the governance of sports organisations, fixing of matches and staging of major sporting events have spurred action on many fronts. Yet attempts to stop corruption in sport are still at an early stage. The Global Corruption Report (GCR) on sport is the most comprehensive analysis of sports corruption to date. It consists of more than 60 contributions from leading experts in the fields of corruption and sport, from sports organisations, governments, multilateral institutions, sponsors, athletes, supporters, academia and the wider anti-corruption movement. This GCR provides essential analysis for understanding the corruption risks in sport, focusing on sports governance, the business of sport, planning of major events, and match-fixing. It highlights the significant work that has already been done and presents new approaches to strengthening integrity in sport. In addition to measuring transparency and accountability, the GCR gives priority to participation, from sponsors to athletes to supporters an essential to restoring trust in sport.

Over the past decade, European football has seen tremendous changes impacting upon its international framework as well as local traditions and national institutions. Processes of Europeanization in the fields of economy and politics provided the background for transformations of the production and consumption of football on a transnational scale. In the course of such rearrangements, football tournaments like the UEFA Championship or the European Champions League turned into mega-events and media spectacles attracting ever-growing audiences. The experience of participating in these events offers some of the very few occasions for the display and embodiment of identities within a European context. This volume takes the 2008 EUROs hosted by Austria and Switzerland as a case study to analyze the political and cultural significance of the tournament from a multidisciplinary angle. What are the special features and spatial arrangements of a UEFAesque Europe, in comparison to alternative possibilities of a Europe? Situating the sport tournament between interpretations of collective European ritual and European spectacle, the key research question will ask what kind of Europe was represented in the cultural, political and economic manifestations of the 2008 EUROs. This book was published as a special issue of Soccer and Society.

This book provides a historical study of the beginnings of the UEFA, demonstrating how the formation of the organisation was linked to the decentralisation experienced by FIFA, the world governing body of football. Vonnard examines why administrators created an association that transcended the barriers of the Cold War, and focused on the development of a network that promoted football outside the constraints of international politics. Finally, he emphasises the role UEFA played in the Europeanisation of the people's game, and in the early years of the European integration process. The research is based on a rich body of new archival material from the UEFA and FIFA Documentation Centres, and various European football federations, as well as reports from a number of leading newspapers of the era, and interviews with football personalities of the 1950s. It will be of interest to students and scholars across the history of sport, international relations, and European studies

The Official History of the Tour de France – fully revised and updated for 2023 – is a celebration of one of the greatest annual sporting events, and the premier competition in world cycling. Through more than 300 photographs, rarely seen documents and items of memorabilia, this book covers more than a century of fascinating stories about the Tour and its iconic yellow jersey. This revised and updated edition includes an authoritative narrative account of each major era, up to and including the thrilling 2022 Tour. There are features on superstar cyclists and memorable moments from each period of the event's rich history, plus a foreword from legendary Tour de France champion Bernard Hinault. This is the definitive illustrated book on the Tour.

The commercialization of sport since the 1990s has had a number of consequences. The market forces that have defined commercialization, notably pay-per-view television, whilst initially welcomed as important new sources of revenue, have also had the unanticipated consequences of de-stabilizing many sporting competitions and institutions, undermining the financial future of clubs in their traditional role as key social and cultural institutions. This has been manifested in the paradox of chronic financial loss-making amongst professional sports' clubs in an era of exponential revenue growth, a trend exemplified by the experience of Italy's Series A and the English Premier League - both cases examined in detail in this book. But, at the same time, some traditional sporting organizations have sought with some success, to chart a middle way, retaining traditional sporting movement objectives whilst also embracing a form of commercialism. The Gaelic Athletic Association in Ireland, the supporter-owned FC Barcelona football club, and New Zealand rugby union, offer illustrative examples of such strategies examined in detail. This book explores the background to this clash of commercial and traditional sporting objectives, and debates the consequences for wider sports governance. This book was published as a special issue of Soccer and Society.

The British, who are rightly proud of their sporting traditions, are now having to come to terms with the dark, unacknowledged, past of racism in sport - until now the truth that dare not speak its name. Conscious and unconscious racism have for decades blighted the lives of talented black and Asian sportsmen and women, preventing them from fulfilling their potential. In Formula One, despite Lewis Hamilton's stellar achievements, barely one per cent of the 40,000 people employed in the sport are of ethnic minority heritage. In football, Britain's premier sport, the number of non-white managers in the professional game remains pitifully small. And in cricket, Azeem Rafiq's testimony to the Commons select committee has exposed the scandal of prejudice faced by Asian cricketers in the game. Veteran author and journalist Mihir Bose examines the way racism has affected black and Asian sportsmen and women and how attitudes have evolved over the past fifty years. He looks in depth at the controversies that have beset sport at all levels: from grassroots to international competitions and how the 'Black Lives Matter' movement has had a seismic impact throughout sport, with black sports personalities leading the fight against racism. However, this has also led to a worrying white fatigue. Talking to people from playing field to boardroom and the media world, he illustrates the complexities and striking contrasts in attitudes towards race. We hear the voices of players, coaches and administrators as Mihir Bose explores the question of how the dream of a truly non-racial sports world can become a reality.

This book is the first independent exploration of the Federation Internationale de l'Automobile's (FIA) institutional history. Virtually unexamined compared with similar institutions like the FIFA and the IOC, the FIA has nevertheless changed from being a small association in 1904 to becoming one of the world's most influential sport governing bodies. Through chronologically organised chapters, this book explains how the FIA manages to link together motorsport circuses like Formula 1 with the automotive industry and societal issues like road safety and environmental sustainability. In an exciting narrative spanning seven decades, it reviews the FIA's organisational turning points, governing controversies, political dramas and sporting tragedies. Considering the FIA to be a unique type of hybrid organisation characterised by what the author calls 'organisational emulsion', this case study contains theoretical innovations relevant to other studies of sport governing bodies. It makes an empirically grounded contribution to the research fields of institutional logics, historical sociology and sport governance.

This first nationwide study of boxing regulations in the United States offers an historical overview of the subject, from the earliest attempts at regulating the sport to present-day legislation that may create a national boxing commission. It examines the disparity of regulations among states, as well as the reasons for some of these differences. The work features interviews with boxing officials, analysts and boxers, and includes the results of a national survey of state athletic commission personnel.

In-depth case studies of boxing regulations in Nevada and Kansas provide a close look at different states' methods, and Argentina's centralized system of regulation is presented as a comparison to the U.S. approach.

The essence of the Rules of Golf is simple… play the course as you find it and play the ball as it lies. However, given golf is played all over the world where the climate, topography and course conditions vary greatly, there are a myriad of situations that can happen when playing golf and players need to know how to deal with those.

The Official Guide to the Rules of Golf is the Bible of Golf Rules. This edition is fully updated to include amendments that come into play from January 2023.

The first section of the book contains the Rules of Golf with Clarifications, where the Clarifications provide additional explanations and in many cases examples to help the reader understand the more complex scenarios. The second section, titled “Committee Procedures”, contains practical guidance for those involved in running day to day play at golf courses or running competitions at all levels of the game.

Founded in 1904 by representatives of the sporting organisations of six European nations then expanding into the Americas, Asia and Africa FIFA has developed to become one of the most high profile and lucrative businesses in the global consumer and cultural industry. Recent years however have been characterised by a series of crises leaving the organisation open to critique and exposure, and creating a soap operatic narrative of increasing interest to the global media.
In this critical new account of one of the world s most important sporting institutions, Professor Alan Tomlinson investigates the history of FIFA and the underlying political dynamics characterising its growth. The book explores the influence of the men who have led FIFA, the emergence of the World Cup as FIFA s exclusive product, FIFA s relationships with other federations and associations, the crises that have shaped its recent history, and the issues and challenges that are likely to shape its future. Particular focus is given to selected moments in the post- Havelange administration and the way in which FIFA, its current president Joseph Blatter and some key close colleagues have responded to and survived successive scandals. The book provides a foundation for understanding the growth and development of what is widely accepted as the world s most popular sport; sheds light on the shifting politics of nationalism in the post-colonial period; and reveals the opportunistic forms of personal aggrandizement shaping an increasingly media-influenced and globalizing world in which international sport was both a harbinger and an early reflection of these trends and forces.

Fascinating and provocative, this is essential reading for anybody with an interest in soccer, sport and society, sports governance, or global organisations.
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Identifying athletic talent and developing that talent to its full potential is a central concern in sport. Understanding talent identification and its implications for both positive and negative developmental outcomes is crucial to sporting success. This is the first comprehensive resource for scientists, researchers, students, coaches, analysts and policymakers looking to improve their knowledge of the talent identification and development process. With contributions from leading researchers and practitioners, this book offers a complete overview of contemporary talent identification and development from in-depth discussion of methodological and philosophical issues through to practical applications. Adopting an international and multi-disciplinary approach, it addresses all key aspects of the talent identification and development process, including skill acquisition and motor learning, psychological factors and family influences, creating optimal environments for performance, and dealing with injury and rehabilitation. Presenting an unrivalled wealth of research, the Routledge Handbook of Talent Identification and Development in Sport is an essential resource for any undergraduate or postgraduate degree course in sport studies, sport science, sport coaching or sport management, as well as for sport policymakers, analysts and coaches.

A no-holds-barred expose on the financial transactions of the world's favourite sport The transfer fees clubs pay to sign top players now top 4 billion a year but much of the money has been flowing out of the game. A small group of wealthy investors including Russian oligarchs, English racehorse owners and a former billionaire gold miner have seized the opportunity to enter this booming market. Some have moved in on the territory of banks and lent money to clubs in exchange for a share in fees generated by Cristiano Ronaldo, Neymar and dozens more of today's stars. Others have acquired obscure teams to get a piece of the pie. Even as the global financial crisis sent fortunes tumbling this select group found a profitable place to park their money. The size of the transfer market has continued to rise - it increased seven-fold in value the last two decades, more than the FTSE share index. Between them, these wealthy investors have amassed hundreds of millions of euros in profits. At the same time, they have managed to stay out of the spotlight the world s most popular sport brings. Football s Secret Trade follows the money along a trail very few know about, from nondescript offices in the U.K. and ramshackle stadiums of South American clubs you have probably never heard of to offshore bank accounts in the Caribbean. Warning you won t see a major transfer deal in the same light again.

This book examines how women athletes were represented in international media coverage during the 2004 Olympic Games. Through feminist theorizing and qualitative textual analysis, the contributors discuss sexualisation, nationalism, success, failure and the [in]visibility of women athletes in newspaper reporting in Asia, Europe and the USA.

When the athletes enter the stadium and the Olympic flame is lit, the whole world watches. Billions will continue to follow the events and to share in the athletes' joys and sorrows for the next sixteen days. Readers of this book, however, will watch forthcoming editions of the Olympic Games in a completely different light. Unlike many historical or official publications and somewhat biased commercial works, it provides -- in a clear, readable form -- informative and fascinating material on many aspects of what Olympism is all about: its history, its organization and its actors. Although public attention is often drawn to various issues surrounding this planetary phenomenon -- whether concerning the International Olympic Committee, the athletes, the host cities or even the scandals that have arisen -- the Olympic System as such is relatively little known. What are its structures, its goals, its resources? How is it governed and regulated? What about doping, gigantism, violence in the stadium? In addition to providing a wealth of information on all these subjects, the authors also show how power, money and image have transformed Olympism over the decades. They round off the work with thought-provoking reflections regarding the future of the Olympic System and the obstacles it must overcome in order to survive.

The first summer Youth Olympic Games (YOG) were held in Singapore in 2010 and the first winter Youth Olympic Games in Innsbruck in 2012. The IOC hopes that the YOG will encourage young people to be more active and that they will bring the Olympic movement closer to its original founding values. This is the first book to be published on the Youth Olympic Games. It critically examines the origins of the Games and the motives of the Games organisers, as well as the organisation and management of the Games and their wider impact and significance. The first part of the book discusses the relationship between the YOG and the ideology of Olympism, in the context of broader developments in youth sport competitions. The second part investigates a wide range of managerial aspects including the bidding process, finance, the prominent role of young people on the organising committees and as volunteers, the role of media and sponsors, and the distinctive competition structure. The final part of the book assesses the current and likely future impact of the YOG on the host cities and countries, the IOC and on national youth sport policies. The Youth Olympic Games is essential reading for any researcher, advanced student or policy maker with an interest in Olympic Studies, sports development, sport policy, youth sport or event management.

Football is the world game. It unites. At a grassroots level it creates communities and, in 2019, those communities helped save the life of one of its own. In 2012, Hakeem al-Araibi was a promising young player on Bahrain's national football team when he was arrested for attacking a police station during the Arab Spring, despite television footage showing him playing soccer at the time of the alleged attack. After three months of torture and wrongful imprisonment, Hakeem was released. He fled the country and made his way to Australia, where he was granted refugee status. Hakeem made a life here and was playing for the suburban Pascoe Vale Football Club, in Melbourne. He thought he was safe. But, in November 2018, on a holiday to Thailand with his wife, Hakeem was again arrested. The Bahraini government wanted to extradite him to face a ten-year jail sentence, or worse. What happened next shows the best of what soccer can do, and the worst the governing body of FIFA brings. If it wasn't for the Australian soccer community and former Socceroo Craig Foster, Hakeem may never have been freed. This powerful memoir reveals how a local soccer legend fought tirelessly to help bring home a man he'd never met. From Pascoe Vale to Switzerland, Canberra to Thailand, Foster raised his voice and tens of thousands of Australians were galvanised to #FreeHakeem. Foster lobbied FIFA and the United Nations and worked with human rights organisations worldwide to enable Hakeem's safe return to his wife in Australia. Despite being from different backgrounds, religions and generations, Craig Foster and Hakeem al-Araibi are united forever through their love of the world game and their fight for freedom.

Identifying athletic talent and developing that talent to its full potential is a central concern in sport. Understanding talent identification and its implications for both positive and negative developmental outcomes is crucial to sporting success. This is the first comprehensive resource for scientists, researchers, students, coaches, analysts and policymakers looking to improve their knowledge of the talent identification and development process. With contributions from leading researchers and practitioners, this book offers a complete overview of contemporary talent identification and development from in-depth discussion of methodological and philosophical issues through to practical applications. Adopting an international and multi-disciplinary approach, it addresses all key aspects of the talent identification and development process, including skill acquisition and motor learning, psychological factors and family influences, creating optimal environments for performance, and dealing with injury and rehabilitation. Presenting an unrivalled wealth of research, the Routledge Handbook of Talent Identification and Development in Sport is an essential resource for any undergraduate or postgraduate degree course in sport studies, sport science, sport coaching or sport management, as well as for sport policymakers, analysts and coaches.

This book provides a historical study of the beginnings of the UEFA, demonstrating how the formation of the organisation was linked to the decentralisation experienced by FIFA, the world governing body of football. Vonnard examines why administrators created an association that transcended the barriers of the Cold War, and focused on the development of a network that promoted football outside the constraints of international politics. Finally, he emphasises the role UEFA played in the Europeanisation of the people's game, and in the early years of the European integration process. The research is based on a rich body of new archival material from the UEFA and FIFA Documentation Centres, and various European football federations, as well as reports from a number of leading newspapers of the era, and interviews with football personalities of the 1950s. It will be of interest to students and scholars across the history of sport, international relations, and European studies

World in their Hands recounts the remarkable events that led to a group of friends from south-west London staging the inaugural Women's Rugby World Cup in 1991. The tournament was held just 13 years after teams from University College London and King's contested a match that catalysed the growth of the women's game in the UK, and the organisers overcame myriad obstacles before, during and after the World Cup. Those challenges, which included ingrained misogyny, motherhood, a recession, the Gulf War and the collapse of the Soviet Union, provide a fitting framing device for a book that celebrates female achievement in the face of adversity. Although ostensibly a story about women's rugby, this is a tale that has rare crossover appeal. It is not only the account of a group of inspirational women who took on the institutional misogyny that existed in rugby clubs across the globe to put on a first ever Women's Rugby World Cup. It is also the compelling and relatable tale of how those women, their peers and others in the generations before them, reshaped the idea of what it means to be a woman, finding acceptance and friendship on boggy rugby pitches. At the time, with the men's game tying itself up in knots about professionalism and apartheid, these women were a breath of fresh air. Three decades on, their achievements deserve to be highlighted to a wider audience.

The epic exploration of football in the twenty-first century through the prism of sociology, politics, and economics, by David Goldblatt, the critically acclaimed author of The Ball is Round.

'David Goldblatt is not merely the best football historian writing today, he is possibly the best there has ever been' - Dominic Sandbrook, Sunday Times

In the twenty-first century football is first. First among sports themselves, but it now commands the allegiance, interest and engagement of more people in more places than any other phenomenon. In the three most populous nations on the earth – China, India and the United States where just twenty years ago football existed on the periphery of society – it has now arrived for good. Nations, peoples and neighbourhoods across the globe imagine and invent themselves through playing and following the game.

In The Age of Football, David Goldblatt charts football’s global cultural ascent, its economic transformation and deep politicization, taking in prison football in Uganda and amputee football in Angola, the role of football fans in the Arab Spring, the footballing presidencies of Bolivia’s Evo Morales and Turkey’s Recep Erdogan, China’s declared intention to both host and win the World Cup by 2050, and the FIFA corruption scandal.

Following the intersection of the game with money, power and identity, like no sports historian before, Goldblatt’s sweeping story is remarkable in its scope, breathtaking in its depth of knowledge, and is a brilliantly original perspective of the twenty-first century. It is the account of how football has come to define every facet of our social, economic and cultural lives and at what cost, shaping who we think we are and who we want to be.

Explore the complete history of The FA Cup in this definitive illustrated book. The FA Cup is the oldest national football competition in the world, and one of the most beloved and popular tournaments in football. In 2022, it will be 150 years since the inaugural Football Association Challenge Cup was clinched by Wanderers Football Club at Kennington Oval. Since then, 'The Cup' has become one of the premier tournaments in the sport, and an iconic mainstay of the English game. The Official History of The FA Cup, produced in partnership with The Football Association, is a lavish, illustrated tribute to this iconic competition. Filled with stunning photographs spanning the full history of the Cup, this book celebrates the most exciting, significant and memorable goals, games and upsets in English football history. Featuring insightful commentary on The FA Cup's development and evolution, details of every FA Cup-winning side, and an exclusive foreword by Arsene Wenger, this is an essential companion for anyone with a love of the competition - which is to say, fans of football everywhere.

The Big Fix gives the first detailed account of how South Africa paid $10 million to secure the 2010 World Cup.

Between June and July 2010, 64 games of football determined that Spain was the world’s best team at the World Cup in South Africa. South Africans – and the world – celebrated a brilliantly hosted tournament where everything worked like clockwork and the stands were packed with vuvuzela‐wielding fans. But the truth was not yet known. Behind this significant national achievement lay years of corporate skulduggery, crooked companies rigging tenders and match fixing involving the national team. As late as 2015 it was revealed that the tournament’s very foundations were corrupt when evidence emerged that South Africa had encouraged FIFA to pay money to a bent official in the Caribbean to buy three votes in its favour. As Sepp Blatter’s FIFA edifice crumbled, a web of transactions from New York to Trinidad and Tobago showed how money was diverted to allow South Africa’s bid to host the tournament to succeed.

In The Big Fix: How South Africa Stole The 2010 World Cup, Ray Hartley reveals the story of an epic national achievement and the people who undermined it in pursuit of their own interests. It is the real story of the 2010 World Cup.