2002

A word from your England correspondent making his maiden speech all the way from Cairns, Australia.

“From now on, Beijing will not encourage the development of internet bars”
Mayor Liu Qi

Sad news today… the internet cafes which helped us create and maintain this site in China are closed or about to close as a result of a fire in a PC bar in Beijing.

Joe Docherty, one of ‘The Arklow Jesters’ in full regalia

Our guesthouse is currently full of Irish, who have descended on the place in force to support their team. Before the game, as they prepared for the confrontation with Spain, all was smiles and optimism…

There is nothing like the World Cup to bring out the xenophobe in even the most enlightened of us. The classic always used to be that African teams were “defensively naive,” with additions, famously from Big Ron who was standing in for HRH the Duke of Edinburgh. With a new century comes another classic. Orientals are short. During a Reith Lecture I heard on the radio the other day, one that was occasionally interrupted by the commentary on some match featuring the Belgiums (sic), I learnt that the entire population of the Orient, if stood on one another’s shoulders would not be as tall as Jan Koller. So join in and start slagging the world…

… and three is a magic numbaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Three nil to the Engerlund!

Well, save my own nervous excitement, I am well removed at the moment from any English fervour for tonight’s game, but will be heading off shortly to an ex-pat bar in Seoul for the game and hopefully a good crowd. Could be a home from home?

“The World Cup should also be an opportunity for us to demonstrate the high standard of our information technology to the world. In this way, it will be remembered as an e-World Cup.”
- from one of Kim Dae-jung’s recent speeches

The World Cup matches are screened in the subway trains

Since we’re here running a multimedia weblog, I thought I’d take the opportunity to see what was going on in the digital world here in Korea. This is a report of my discoveries so far.

Who’d have thought it?

FIFA must be as pleased as the supporters - three countries where football is still in its infancy are through to the second round. Can’t be bad for the competition. Or the advertising revenue, either, come to that…

CNN set up for the interview at Seoul stadium

More media action for the FLH team today, with CNN whisking the two of us off to Seoul stadium for an on-camera chat with host Tim Lister. Unfortunately, yet again we couldn’t get into the stadium, so the producer decided that we’d film on the grass in front of it.

Would it become a battle of the acronyms?

Glowing footballs for sale outside the stadium

FLH headed off to Taejon for this final game of the group, anticipating a lively encounter between two teams playing great football. South Africa needed a draw, and I guessed they would come out with a will to win, while Spain had already qualified, and could relax into their game….