http://www.spiritoffootball.com/2010/blog Football's equivalent to the Olympic Torch Thu, 11 Sep 2008 12:33:42 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en We're very proud to announce that The Ball for 2010 will be made by Alive & Kicking in South Africa. This amazing project makes cheap, tough, repairable footballs, netballs and volleyballs, using African skills and African leather. Each carries a message about HIV/AIDS and malaria. The Ball 2010 will be "an ... http://www.spiritoffootball.com/2010/blog/2008/09/10/alive-and-kicking-partnership Winners of the World Cup can now display a badge as well as stars on the national shirt. The 'FIFA World Champions Badge' on the Italian shirt In fact, it looks like the Italian FA has incorporated the stars into their badge design -- previously the stars would circle the national FA's ... http://www.spiritoffootball.com/2010/blog/2008/09/07/badges-stars-and-balls Keeping you up to date on official balls... A soccer ball identical to the balls to be used in Olympic soccer competition is seen in an Adidas store in Beijing Tuesday July 29, 2008. The ball, called Adidas Magnus Moenia, or Great Wall Star, and featuring the Chinese characters for "China" ... http://www.spiritoffootball.com/2010/blog/2008/08/01/the-olympic-ball The Padanian VIVA World Cup winning team (see this photo on Flickr) Our congratulations go to Padania, who were 2-0 winners over the Aramean Syriacs in this year's VIVA World Cup final. Padanian fans with their flag (see this photo on Flickr) The VIVA World Cup is a competition for countries that ... http://www.spiritoffootball.com/2010/blog/2008/07/14/viva-padania In an ongoing series of video embeds that I think have a bearing on the way we develop our style for 2010, here's one from Matt Harding that's been doing the blogosphere rounds of late: Where the Hell is Matt? (2008) from Matthew Harding on Vimeo. I have to say that I ... http://www.spiritoffootball.com/2010/blog/2008/07/02/hats-off-to-matt-harding Although he's a little bit too inconsiderate towards the unwitting "goalkeepers" in this video for my liking, I enjoy the way he uses the urban landscape as his "pitch". And his skills are pretty decent too. Thanks for the heads-up, Ian http://www.spiritoffootball.com/2010/blog/2008/06/27/remi-gaillard A generally optimistic Kenyan view: 2010 promises to be a great year for South Africa if everything goes as planned. Is South Africa ready to host the 2010 World Cup? Let's hope it does. http://www.spiritoffootball.com/2010/blog/2008/06/16/preparations-in-south-africa http://www.spiritoffootball.com/2010/blog/2008/06/15/the-ball-2008 John Turnbull has posted an interesting article on the birth of football in the US on The Global Game. The article details the history of Paterson FC, which has a strong claim to being the first club to play football according to the 1863 rules which we honour with our ... http://www.spiritoffootball.com/2010/blog/2008/04/21/bookmark-this-for-2014 Since the idea of The Ball is to some extent inspired by the Olympic Torch and the Torch Relay, we're following the progress of this year's torch closely. 2008 Torch Relay on Google Earth .kml If you're in the UK, this is the route through London tomorrow. It's interesting to note that the ... http://www.spiritoffootball.com/2010/blog/2008/04/04/the-olympic-torch