Serenada

Pep Guardiola's arrival proves the Bundesliga is attracting big names

As Bayern Munich were finally crowned Champions League winners many started to ponder the growing strength of the Bundesliga and more specifically in comparison with the Premier League. It looks set to eclipse the Premier League, but why?
The most obvious answer as to why German football is stronger than English football is that two German teams were represented in the final of the greatest club competition in the world.
No English side made it past the quarter-finals of the Champions League. Knockout competitions are always about the draw but of the four teams to enter the Champions League, not even the mighty Manchester United could negate their way through.
Chelsea may have went on to win the Europa League but Rafa Benitez always said that Champions League qualification was the priority.
A key strength is the Bundesliga is retaining its best players and beginning to attract big names, with the greatest being the arrival of Pep Guardiola at Bayern Munich. Now more than ever you can see big names opting to stay in Germany rather than move.
Even David Moyes, the new Manchester United manager spoke of how he wants to one day ply his trade in Germany.
German teams also blew aside the so-called super teams of Real Madrid and Barcelona en route to their clash at Wembley for the Champions League final.
Borussia Dortmund beat Real Madrid 4-3 on aggregate while Bayern Munich eased Barcelona aside 7-0 on aggregate. Spain may not be the best league but the two best sides in Europe if not the world were comfortably beaten. Not even British teams can do that.
You could say that Chelsea beat Barcelona in last year’s Champions League but Chelsea did not win that game, Barcelona merely lost it. If you cast your mind back to the final between Manchester United and Barcelona in 2009 you can see that it was quite simply decimation.
The Bundesliga is not the best League in the world but they are well on their way and look set to eclipse the Premier League.

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May 31, 2013 - 06:55
Soccer is more than just a fun ball game. It’s also a very effective form of exercise.
A new study shows that soccer practice twice a week can lower the blood pressure in type 2 diabetes patients as much as blood pressure drugs can.
Soccer practice improved the functioning of the study’s participants’ hearts relatively quickly, says one of the two researchers behind the new study, project leader and PhD student Jakob Friis Schmidt, of Copenhagen University’s Department of Nutrition, Exercise and Sports.
Many type 2 diabetes patients have a heart muscle that has become less flexible due to factors such as high blood sugar, and this is one of the earliest signs that type 2 diabetes affects heart function. This increases the risk of later developing heart disease in the form of heart failure.
“We discovered that soccer training significantly improved the flexibility of the heart and also that the cardiac muscle tissue was able to work 29 percent faster. This means that after three months of training, the heart had become 10 years ‘younger’.”
But it was not only the heart’s flexibility that improved.
The participants also saw quick improvements in their general fitness, and they all maintained their interest in soccer training after the study had been completed.
The researchers believe that soccer training has a great potential for helping not only diabetes patients but also for improving public health.

Stamina and fitness improved after 12 weeks

The study is based on a project in which 21 men aged 37-61 participated, all of whom had type 2 diabetes.
Twelve of the 21 men were asked to play soccer twice a week, while the other nine made up the control group.
None of the 21 men made any changes to their dietary habits or the physical activities they normally engaged in. The only difference was that one of the groups had started playing soccer.
After only 12 weeks the researchers found that the training had a positive effect on the treatment group.
The effects were as follows:

• The fitness score increased by 12 percent. 
• Stamina increased by 42 percent  
• Advanced ultrasound scanning of the heart also demonstrated that the heart’s contraction phase was improved and that the capacity of the heart to shorten was improved by 23 percent – a research result that had not been reported with other types of physical activity  
• Sixty percent of the participants had high blood pressure before the start of the experiment and took medication to lower it. The soccer training reduced the blood pressure by 8 mmHg. This is equivalent to the effect of a hypotensive pill. Such a large difference has not previously been demonstrated in studies of physical activity.

”An improved physical fitness reduces the risk of complications in type 2 diabetes and makes it easier to cope with daily chores and maintain a physically active life,” says Schmidt’s co-author Thomas Rostgaard, a PhD student at Copenhagen University’s Department of Nutrition, Exercise and Sports.
The results came from tests such as endurance tests, measurements of oxygen uptake while exercising on a bike, blood glucose tests, blood pressure measurements and ultrasound scans of the heart.
Schmidt says that previous studies have shown that soccer differs from running and other forms of exercise not only because it’s good for the body in every conceivable way, but also due to the unique social aspects involved.
”If you want to improve your fitness rating, you should do interval training. But soccer is just as good for that purpose. If you want to burn fat, it’s a good idea to do long runs. But again soccer is just as good for that. If you want strong muscles and bones, then weight training is the way to go. But soccer is just as good there too,” he says.
”There is a great deal of intensity in soccer, but you’re playing with other people and you’re highly focused on the game. For these reasons, the participants felt that playing soccer was less hard than doing interval training.”

Soccer promotes a physically active lifestyle

According to Schmidt, soccer is a great way of getting people to maintain their motivation to lead a physically active life. For instance, the participants in the study continued their soccer training after the completion of the project, on their own initiative.
”This motivational element is what promotes public health. It’s important that people continue to be physically active throughout their lives, and soccer is great for building up social capital and motivation, which has resulted in all our participants wanting to continue with their training because it’s social and it’s fun.”

The study is published in the journal Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise.

Sebuah kumpulan rekaman video sederhana dan insipratif yang diambil dari kamera di atas dashboard mobil. Merekam kisah bagaimana orang saling tolong-menolong, meski tak mengenal sebelumnya. Bahkan, hewan pun tak luput dari tangan-tangan manusia yang menolong.

Rekaman ini diopload via Youtube pada 25 April 2013 dari Russia.

“Wahai hati, jika kau mengakui adanya perbedaan antara kesenangan dan kesedihan, garis–garis ini akan menyekatmu. Kendati seleramu yang manis–manis, bukanlah Kekasih tidak ingin membuatmu tidak berselera? Kehidupan para pecinta ialah dalam mati; Engkau tidak akan memperoleh hati kekasih kecuali jika kau menghilangkan dirimu”

Jalaluddin Rumi

 

Hari itu, di kereta api terdapat seorang pemuda bersama ayahnya. Pemuda itu berusia 24 tahun, sudah cukup dewasa tentu.
Di dalam kereta, pemuda itu memandang keluar jendela kereta, lalu berkata pada ayahnya.

* cerita diterjemahkan dari islamicthinking.tumblr.com

"If we win, we will not be the best team in the world – we will have beaten the best team in the world."

Juergen Klopp, Pelatih Borrusia Dortmund

* sehari jelang final Champions League, Bayern Munich vs Borrusia Dortmund di Stadion Wembley, Inggris, Sabtu, 25 Mei 2013

As monsoon rains swept the stadium, the chanting grew louder: “Indonesia! Indonesia!”
More than 60,000 people packed into Gelora Bung Karno Stadium in Jakarta on a recent Saturday night to see the national soccer team play. Another 100 million tuned in to television to watch the match, underlining the appeal of football in Indonesia where attendance rivals the top English and German football leagues.
Among the fans are two of Indonesia’s most powerful people — President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and politically ambitious businessman Aburizal Bakrie. Their parties have long been battling for control over the sport and its huge audience, hoping this could be a factor in elections next year.
Bakrie, who leads the Golkar party and has said he will be a presidential candidate, seems to have wrested control of a unified football association that was formed in March after almost two years of the two groups running parallel associations and parallel leagues. The association in charge of the sport controls marketing in the stadiums and on television.
“If you can control football, you are half way to controlling Indonesia,” said a senior official at the Indonesian national soccer association, or PSSI.
“No political party campaign can get such a huge, devoted and noisy crowd. No wonder they [politicians] are dying to get hold of this.”
Bakrie has own TV channel to both show matches and advertise his presidential ambitions. While he has announced his candidacy, Yudhoyono’s Democrats have yet to announce their front-runner for the 2014 presidential polls, which will be preceded by parliamentary elections.
Several other candidates are also in the fray for president and latest opinion polls suggest the front-runners are Jakarta Governor Joko Widodo and former military general Prabowo Subianto.
But controlling football will provide an edge in the country of 240 million people, where the sport is widely popular despite Indonesia being ranked 170 out of 209 soccer-playing nations. Weekend games are watched by 52 million television viewers, while about 12 million attend games each year, said Widjajanto, chief executive of PT Liga Prima Indonesia Sportindo, the operator of the Indonesian Premier League.
The league will merge with the rival Indonesian Super League by 2014, according to the agreement thrashed out in March.
By comparison, Germany’s Bundesliga had an attendance of about 13.8 million in the 2011-12 season, while England’s Premier League attracted 13.1 million people to its matches.
Votes are not the only prize. The potential business, if the sport can get back on track, is also mouth-watering.
The Indonesian Super League’s TV broadcasting rights were sold for just 1.3 trillion rupiah ($133.5 million) for 10 years in 2011. Widjajanto estimates that once there is a unified league, broadcasting rights and advertising would be worth at least $360 million a year.

Proxy war
“It’s very clear that it’s a proxy battle between the Democratic Party and Golkar for the 2014 elections,” said Tjipta Lesmana, a university professor and former head of a PSSI committee, of the battle for control of the association.
“The association has been used for political purposes and both parties’ executives realized that soccer has the influence to help them gather support.”
Before the chaotic arrival of democracy 14 years ago, Indonesia’s football was tightly regulated under the three-decade autocratic rule of former president Suharto. After his ouster in 1998, management of the sport went into decline.
In the new political era, freewheeling business interests gained influence. They included the Bakrie Group, founded by businessman Achmad Bakrie, whose son Nirwan became PSSI vice chairman in 2003. Nirwan is Aburizal Bakrie’s brother.
In 2010, the government stepped in and the battle for dominance began.
Yudhoyono, elected a year earlier to a second term, dispatched his sports minister to wrest back control of the PSSI which resulted in Nirwan Bakrie and the PSSI chairman kicked off the association board in 2011.
Bakrie’s backers set up their own association and the rival Indonesian Super League.

Heart and soul
The dispute scared off sponsors and ravaged club finances.
The government also withdrew state financing that some clubs received each year, causing many to shut down.
The sport hit a low point late last year when a Paraguayan player, unpaid for so long he could not afford medical treatment, died. Media reported that some other foreign players had taken to the streets to beg because they had not been paid.
This year, Yudhoyono sent Democratic Party executive Roy Suryo to sort out the mess.
“The government put me in the lion’s den,” Roy said. He convened a congress in March attended by both sides. Dozens of police stood guard in case tempers flared.
By the end of the meeting, a deal was brokered and Indonesian football was again left with one controlling body and the promise of a single league, although the outcome seemed skewed in favor of the Bakries.
Djohar Arifin Husin, who is aligned with the Bakries, was named chairman of the PSSI while six of the board members, aligned to the Yudhoyono faction, walked out.
Djohar told Reuters on the sidelines of the meeting that the deal was a major development for the future of Indonesian football.
Nirwan, although no longer affiliated with the association, is considered an influential figure in it. He dismissed suggestions that the battle for control of the PSSI was all about politics and money, calling it a dispute among people who loved the game but simply had different ideas how to run it.
“If you fall in love with your girlfriend, you give your heart but if you fall in love with football, you’ll give your heart and your soul,” he told Reuters.

Reuters

taken http://www.thejakartaglobe.com 

Global Transfer Market 2012 – FIFA TMS reports 11,552 transactions with a combined transfer compensation value of more than USD 2.5 billion

FIFA Transfer Matching System GmbH (FIFA TMS) has published today for the second consecutive year, data and analysis covering the international transfers of professional football players.

Global Transfer Market 2012 is a unique report that provides a global view of player transfers, covering  six regions, over 200 countries and 5,600 professional clubs around the world. For the first time, it includes in-depth analysis of the 2012 international transfer market’s major elements, such as structures and mechanics, key characteristics and trends.

The English version will be available both as a free report (highlights) and as a fee-based premium product (full report) as of 16 April 2013 through the relaunched website of FIFA TMS.

With over 250 pages, the full report is the ultimate knowledge resource on the international transfer market featuring a detailed view of transfer streams between countries and regions, hierarchical models of the transfer market from spending and receiving perspectives as well as country-level statistics on salaries for the most active countries.

For example,

    In 2012, FIFA TMS handled 11,552 transactions with a total value of international transfer-related club-to-club compensation value of USD 2.53 billion, that’s -10% compared to 2011.
    The most active transfer stream between countries was from Portugal to Brazil involving 145 player transfers.
    The most represented nationality in the international transfer market is Brazilian.
    The average age of players transferred internationally is 24 years & 10 months.
    The average fixed annual salary of players moving into Italy amounts to USD 720,000, the highest average salary of the world’s six most active countries.
    The total club intermediary compensation paid by English clubs on international transfers was USD 59 million, the highest worldwide.

The report also provides case studies including interviews with leading football stakeholders and a full appendix with data featuring over 190 countries.

The information provided in Global Transfer Market 2012 will enable football’s stakeholders to develop a unique understanding of the market. Players, club decision makers, association representatives, intermediaries, and all other football stakeholders can now benchmark their activities in relation to the transfer market.

FIFA TMS also provides the free The 2012 Global Transfer Market – Highlights. The preview of the FIFA TMS annual review of the international transfer market includes highlights and entire subsections of the 2012 full report’s analysis and key indicators. Compared to the 2011 edition, the free version of the 2012 report is considerably larger in both volume and details, providing unique and compelling insight.

The premium product Global Transfer Market 2012 is available as printed version in English (release 16 April), and Spanish, French, and German (release 18 April 2013).

* taken from fifatms.com Global Transfer Market 2012 16.04.2013

Klub-klub yang berlaga di Bundesliga punya harga tiket yang jauh lebih murah dibanding kompetisi domestik Eropa lain. Tapi di saat bersamaan Bayern Munich dkk. juga punya kondisi keuangan yang sangat sehat.

Kelolosan Bayern Munich dan Borussia Dortmund ke final Liga Champions musim ini menjadi highlight dari kekuatan liga domestik Jerman. Die Roten dan Die Borussen tampil gemilang di semifinal dengan mengalahkan dua raksasa Spanyol, Barcelona dan Real Madrid.

Memastikan terjadinya 'all German final' buka satu-satunya keunggulan Bundesliga jika dibanding Seri A, La Liga Primera dan bahkan Premier League sekalipun. Bundesliga punya kepekaan (atau empati) yang lebih besar terhadap fansnya. Bukti paling gampang yang bisa ditemui adalah soal harga tiket pertandingan.

Bayern, yang sudah memastikan mendapat kembali gelar juara Liga Jerman musim ini, cuma mematok harga mulai dari 104 poundsterling (sekitar Rp 1,5 juta) untuk tiket musiman. Padahal mereka punya segalah hak untuk memasang harga tinggi terkait statusnya sebagai yang terbesar di Jerman dan salah satu klub dengan sejarah paling berkilau di Eropa. Sementara Arsenal, yang belum memenangi satupun gelar dalam delapan tahun, memasang harga 985 poundsterling (Rp 14,9 juta) untuk tiket musiman paling ekonomis. Bahkan Wigan Athletic mematok harga tiket musiman termurahnya dengan 255 poundsterling (Rp 3,8 juta).

"Kami bisa saja mematok harga lebih dari 104 poundsterling. Sebut saja, misalnya, 300 poundsterling. Kami akan mendapat pemasukan lebih sekitar dua juta euro, tapi buat apa dua juta euro untuk kami? Jika terkait transfer pemain hal itu bisa didiskusikan dalam lima menit. Tapi perbedaan antara 104 poundsterling dan 300 poundsterling sangat besar untuk fans."

"Kami tidak berpikir fans seperti sapi, yang bisa Anda perah. Sepakbola harusnya buat semua orang. Itu perbedaan terbesar antara kami (Bundesliga) dengan di Inggris," papar Presiden Bayern Uli Hoeness beberapa hari lalu.

Meski cuma meraup sedikit pemasukan dari penjualan tiket, toh klub-klub Jerman punya keuangan yang relatif lebih sehat. Apalagi Bundesliga menerapkan aturan tegas soal kondisi keuangan klub. Musim lalu di Bundesliga cuma ada empat klub yang terbelit utang, sementara di Premier League justru cuma ada tiga klub yang terbebas dari utang. Kondisi serupa terjadi di Italia, dan tentunya Spanyol karena klub sebesar Madrid dan Barca saja tetap dibebat utang.

Superstar sepakbola memang tak banyak yang merumput di Liga Jerman, karena kontrak luar biasa besar tidak mereka dapatkan di sana. Tapi di sisi lain hal tersebut punya pengaruh positif terhadap timnas Jerman, terkait pengembangan pemain muda lokal. Di Bundesliga 52% pemainnya berstatus home-grown, sementara di Liga Inggris jumlahya 32%.

Murahnya harga tiket jelas berefek pada tingginya jumlah rata-rata penonton per pertandingan. Musim lalu, satu pertandingan Bundesliga rata-rata ditonton langsung oleh 44.293 orang. Jumlah tersebut menjadikan Liga Jerman sebagai liga dengan jumlah penonton terbanyak di banding empat kompetisi teratas lainnya. Sebagai pembanding, untuk periode yang sama Premier League rata-rata disaksikan oleh 34.601 penonton per pertandingan.

Hal lain yang membuat stadion-stadion di Jerman mampu menyerap lebih banyak penonton untuk menyaksikan langsung pertandingan adalah masih adanya tribun berdiri -- hal mana sudah cukup lama dilarang di Inggris karena alasan hooliganisme dan keamanan. Tribun berdiri ini kemudian mampu menghadirkan suasana matchday yang sangat berbeda.

Westfalenstadion, atau yang dikenal sebagai Signal Iduna Park dan merupakan kandang Dortmund, memiliki apa yang disebut dengan die Sudtribune. Sisi stadion yang khusus untuk suporter tuan rumah itu merupakan tribun berdiri terbesar di Eropa saat ini dengan total mampu menampung 25.000 fans. Tanya Cristiano Ronaldo dkk bagaimana rasanya bermain di depan die Sudtribune itu.

Buat fans Borussia Dortmund, Bayern Munich, Bayern Leverkusen, Shalke 04 atau bahkan Hoffenheim sekalipun, sepakbola adalah soal passion. Mereka hidup untuk klubnya. Hal lainnya, fans klub-klub Jerman sangatlah akur satu dengan yang lain. Jangan heran kalau segerombolan fans Bayern dan sekelompok suporter Dortmund asyik ngobrol bareng menuju stadion dan bahkan saat laga tuntas dan pulang ke rumah masing-masing.

Akhir pekan kemarin misalnya, saat Dortmund dan Bayern berhadapan dalan lanjutan Liga Jerman. Ketika Rafinha dikartu merah dan sempat berkonfontasi dengan Juergen Klopp di pinggir lapangan, tak ada laporan soal keributan antara suporter kedua tim. Padahal itu laga panas, sebagai persiapan untuk final Liga Champions di akhir bulan ini.

Dan terkait dengan laga final Liga Champions di akhir bulan nanti, Inggris (Premier League) akan dapat pelajaran bahwa sepakbola pada esensinya adalah soal semangat dan antusiasme, bukan uang semata, saat Bayern vs Dortmun mentas di New Wembley.(*)

*Artikel tulisan Doni Wahyudi - detikSport, Senin, 06/05/2013 12:57 WIB