National Football Museum has kicked off

On July 6th it finally happened: The National Football Museum in Manchester, England opened its doors, or turnstiles rather.
The whole weekend seems to have been a great success. Both the permanent exhibitions and the temporary ones seem to have been highly appreciated among visitors as well as the family activities.

The first temporary exhibition is: Moving Into Space: Football and Art in West Africa

"A thought-provoking exhibition featuring the work of leading contemporary West African artists whose art is inspired by football to explore wider social issues. The exhibition features a wide range of work including painting, sculpture, installation, textiles, and photography.

Today, football is a worldwide phenomenon with an estimated 715 million people watching the 2006 World Cup final. The game has spread to all parts of the globe and in West Africa it is part of the fabric of society, from the street games of children to the large amounts spent on national teams by governments seeking to gain popularity and electoral advantage."

Read more about the exhibition here.
Moving Into Space: Football and Art in West Africa6 July  - 31 December 2012

Sneak preview of the National Football Museum

I recently had a delightful trip to Liverpool and Manchester, UK where I got the chance to visit the National Football Museum one month before opening.
The behind-the-scenes tour was highly interesting and I can assure you that this museum will raise the standard immensly for all the Football Museums worldwide.
I am especially impressed with the balance in content, the well-motivated choices and the fresh design of both the building and the exhibitions.

Good luck for the opening on July 6th!
/Pontus Forslund, Balls & Boots

Thanks to Kevin Moore, Director of the National Football Museum who generously gave the tour and for a rewarding discussion afterwards.
I can't wait to come back and see the whole thing up and running

Some pictures from my visit:



One of my favourites: Ray Kennedy





The official Adidas ball of World Cup 1970

Newcastle United heritage is awarded grants

Newcastle United FC reports that grants have been awarded for a heritage project including an exhibition in the Discovery Museum in Newcastle as well as an education and outreach programme. The National Lottery Fund and the Premier League Community Fund are awarding grants in the total of nearly £170'000.

The project Toon Times kicks off in september 2012 and the exhibition is planned for October 2014 - June 2015. The whole project aims to attract 360'000 visitors.

Read the news here

Just a year ago there was another Newcastle United exhibition in the Discovery Museum: NUFC: For the love of Football.

There seems to be a strong connection between the club and the Discovery Museum. It is argued that a city of Newcastle size with only one professional football team enjoys much more support from the city council as well as the local community. This gives them a much greater chance to explore their heritage than other clubs in other cities that holds rival teams such as Birmingham, Liverpool, Sheffield or Glasgow.

German Academy of Football Culture

The next website you should visit is the Deutsche Akademie für Fussball Kultur.
An amazing resource for everyone interested in football in German and European society.
They also have a special page about Football Museums and collection. A real gold mine for Balls & Boots.
It also confirms Germany as the great nation of Football Museums alongside Great Britain.

I also came upon a Deutches Fussball Museum in Berlin. A little surprising because it seems to cover the same themes as the planned DFB Fussball Museum (the national museum of the German FA) in Dortmund.

So, I'll try to investigate further.
Meanwhile I have some German club museums to visit online and, look (guck mal) there seem to be another museum dedicated to a player in progress.
Stay tuned!

Museum Ball III: Walsall

This ball is on display in the Walsall Leather Museum, England. It is the match ball from Walsall FC's biggest game: when they beat the league champions Arsenal in the third round of the 1933 FA cup, 2-0. The game was played 14th january 1933 in Walsall's (nicknamed The Saddlers) Fellows Park.

Walsall supporter Steve Blake writes about the game:
In the first ten minutes, Arsenal were awarded many free kicks, and Walsall held the “Gunners” to a goalless draw at half-time. In the second half, Walsall’s centre forward,Gilbert Alsop headed in the first goal from a corner. They say the cheering was heard two miles away! Arsenal missed many chances untill Tommy Black lost his cool and the resulting foul produced a penalty, and Sheppard scored to put the result beyond doubt. Herbert Chapman, the Arsenal manager, was in a state of shock and promptly banned Black from Highbury, and then a few weeks later transferred him to Plymouth.

Fact File: Borusseum

Borusseum is the Club Museum, of the German Bundesliga club Bourssia Dortmund.

Location: In the North-East-Corner of the Signal Iduna Park, in Dortmund.
Opening year: 19th of December 2008 (the 99th anniversary of the club.)
Annual visitor number: 29 000 (2010)
Collection size: Several thousand, and increasing (about 10% is on display)

One of the great clubs of German and European football, Bourssia Dortmund enjoy a massive support in their home stadium. Currently defending champions of the Bundesliga and has got both a successful history from the game but also troubles with finances.

The Borusseum is a museum from supporters for supporters it partly focuses on the history of the supporters. A museum feature is for instance movies about the choreographies of the supporters.
In the special object exhibit there is the tricot from Lothar Emmerich, which shows spoors of usage of the final match of the European Cup of 1966 against Liverpool FC.
The treasure in the Borusseum treasury is certainly the Champions League Cup (right now the original trench coat from Ottmar Hitzfeld, which he wore in the Champions League final in Munich, is displayed in an exposition in the Wembley stadium).

Other players’ related objects are: the floodlight-tricot, which Reinhold Wosab wore in 1963 against Benfica Lissabon, has its own history (Dortmund won this match in his old stadium, called “Rote Erde”/ “Red Earth” 5-0);  the top scorer trophy Lothar Emmerich got together with Gerd Müller 1966/67; and Emmerich’s shoes he wore as top scorer in the Bundesliga as well as top scorer in the European Cup Winners’ Cup which’ve been gilded later on.

Another object related to the joy of winning are the broken glasses of manager Jürgen Klopp: they were damaged after the match against the FC Bayern Munich in February 2011. Nuri Sahin was so happy about the 3-1 success of Dortmund, that he jumped on the back of Jürgen Klopp so broke his glasses.

As for a classic Borussia Dormund anecdote: the Werner Erdmann brassiere is also on display. In 1947 the whole team of Dortmund was in training camp, because they wanted to be well prepared for the new season. They trained very hard, but they also had a lot of fun. Before the departure back to Dortmund the keeper Willi Kronsbein stole a brassiere from the clothesline of their hotel and put it in the suitcase of his teammate Werner Erdmann. Naturally, he didn’t suspect anything but back at home his wife opened the suitcase and found the brassiere. She immediately thought her husband had had a love affair. Werner Erdmann told her that he was innocent of such allegations, but Mrs. Erdmann was really angry and she went directly to the team meeting and wanted to hear the truth about the bra. After a lot of discussions Willi Kronsbein told her the truth and Werner was no longer suspected by his wife having a love affair. This was the first and only team meeting in the whole history of Borussia Dortmund where ever a woman participated. Therefore the brassiere is in the exhbition.

The Borsseum keep temporary exhibitions once or twice a year. For 2012, one is planned with the topic “The singing of the supporters”. For this exhibition the museum works scientifically together with the University of Paderborn and creatively with the FH of design in Dortmund. 

The museum is run and paid for by the club but also has some sponsors. They bought a tile with their names on it, on the bridge in the entrance hall. The Club’s special department for advancement and supporter activities has also been crucial to the foundation and current activities of the museum. Furthermore private people of fanclubs can donate a sum of 109,09 euros and get a plate, also with their names on a wall in the Boursseum. The thought is that they’ll become a part of the museum forever.

Thanks to Kirsten Behnke, of the Museum Direction (Museumsleitung)

When will the Manchester City Museum rise again?

Almost three years ago, in May 2009, The Manchester City Museum closed their doors to the public. The headline was "Museum closes to rise again".

"The club museum at the City of Manchester Stadium is going to get bigger and better, with plans in the pipeline for an exciting project that will reflect and cherish the club's rich heritage."

Three years later, judging by the MCFC website, the museum is still closed. An email from Balls & Boots has been sent for an update of this state.

Date set for the National Football Museum: 6 July

The National Football Museum of England has set a date for their opening: Friday 6 July.
This was stated in their web-based newsletter distributed today.

"The museum is home to the biggest and best football collection in the world, and will be filled with exciting, interactive exhibits for all the family. Inside, you'll be able to explore how the rules set out in England in the 19th Century grew into the world's biggest sport and how football has affected everything from politics, to social change, to art, fashion and the media."
More can be read on their website's article on the matter: National Football Museum.