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South African mobile discussion |
amawanqa
Joined: May 08, 2004
Posts: > 500
From: Hornchurch UK & East London SA
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Part 2: Player and VIP entrance and function rooms.
Marius, his wife and us about to be shown around (sorry for the poor P900 VGA quality in the 1st pic here):
An EXACT replica of the Premier League floating trophy, after they finished Premiership champs in '95. The crown at the top is solid gold. Cost £50 000 (approx R700 000) to make.
Row upon row of cabinets filled with momentos from other clubs that they have played against, miscellaneous trophies etc etc (P900 again...):
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He who laughs last...thinks slowest.
 T39m,  T610,T630,P900,Nokia7600 & N73
[ This Message was edited by: amawanqa on 2007-08-24 22:15 ] | |
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amawanqa
Joined: May 08, 2004
Posts: > 500
From: Hornchurch UK & East London SA
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On Monday, when we returned to the stadium and the others were in the official Blackburn Rovers shop, I was taking pics of the stadium outside.
After a while of taking N73 pics, a different guy in a suit (Blackburn Rovers blazer and tie)approached me. We got talking. I didn't realise at the time what his role was. When he heard about us being from SA etc, he just said to wait there and he'd be back in 5 minutes; he was going to organise us access into the restricted areas and show us quite a bit that goes on behind the scenes in an English Premiership club!
More about the dude later.
Part 3: The Pitch.
N73:
P900:
£1000 (approx R14000) fine if a member of the public goes onto the pitch without any permission...
That didn't stop us nicking a bit of the grass.. 
BTW, any idea how much money is spent in a year on fertiliser for a Premiership football pitch? A cool £100 000 (approx R1 400 000).
_________________
He who laughs last...thinks slowest.
T39m, T610,T630,P900,Nokia7600 & N73
[ This Message was edited by: amawanqa on 2007-08-24 21:49 ] |
*Jojo*
Joined: Oct 15, 2003
Posts: > 500
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@ama - Nice pics !
[addsig] |
amawanqa
Joined: May 08, 2004
Posts: > 500
From: Hornchurch UK & East London SA
PM |
Thanks Jojo.
We were very privileged to see what we all saw next. This is where the players come out onto the pitch. As you can see, there's a lot of cleaning in progress after match day.
Oops...
..and to the changing rooms:
One of the tactics boards..and a hairdryer for the players, those all-important press conferences LOL..
Cameras along the roof framework link to a centralised computer, which then calculates the opponents' pattern of play, passing strategies etc and then projected onto this interactive whiteboard in the changing room!
@ da brixsta,
Check out their strategies against your team:
Red obviously Arsenal, blue for Blackburn:
Apparently, all the opposing team changing rooms are never to the same spec, and go for any psychological edge possible, for example at Middlesbrough's stadium, the opposition team's changing room is painted in dark purple and green colours to try and 'nausiate'/distract the players in there..
So what do they do after a match?
_________________
He who laughs last...thinks slowest.
T39m, T610,T630,P900,Nokia7600 & N73
[ This Message was edited by: amawanqa on 2007-08-25 03:01 ] |
amawanqa
Joined: May 08, 2004
Posts: > 500
From: Hornchurch UK & East London SA
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@ Kryptik,
Check what this club does for their local community.
First a little background info. Every Premiership club has a responsibility to assist the local community with various programmes. They also have 'Learning Zones' run by teachers etc, helping pupils from surrounding schools with both academic and sporting programmes too.
West Ham United took some of our Gifted and Talented pupils recently, giving them free extra challenging academic activities at the stadium's own learning zone. They collect the pupils once a week from school in a minibus.
During the holidays, football trials clubs are held at various high schools around the area, where the local football club will have a few talent scouts in attendance.
Now funny enough, the richest Premiership clubs apparently invest the least in their local community, whereas Blackburn head the charts for investing in the local community...40% of their total profits! Charlton and Fulham are apprarently runners-up.
Rovers have their own on-site school. Pupils/students that have been identified as potential football stars of the future attend school in the stadium's dedicated classrooms. However, the ruling is that they can only continue with the football training IF their academic results are up to scratch too. So they really have to pull their weight and not feel that they can just 'ride' on their footballing skills. Well done, Rovers!
So what else do they do?
Kids who are frequently bunking will be referred to the club, who have specialist staff to identify root causes for the truanting and run programmes to get them motivated, as well as feed back their findings as to why there are issues, to both the school and the local education authority. If there's major improvement, they have an opportunity to meet the players.
For juveniles that may have ASBO's (anti-social behaviour order), again the club will run workshops for them, running courses on how to become referees etc...but on Friday nights and on weekends that there's away matches..when these kids would be most likely to cause mischief.
Again, apart from the skills they leave with, they can also meet the players IF there's enough of a turnaround in their behaviour etc.
So what about the kids that do attend, do behave etc? Well fortunately the club has got similar incentives for those kids who do warrant meeting the players and having other privileges, which I was relieved to hear.
But that's not all (Oh hell Wanqa, you sound like a Glomail advert now LOL).
They also run workshops for single moms aged between 16 and 24, helping them to regain some sense of self esteem, how to do CV's, conduct themselves at job interviews, etc etc.
They also run socials for pensioners in the local old age homes, and so on.
What an eye-opener it was.
One of the classrooms:
_________________
He who laughs last...thinks slowest.
T39m, T610,T630,P900,Nokia7600 & N73
[ This Message was edited by: amawanqa on 2007-08-25 04:24 ] |
*Jojo*
Joined: Oct 15, 2003
Posts: > 500
PM |
@ama - I think I saw mrs. ama's  PIC in your ecent UPLOADS mate  Lovely indeed !
[addsig] |
amawanqa
Joined: May 08, 2004
Posts: > 500
From: Hornchurch UK & East London SA
PM |
Previous season's strip going so damn cheap in the official shop...so many specials!
Goalkeeper's shirt:
OK, that's it for now. I apologise to anyone who had to suffer while waiting for all these images to load, as well as to those who aren't into sport/ English Premiership football, even though the whole visit/ Wanqa Documentary was covered by cellphones.
Oh well, it's keeping the thread ticking over too, I guess. 
He who laughs last... thinks slowest.
Nokia 5800, Sony Ericsson P1i, Nokia 7600. |
amawanqa
Joined: May 08, 2004
Posts: > 500
From: Hornchurch UK & East London SA
PM |
Well spotted Jojo. 
I've got additional pics from our time in Scotland etc. for the non- thread, which I'll try post there later on Saturday.
Anyway, it's nearly 3:30pm. Time to catch some 
G'night, matey. Hope you're having a great SUNDAE.
_________________
He who laughs last...thinks slowest.
T39m, T610,T630,P900,Nokia7600 & N73
[ This Message was edited by: amawanqa on 2007-08-25 03:27 ] |
*Jojo*
Joined: Oct 15, 2003
Posts: > 500
PM |
On 2007-08-25 04:25:42, amawanqa wrote:
Anyway, it's nearly 3:30pm. Time to catch some
@dad - Why in the afternoon - 3:30 PM you say
[addsig] |
Kryptik
Joined: Jun 24, 2005
Posts: > 500
From: Port Elizabeth, S.Africa
PM |
That's brilliant Wanqa, those clubs certainly deserve a pat on the back! The lengths to which they go are quite extraordinary, considering that they could've probably gotten away with the bare minimum had they so chosen. Nice pix there btw boet 
So the neighbour's daughter is now sporting a Nokia 6085. Not a shabby piece of hardware... Set up an email address for her earlier, then installed some apps, including Gmail and Opera Mini. May as well point her in the proper direction now before Mxit et al claim another scalp
I'm not superstitious, merely mildly stitious. |
Hobbs
Joined: Oct 07, 2006
Posts: > 500
From: Cape Town,South Africa
PM |
Thats what i need wanga,a spinning bicycle right next to my bath.As you hit your 30 you start getting a bit rough around the edges if you dont take care of yourself.your friend was very fortunate on the day to get such v.i.p treatment.lucky him been a fan and all.now everytime he watches it on the telly he can tell everyone...been there..done that..got the pics to prove it.great stuff.
Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 3
Huawei Mate 40 Pro 256GB |
amawanqa
Joined: May 08, 2004
Posts: > 500
From: Hornchurch UK & East London SA
PM |
@ Jojo,
Oops...my bad, that should've obviously been 3:30am.
Shows you how half-asleep I was by then. 
@ Kryptik,
Thanks boet. It's good to hear that some of the players really do their bit by promoting and helping out within the community as well, more so than others, although a certain Benni McCarthy (apparently) has his occasional bouts of laziness during these and football training sessions at times...
@ Das Hobbsmeister,
Ya I think I need one of those next to the PC, before I start developing some serious rotund proportions. Either that or some Wanqa Weight Watcher programme that I'll need to concoct and follow sooner rather than later.
He who laughs last... thinks slowest.
Nokia 5800, Sony Ericsson P1i, Nokia 7600. |
amawanqa
Joined: May 08, 2004
Posts: > 500
From: Hornchurch UK & East London SA
PM |
The T650i is now available here, for £279.95 (approx R4000!) from Carphone Warehouse.
http://shop.carphonewarehouse[....]-go/sony-ericsson/t650i-green/
I'd rather pay an extra £45 and get a p1i from Mobilefun.
Could almost guarantee that the T650i launch price won't stay like that for a long while; it'll soon drop to well below the £200 mark in the next few months, such is the trend with virtually all handsets, particularly the mid-range ones.
He who laughs last... thinks slowest.
Nokia 5800, Sony Ericsson P1i, Nokia 7600. |
Hobbs
Joined: Oct 07, 2006
Posts: > 500
From: Cape Town,South Africa
PM |
The Springboks are about to do battle against the Scots(who I think have the best national anthem in the world.) Lets see what Jakes team is capable of as we go into the World Cup.Hope its a cracker. |
Hobbs
Joined: Oct 07, 2006
Posts: > 500
From: Cape Town,South Africa
PM |
R u suprised with the R4000 pricetag on the T650i Wangs?
Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 3
Huawei Mate 40 Pro 256GB | |
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Access the forum with a mobile phone via esato.mobi
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Posted: 2007-08-24 22:01
