World Cup Website Round-Up
World Cup Online (Channel One)
The first thing that hits you about this website is the confusing homepage. Looking like it belongs to the opening credits of a tacky TV gameshow it gives you four choices – do you want ‘News’, ‘Chatshow’, ‘Entertainment’ or ‘Cartoons’?! Not being sure what on earth the other three options would do – an explanation of each would have been nice – I went for ‘News’ first.
The selection of stories is certainly odd to say the least and there is little evidence that they are being updated with regularity. Just four stories were available when I visited – all bar one consisted of about three sentences. Two of these four stories informed me that the Nigerian goalkeeper will, alas, be missing the Finals in France and that Saudi Arabia recently managed to overcome Trinidad & Tobago by 2 goals to 1 (I will leave it to those interested enough to look up the goalscorers’ names on this rather pointless news service).
A redeeming factor can be found when scrolling down to ‘Features’, where the team profiles are actually quite interesting, but ‘World Cup Online’ is unfortunately truer to form when accessing the pathetic attempt at a World Cup ‘History’. This is amazingly fitted into just FIVE sentences and does not mention anything which occurred between 1930 and 1994!
After the disappointment of the so-called news the next two homepage options unbelievably take the viewer to even less worthy pages. ‘Chatshow’ does not even appear to be working yet, whilst the next link simply explains the purpose of the ‘World Cup Online Entertainment Channel’. Instead of being completely blank though, a crumb of entertainment is provided in just one line: “We intend to be the most dynamic, interactive entertainment channel on the web”! Er, right.
Something that will grab your attention does come in the form of the cartoons, if you can be bothered downloading Shockwave – these are amusing but likely to produce all sorts of frustrating technical errors.
***** Why bother?
FIFA World Cup
Upon entering this URL it is striking how colourful, and messy, it is. The positioning of the advertisements, which add to the clutter in the middle of the screen, and the background that attempts to replicate football turf, do not help this. The next striking thing becomes obvious when clicking on just about any link – this website can be painfully slow, and therefore frustrating (although I found choosing ‘Stop’ then ‘Reload’ on my browser often helped).
This is a shame because perseverance reveals this Italian website to be good in parts. In particular the team guides prove to be well set out, although it is unfortunate that so far they have only “seven of the best teams” available (Scotland and England are not amongst these). The basic but easy to view World Cup history stats are pleasant to look at. Indeed it is in the most visual areas that the best bits of this site are found, under ‘Stadia’ and the World Cup Finals ‘Pictures’.
Beyond the nice images the site’s strengths lie in its easy to follow guide to the World Cup groupings and fixtures. The depth of information to be gained from here, however, is very limited and this ultimately helps the user get the basics right.
***** Simple, basic, user-friendly when not too slow.
France ’98 World Cup Official Site
Having chosen the English version of the official France ’98 website you are greeted with an attractive looking homepage with a rich blue background. It is simple to understand with the main options down the left-hand column and your attention is brought to headlines in the centre of the screen. Use of space, though, is a bit illogical with small text and a vast amount of the area unoccupied.
News is pretty much comprehensive and updated on a daily basis. There is an impressive Shockwave Flash view of the fixtures, which is, er, flash. Information on the teams is well done, with a short history on each, but the qualification stats could be far better than just the Teams-Result-Date-Venue format adopted here. The teams are abbreviated to just three letters, therefore sometimes leaving the user none the wiser as to who, for example, the Korea Republic played on 6th September 1997 (just who are ‘KZK’?!). Each team has two players selected for a well-done profile.
Articles on the venues appear to have been written by the French Tourist Board as the commentary moves far beyond footballing matters onto “how beautiful” the surrounding areas are. Having said this, the section is very slick, as is the ‘Hosts’ option which involves more back-slapping and self-aggrandisement in what is essentially the corporate blurb including a word or two ‘from our sponsors’.
Coverage of past World Cups adds to the pluses of this site. As you would expect for an official site this is amongst the best sources of information on the World Cup.
***** Professional job, but lacking flair – and that’s official!
World Cup Café
http://www.worldmedia.fr/soccer
I like this site! Combining humour and good design (it is littered with images of cartoon characters) with well-researched World Cup data this is a most entertaining web address. The trend is soon set when you, say, go to look up the player profile of flamboyant midfielder Carlos Valderrama and find: “Strong Points: The greatest influence on the Colombian style of play. Weak Points: He’s old and slow”!
This site provides what your average footy fan wants – forthright, unashamed opinions and comment (listed under titles like ‘Could They Win? Could They Hell!’) and the latest World Cup news. The World Cup History admittedly is not the most in-depth ever but will still manage to raise a chuckle or two. In contrast the background provided on each venue is very informative. The news has links to profiles on virtually every team or player mentioned but these can be slow to download. A drawback comes in the all to common tendency for many websites to have text in a single column – here there are about five words per line which means loads of scrolling!
The games room keeps the viewer engrossed with a World Cup quiz and a Spot-The-Ball competition where the prizes are most generous: “If you find it, award yourself a big hug from your team-mates”, whilst upon spotting a ball you are told, “You can drop to your knees and raise your fists heavenward.”
A downside can be found under ‘Results’ which claims will hold every qualifying game for this World Cup which started back in March 1996. This service will apparently open in April…
Overall though this is a site likely to be very much enjoyed by all who access it.
***** Good, informative, fun!
USA TODAY Soccer World Cup France ’98
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/soccer/wcix.htm
The American homepage provides an unwelcoming introduction to ‘USA Today’s’ World Cup coverage. Most of the options are not even visible, as scrolling is required to see exactly what choices you have. What limited news there is consists of concise quotes and comment bar the few items that offer a ‘Full Story’ link, where a well-written, informed article can be found.
All statistics, whether they be groupings or fixtures or past results, are given in a most unattractive, basic format more suited to a Spectrum ZX81 than a 1998 webpage. There is a complete absence of World Cup history. The ‘Group-by-Group overview’ has an extremely brief extract for each team consisting of a list of key players, previous appearances and a short analysis.
Only those after very basic information need pay much attention to this site – at least it does not suffer from slow connections like the other, more substantial, France ’98 homepages.
***** Brief overview, unlikely to hold attention.
Sky Sports / Budweiser World Cup 1998
http://www.sky.co.uk/worldcup/
After being greeted by a Bud this is revealed to be a stylish looking effort, although again suffering from not making full use of the screen. The news, which appears on the homepage, is lacking in content – this can be attributed to Sky’s news resources being far more geared towards the Premiership than a competition they do not actually own the rights to. From here on though this proves to be a professionally operated site. Writing on the teams and past competitions is top notch (including the odd link to a particularly relevant photo of a goal they are describing) although historical data is not as in-depth as some World Cup sites. The grounds section offers only very basic details.
One thing unique to this site is the ‘TV/Radio’ guide. Its existence is surprising considering all the games listed are on BBC or ITV (maybe it’s a case of promoting them rather than Eurosport). Oddly there is a complete absence of Radio information, so essentially this is just a TV guide. Yet this is not the only thing unique to Sky’s France ’98 URL, as they have also taken the time to devote a section to explain the rules of the competition. Here you discover, rather worryingly, that in the eventuality of teams being equal on points, goal difference, etc, qualification for the next round will be decided by “drawing lots”!
There is a lack of depth and character to this site. It could do with more thought-provoking comment and a more comprehensive guide to the players. Despite this it is easy to use and follow.
***** Accurate, yet unadventurous considering the Sky’s the limit.
Soccernet World Cup ’98 (SportsLine Worldwide & Daily Mail)
http://worldcup.soccernet.com/
For those familiar with http://www.thisislondon.co.uk this website is reminiscent of the Evening Standard’s homepage in terms of layout. This makes sense considering that this site is partly hosted by the Standard’s sister paper, the Daily Mail. As a result the news service is second-to-none: new stories come in with extreme regularity and often links to related items are provided, including a topical chat forum. Unfortunately the forums are confusing, and it is difficult to keep track of who is replying to what.
Confusion also reigns on the homepage due to some options being laid out horizontally across the top and the rest vertically lower down the left-hand side of the page. But clicking on any of these links reveals this site to be an excellent source of information in terms of detail and coverage. Any profile will contain links to yet another relevant item, taken from a large catalogue of news articles and data (there are reports for nearly all the World Cup qualifying games) – you could get lost in here! What this does prove is that this is the biggest and best World Cup database you are likely to find. The history covers virtually everything you would reasonably need to know and the photo archive is as large as it is impressive.
The fan poll is a great interactive feature where, having submitted your opinion on the top teams in the Finals you can then compare this with the running total of votes for each country. The interactivity extends to the arcade games, which are appealing; these include penalty shoot-outs, ‘Match-Up’, which tests your knowledge of players and countries, and ‘Spot-The-Ball’.
The site has just about everything a World Cup fan could want, and even the advertisements are placed sensibly – not getting in the way or cluttering the screen, and still positioned effectively. One niggly thing to point out is the Americanisation in evidence on areas of this site: some tables are given in a Won-Lost-Tied format and if you want to buy a football shirt you will have to pay in dollars.
***** Look no further for THE web guide to the World Cup.
BBC News & Sport World Cup 98
Not a million miles away from the design and format of ‘Soccernet’, the BBC’s offering has added a colourful background as well. Whilst more appealing to view, this may be the cause of the slow connections the site seems to suffer from on occasions. The BBC site is, perhaps not surprisingly, strong in its news content and the multitude of related links does rival that of Soccernet’s, but technically these do not operate as smoothly and ultimately can lead to frustration on the part of the user.
Interactivity comes in the form of the opportunity to send your comments on any news story, but instead of a forum it appears that only a selection of brief comments eventually get displayed. Similarly you can pick your ideal England team but are left wondering, “What was the point of that?” after hitting the send button – will anyone actually see your selection? The only redeeming factor is that upon sending your choice you get to see a particularly cheesy picture of Des Lynam (labelled ‘Mr World Cup’!) looking his fine and dandiest! Spot-The-Ball offers the chance to win a life-size cut-out of Jimmy Hill but even such an incentive as this is not enough for anyone to endure the slowness of downloading the features of this game for too long! A map featuring the stadiums is also available.
The coverage of past World Cup Finals is descriptively sound but lacking in statistics. Welcome features are contributions by Alan Hansen and Trevor Brooking on Scotland’s and England’s chances this summer. The Beeb certainly have used this medium to plug their own television broadcasts, which will infect our screens in June.
Potentially ‘Auntie’ has squandered a good opportunity to provide an essential World Cup site for most people to enjoy. An abundance of patience is certainly needed to gain satisfaction from this large and informative database. Shame.
***** Powerful web browser essential or you won’t be back for more.