Producing a magazine during lockdown has had its challenges. But it’s been a positive, if at times fraught, experience. We’ve certainly had to adapt. Photo shoots were cancelled and interviews were conducted online, but we found a way. In some instances the problems even opened up interesting opportunities.
Take our covers for issue 4, for example: it’s the first time we’ve used illustrations and we were very pleased with the results. Check out the “making of” videos for both the Steven Gerrard and Kalidou Koulibaly covers – Louise Cobbold’s and Dan Evans’ approaches to creating them were fascinating stories in themselves.
The year is certainly ending on a high for Gerrard, with Rangers racing clear at the top of the Scottish Premiership. All the more reason to revisit Graham Hunter’s revealing interview – and finely crafted article – covering the former Liverpool man’s first steps in coaching and how he’s adapting to life on the touchline.
Speaking of Liverpool, it was great to team up with Reds fan Jacqui McAssey to talk about her Girl Fans photography project, which shines a light on female supporters. The pictures are brilliant and it was fascinating to learn about the inspiration and ideas behind her drive to give female fans a voice.
Two of our female Champions Journalist fan reporters featured prominently in issues three and four. Each season we run a competition asking supporters to write about their clubs; Atiya, a Chelsea-supporting Londoner, and Atlético fan Carla Fernández Ariño in Madrid, both wrote engagingly about their teams. Carla welcomed my colleague Dan Poole to her city to experience a matchday Atleti style, while Atiya’s heartfelt Lockdown Diary explained exactly what football meant to her just as the pandemic brought the game to a halt.
When the Champions League did return there was no stopping Bayern München. Our art director Oliver Meikle captured the campaign in his photo essay in issue 5, while Simon Hart's analysis of Hansi Flick’s approach to coaching in the same edition provides a brilliant insight into the importance of the human touch in dealing with the modern superstar.
At the other end of the psychological spectrum there was the trauma meted out on Barcelona by Bayern in the quarter-finals, followed by the turmoil surrounding Lionel Messi’s request to leave the club. In the eye of the storm, it was nice to take a step back and just recall the player at his absolute best. Peak Messi, in fact. That’s how Chris Burke describes his headed goal in the 2009 final, with his wonderful prose supported by Osvaldo Casanova’s beautiful illustration. Here’s an extract:
“Leaning away as he hangs majestically in the air, the Barça No10 finds the right contortion to head back across Van der Sar, whose jaw drops as the ball sails above. And by the time it finds the far corner, Messi has crumpled to the earth, his boot popping off to be held as a temporary trophy on a jubilant run to the corner flag … It was a goal so unMessi-like that it arguably looms above the rest as peak Messi. Proof that the man who can do everything can actually do everything.” Love it.
On a personal note, it was an absolute privilege to speak to former Hibs captain Pat Stanton. It had originally been suggested that he would be keen to contribute to My Greatest European Night, our back-page feature in each issue. But it soon became clear, as he recalled watching Hibs in the first season of the European Cup in 1955/56, that he would need much more space than that. His memories of watching as a ten-year-old alongside his dad in the stands on glorious floodlit nights at Easter Road were wonderfully evocative of a bygone era.
Another highlight was getting to meet Jürgen Klinsmann, albeit via Zoom. The Champions League was one of the few trophies he never won, but it was great to hear him talk about his run to the semi-finals with Monaco in 1993/94, as well as the story behind his tongue-in-cheek dive celebration with Spurs. His shrill laugh and sense of humour are infectious.
Readers will have also noticed our decision to bring a temporary halt to our gallery series on the great Champions League grounds. The San Siro, Mestalla and Estadio San Paolo – now Stadio Diego Armando Maradona – featured in the first three issues, but with fans unable to attend games, the focus on empty stadiums suddenly felt misplaced. Our gallery in issue 4 instead put the spotlight on supporters, reflecting our hope that they will again be filling those glorious grounds to the rafters before too long.
Happy New Year. See you in 2021.
We’d love to hear what you have enjoyed most about Champions Journal this year – and what you’d like to see more of. Let us know at info@champions-journal.com
Producing a magazine during lockdown has had its challenges. But it’s been a positive, if at times fraught, experience. We’ve certainly had to adapt. Photo shoots were cancelled and interviews were conducted online, but we found a way. In some instances the problems even opened up interesting opportunities.
Take our covers for issue 4, for example: it’s the first time we’ve used illustrations and we were very pleased with the results. Check out the “making of” videos for both the Steven Gerrard and Kalidou Koulibaly covers – Louise Cobbold’s and Dan Evans’ approaches to creating them were fascinating stories in themselves.
The year is certainly ending on a high for Gerrard, with Rangers racing clear at the top of the Scottish Premiership. All the more reason to revisit Graham Hunter’s revealing interview – and finely crafted article – covering the former Liverpool man’s first steps in coaching and how he’s adapting to life on the touchline.
Speaking of Liverpool, it was great to team up with Reds fan Jacqui McAssey to talk about her Girl Fans photography project, which shines a light on female supporters. The pictures are brilliant and it was fascinating to learn about the inspiration and ideas behind her drive to give female fans a voice.
Two of our female Champions Journalist fan reporters featured prominently in issues three and four. Each season we run a competition asking supporters to write about their clubs; Atiya, a Chelsea-supporting Londoner, and Atlético fan Carla Fernández Ariño in Madrid, both wrote engagingly about their teams. Carla welcomed my colleague Dan Poole to her city to experience a matchday Atleti style, while Atiya’s heartfelt Lockdown Diary explained exactly what football meant to her just as the pandemic brought the game to a halt.
When the Champions League did return there was no stopping Bayern München. Our art director Oliver Meikle captured the campaign in his photo essay in issue 5, while Simon Hart's analysis of Hansi Flick’s approach to coaching in the same edition provides a brilliant insight into the importance of the human touch in dealing with the modern superstar.
At the other end of the psychological spectrum there was the trauma meted out on Barcelona by Bayern in the quarter-finals, followed by the turmoil surrounding Lionel Messi’s request to leave the club. In the eye of the storm, it was nice to take a step back and just recall the player at his absolute best. Peak Messi, in fact. That’s how Chris Burke describes his headed goal in the 2009 final, with his wonderful prose supported by Osvaldo Casanova’s beautiful illustration. Here’s an extract:
“Leaning away as he hangs majestically in the air, the Barça No10 finds the right contortion to head back across Van der Sar, whose jaw drops as the ball sails above. And by the time it finds the far corner, Messi has crumpled to the earth, his boot popping off to be held as a temporary trophy on a jubilant run to the corner flag … It was a goal so unMessi-like that it arguably looms above the rest as peak Messi. Proof that the man who can do everything can actually do everything.” Love it.
On a personal note, it was an absolute privilege to speak to former Hibs captain Pat Stanton. It had originally been suggested that he would be keen to contribute to My Greatest European Night, our back-page feature in each issue. But it soon became clear, as he recalled watching Hibs in the first season of the European Cup in 1955/56, that he would need much more space than that. His memories of watching as a ten-year-old alongside his dad in the stands on glorious floodlit nights at Easter Road were wonderfully evocative of a bygone era.
Another highlight was getting to meet Jürgen Klinsmann, albeit via Zoom. The Champions League was one of the few trophies he never won, but it was great to hear him talk about his run to the semi-finals with Monaco in 1993/94, as well as the story behind his tongue-in-cheek dive celebration with Spurs. His shrill laugh and sense of humour are infectious.
Readers will have also noticed our decision to bring a temporary halt to our gallery series on the great Champions League grounds. The San Siro, Mestalla and Estadio San Paolo – now Stadio Diego Armando Maradona – featured in the first three issues, but with fans unable to attend games, the focus on empty stadiums suddenly felt misplaced. Our gallery in issue 4 instead put the spotlight on supporters, reflecting our hope that they will again be filling those glorious grounds to the rafters before too long.
Happy New Year. See you in 2021.
We’d love to hear what you have enjoyed most about Champions Journal this year – and what you’d like to see more of. Let us know at info@champions-journal.com
Producing a magazine during lockdown has had its challenges. But it’s been a positive, if at times fraught, experience. We’ve certainly had to adapt. Photo shoots were cancelled and interviews were conducted online, but we found a way. In some instances the problems even opened up interesting opportunities.
Take our covers for issue 4, for example: it’s the first time we’ve used illustrations and we were very pleased with the results. Check out the “making of” videos for both the Steven Gerrard and Kalidou Koulibaly covers – Louise Cobbold’s and Dan Evans’ approaches to creating them were fascinating stories in themselves.
The year is certainly ending on a high for Gerrard, with Rangers racing clear at the top of the Scottish Premiership. All the more reason to revisit Graham Hunter’s revealing interview – and finely crafted article – covering the former Liverpool man’s first steps in coaching and how he’s adapting to life on the touchline.
Speaking of Liverpool, it was great to team up with Reds fan Jacqui McAssey to talk about her Girl Fans photography project, which shines a light on female supporters. The pictures are brilliant and it was fascinating to learn about the inspiration and ideas behind her drive to give female fans a voice.
Two of our female Champions Journalist fan reporters featured prominently in issues three and four. Each season we run a competition asking supporters to write about their clubs; Atiya, a Chelsea-supporting Londoner, and Atlético fan Carla Fernández Ariño in Madrid, both wrote engagingly about their teams. Carla welcomed my colleague Dan Poole to her city to experience a matchday Atleti style, while Atiya’s heartfelt Lockdown Diary explained exactly what football meant to her just as the pandemic brought the game to a halt.
When the Champions League did return there was no stopping Bayern München. Our art director Oliver Meikle captured the campaign in his photo essay in issue 5, while Simon Hart's analysis of Hansi Flick’s approach to coaching in the same edition provides a brilliant insight into the importance of the human touch in dealing with the modern superstar.
At the other end of the psychological spectrum there was the trauma meted out on Barcelona by Bayern in the quarter-finals, followed by the turmoil surrounding Lionel Messi’s request to leave the club. In the eye of the storm, it was nice to take a step back and just recall the player at his absolute best. Peak Messi, in fact. That’s how Chris Burke describes his headed goal in the 2009 final, with his wonderful prose supported by Osvaldo Casanova’s beautiful illustration. Here’s an extract:
“Leaning away as he hangs majestically in the air, the Barça No10 finds the right contortion to head back across Van der Sar, whose jaw drops as the ball sails above. And by the time it finds the far corner, Messi has crumpled to the earth, his boot popping off to be held as a temporary trophy on a jubilant run to the corner flag … It was a goal so unMessi-like that it arguably looms above the rest as peak Messi. Proof that the man who can do everything can actually do everything.” Love it.
On a personal note, it was an absolute privilege to speak to former Hibs captain Pat Stanton. It had originally been suggested that he would be keen to contribute to My Greatest European Night, our back-page feature in each issue. But it soon became clear, as he recalled watching Hibs in the first season of the European Cup in 1955/56, that he would need much more space than that. His memories of watching as a ten-year-old alongside his dad in the stands on glorious floodlit nights at Easter Road were wonderfully evocative of a bygone era.
Another highlight was getting to meet Jürgen Klinsmann, albeit via Zoom. The Champions League was one of the few trophies he never won, but it was great to hear him talk about his run to the semi-finals with Monaco in 1993/94, as well as the story behind his tongue-in-cheek dive celebration with Spurs. His shrill laugh and sense of humour are infectious.
Readers will have also noticed our decision to bring a temporary halt to our gallery series on the great Champions League grounds. The San Siro, Mestalla and Estadio San Paolo – now Stadio Diego Armando Maradona – featured in the first three issues, but with fans unable to attend games, the focus on empty stadiums suddenly felt misplaced. Our gallery in issue 4 instead put the spotlight on supporters, reflecting our hope that they will again be filling those glorious grounds to the rafters before too long.
Happy New Year. See you in 2021.
We’d love to hear what you have enjoyed most about Champions Journal this year – and what you’d like to see more of. Let us know at info@champions-journal.com
Producing a magazine during lockdown has had its challenges. But it’s been a positive, if at times fraught, experience. We’ve certainly had to adapt. Photo shoots were cancelled and interviews were conducted online, but we found a way. In some instances the problems even opened up interesting opportunities.
Take our covers for issue 4, for example: it’s the first time we’ve used illustrations and we were very pleased with the results. Check out the “making of” videos for both the Steven Gerrard and Kalidou Koulibaly covers – Louise Cobbold’s and Dan Evans’ approaches to creating them were fascinating stories in themselves.
The year is certainly ending on a high for Gerrard, with Rangers racing clear at the top of the Scottish Premiership. All the more reason to revisit Graham Hunter’s revealing interview – and finely crafted article – covering the former Liverpool man’s first steps in coaching and how he’s adapting to life on the touchline.
Speaking of Liverpool, it was great to team up with Reds fan Jacqui McAssey to talk about her Girl Fans photography project, which shines a light on female supporters. The pictures are brilliant and it was fascinating to learn about the inspiration and ideas behind her drive to give female fans a voice.
Two of our female Champions Journalist fan reporters featured prominently in issues three and four. Each season we run a competition asking supporters to write about their clubs; Atiya, a Chelsea-supporting Londoner, and Atlético fan Carla Fernández Ariño in Madrid, both wrote engagingly about their teams. Carla welcomed my colleague Dan Poole to her city to experience a matchday Atleti style, while Atiya’s heartfelt Lockdown Diary explained exactly what football meant to her just as the pandemic brought the game to a halt.
When the Champions League did return there was no stopping Bayern München. Our art director Oliver Meikle captured the campaign in his photo essay in issue 5, while Simon Hart's analysis of Hansi Flick’s approach to coaching in the same edition provides a brilliant insight into the importance of the human touch in dealing with the modern superstar.
At the other end of the psychological spectrum there was the trauma meted out on Barcelona by Bayern in the quarter-finals, followed by the turmoil surrounding Lionel Messi’s request to leave the club. In the eye of the storm, it was nice to take a step back and just recall the player at his absolute best. Peak Messi, in fact. That’s how Chris Burke describes his headed goal in the 2009 final, with his wonderful prose supported by Osvaldo Casanova’s beautiful illustration. Here’s an extract:
“Leaning away as he hangs majestically in the air, the Barça No10 finds the right contortion to head back across Van der Sar, whose jaw drops as the ball sails above. And by the time it finds the far corner, Messi has crumpled to the earth, his boot popping off to be held as a temporary trophy on a jubilant run to the corner flag … It was a goal so unMessi-like that it arguably looms above the rest as peak Messi. Proof that the man who can do everything can actually do everything.” Love it.
On a personal note, it was an absolute privilege to speak to former Hibs captain Pat Stanton. It had originally been suggested that he would be keen to contribute to My Greatest European Night, our back-page feature in each issue. But it soon became clear, as he recalled watching Hibs in the first season of the European Cup in 1955/56, that he would need much more space than that. His memories of watching as a ten-year-old alongside his dad in the stands on glorious floodlit nights at Easter Road were wonderfully evocative of a bygone era.
Another highlight was getting to meet Jürgen Klinsmann, albeit via Zoom. The Champions League was one of the few trophies he never won, but it was great to hear him talk about his run to the semi-finals with Monaco in 1993/94, as well as the story behind his tongue-in-cheek dive celebration with Spurs. His shrill laugh and sense of humour are infectious.
Readers will have also noticed our decision to bring a temporary halt to our gallery series on the great Champions League grounds. The San Siro, Mestalla and Estadio San Paolo – now Stadio Diego Armando Maradona – featured in the first three issues, but with fans unable to attend games, the focus on empty stadiums suddenly felt misplaced. Our gallery in issue 4 instead put the spotlight on supporters, reflecting our hope that they will again be filling those glorious grounds to the rafters before too long.
Happy New Year. See you in 2021.
We’d love to hear what you have enjoyed most about Champions Journal this year – and what you’d like to see more of. Let us know at info@champions-journal.com
Producing a magazine during lockdown has had its challenges. But it’s been a positive, if at times fraught, experience. We’ve certainly had to adapt. Photo shoots were cancelled and interviews were conducted online, but we found a way. In some instances the problems even opened up interesting opportunities.
Take our covers for issue 4, for example: it’s the first time we’ve used illustrations and we were very pleased with the results. Check out the “making of” videos for both the Steven Gerrard and Kalidou Koulibaly covers – Louise Cobbold’s and Dan Evans’ approaches to creating them were fascinating stories in themselves.
The year is certainly ending on a high for Gerrard, with Rangers racing clear at the top of the Scottish Premiership. All the more reason to revisit Graham Hunter’s revealing interview – and finely crafted article – covering the former Liverpool man’s first steps in coaching and how he’s adapting to life on the touchline.
Speaking of Liverpool, it was great to team up with Reds fan Jacqui McAssey to talk about her Girl Fans photography project, which shines a light on female supporters. The pictures are brilliant and it was fascinating to learn about the inspiration and ideas behind her drive to give female fans a voice.
Two of our female Champions Journalist fan reporters featured prominently in issues three and four. Each season we run a competition asking supporters to write about their clubs; Atiya, a Chelsea-supporting Londoner, and Atlético fan Carla Fernández Ariño in Madrid, both wrote engagingly about their teams. Carla welcomed my colleague Dan Poole to her city to experience a matchday Atleti style, while Atiya’s heartfelt Lockdown Diary explained exactly what football meant to her just as the pandemic brought the game to a halt.
When the Champions League did return there was no stopping Bayern München. Our art director Oliver Meikle captured the campaign in his photo essay in issue 5, while Simon Hart's analysis of Hansi Flick’s approach to coaching in the same edition provides a brilliant insight into the importance of the human touch in dealing with the modern superstar.
At the other end of the psychological spectrum there was the trauma meted out on Barcelona by Bayern in the quarter-finals, followed by the turmoil surrounding Lionel Messi’s request to leave the club. In the eye of the storm, it was nice to take a step back and just recall the player at his absolute best. Peak Messi, in fact. That’s how Chris Burke describes his headed goal in the 2009 final, with his wonderful prose supported by Osvaldo Casanova’s beautiful illustration. Here’s an extract:
“Leaning away as he hangs majestically in the air, the Barça No10 finds the right contortion to head back across Van der Sar, whose jaw drops as the ball sails above. And by the time it finds the far corner, Messi has crumpled to the earth, his boot popping off to be held as a temporary trophy on a jubilant run to the corner flag … It was a goal so unMessi-like that it arguably looms above the rest as peak Messi. Proof that the man who can do everything can actually do everything.” Love it.
On a personal note, it was an absolute privilege to speak to former Hibs captain Pat Stanton. It had originally been suggested that he would be keen to contribute to My Greatest European Night, our back-page feature in each issue. But it soon became clear, as he recalled watching Hibs in the first season of the European Cup in 1955/56, that he would need much more space than that. His memories of watching as a ten-year-old alongside his dad in the stands on glorious floodlit nights at Easter Road were wonderfully evocative of a bygone era.
Another highlight was getting to meet Jürgen Klinsmann, albeit via Zoom. The Champions League was one of the few trophies he never won, but it was great to hear him talk about his run to the semi-finals with Monaco in 1993/94, as well as the story behind his tongue-in-cheek dive celebration with Spurs. His shrill laugh and sense of humour are infectious.
Readers will have also noticed our decision to bring a temporary halt to our gallery series on the great Champions League grounds. The San Siro, Mestalla and Estadio San Paolo – now Stadio Diego Armando Maradona – featured in the first three issues, but with fans unable to attend games, the focus on empty stadiums suddenly felt misplaced. Our gallery in issue 4 instead put the spotlight on supporters, reflecting our hope that they will again be filling those glorious grounds to the rafters before too long.
Happy New Year. See you in 2021.
We’d love to hear what you have enjoyed most about Champions Journal this year – and what you’d like to see more of. Let us know at info@champions-journal.com
Producing a magazine during lockdown has had its challenges. But it’s been a positive, if at times fraught, experience. We’ve certainly had to adapt. Photo shoots were cancelled and interviews were conducted online, but we found a way. In some instances the problems even opened up interesting opportunities.
Take our covers for issue 4, for example: it’s the first time we’ve used illustrations and we were very pleased with the results. Check out the “making of” videos for both the Steven Gerrard and Kalidou Koulibaly covers – Louise Cobbold’s and Dan Evans’ approaches to creating them were fascinating stories in themselves.
The year is certainly ending on a high for Gerrard, with Rangers racing clear at the top of the Scottish Premiership. All the more reason to revisit Graham Hunter’s revealing interview – and finely crafted article – covering the former Liverpool man’s first steps in coaching and how he’s adapting to life on the touchline.
Speaking of Liverpool, it was great to team up with Reds fan Jacqui McAssey to talk about her Girl Fans photography project, which shines a light on female supporters. The pictures are brilliant and it was fascinating to learn about the inspiration and ideas behind her drive to give female fans a voice.
Two of our female Champions Journalist fan reporters featured prominently in issues three and four. Each season we run a competition asking supporters to write about their clubs; Atiya, a Chelsea-supporting Londoner, and Atlético fan Carla Fernández Ariño in Madrid, both wrote engagingly about their teams. Carla welcomed my colleague Dan Poole to her city to experience a matchday Atleti style, while Atiya’s heartfelt Lockdown Diary explained exactly what football meant to her just as the pandemic brought the game to a halt.
When the Champions League did return there was no stopping Bayern München. Our art director Oliver Meikle captured the campaign in his photo essay in issue 5, while Simon Hart's analysis of Hansi Flick’s approach to coaching in the same edition provides a brilliant insight into the importance of the human touch in dealing with the modern superstar.
At the other end of the psychological spectrum there was the trauma meted out on Barcelona by Bayern in the quarter-finals, followed by the turmoil surrounding Lionel Messi’s request to leave the club. In the eye of the storm, it was nice to take a step back and just recall the player at his absolute best. Peak Messi, in fact. That’s how Chris Burke describes his headed goal in the 2009 final, with his wonderful prose supported by Osvaldo Casanova’s beautiful illustration. Here’s an extract:
“Leaning away as he hangs majestically in the air, the Barça No10 finds the right contortion to head back across Van der Sar, whose jaw drops as the ball sails above. And by the time it finds the far corner, Messi has crumpled to the earth, his boot popping off to be held as a temporary trophy on a jubilant run to the corner flag … It was a goal so unMessi-like that it arguably looms above the rest as peak Messi. Proof that the man who can do everything can actually do everything.” Love it.
On a personal note, it was an absolute privilege to speak to former Hibs captain Pat Stanton. It had originally been suggested that he would be keen to contribute to My Greatest European Night, our back-page feature in each issue. But it soon became clear, as he recalled watching Hibs in the first season of the European Cup in 1955/56, that he would need much more space than that. His memories of watching as a ten-year-old alongside his dad in the stands on glorious floodlit nights at Easter Road were wonderfully evocative of a bygone era.
Another highlight was getting to meet Jürgen Klinsmann, albeit via Zoom. The Champions League was one of the few trophies he never won, but it was great to hear him talk about his run to the semi-finals with Monaco in 1993/94, as well as the story behind his tongue-in-cheek dive celebration with Spurs. His shrill laugh and sense of humour are infectious.
Readers will have also noticed our decision to bring a temporary halt to our gallery series on the great Champions League grounds. The San Siro, Mestalla and Estadio San Paolo – now Stadio Diego Armando Maradona – featured in the first three issues, but with fans unable to attend games, the focus on empty stadiums suddenly felt misplaced. Our gallery in issue 4 instead put the spotlight on supporters, reflecting our hope that they will again be filling those glorious grounds to the rafters before too long.
Happy New Year. See you in 2021.
We’d love to hear what you have enjoyed most about Champions Journal this year – and what you’d like to see more of. Let us know at info@champions-journal.com
