Chelsea Youth Academy Part 1: Josh McEachran

This is part one in a series of articles on the successes and failings of Chelsea Youth Academy. The series will analyse players and eventually be concluded in an in depth look at what is happening in Chelsea Youth Academy at the minute.

Josh McEachran Is an 18 year old football player contracted to Chelsea Football Club. In my opinion he is Chelsea’s best youth player and has recently cemented his place as a back-up player for the first team. When speaking to a Chelsea fan about Josh he was unsure as to why he had not been sent on loan this season, yet to Andre Villas-Boas keeping him at Chelsea is paramount to his plans for Premier Division Glory. The Former Porto managed has praised McEachran on several occasions stating his belief that the youngster has ‘So much talent.’

McEachran looks set to flourish at Chelsea. He has already featured in 19 first team games, starting in five of them. He has not yet scored for them but has got two goals for England’s youth teams. He was originally scouted by Chelsea playing for his local side, Garden City F.C. in the Oxford Mail Boys League. As well as adding to his capa, Both for Chelsea and England, He has plenty of silverware. The 18 year old has already won Chelsea’s Young Player of the Year 2011 and Oxford Sportsman of the Year.

Under former Chelsea manager Guus Hiddink he was played as a defensive midfielder but more recently he has filled a more attacking roll. This has led many to believe he is the long term replacement for Chelsea Legend Frank Lampard. They have had a very similar experience internationally, both playing for England’s youth teams, McEachran gaining 27 appearances and Lampard gaining 16.Lampard however is 33 and many are calling for his international retirement to make way for younger players such as McEachran.  The Chelsea number 8’s appearances for Chelsea are starting to look tiresome and he may be starting to lose those qualities which have cemented him in Chelsea’s history books.

It would be highly optimistic to claim McEachran will score anywhere near the amount of goals Lampard has in his glittering career but he does have many of the qualities required to equal his influence from midfield. What impresses me most about the Chelsea Youngster is his close control of the ball which is very reminiscent of Zidane’s. The Frenchman has always been listed amongst McEachran’s heroes but it is his similarity to Zidane that really matters when it comes down to 90 minutes.

McEachran is ready to come out of his shell this season under the Villas-Boas regime. Lampard may be on his way out and Chelsea need a new star player and they do not need to look further than the Chelsea number 20. Chelsea fans keep your eyes open and prepare for Josh McEachran Coming to a pitch near you!

Media Law Blog - Contempt of Court Act

The Contempt of Court Act is essential to modern legal case conduct. It aims to prevent public and media influence over the outcome of a case. This validity of this act was thrown into confusion this past December due to the coverage of the press on the Joanna Yeates case. Joanna Yeates was reported missing on the 19^th December 2010. Somerset and Avon Police immediately began a search for her, an operation which used 80 detectives and civil servants. On the 25^th December Joanna Yeates’ body was found and the investigation into her death began. After the Post-Mortem confirmed she was killed by ‘strangulation’ police began compiling a list of suspects. On the 30^th December  2010 Christopher Jefferies was taken into police custody for questioning and released on bail on the 31^st December. The Media immediately turned there coverage to focus on Christopher Jefferies and became the centre of a controversial media campaign. The media started to paint a less than favourable picture of Mr Jefferies, making him out to be a very strange man with a love for niche films and unruly white hair. Rhys Mardon, one of Christopher’s representatives stated ‘His name has been blackened, and his privacy invaded.’ Dominic Grieve, the Attorney General for England and Wales stated he was planning to take action under The Contempt of Court Act so the media would stop there tirade against the 65 year old landlord. The police however were wary of punishing the media as there main appeal for evidence had been through the same media streams they sought to restrict. The media’s coverage made it hard for the police to clear Jefferies name and so Jefferies laid low for weeks. During this time the police managed to find a breakthrough due to new evidence being presented. On the 20^th January, 32 year old Vincent Tabak was arreseted and on the 22^nd January he was charged with the murder of Joanna Yeates. The main controversy over media coverage was how quickly the media attacked Christopher Jefferies even though he had not been charged. This clearly affected the case as it swayed public opinion and police action. The Contempt of Court Act has always been about limiting public and media influence over a case, especially concerning trials and the Jury. Dominic Grieve clearly predicted this media uprising and yet seemed to have limited power to prevent this. Kelvin MacKenzie stated “If it (The Contempt of Court Act) wasn’t inconsequential before, the online world makes it ridiculous now.” His comments follow his record fine he was issued in 1994 for publishing a photo and collapsing a murder case. This has questioned the power of the Contempt of Court Act with many media sources pushing there publications to the limits of the law. Many have started to view the media’s attitude as ‘act now, think later,’ with company lawyers left to clean up behind.  The Joanna Yeates case could therefore be revolutionary to the future of the media and The Contempt of Court Act.

Marconi and the birth of Radio News in the UK and USA

Heinrich Hertz was a leading pioneer in the invention of Radio. Hertz had laid the foundations for the groundbreaking work which Marconi would go on to do. Unfortunately, Hertz died 1894 before he could finish his work resulting in his research being published. Marconi was driven by this and so was given permission to study the works of Marconi. Marconi, still only nineteen, began his research and made great progress where others had failed. Many had tried to create a radio telegraph system before Marconi but with these past efforts, he was able to combine them and in 1896 he had a working model. However this was still not a viable commercially as Marconi had not yet given it a long enough range. Marconi however slowly increased the range of his apparatus and in 1899 he sent a transmission 75.9514 miles from a ship, the SS St Paul, to the English coast. This then further increased to 2200 miles as Marconi transmitted a message from Wexford to Canada. Marconi immediately set about establishing a commercial radio telegraph system. In 1904 a system was then set up to send news to ships. This was done at night as Marconi discovered that radio waves travelled further at night. Although Marconi had previously reported on other subject, this was the first official commercial news broadcast. Even this broadcast had its problems however due to variance in signal strength.  The most memorable moment Marconi’s radio has seen is probably his participation in the Titanic disaster. Marconi had set up a communication radio on most ships and so when the Titanic crashed, the crew were able to put out an emergency broadcast. The Titanic crashed into an iceberg and so sent out a distress call on one of Marconi’s systems. The Carpathia received this via a weaker Marconi system. Marconi states in his testimony that the Carpathia radio system was able to transmit “200 miles but on very rare occasions” and the Titanic could transmit “Almost every night 1000 miles”.  The fact is this; without Marconi’s devices there would have been more deaths and more injuries. Marconi’s device helped get an immediate response for the distress call issued by the Titanic, saving many lives. Moving back to the news side of this blog, the first USA news broadcast was transmitted on the 31^st August 1920. This was done from Detroit Michigan by a station named 8MK. To clarify what I mean by news broadcast, I mean a program devoted totally to news. In 1922 news programs had spread and had become a regular fixture on public radio. Many of the public had access to these programs due to the wide spread availability of crystal sets. These were the most common set and the easiest to get. Some people even constructed their own. This was encourages by the USA government. As such news was available regularly on a new media without daily cost. Newspapers were still crucial to the communication of news but radio had created a new revolutionary way to communicate it.

All Marconi quotes from his testimony taken from : http://www.titanicinquiry.org/USInq/AmInq01Marconi02.php

Machiavelli : Corrupt or Realist

In our latest HCJ lecture we examined Machiavelli and further to that, we discussed him in our seminar this past week. He was a Florentine polotician. MAchiavelli enters the forentine political system shortly after the Medici family had been exiled in 1494. However in August 1512, the Medici along with Pope Julius II ended the Republican goverment and took charge of Florence again. This assault on the political system by the Medici resulted in Machiavelli being relieved of all his positions. Machiavelli was also blamed for a conspiracy to remove the Medici and was jailed until release after the amnesty of the Medici. This was to recognise the promotion of Cardinal Giovanni de Medici to the seat of St Peter.

The main subject matter I will focus on is why did Machiavelli write The Prince. It is my belief that he wrote it not for flattery of a corrupt goverment but as a CV. In the new goverment, Niccolo could only get a job by pointing out his knowledge of past and future politics. He states in a letter to Francesco Vettori on the 10th December 1513 that he simply wishes 'that these Medici princes should begin to engage my services'. This would imply his book is made simply for monetary return and not for the false appreciation of a tyrant.

Machiavelli is often misconceived as being corrupt. His blunt form of political philosophy can often be interpreted as a form of instruction booklet. He claims in The Prince that 'it is better to be feared than loved for love is fickle and fear is eternal'. This mentality has led many to believe Niccolo to have traded his moras for a right hand job with the Medicis.

His book states somewhat vulgar instructions to gain power in whatever way nessecary and to maintain power through corruption and injust power. To keep the public in fear, Niccolo suggests the murder of rebe politicians or conquests which are false and so clouded by religious quests and rebellion quelling. He even encourages getting involved in other fights, irrelevant to the realm of the ruler. This is the sort of talk which has turned readers of The Prince to Condemn Machiavelli.

It seems to me that Machiavelli is seen to be a realist. He simply states that which has come before. Machiavelli takes examples from famous tyrants such as Caeser, Nero and even past Medici rulers. Machiavelli is not corrupt in my mind, he is simply factual, as the saying goes 'the truth hurts'! If this book was an article in a paper, Machiavelli would seem to be acting in the public interest and simply uncover scandal. Machaivelli achieves this, he simply litters his writing with sarcastic criticism on the current Medici rule. He wants to get a job for this knowledge but also to get some form of revenge on the Medici family even if unknown to them through hidden satiristic patterns.

To summarise, as I have rambled on for a long time now, Machiavelli is simply a realist. He is a journalist in a way, reporting fact and revealing the inner corruption of the Medici rulers. He is far from corrupt as he is working in public intrest if we examine him in a modern legal light.

My next post will be about the Miscarriage of Justice conference including an interview with Steve Gray, one of UAI's leading pioneers.

An Overview : The History and Context of Journalism

The first lecture I have attended this year was focused around the 14th to 18th century. This period of time could well be the most important time for the progression of human intelligence and what we believe to be true. During this period of time two era's are set in action; The Renaissance and The Age of Enlightenment. These brought a revolutionary way of thought in defining what is fact and what is belief and where we can draw a line in between.

The french philosopher Rene Descartes opened this debate with his saying; 'Cogito ergo sum'. For those who are less classical minded than myself you may also know this as 'I think , therefore I am'. This was his way of proving the existence of God. This may have been a very early idea but it would lay the foundations for many future philosophers. The idea raised here gave freedom to every man, woman and child.

The reason this new age of thought had been set in motion was because of The Renaissance period. As Chris Horrie put it; 'Imagine someone one day out and found a lot of papers in a case that had been forgotten'. This summarises The Renaissance. The Middle Ages had left many classical ideas behind and slowly they were forgotten. This left a large gap in our knowledge of Greek Civilisation. However, when this 'case' was found again, we learnt many things we had not known before. We learnt about Architecture, Life but arguably the most important discovery was the ravings of ancient philosophers. Aristotle was, arguably , the most important of these. He was held in such great esteem that Cicero called his works ' A river of Gold'. He mainly focused on what he called science but even this raised doubt over fact. For instance, Aristotle was the first man to include a fifth element in his list of matter. This was known as Aether which he claimed was the creator of heavenly bodies. Other Classical writers had not included this in their analysis of the world we live in so this prompted a question. What is fact and what makes it so?

Sir Issac Newton was revolutionary in the attempt to answer this question. His science was something had not been seen before . He refers to an invisible substance known as gravity. This is the force that causes things to fall form trees such as apples. However, how can we decide whether this is the true reason for the apple falling. Many originally considered Newton's theories to be ridiculous and yet it has developed into what we would today classify as Science, in particular physics. This could easily be a belief. Science claims to have proved the Big Bang to have caused the creation of the universe. Other's believe God sprung the world into existence over 7 days. There is no way of determining which one is fact. Descartes' theory would mean to each separate group of believer that their beliefs were true.  Each has, which in literary terms would be called, a framing device. One a set of numbers claiming we can see radiation and the Bible claiming reports of God's actions and how he orchestrated them.

I could go on for hours, and to be honest, I quite want to. However, I'm off to read McNae's Essential Law for Journalists. To draw this to a close, the lecture taught us about a new way of thinking. More importantly it taught us about the nature of fact. Micheal Parkinson recently won a year long legal battle against the Daily Mail for their claims about his Uncle. Fact is essential to a journalist and what was believed to be Fact by the Daily Mail was in fact not. A journalist (like myself) must be sure that what he writes is the truth. If we were not abide by this fundamental principle then the news would simply be rumour. I hope I can learn from these Scholars and events such as the one I have just referenced to improve my chances to become a great journalist!