Hi there,
I hope you enjoyed the class today.
Today’s homework:
Composition!!!! 
Write a reference letter. See page 64 (coursebook). Follow the guidelines and use exercise 5 as the task. There’s a model answer on page 191 (just in case you decide not to read the other exercises).
Enjoy your weekend!
Rick
Here’s the text we analysed today:
Why England should host the 2018 World Cup – and why they shouldn’t
Brazil and Italy transported their Emirates audience – which is more than can be said for the trains
If any Fifa dignitaries happened to drop in on London this week for a fix of international football at its finest delivered by Brazil and Italy, they would have flown back to Switzerland with some very strong opinions about England’s bid to host the World Cup in 2018.
Here, crystallised in one evening’s entertainment, were all the persuasive reasons why England should – and also arguably why they should not – put on the greatest show on earth.
So here is the pro: "What a stadium!" yelled the man from Gazzetta dello Sport. "We have nothing like this in Italy. We have to learn how to do this." Well said. The facilities at English stadiums are top-class, with off-stage organisation to match. The visiting fans – once they had snapped photographs with the mounted police, sipped a pre-match drink at the Drayton Arms and whacked their drums on Hornsey Road – were able to navigate the stadium and its facilities with comfort and ease.
And here is the con: "Ohmigod," lamented the man from Gazzetta. "The metro." He was aghast by his inability to get on to even one of the sardine specials to make his way by tube to the stadium. A PA announcement five minutes from the end of the game then announced that Arsenal station was closed. Another one a couple of minutes later said: "Er, sorry about that, actually Holloway Road is closed." Good luck to all the overseas visitors unfamiliar with the state of our public transport system.
Compared to the immaculately organised shuttling of fans at the last two World Cups, in Germany 2006 and South Korea/Japan in 2002, this is one area where England looks pretty shambolic.
But if there was one factor that should have made an impression on Fifa – wherever it chooses to host its tournament – it was the atmosphere. Inside the Emirates Stadium it was a throwback – infinitely better and considerably more boisterous, than any World Cup finals game since Italia 90 because of the liberating absence of corporate guests.
Didier Deschamps, at the time the France captain, famously spoke out about the suits he despised inside the stadiums in the build-up to the World Cup final in 1998, and it has got worse ever since. Come on Fifa. It’s enough, now. Official sponsors are welcome to their pitchside hoardings and half-time adverts, which will rake in plenty of revenue, but we’ll have the tickets back for the fans, thanks very much. Believe it or not, your product will be even more marketable if it looks and sounds half as wonderful as the Emirates Stadium did on Tuesday night.
The response from the players was a memorable match high on skill and competitive edge. While Robinho and Elano captured the headlines with sparkling goals, Ronaldinho seemed to glean particular pleasure from his night’s work. The Italians, though, were not so impressed. They thought he was trying too hard to upstage opponents he works with and against in Serie A, to make people look foolish. They thought he was showing off and grudgingly gave him a mark of only six out of 10. Only Adriano scored worse.
To less partial judges, Ronaldinho’s repertoire of tricks rolled back the years. He looked revitalised, sharp, more agile. Mind you, that’s the benefit of playing alongside the portly Adriano. With the current world champions beaten, Kaka and Diego to come back into the side, and Dani Alves deemed worthy of only a 20-minute cameo appearance, Brazil are warming up nicely for the next World Cup.
Even though it’s old and deals with football, it still gives us an insight on how our country is viewed abroad.
The Brazil striker will play in the World Club Championship despite being jailed for manslaughter.
When Manchester United play Vasco da Gama in what is likely to be the decisive game of their World Club Championship group, it will offer a rare chance to see one of the world’s most talented footballers on an international stage.
Whereas most Brazilian players in their prime leave their homeland for richer pastures in Italy, Spain, even Middlesbrough, Edmundo has essentially ruled himself out of playing anywhere but with the Rio de Janeiro club.
It used to be the fights – with coaches, referees, team-mates and opponents – that put off prospective employers. Then it was his inability to make friends, which ended an unhappy 18 months with Fiorentina in Italy. Now he has a more serious logistical difficulty: a 4-year prison sentence for killing three people in a 1995 car crash.
Edmundo, aged 28, spent one day earlier this month behind bars when the appeal against his conviction for manslaughter failed. Brazilians were shocked as it was a rare example of justice being done. In Brazil, the rich and famous tend to get off scot-free. But less than 24 hours after Edmundo entered Rio’s Polinter jail it was business as usual: the striker was let out pending a second appeal.
But if – as now seems possible – the appeal is again quashed, Edmundo will be sent back to prison to serve time in a "semi-open" regime, which means being let out during the day but having to sleep in the prison at night. He would need special permission for away matches or evening games.
The episode was the latest in a tormented history for the player considered by many to be Brazil’s most innately gifted footballer. In 1997 he broke the Brazilian championship scoring record with 29 goals, but received seven red cards in the same year. His temper earned him the nickname Animal.
"He is an immense talent," says Mario Zagallo, the former Brazil coach. "He does not just hang about the box. He can push forward, he’s intelligent and knows how to score. If I was still national coach then I have no doubt I would choose him."
Zagallo chose Edmundo for the World Cup in France, although team-mates said he constantly poisoned the atmosphere by complaining about not being in the starting 11.
He has not been picked for Brazil since Wanderley Luxemburgo took over as coach a year ago. The two men had frequent bust-ups when they were both at the Sao Paulo club Palmeiras in the early 1990s. On one occasion the striker was expelled and the coach relented only when he apologised to team-mates. Palmeiras went on to win two successive championships.
In 1995, Edmundo kicked a TV cameraman after missing a penalty kick and losing a first-round Copa Libertadores match in Ecuador. He was detained for three days in Guayaquil, and the Brazilian foreign ministry stepped in to avert a diplomatic incident.
In December of the same year, Edmundo was driving at night through a middle-class Rio suburb when his pick-up truck collided with a car and flipped over. The car smashed into a pole, killing three passengers. The truck’s airbag saved Edmundo, who received 10 stitches in his forehead. Four witnesses testified that Edmundo was going at least 60mph in a 40mph zone. Witnesses at the nightclub where Edmundo had been prior to the accident said he had consumed a large amount of alcohol, although Edmundo claimed he had only two glasses of beer. He was convicted of manslaughter in March this year.
Vasco are currently second in the Brazilian league and last month Edmundo tried to show he had mellowed by inviting press to a party for his one-year-old son, Edmundo Junior. He hired a circus for the day and, to please photographers, the Animal gave a chimpanzee a glass of beer. It caused an outcry and the governmental environmental agency to threaten to fine him.
"I’ve done a lot of stupid things," he said apologetically. "But I’m trying to get better. I look at my wife and my son and I want a better world for them and everyone else."
source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/1999/oct/30/newsstory.sport
Hello there,
I hope you had fun today and I do hope you can still remember the idioms and expressions we saw in class. It’s always a nice idea to put them to use, so feel free to write comments using them in sentences, ok?
Don’t forget to pay a visit to the wiki to check on gradable vs. ungradable adjectives.
Homework
- Coursebook: page 55
- Exam maximiser: pages 40 – 43 – don’t forget to start from exercise 3 for pages 42/43.
- Dictionary work: look up idioms and phrasal verbs with call, speak, say, tell, and talk. Perhaps you could post them as comments here as well, what do you think?
Enjoy your carnival!!!
Cheers,
Rick
Dear students,
I hope you enjoyed the lesson today even though we haven’t produced that much. I believe that after this first lesson you can start to find your way around the exam and get down to business on your own as well. Anyway, if you’re interested in learning a bit more about the exam, I suggest you pay a visit to:
This is the official website. You’ll find loads of information there.
Other useful websites we have discussed today were:
I hope you start making use of them as soon as possible.
Homework:
- Coursebook: page 55 & 56 – exercises 1 and 3.
See you guys next Friday!
Have a great weekend!!
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