The beautiful (and highly social) game

by Sophie

Now that the whole nation is well and truly immersed in World Cup fever, I thought it might be interesting to take a look at how we’re keeping ourselves up to speed with the latest updates and news.   It’s been two years since the latest major football tournament (Euro 2008) and oh how the media landscape has changed in this time.  More traditional forms of communications have paved the way for apps, videos, fan pages, Twitter feeds.  So for all of you that haven’t already dumped England off at the first hurdle, here we take a look at three of the best ways to follow the beautiful game:

1. On the 1 June, the FA launched their biggest campaign to date in an effort combine the public’s enthusiasm for football with actual participation.  This has included a Facebook app where users can create their own Official England Shirt and then post it as their profile picture.  You’ll have to move fast to get the number you want though. 24 has been taken by Stuart Pearce, 25 by Ray Winstone, 30 by Stephen Fry and 67 by Nick Clegg.  Other numbers include 66 by the Bobby Moore foundation, 2012 by The Olympics and 2018 by Back the Bid

2.Twitter has launched their official World Cup Tracking page.  Twitter staff select the most interesting tweets using the hashtag tool and algorithms.  You can also view the latest country updates by clicking on the flag of choice.

3.Video had to feature in this list – so here you go!  If you’ve missed any of the action or fancy a cheeky lunchtime watch of any of the games go to Footytube.  It’s not completely new for the World Cup – you can watch league teams (even smaller ones) in action – but they have a dedicated World Cup page so that you can make sure that you’ve always got some good footy knowledge to share down the pub at the end of the day.

So, great news for us – these are just three of the many ways we can stay up to date with all the action via social media.  Check out Mashable’s Social media hub here. 

 

 

Not so great news for our players where the teams from Spain, Brazil, Mexico, Holland, Germany, Argentina and England are forbidden to use any social media tools including sites like Twitter! Shame, would have been interested to see what Green would have tweeted after Saturday’s match.