A week is a long time in sport

Having promised to Blog and Twitter my way through the Play the Game conference last week, I failed dismally. If you would like to find out what went on during the conference, check out the on-demand coverage: http://www.playthegame.org/conferences/play-the-game-2009/on-demand-streaming.html My own personal favourite session was that which addressed the issue of match fixing. While I was holed-up in the conference, the world record transfer fee for a football player has been broken twice and a major sport broadcaster has been brought to the brink of bankruptcy. So, a week of blogging lost, but plenty to talk about; so, drawing inspiration from the week's events and the Play the Game conference, here is a series of questions to consider:

• To what extent is it justifiable (economically, socially and morally) to spend £80 million to 'purchase' the services of one person, and does the acquisition of Cristiano Ronaldo by Real Madrid tell us anything about the value we place on sport?
• Is match-fixing in sport really taking place to any great extent and, if it is as serious as some suspect, exactly what is the 'threat-level' that it poses?
• Are on-line gambling companies to blame for the presumed growth in fixing; alternatively stated, are they part of the problem when they need to be part of the solution?
• Is European football now polarising to such an extent that we are rapidly heading for a two-track game - the 'haves' and the 'have nots' - which will seriously undermine competitive balance thereby destroying the sport's fundamental appeal?
• Just exactly how many athletes/competitors in sport take performance-enhancing drugs that often go undetected, and is it our fault or theirs that the case for taking drugs often seems so seductive to them?
• Has the relationship between sport and television become too close, and is there a need for the dependency of sport on revenues derived from TV to be reappraised?
• Are sporting mega-events worth the money, or should the money spent on them be allocated to the funding of other forms of sport?
• Do we need to think more about the role that animals play in sport, when there thousands and thousands of animals being discarded each year in the name of sporting success?