Team GB vs Uruguay

 This time tomorrow, Cardiff’s city centre will be bouncing with fans from all over Britain and the occasional one or two from distant Uruguay. They will be making their way to the iconic Millennium Stadium to watch the final group stage match between Team GB and Uruguay in the men’s Olympic football competition. It will be a tense and an emotional evening for the British fans; a win or a draw will see Team GB through to the quarter finals on Saturday but Stuart Pearce, the manager of the British national team regards the game as 'an instant knockout'.

Team GB Coach Stuart Pearce

The Millennium Stadium started its Olympic voyage by hosting the female British football team against the New Zealand ladies with a 1-0 victory for Team GB on the 25th of this month. It went on to again host the women’s British team on the 28th against Cameroon. The first men’s event to be held at the stadium was Brazil against Egypt on the 26th of July with Brazil narrowly beating the Egyptians by 3 - 2. The atmosphere in Cardiff was fantastic and the reviews from all the fans, British and international were top notch.


Cardiff's Millennium Stadium



Ryan Giggs Scores against UAE

Next up are Ryan Giggs and the rest of the men’s Team GB football team. The first game of the day will be Mexico vs. Switzerland due to kick off at 17:00 followed by the main event Team GB vs. Uruguay at 19:45. It promises to be an emotional evening at the Millennium Stadium for all Team GB but especially for the Welsh members-the former Wales captain Ryan Giggs, Craig Bellamy, Joe Allen, Neil Taylor of Swansea and the boy from Caerphilly who now plays his football at Arsenal FC, Aaron Ramsey.
Coming back to Cardiff is very special for Craig Bellamy, the Cardiff born footballer who now plays his football in Liverpool. Originally from Splott in Cardiff Bellamy had this to say on Monday. 'I had a great time in Manchester, loved living there and London was just immense. But to me Cardiff is just a fitting place to play our last group game but hopefully it won’t be our last game'.

Bellamy, along with his Welsh colleagues at the games, have come under constant criticism from the Olympic authorities for not taking part in the singing of the anthem 'God Save The Queen' before each game. Ryan Giggs has come out and said there is no issue over the singing of the anthem and that it makes no difference whether or not the Welsh players sing the anthem at the games. Let’s just hope the Welsh fans will respect the anthem and there will be no booing around the 75,000 seated stadium.
The atmosphere in Cardiff should be great, let’s hope it’s a friendly and an exciting one with a British victory at the end of it. Here is a list of games that Cardiff's Millennium Stadium still has to offer.

3 August 2012 17:00 2E v 2F (w)
4 August 2012 19:30 1A v 2B (m)
10 August 2012 19:45 Bronze Medal Final (m)

COME ON TEAM GB!

An Interview with Ben Donovan - Swansea City AFC

Ben Donovan, the editor of the 'Jack Magazine' and the press officer for Wales' first Premier League football club, Swansea City FC, took some time out of his busy lifestyle to share with us how he landed his dream job.



Ben Donovan

How to 'Market' your Blog

Now that your blog is up and running, you can start to concentrate on marketing your blog. There are many blogs on the internet from people all over the world and we are all competing for the best advertising space on the internet. So today I will be helping you and giving advice on how to raise the awareness of your blog to the world.


There are many ways to market your blog, for example: via search engines, alt text, telling your friends face to face, telling your contacts via social networking sites, and distributing flyers.

Search Engines

It is very important that blog readers find it easy to access your blog via Google or other various search engines such as Bing and Yahoo. Google is the most important search engine and accounts for 50% of visits to websites, Bing and Yahoo accounting for less than 2% each. What actually happens is when a user types what it's looking for into Google, Google searches all blogs looking for the key words used by the searcher. You must ensure therefore that the name of your blog contains the keywords searchers are more likely to use.

Alt text

Alt text is the explanation you receive when you float the cursor over an image. Alt text allows the search engine to know what the image contains. The search engine cannot read the image therefore without alt text the search engine won't use the image to direct searches to your site. The advantages to using alt text are that you can entice traffic from Google images and also blind people can view your site when they are using a screen reader. The only disadvantage is that if you use blogger, it does not provide an easy way to use alt text with your images.

Social Media Optimising

I assume most blog readers have a Facebook or a Twitter page. If not, get one because on average, 8% of traffic to websites comes from social networking sites. Adding features and buttons to your blog such as Twitter, Facebook or Google+ will be benificial. Even better will be the addition of gadgets which allow your reader to share your blog content with their own friends and followers. Have you heard of sharing sites such as Delicious, Dig and StumbleUpon? Your blog would reach other users if the content was shared on sites such as these. A word of warning, beware of spamming on these sites.

Other ways to market your blog

There are many ways to market and advertise your blog. A simple email to all your friends in your account informing them about your blog and asking for their feedback will go a long way. Remember, every little helps.

Whenever you have the time, introduce your blog into a conversation when you're spending time with your friends and family and ask for their opinions on your content.

Create interesting, attention grabbing cards, flyers, posters and leaflets advertising your blog and hand them out to people in the park, shopping centres, or even leave them at places such as pub tables and shop windows.

Find blogs similar to your own and get in the habit of leaving comments on them. Hopefully, the blogger will return the favour to you. Start to submit your URL to magazines and newspapers particularly in your chosen field. You have nothing to loose.  

Remember to keep your blog up to date and keep posting new stories onto your blog to keep your readers/followers happy. Remember being patient brings success. So keep at it.

The iPad 3

Today Friday 16th March 2012 has seen the launch of the iPad 3 by Apple. I thought my readers might be interested in the product so I have completed a short review of the background, cost, spec, new features and apps.

A History of Welsh Rugby

Fans enjoying the atmosphere at the Millenium Stadium

The hottest ticket in town at the moment has to be a ticket for Wales vs France, Saturday 17th March at the Millenium Stadium, Cardiff, when Wales go for the RBS Six Nations Grand Slam. If you are one of the lucky 74500 people with a hot ticket, I'm sure you will find my blog this week particulary interesting. I have decided to look at the history of Welsh rugby.

How to Enjoy Swansea and the Gower Coast

Worms Head

My blog this week is going to be a step by step guide on how to enjoy and get the most out of a visit to the world renowned Gower Peninsula. I will be covering topics such as location,  the range of hotels available, the types of activities you can try, the variety of restaurants in the area and the latest news. First of all though, where are Swansea and the Gower Peninsula?

A review of 'The Muppets'

Is there anybody of about my age who didn’t grow up loving the Muppets? If like me, the Muppets were an intrinsic part of your childhood you’ll be delighted to hear about the release of their most recent film.

An Evaluation of five blogs similar to my own

Here are some alternative blogs which my readers may be interested in. They give out information and provide reviews of events in Wales.

Blog one - The Visit Wales Blog

This is a blog that is very direct, simple and to the point. It wasted little time loading onto my screen and from then on it was easy to identify what the site was about and who it was aimed at. The site is very pleasing to the eye and it has a very professional look about it. The same fonts and colours have been used throughout the blog ensure it is visually appealing.