EFW latest....

News in brief

In a nod to my favourite thing of all time ever: Ceefax page 312 (news in brief), here's a few snippets of information from EFW Towers. This is in no way just a "filler" to make up for the fact none of us have been on a European Football Weekend this week. Nor is it a reason to shoehorn in a photo taken from my bible, 'The First World Atlas of Football' of a map of Slovakia and Czech Republic with the football teams strategically marked out.

Next Thursday the EFW Roadshow rolls into Slovakia for the start of the third annual European Football Weekends Oktoberfest. We're off to see Slovan Bratislava v PSG in the Europa League. Sadly, there have been rumours about some off-the-field shenanigans - but fear not, we have a local guide in the shape of @BritskiBelasi who has agreed to take us under his wing for the day.

From Slovakia we - there's around 40 of us from all over Europe - move on over to the Czech Republic to see games at Slovan Liberec, Sparta Prague B, Tempo Praha, Dukla Prague, Admira Praha and Viktoria Plzen. We're even wheeling the EFW bingo bus out of retirement to take us to Liberec on the Friday because that's the way we roll. Well, that and the fact the train didn't return into our base in Prague until 7am in the morning, and frankly we're not getting any younger. That'll be seven games in two countries over four days then. Marvellous. Reports and all of the usual gubbins will saturate these pages in the coming weeks.

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Those crazy fools erudite folk at Picklive have decided that I'm a "safe pair of hands". I've been selected as one of the judges for the NOPAs 2011. Last year EFW staggered away from this event with an award for best blog. It was safe to say beer had been taken and the actual trophy took a bit of a beating. Anyway, my year of open-top bus parades comes to an end on December 15th at The Old Finsbury Town Hall. It's a brilliant night which is more about socialising and funnies than the actual prize giving - just how it should be. Click HERE for more information.

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(Danny) Lastly, there could well be a very cheeky Polish EFW taking place in December with his nibs, @theballisround and I. This is part of a very exciting project with the good people of @inbedwimaradona, the finer detail of which I'm not sure I'm allowed to mention just now. Needless to say that with IBWM on board it'll be absolutely fantastic. If you can't wait for that then @Ryan_Hubbard is out in Poland as I type this nonsense, and he'll be reporting back from his Polish EFW on these very pages next week. To whet your appetite for that, he's already sent us back a photo of the Ruch Chorzów floodlights....

So tall and thin, it makes me grin. A Ruch Chorzów floodlight, yesterday.

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NOPA awards

European Football Weekends trouser prestigious prize

We are not ones to blow our own trumpet here at European Football Weekends*. *We are. But last week saw the inaugural NOPA awards take place in London village. It was the best award ceremony I'd ever been to - in Hoxton, and was designed to acknowledge the cream of football blogging and podcasts. And EFW. Oh, and we don't like to talk about it, obviously, but it was all for charity. So dig deep this Christmas time and donate what you can to DSActive.

European Football Weekends was nominated in three categories; the best contribution to a blog, best blog and the people's choice award. It was hard to keep a straight face for the first of those, because I was up against Sid Lowe from The Guardian. Hardly fair sides. As it happened Iain Macintosh walked away with that prize for his splendid contribution to In Bed With Maradona.

The night was hosted by Welsh wizard Tim Morgan. I don't belong to the school of thought that labels the Welsh lazy, because they don't cross their i's and dot their t's in their language - which is full of ll's. Morgan was actually the perfect host, shoe-horning in jokes, better than that one, willy nilly throughout the evening.

The real stars of the show though were the lads from the Football Ramble and Barry Glendenning from The Guardian. They waged a (phoney) war on each other all night. Glendenning waltzed up to the stage flicking v's at the Ramblers as he collected the award for best football podcast, and moved the microphone over to their side of the stage to mock and milk them for all he was worth. He was to pay for that later as the Football Ramble collected the people's choice award, "the people have spoken" said Lukey Moore as Barry tucked into his humble pie.

As well as filling up on free beer and food, it was a great opportunity to put a face to all those people I spend talking to on Twitter and perusing their respective websites. Michael from Zonal Marking, Kieran (Swiss Ramble), David (The Seventy Two), James Appell, Magic Spongers, The Gib Football Show, The Equaliser, Two Footed Tackle, Two Hundred Percent, Tim Hill, Girl that loves the Gunners, Ubecha blog. Hell, even Clive Tyldesley took time out from discussing that night in Barcelona to put in a show.

You could have knocked me down with a feather when EFW received a huge cheer upon being read out amongst the nominees for the best blog award. Barry Glendenning then proceeded to bring the house down with a few funnies, opened the envelope in the style of Sepp Blatter, and uttered the words "And the winner is Danny Last and European Football Weekends" - just how I dreamt it. I rocked back in my chair, gulped down a bit more red wine, shuffled up to the stage and mumbled something or other about Qatar before retaking my seat.

The rest of the night was a drunken blur, obviously.

There's so many people to thank; Ana who is my long suffering wife, Stuart Fuller, Big Deaks, Cynical Dave, Andy Hudson, Dan Richardson, Nick Ames, Ulas Gürsat, Lewes FC, Michael Hudson, Garreth Cummins of the FSF, the lads at the Guardian and so many more. And to you the reader, you are lovelier than lovely.

For the record, the full list of awards were as follows:

1. Best Young Blogger – Sian Ranscombe for From A Girl Who Loves the Gunners
2. Socrates Award – Ian King for Two Hundred Percent
3. Best New Blog – Michael Cox for Zonal Marking
4. Best Contributor to Blog or Podcast – Ian McIntosh for In Bed With Maradona
5. Best Podcast – The Football Weekly
6. Best Blog – Danny Last & European Football Weekends
7. Peoples Choice award – The Football Ramble

NOPA awards

Football, comedy, beer and charity.

A fun evening, filled with tons of booze, lots of nice food, a chance to meet or catch up with fellow bloggers and it's all for charity you say? Guests to include Barry Glendenning, Luke Moore, Clive Tyldesley and - to reiterate - it's all for a good charitable cause? Where do we sign?

It's not often I pull a suit of the peg, but this has to be worth putting in an appearance for, no? Furthermore, European Football Weekends has somehow managed to shoehorn its way onto the list of nominees. In fact, if you're at a loose end, you can vote for whoever tickles your fancy here:

The inaugural NOPA awards , hosted by PickLiveFootie and designed to celebrate the best that the football blogging and podcast world has to offer, take place at Hoxton Hall in London Village. Tickets for the event can be purchased HERE. All food and drink is included in the price of a ticket. All proceeds go to the charity DS Active.

With all the furore surrounding Fifa and their World Cup bidding shenanigans, it probably isn't the best time to tell you that EFW have also been nominated for another award as well. So, in no way will I be asking any of you to head over to the Soccerlens Awards page for best niche website and put a tick in the box for us there, not on your nelly.

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