Top 100 F1 Drivers: Numbers 100-91

It's been nearly two years since I last made entries into this blog, and in that time the list for the Top 100 F1 Drivers has changed. For those of you who weren't there when it started, this is a statistical analysis of every driver in Formula One, with different achievements amalgamated into a homemade formula that gives each participant a score. While the idea of 'Best Driver' is one is down to highly subjective criteria, I like to think of this formula as a process to find the most successful drivers of all time. That way, I can hide from the fact that Gilles Villeneuve appears below Heinz-Harald Frentzen...

The scoring system is as follows:

Drivers Championship - 120 points
Race Win - 18 points
Second Place Finish - 7 points
Third Place - 5 points
Fourth Place - 2.5 points
Fifth Place - 2 points
Sixth Place - 1.5 points
Seventh Place - 1 point
Eighth Place - 0.5 points
Pole Position - 2 points
Fastest Lap - 1 point
Race Start - -0.1 point

Subtracting a point for race starts is an attempt to neutralize the effects of what I call "Massive career syndrome", which is where a driver appears extremely high on the list purely because they have over 200 races under their belt. It hasn't quite worked perfectly, but somewhat comedically it does leave Charles Pic at the bottom of the list (in P757) with -3.9 points...

So with all that said, let's do the list... again! A lot of these will be pulled from the original article, but there are already some new entries to the list ahead...

100. Jean-Pierre Jabouille (France) 49 Starts, 2 Race Wins, 46.1 F-Points

Jean-Pierre Jabouille's racing career was uncharacteristically slow and steady. He took up the sport aged 22, made it to Formula 2 aged 27, and didn't secure a permanent F1 seat until he was 35. He was lucky enough to dabble in a Tyrrell seat for one race in 1975, but it wasn't until he won the F2 Championship at his seventh attempt in 1976 that he started to establish himself in Formula One.

Having been brought in to help develop Renault's new turbo engines, Jabouille began to display impressive form with a few standout qualifying performances. The car itself was extremely unreliable based on the untested concept of the vehicle, but Jabouille pulled out a Fourth place in 1978.

Jabouille booked himself a place in F1 history in 1979 by leading the Renault to victory at his home Grand Prix in Dijon. This marked the first occasion on which a turbocharged car had won a Grand Prix. The car remained very unreliable and rarely finished a race, but Jabouille was able to achieve his second race victory in 1980 by taking the chequered flag in Austria ahead of Alan Jones by less than a second.

He had planned a move to Ligier in 1981, but a broken leg sustained in the Canadian Grand Prix badly affected his preparations. He missed the first two races and struggled upon his return. He was dropped and never made a return to Formula One. He now runs his own team in the FIA Sportscar Championship.

99. Luigi Fagioli (Italy) 7 Starts, 1 Race Win, 50.3 F-Points

With just seven race starts in World Championship Formula One events, Fagioli has the least Grands Prix under his belt of anyone on this list. However, this statistic does not do justice to a driver who played a significant role in the European Championships of the 1930s, racing for early incarnations of Alfa Romeo, Maserati and Mercedes. He won numerous races, but his attitude proved to be an issue with some of his teams. He was ordered to move over for his team-mate in the first race of 1934, and retaliated by parking the car and abandoning the race. He continued to race up until 1937, when severe rheumatism meant he was no longer in any condition for the rigours of the sport.

After the war, Fagioli's health improved and he returned to racing for the inception of the official Formula One World Championship. Driving for Alfa Romeo, Fagioli scored five podium finishes in his six races of the 1950 season, finishing a very credible third in the championship. In 1951, Fagioli only entered one Grand Prix in which he shared an Alfa Romeo with Juan Manuel Fangio. They were victorious, and aged 53 he became the oldest driver to win a Formula One grand prix, a record he unsurprisingly still holds today.
Fagioli died in 1952 after crashing a touring car at the Monaco circuit.

98. Piero Taruffi (Italy) 18 Starts, 1 Race Win, 55.2 F-Points

Piero Taruffi is perhaps more notable for his careers in motorcycles and sports cars, but his 18 appearances in Grand Prix racing gives him a well-earned place on this list. With a long and impressive motorcycling career in the 1920s and 30s (including the land-speed record on a motorcycle, which he clinched in 1937), Taruffi entered numerous events in the 50s with only one eye focussed on F1.

His most successful year in the sport was undoubtedly 1952 in which Taruffi, driving for Ferrari, scored his first race win at Switzerland. Another two podiums that season gave Taruffi a third placed finish in the Championship, which was to be the best classification he would achieve in F1. Sporadic appearances for Ferrari and Mercedes yielded him a few more good results, but Taruffi had so many pursuits that he never gave himself a true chance to establish a proper F1 title challenge.

He retired from motorsport after the terrible crash in the 1957 Mille Miglia, in which 14 people were killed. He went on to write an acclaimed book named The Technique of Motor Racing, and passed away in 1988 aged 81.

97. Innes Ireland (Great Britain) 50 Starts, 1 Race Win, 55.5 F-Points

Innes Ireland is the first of 20 Brits who have made this list, and perhaps one of the most colourful. Known for his uncompromising and outlandish nature, especially on track, Ireland was a popular figure in the paddock. Having taken up motor-racing as a career in 1957, Ireland found himself in a Lotus in 1959, a seat which he held for three years. During that time Ireland managed four podiums, including his only race victory at the 1961 USA Grand Prix at Watkins Glen. He admitted his victory was lucky, and showed his appreciation for the mechanic that fixed his car three times over the weekend by tipping him £25.

Despite this success, Ireland found himself out of favour with team boss Colin Chapman, who instead hired Jim Clark to drive for Lotus. Ireland dabbled with the BRP and BRM teams, but could only manage a few more points finishes before his career ended in 1967. He continued to work as a journalist, and was briefly the president of the BRDC before dying of cancer in 1993, aged 63.

96. Andrea de Cesaris (Italy) 208 Starts, 0 Race Wins, 57.7 F-Points

Andrea de Cesaris holds something of a dubious distinction in that he has started the most F1 Grands Prix without a single race victory. Despite his inability to hit the top step of the podium, de Cesaris had a long career in the sport, racing for ten different teams over fifteen seasons.

Andrea came to Formula One with a bit of a reputation for causing crashes. He had already been involved in an incident in which Nigel Mansell broke his neck, and in only his second start in F1 he threw his Alfa Romeo into catch fencing at Watkins Glen. Despite this, he managed to land a seat in the McLaren team in 1981. This didn't lead to anything more than a single points finish for de Cesaris, before he moved back to Alfa Romeo.

The Italian took his first podium in a breathless Monaco Grand Prix in 1982, in which almost every car ran out of fuel. Things improved even further for de Cesaris in 1983, when he took two second-placed finishes in Germany and South Africa to place eighth in the World Championship. He also came close to taking his maiden win in Spa, leading for much of the race before a bad pit-stop spoiled his champagne moment.

His moves to Ligier and Minardi did not give de Cesaris much cause to celebrate, but a season at Brabham saw him stand on the podium for a fourth time at the 1987 Belgian Grand Prix. He then spent a couple of years at the promising but ultimately disappointing Dallara team, before moves to Jordan, Tyrrell and Sauber capped off his career in F1. His final podium came at Canada in 1989, but the elusive race victory was never found.

Andrea de Cesaris is now a currency trader, but makes appearances at Grand Prix Masters events.


95. Luigi Villoresi (Italy) 31 Starts, 0 Race Wins, 58.9 F-Points

Luigi Villoresi is another Italian who was racing in Formula before the sport had officially established its World Championship. Appearing in a Maserati in 1938 and 1939, Villoresi's career was interrupted by the war before he returned and spent three more years with the team. He then moved to Ferrari, driving for them between 1949 and 1953. Though he recorded a race win in his first season for Ferrari, the statistics do not count races pre-1950.

Villoresi managed to score eight podiums after the establishment of the Championship, coming fifth place in the standings twice. Despite having a fair amount of success with Ferrari, he moved to Lancia in 1954 alongside Alberto Ascari, who had beaten him on both his second placed finishes. Villoresi was unable to replicate the kind of form he managed in the Ferrari for Lancia, and following Ascari's fatal crash decided to retire from the sport. Villoresi died in 1997, aged 88.

94. Jo Bonnier (Sweden) 104 Starts, 1 Race Win, 60.1 F-Points

Jo Bonnier was a true journeyman. Between 1956 and 1971, the Swede raced for eleven different teams and rarely completed a full season in just one race seat. He began his career at Maserati, spending three years at the team and suffering a crash that very nearly killed him at a non-championship race in Imola. He then moved to BRM where he scored his one and only race victory at the 1959 Dutch Grand Prix. It was a result that put him second in the Championship, but he failed to capitalise on the position as the car wasn't strong enough to pursue a title fight.

Despite his CV listing an absurd amount of teams, Bonnier specialised in scraping out a few points-scoring results regardless of what team he drove for. He scored points for BRM, Porsche, Cooper, Brabham, McLaren and Honda, failing only at his first team Maserati and his self-run team Ecurie Bonnier. Though he continued to drive for his team on occasion, Bonnier's time in F1 was clearly up and he raced his final race at Watkins Glen in 1971.

He was killed at Le Mans in 1972 after a collision with another car.

93. Valtteri Bottas (Finnish) 47 Starts, 0 Race Wins, 61.8 F-Points

Valtteri Bottas is the most recent driver to have broken his way into our top 100, continuing the recent tradition of flying Finns soaring to success in Formula One. He began karting in 1995, aged 6, and he continued to race throughout his childhood. In 2005 he finished eighth in the Karting World Cup, and his impressive form propelled him into the higher echelons of motorsport.

2008 proved to be something of a breakthrough year for Bottas, as he won his first title: The Formula Renault Eurocup. A move to Formula Three, and another strong season with two pole positions, saw Williams snap Bottas up as their test driver, replacing Nico Hulkenberg. Bottas continued to race in GP3, and won the championship in 2011. He then made the unusual move of choosing to focus solely on test driving for Williams in 2012, a decision he feels gave him the best preparation for F1 possible.

Bottas lurked in the shadows of the underwhelming Bruno Senna, taking his car in every practice session that year. His enthusiasm and willingness to get involved in various departments of Williams saw him land a race seat for 2013. Unfortunately for the Finn, Williams suffered one of their worst seasons, and Bottas had little opportunity to impress. Despite this, he did make waves by qualifying in third for the Canadian Grand Prix, and scored his first points by finishing eighth late in the season at the American Grand Prix.

Williams changed engine supplier to Mercedes for 2014, and Bottas was able to utilise the potential of his new machinery. Bottas only failed to score points in two races throughout the season, and outshone his experienced teammate Felipe Massa. The Finn secured his first podium by finishing third in the Austrian Grand Prix, and took second place in the following two races. The most impressive of these was his drive at Silverstone, where he came from 14th on the grid and held off a charging Lewis Hamilton to keep hold of second place.

 Bottas finished a remarkable fourth-place in the Drivers Championship, and has carried on his good form in 2015. Rumours of a move to Ferrari don't flatter Bottas, as his future in F1 seems extremely bright. There is little doubt that he will continue to climb this list.

92. Romain Grosjean (French) 74 Starts, 0 Race Wins, 62.1 F-Points

It may be something of a surprise to see Romain Grosjean in this list, considering his bubbling reputation as a somewhat clumsy driver. However, this is harshly derisive of a driver who has, when given the opportunity, demonstrated class and skill. Grosjean began karting aged 14, and despite starting relatively late was able to make enough of an impact to move to Formula Renault within three years.

His first season in the Swiss Formula Renault Championship saw him win all 10 rounds. 10 victories would also secure him the French Formula Renault Championship in 2005, and Renault themselves were inspired by Grosjean's progress enough to sign him up to their Driver Development programme.

Grosjean continued his penchant for winning lower series by taking titles in the Formula Three Renault and GP2 Asia championships. He was made Renault F1's test driver in 2008, and following the Crashgate controversy he replaced Nelson Piquet Jr. for the second half of the 2009 season in a race seat. It was a tumultuous beginning to F1 for Grosjean, who struggled to match the form of his teammate Fernando Alonso and failed to score a point. Despite a difficult period, Grosjean says he learned a huge amount from Alonso.

Grosjean was replaced by Vitaly Petrov, and changed to Auto GP for 2010. He marked it down as another Championship victory, and returned to GP2 in 2011. It was this season which reignited his F1 career, as he pulled ahead of rivals Jules Bianchi and Giedo van der Garde to take both the GP2 and GP2 Asia titles. Following an impressive few years away from F1, Lotus decided it was time for Romain to have a second crack at the big leagues. He was signed to partner Kimi Raikkonen for 2012.

Lotus enjoyed a successful year in 2012, and while Grosjean was clearly the support act to a reinvigorated Kimi Raikkonen, the Frenchman certainly justified the team's faith in his ability. He scored his first podium (and the first for a Frenchman in nearly 14 years) when he came third in the Bahrain Grand Prix, securing a 2-3 finish for his team. Just a few races later, he topped this performance in Canada, overtaking his former team-mate Alonso to finish second.

Despite these impressive results, Grosjean struggled towards the end of the season. He put himself in an invidious position after causing a dangerous collision in Spa which resulted in a one-race ban. From there, he found it difficult to regain the form he had shown earlier in the season, while his team-mate Raikkonen drove his Lotus to their first race victory as a new outfit.

Nevertheless, Grosjean was retained for 2013 and managed to pull himself out of the slump. Six podium finishes meant he was a lot closer to Raikkonen in terms of performance. Grosjean took seventh in the Championship (his best finish so far) and was entrusted to lead the team into 2014 alongside new team-mate Pastor Maldonado. However, Lotus struggled to deal with new specifications and both drivers found it difficult to score points. Grosjean's misery was compounded by a slightly embarrassing incident in which he crashed behind the safety car in Hungary.

Lotus' turbulent season continues into 2015, but Grosjean has been able to score a handful of points this year, and is comfortably outperforming Maldonado. With the right kit, it seems Grosjean can show real talent and potential.

91. Jean Behra (France) 53 Starts, 0 Race Wins, 65.2 F-Points

Short and stocky, French driver Jean Behra was a consistently strong figure in F1 during the 1950s. Having begun his career in motorcycle racing before the second world war, Behra moved to car racing in 1952, making his Formula One debut in that year's Swiss Grand Prix and finishing on the podium. Behra spent his first three years in a Gordini, but the car was unreliable and often didn't make it to the finish line. Despite this, Behra pulled off a handful of victories in non-championship events, including a triumph over the much fancied Ferraris in the 1952 Grand Prix of Reims.

Behra enjoyed his most competitive seasons as part of the Maserati line-up between 1955 and 1958. In this time, he recorded seven podium finishes and a fourth-place finish in the 1956 Championship. However, the Frenchman never managed to win an official Formula One Grand Prix, hiding behind the limelight of his teammates Stirling Moss and Juan Manuel Fangio. Regardless, Behra drew much respect from the paddock for his reputation as a driver with great flair and ability.

He moved to Porsche, and then Ferrari. Midway through the 1959 season, he suffered a crash in a sports car race before the German Grand Prix. He was thrown from the car and died of his injuries aged 38. His funeral drew 3000 mourners in his hometown of Nice.

Numbers 90-81 follow tomorrow!

F1's Conflicted Self-Pondering: Pulling apart the GPDA survey

Are fans still in love with F1?

Wasn't the Hungarian Grand Prix a blast? The Battle of Budapest cooked up an unusually enthralling storm, which gave analysts a convenient hook for predictable "Who says F1 is boring?" comments. While there is no denying that the last two races, and indeed the 2015 Championship battle, have been entertaining, this seems like a simplification of the more severe underlying problems that F1 is going through. This great branch of motorsport is trying to answer some tough questions about its future, but how can anyone be sure of the direction it needs to take?

The GPDA (Grand Prix Drivers Association) attempted to find some clarity by conducting an enormous survey into fans' opinions of the state of Formula One. The amount of responses received is admittedly impressive, with over 200,000 people from 194 countries taking part. The results are summarised in a slick document available on the GPDA website, which gives basic data for each questions. By dissecting this further, I think it's possible to find some very interesting information that stretches beyond what the organisation were looking for.

 Crowds continue to turn up in droves for the British GP.

Before looking at the audience which took part, there are some results that are immediately striking. Page 12 details a list of attributes fans associate with F1, both in 2010 and 2015. The top 3 descriptors for F1 in 2010 are 'Competitive, technological and exciting', whereas in 2015 they are 'Expensive, technological and boring'. This is not just a damning verdict on Formula One today, but also a somewhat surprising one. The 2010 season saw a total of 547 overtakes during the entire season (lower than the four following seasons) and, despite a memorable Championship fight, failed to produce any real classic Grands Prix.  It's very odd that fans would be so fond of this period of Grand Prix racing, but clearly there is a feeling that the quality has dropped dramatically.

Sure enough, less than 10% of those surveyed believe that Formula One is healthier than it was 5 years ago. "Healthier" leans more towards the suggestion of F1's current financial state and its future. It makes a lot more sense that fans would have a pessimistic outlook on the sport. In 2010, we had the arrival of Caterham, Virgin and Hispania, as well as Mercedes taking over Ross Brawn's team. It was a counter-boom to the world's troubled economy. Since then, the cracks have slowly covered the stoic face of the sport, with Marussia clinging on as the only surviving member of the new-fangled trio, as well as other teams flirting with the idea of ditching F1. It's only natural to feel an impending sense of dread about F1's next few years as it struggles to compete with its own unsustainable model.

 A less 'healthy' F1 has seen smaller teams struggle to stay in existence.

Now, it's difficult to talk about the rest of the survey without analysing the audience that took part. While it would seem fair to assume that most people answering a questionnaire about F1 on the internet are hardcore Formula One fans, page 8 of the document actually throws some fascinating curveballs. Less than one-in-four people who answered the survey regard Formula One as their favourite sport, and an ambiguous-but-discouraging "over half" watch at least 12 races a season in some form.  These results suggest that the survey wasn't just completed by staunch F1 followers, but quite a few casual fans as well. That's not to say that these are passing fans though, as some of the questions involved do require a base knowledge of the more technical aspects of F1. 

Further to this, the average age of those who responded to the survey is 37. Bearing in mind that this survey was exclusively online, this number is quite high. Is it the case that Formula One has very little appeal to younger fans? Or is this more to do with the sort of person who will complete a survey in general? Either way, these facts should be kept strongly in mind when viewing the rest of the results. These are not all staunch F1 fans, and typically, are the opinions of a low-middle-aged sample.

 F1 - A sport for hardcore and casual fans?

Having evaluated the audience, there are some results that speak volumes. 85% believe that Formula One needs to recruit new fans. This may seem obvious, but compare that to 64% of people believing the same in 2010. Why were we so passive about new fans before? What's changed now? A lot of this probably comes down to the 'health' of the sport being seen as poorer than before, and part of that feeling could be to do with falling viewer numbers. 'Recruiting more fans' is the obvious solution, but how?

Reading further on in the survey gives us an insight into what fans feel needs to be done to help this recruitment process. The top suggestion of what's important to current fans, with 74% 'agreeing', is that rules should be relaxed to allow a great diversity of technology and cars. Other factors seen as important include "the sound of engines", "the power of engines" and "the size and type of engines". Going back to our audience data, it seems worthy to make some sort of amendment here. The audience we're looking at is a mix of hardcore and casuals, but it seems fair to suggest there is a tendency towards technical fanatics when it comes to this particular sample.

Are current engines noisy enough? Some fans don't think so.

Maybe that's not fair. Maybe there really is mass appeal when it comes to the engines and technology, but is this really what we can imagine the prospective casual fan that we are looking to recruit enthusing about while watching a race? Perhaps when attending a Grand Prix, we can envisage casual fans being wowed by the roar of the Formula One engine as a car sweeps past the grandstand, but it seems more likely that a potential F1 viewer is going to watch a few races on TV before shelling out for a race-day ticket. 

For hardcore fans, this matters. Of course it does. And if F1 is looking to recruit more 'hardcore' fans then this is fair. But that's the decision the sport has to make. The benefits of coming to such a conclusion would be that F1 can aim to please its most fanatic viewers, thereby ensuring a core support of devoted fans. However, a sport that has historically thrived on the financial gain of advertising huge brands and reaching big viewer numbers is going to struggle to make that transition and continue to be the pinnacle of motorsport, which 60% of fans currently believe is the case.

 Would bringing in another tyre company improve the sport?

In fairness to those surveyed, the choices given in the 'What's important to you' section of the survey seem pitifully off the mark. There is nothing regarding competition, overtaking, accessibility or driver aids. With these involved in the survey here, this table might have been more reflective of what you would expect to see F1 fans say. Going back to page 13, a section titled "Your Views on F1", 89% of fans answered that they feel Formula One needs to be more competitive. This doesn't really communicate much information though, as it's hard to imagine the fan who doesn't think F1 should be more competitive. 

So what else does this survey indicate that fans want? 80% believe that there should be more than one tyre supplier in Formula One. There is a logic behind this being the most desired change, although it is flawed in some respects. A lot of fans are understandably fed up with Pirelli tyres and want a tyre-war to add another aspect of competition. If we could be sure that this would definitely increase overtaking and general race drama, then this would be a very agreeable concept. However, overtaking was poorest during the tyre-war between Bridgestone and Michelin, and the level of competition during quite a few of those seasons was exceptionally poor. 

Some will argue that allowing companies to develop the best tyres possible will increase the ability for drivers to race at full speed. Is this important to fans? I think so, perhaps a survey question would have helped here, but again none of the survey focussed on an issue that has been discussed quite a lot recently, which is whether or not F1 cars should be going faster. However, considering that fans feel engine specifications are important, and a surprising 60% of fans also backed the reintroduction of refuelling, it seems that a lot of these results are aiming towards an F1 where the cars are faster, which is of course what has been planned. Will a tyre war help along the way? Perhaps it will, but if 89% of fans think F1 should be more competitive, isn't that what we should aim for first?

 Wheel-to-wheel racing: The bread and butter of this great sport.

I'll try to summarise what feels like a mash of ideas. I think this survey gives us a lot of interesting thoughts, but from the very premise missed out on what could have been some more fundamental insights into what makes a Formula One fan tick. I really would like to know whether F1 fans prefer speed or competition, as this seems to be the crossroads we're starting to head towards. Currently we have neither, and of course we want both. But if F1 really does need to recruit new fans, it needs to know what makes those fans interested in the first place. This survey suggests that fans want more speed, faster cars, better engines. 

I've always enjoyed watching British Touring Cars as a casual viewer. I don't watch it for the speed, the cars or the engines. I watch it because it's bloody good fun, and it keeps me coming back. I think that is what F1 needs to be looking for if it's ever going to appeal to the casual viewer in a way that will improve the 'health' of the sport, but there is always the possibility to focus on the hardcore fans. Maybe that is the question that F1 needs to ask itself first: What sort of fans do we want?

You can view the GPDA survey results here.

As Bad As It Looks? - Cyberbully (A Review)

Though my rage and alcohol-fuelled review of Keith Lemon: The Movie seemed to me, in retrospect, to be a rambling mess, it managed to generate quite a few views. That may have been down to sympathetic members of forums clicking on the article following a less-than-dignified plug, but Blogger informs me that at least one view came from the search terms "big cock", so there's a lesson in marketing for you kids.

Nevertheless, it somehow worked and with Netflix offering up a wide range of tripe to be viewed, it seemed unfair for me not to utilise the service and make the gamut of terrible films into something productive. With that, I decided to start a new series of reviews named "As Bad As It Looks?". The idea is that I will be watching films that seem like the sort of thing I would never in a million years find tolerable. I'm hoping that eventually I'll find one that I actually like, but sadly this was not the case with today's choice: Cyberbully.

Cyberbullying is a hot topic at the moment, with BBC News reporting yesterday that one in five children are subject to bullying online. To make a film surrounding the issue would take some clever story-work, some delicate touches, believable character and a clear well-executed message. This film had none of those.

Our story revolves around a high-school girl named Taylor, who finally gets her own laptop that she can use away from her over-protective mother. She signs up to a social networking site named Cliquester, and her brother gets onto her laptop and posts a ridiculous status (Frape? Crape? I dunno what you'd call it). This incomprehensibly starts a wave of vicious comments being posted on her page by classmates.

The film follows a fairly routine format in this regard. Taylor reads nasty comments, then cries whilst sad music plays, then one of her friends ditches her. The bullies themselves are actually incredibly funny in this film, as they are completely over-the-top and seem to go above and beyond to taunt their victim. They even produce a miniature film, with masks and costumes and everything, just to make fun of Taylor. I don't care what you say, they deserve some kudos for their commitment.

As well as comments from these remarkably one-dimensional villains, we have a mysterious boy called James initially posting to show support for Taylor. When he inexplicably changes his tune to claim that Taylor gave him an STD, it becomes apparent that the account was a fake. This is all too much for Taylor, who posts a farewell video before attempting suicide.

Now in fairness, the actual moment where Taylor tries to commit suicide is actually pretty well done. Her friend Samantha rushes to her house and frantically calls Taylor's mother. The ambulance arrives, they dart around the house looking for her. I think maybe the sudden moment of drama just made a nice change to the moping around and reading things online that was pretty much the entire first half of the film. When they finally find her, she's trying to open a bottle of pills while screaming "I CAN'T GET IT OPEN". This goes down as the funniest suicide attempt in film history. Samantha restrains her, and Taylor breaks down in tears.

For some reason, in the next scene she's in a hospital, being sedated and attached to a heart-monitor (they make it clear she didn't take anything, so as far as precautions go this is like wearing a helmet to put shoes on). Then the film becomes about a cause, but I think they had trouble working out what it was. First, the Mother seems determined to find out who James was even though the other bullies were far nastier and more persistent than 'James'. She even confronts Lindsay, the ringleader of the bullies, but pays no interest while she tries to find out who was responsible for the fake profile

.

Notice how contrived this is all sounding? Well the reason the story puts so much stock in finding out who was behind the James profile is because it was actually Taylor's best friend Samantha. This is completely bizarre and I was baffled as to why they felt the character should do such a thing. They eventually reveal it was because of jealousy as a boy asked her out to the dance, yet despite my theory that 99% of high-school girls are psychotic, I simply cannot fathom why this would happen. Taylor finds out and the two aren't friends anymore.

Anyway, the Mother's cause in the film becomes apparent when she chases ways for the cyberbullying to be prevented. First, she goes to the principal, who basically says he can't do anything about what happens online and claims that he has no legal right to punish children over what they do on the internet. Either this is the most spineless principal in the world, or the writer's chose another cop-out route.

So the Mother goes to her local senator, who says that he sees no reason for a law against cyberbullying. Finally, the Mother decides that talking to a journalist and pressuring the senator into a law change is her only option. This is when the film's message finally became apparent: "THERE SHOULD BE A LAW AGAINST THIS". As far as moral crusades go, putting forward the idea that constant harassment should be illegal is rather easy.

The journalist says he will do a story with Taylor, but only if Samantha is interviewed with her as well. Why a journalist would take the angle of "Let's hear two high school girls talk about their bitchy catfight" as opposed to "An isolated young girl who tried to take her own life", I don't know, but it allows the film come to a conclusion so let's not have a go at it. The two patch up their differences, and the story is so influential that the senator completely changes his mind in an instant and draws up a new law against cyberbullying.

The final scene is vomit-inducing. Taylor finally returns to school following her suicide attempt, and suffers another biting comment from Lindsay and the bullies. She decides not to let it go this time, and calmly starts to tell Lindsay how her words hurt. Just a few seconds into this quiet speech, kids from all over the cafeteria start to turn around and say "Hey look over there!". Then Taylor's friends begin to chime in saying that Lindsay is full of hate, and a couple of other bullied kids also add their thoughts. Lindsay is mildly bemused and leaves the cafeteria, leaving the viewer to wonder if that really was supposed to be the pay-off. The film ends with shots of kids using their phones to inform friends of the incredible smackdown Taylor just handed Lindsay, with one response being "Wow! So it's safe to go online again?"

So what's wrong with Cyberbully? It's by no means the worst film ever, but it doesn't present a realistic outlook on the problem of cyberbullying in the first place, and I think that is where the whole concept collapses. Cyberbullying isn't something that begins with a 'frape', or is a result of a Mother's intrusion being withdrawn. It's an extension of real-life bullying, and the worst of it can be the anonymous comments that endlessly follow a victim around.

Taylor makes no attempt to end the cyberbullying. It is quickly established that Cliquester uses a friend request system, and yet she accepts everyone who bullies her as a friend. At no point does she try to unfriend people, nor does she ever block anyone (one scene in a support group shows the therapy douche suggesting that they block a bully, and Taylor remarks "I never knew you could do that!"). The worst cyberbullying is that which a victim cannot get away from, and yet Taylor could have easily gotten away from this.

As well as this, the characters themselves are very bland and almost indistinguishable from one another. It seemed that the makers wanted a safe drama about typical teenage girls going through this "cyberbullying" thing they had heard all about, and put little effort into making it interesting or realistic. There are some scenes that work to create some drama, such as the suicide scene, but otherwise this is just a dull watch. 

My main problem though, is that this film pretends it has a message; that it's saying something profound about cyberbullying. What it's really doing is pointing at it. The solution to Taylor's problem was for her to stay off of school for a while and then tell Lindsay she's a big meanie. I don't think that's a message that any young people suffering the same problems will be able to use with any great effect.

*   *   *   *   *

My final rating for this film: 4/10. That puts it above Keith Lemon: The Movie in the ABAIL chart, which will hopefully become a catalogue of the worst-looking films available to watch.

ABAIT Chart:

1. Cyberbully - 4/10

2. Keith Lemon: The Movie - 1/10

Qat-are You Serious, FIFA?

Upon the announcement that the 2018 and 2022 World Cups would be hosted in Russia and Qatar respectively, I wrote a piece for the University newspaper defending the decision to award Russia the 2018 tournament, but displaying some confusion at the choice of Qatar for 2022. Though in the interests of writing brash and sensational articles for the University I put the decision down to money, at the time I concluded internally that such a feeling could only be a result of the anger we were all feeling that England's realistic bid for 2018 had been rejected at the first round of voting.

There was definitely a cause for concern when the choices were made. With Qatar especially, it became very difficult to rationalise how they had bluffed their way into hosting a World Cup. The national team have no presence in the world of football and construction had started on almost none of the proposed stadiums to be used for the tournament in their bid. With nations such as the USA and Australia (had they been chosen, the World Cup would have had the distinction of being held in every continent) pitted against them for the 2022 event, it simply became a question of 'why?', and the idea of money was not a stranger to many lips.

Though the thought was tempting, in truth I considered Russia to be a huge footballing nation that, by now, really should have hosted a World Cup. Though Qatar was a more difficult choice to justify, I also considered that this was the sort of region football owed a visit. Given how Formula One spends a lot of time in places like Abu Dhabi and Bahrain despite these countries having no real pedigree for the sport, it seemed that perhaps FIFA's decision came from a similar ambition to place the prestige of the World Cup in this region, and to give the unique tournament another unique location in which historic moments could take place.

 

Boy, was that a stretch.

It only took a short while for issues to be raised that made Qatar out to be a massively unsuitable location for a World Cup. The first was the problem of homosexuality, which is outlawed in Qatar. It is debatable as to whether the FIFA executives were aware of this, or whether they were ignorant enough not to see it as a problem, but with football still struggling to get to grips with the idea of  homosexuality in the sport this was a bad time to take the most prestigious event in the sport to a country with such a discriminatory attitude. Though David Cameron recently showed the sort of poise natural to a politician by dancing around the issue in relation to the Winter Olympics in Russia (we can let FIFA off with the World Cup in Russia, as the laws were not in place when they were awarded the tournament to them), Blatter clumsily clattered into the problem by commenting that gay people should "refrain from sexual activity" when attending the event.

Then came the revelation that it's quite hot in Qatar, and this has put many footballing organisations into a troublesome bind. With temperatures of up to 50°c commonplace during Qatari summers, it quickly became apparent that playing football in such weather was a terrible idea. Just as Blatter scrambled to pretend that the homosexuality issue had indeed been considered by FIFA and there was a simple answer to it, he repeated the same trick with this more practical problem by suggesting that the World Cup would be held in winter.

Naturally, many football fans weren't too impressed by the idea of overturning the whole calender of football for a season in order to accommodate for FIFA's idiotic whims, but Blatter pressed on with the idea in the face of opposition. FIFA vice-president Jim Boyce's comments today suggesting that the Premier League should just get on with it are frustrating enough, but one part of the article on BBC Sport confirmed the very worst of my fears. To quote the piece:

"[Boyce] also acknowledged that, before it voted in 2010 to award the event to Qatar, Fifa did not fully consider the implications of playing there during the summer, when temperatures can reach 50C."

I can't profess to knowing the ins and outs of how FIFA's decision making process works for the hosting of the World Cup, but if the first question is not "Can you play football there?", then something is seriously, seriously wrong.

It is impossible to put up a front and say that there is any alternative. FIFA executives, when making the decision to award the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, clearly did not take into account footballing pedigree, spreading the tournament across the world, existing infrastructure, the political situation of the country in question, or even whether it is feasible that football can take place there. I used to believe that my conclusion three years ago, that money was the root of the decision, was a cheap way to push the reader into a reaction. Now is the grim realisation that I had actually hit the nail squarely on the head.

Despite the strong opposition from the Premier League, it is difficult to envisage a way in which a winter World Cup does not take place. Playing in such heat would not only be difficult for players, it would be outright dangerous, so that possibility is out. FIFA won't reverse their decision either, as I'd imagine it would allow Qatar to take legal action against the organisation, and that would mean money coming out of executive pockets, so this is not going to happen either. The only conclusion now is for the tradition and legacy of the World Cup, and an entire domestic season, to be ruined by pigs in need of a bigger trough.