Everybody’s team? The national narrative in the Hebrew press covering Israeli national soccer team matches

The 1940s–1950s: the era of homogeneous discourse

The sheer size of Israeli daily newspapers during this period was limited, yet coverage of the national team’s matches was considerable. Three groups of journalistic storytellers dominated the coverage: news agency journalists’ reports featured, as expected, a seemingly neutral rhetoric and avoided commentary. The choice of a second group of narrators – news correspondents, who were not sports reporters – illuminates the significance that was ascribed to the matches of the national team, as well as the inner-hierarchies within the journalistic community. And so, for instance, two of Ma’ariv’s senior reporters – Theodor Leviteh, a political correspondent, and Yehoshua Bitzur, a parliamentary correspondent – covered the match held in Israel against the Soviet team. Choosing these high-ranking reporters to report on a soccer match indicates the national importance assigned to sports events as well as the disdain felt by newspaper editors of that time toward sports journalists.

The third group of storytellers was the sports journalists themselves. The activities of members of this professional group illuminate how at the time the boundaries between the press and the sports establishment were blurred. Hence, for instance, Ben-Zion Patt, Ha’aretz’s sports reporter during the 1940s and 1950s, was also head of the Maccabi Zionist sports club; in 1954, Patt was nominated as Chairman of the Israeli Soccer Association.

Sports journalists saw themselves as an integral part of the sports establishment and were often active members of its politically affiliated institutions. This perception was apparent in their work: thus, for example, in 1956 Ma’ariv reported, following the politically charged match (and Israeli lose) against the Soviet team:

Late at night we got a phone call [from Israel] saying ‘You fought like lions for every ball’ […] Crowds gathered once again in front of the entrance. They cheered us and we replied with a mighty singing of Hevenu Shalom Aleichem. ¹ (Dolev, 1956: 1)

The text features no clear distinction between the sports delegation and the reporters as they are both presented as representatives of the young nation. Therefore, the discourse regarding the team’s matches, during that era, usually embraced a highly patriotic tone.

The prominent features of the reporters covering the team in those years were that they were men, Jews, and devoted Zionists. Surveys taken during that era showed that less than 7% of Israeli journalists were women (Meyers and Cohen, 2011), so it is not surprising that not one female reporter was found in the studied sample. The male-dominated field, in which the sports reporters operated, often yielded chauvinistic writing. For instance, Hadshot HaSport wrote about the Soviet players that ‘they like perfume, but don’t pick on girls’ (Yoel, 1956: 5). Another salient feature is that all the reporters were Jews, who relied on Jewish cultural knowledge to convey their narratives. The symbols and metaphors were thus taken from Jewish tradition, and consequently the Israeli team was portrayed as representing only the Jewish people, rather than the actual citizenry of the state of Israel. Hence, for example, a Ma’ariv’s reporter covering a 1956 wrote, ‘When Carmel caught one ball after another, we recited Ha-Gomel’ (a Jewish blessing recited after surviving illness or danger) (Giladi, 1956: 5).

The 1960s–1980s: rise of a professional discourse

During this second era, the sports sections expanded considerably. The share of sports reporters in sports events coverage grew, and they became the almost sole narrators of the narrative. The features that characterized the storytellers in the previous era – patriotic Jewish men – persisted; however, unlike the preceding era, one can clearly discern the rise of a critical voice bemoaning the ills of the sports establishment.

During this period, reporters still perceived the national team as representing the Jewish nation, rather than the diversity of Israeli (namely, Jewish and Arab) identities, and thus, we can find quotes such as ‘they used their Jewish brain, and the fighting spirit and determination typical of the People of Israel, to achieve the unbelievable’ (Kaufman, 1976). The reporters thus emphasize the Jewish aspects of Israeliness while ignoring, for example, the 1976 inclusion of Rifa’at Turk, the first Israeli-Arab soccer player in the national team.

According to Caspi and Limor (1999), during the years 1976–1986, the percentage of women journalists in Israel doubled, but as evident from our exploration, the sports sections were an all-men territory as the reporters’ style became all the more chauvinistic, with headlines such as ‘women arouse all his senses’ (Keinan, 1964: 3) and ‘The referee from Malaysia is impressed by the [Israeli] women’ (Yair, 1964: 12). Crouse (1973) has offered the concept of ‘pack journalism’ to indicate journalists’ tendency to travel as a group as they cover major events. Boyle (2006) claims that this tendency is especially prevalent among sports journalists, as is also evident in the present sample that is saturated with reporters’ references to their colleagues. However, besides being a professional community, journalists are also an interpretive community (Zelizer, 1993). As such, journalists maintain a dialog about their work, by which they examine and redefine the appropriate standards of professional conduct.

But in sports journalism, the ‘pack’ phenomenon sometimes extends beyond the boundaries of the journalistic community, and Boyle (2006) mentions sports journalists’ tendency to travel as a pack with the people they assigned to cover – the players. This phenomenon ended in Britain during the 1980s, when the economic and cultural gap between players and reporters widened. In Israel, in contrast it seems as though the close relationships between players and journalists were persevered throughout the 1980s as the journalists still saw themselves as an integral part of the Israeli delegation, rather than mere reporters covering it. Hadshot HaSport’s Yizhar Brenner (1976) provided a prime example of this perception: ‘It was a delegation that became one big family – soccer players, coach and reporters – and we all shared in the battle cry: One for all and all for one!’ (p. 3).

One notable change in journalists’ conduct during this period relates to newly expressed criticisms. The criticism regarded mostly professional aspects of the matches, although – paradoxically – the team’s accomplishments were immeasurably better than during the first period. A minority of criticisms related to organizational aspects of the Israeli delegation’s conduct. Criticisms of both kinds reflected the journalists’ self-perception as active advisors to the establishment, rather than reporters observing the events from a distance. Hence, for example, in 1970 a Ma’ariv reporter complained to the Soccer Association that it did not implement any of his reported suggestions (Porat).

The 1990s–2000s: a multi-vocal discourse

During the last examined period, sports discourse expanded significantly. The new reporters portrayed a diverse picture that manifested Israeli national identity in various ways, which in turn yielded a far more multi-voiced discourse.

Before pointing out the differences that characterize this most recent era, it should be mentioned that despite the reported diversity, most mainstream sports journalists are currently still patriotic Jewish men. The presentation of the Israeli team as a Jewish team is especially salient in the popular Yediot Aharonot:

We are all first and foremost fans of the Israeli team. It is truly e-v-e-r-y-body’s team. We all stand before the match and sing the national anthem with a prayer in our hearts that in 90 minutes we’ll leave [the stadium] happy. (Efrat, 1999: 2)

The automatic sympathy attributed to Israeli soccer fans ignores empirical findings that indicate a high level of hostility toward the team by Israeli-Arabs (Amara and Kabaha, 1996) so that ‘everybody’s team’ is necessarily a false assumption.

The most recent examined period features several significant differences in terms of storytellers’ identities and patterns of coverage. The new writers, quite conspicuous in the sports sections, are active team members, who perceive themselves as external to the journalistic field and who rank their personal achievements above a possible national achievement. Alon Mizrahi, one of the national team players answered the question ‘What would you choose: a good contract in a big club next season or scoring a goal against Austria?’ by saying ‘Oh … I don’t know what to tell you’ (Bismut, 1999: 10).

This type of discourse illustrates fundamental changes in the Israeli cultural ethos, delineating the triumph of individualism over collectivism (Sagy et al., 1999). The prerogative of the national identity is no longer perceived as natural, and values such as self-sacrifice for the sake of the collective gave way to self-fulfillment. As part of the expansion of the sports sections, more room than ever is devoted to coverage of rival teams and the provision of a platform for foreign journalists, who present the viewpoint of these teams, which was previously absent from the journalistic discourse, thus blurring the boundaries between ‘us’ and ‘them’.

The feminization of journalism in Israel accelerated since the 1980s (Caspi and Limor, 1999), and it is assumed that currently women compose roughly half of the journalistic workforce (Meyers and Cohen, 2011). The pace of this change was far slower in the sports sections, with several notable exceptions. Hence, for instance, since the 1990s Yediot Aharonot’s sports section has featured women writers, but their journalistic role was of a designated outsider – offering ‘anthropological’ and at times subversive observations, exploring a seemingly all-male realm. Irit Linur (1999), a female Yediot Aharonot columnist wrote,

If you don’t regard national matches as the very essence of the State of Israel, you can ask yourself some questions that are not about sporting achievements […] Perhaps, it’s time for Israeli journalists to finally renounce their sticky relationship with the national team, and judge it on its merits. (p. 2)

Around the same time, the local Tel Aviv weekly Ha’Ir started publishing in its sports section a column written by female journalist, Vered Shapira (1999), voicing an alternative point of view, which placed local identity before national identity, and offered the national team conditional sympathy, at best:

There is an aggressive campaign to convince us to link our personal condition to the national team’s ascent to the European finals, a connection that a person usually keeps to himself and the [local] team he has identified with since the age of six … Something fundamental has changed about the national team. No more open credit, or heart pressures; more polite interest and acceptance of reality – emotional detachment. (p. 115)

Shapira’s viewpoint, that the national soccer team is a product in need of a public relations (PR) campaign to gain identification from the public, reflects the tension between viewing the team as a national symbol and the accelerated commercialization process Israeli soccer underwent through the last two decades (Ben-Porat, 2003). This distant style is typical of Ha’Ir’s writers, many of whom did not come from the ranks of sports journalism. They emphasize their alienation from the national collective by referring to Israeliness in the third person, as can be seen in the writing of the cinematographer Ari Folman (1999):

Scharf [the national soccer team head coach] is humus in a pita … he is the authentic Israeli. Take him away from you and you lose your mirror … But, Shlomo Scharf is not relevant anymore, just like this [brand of] Israeliness … Imagine, just imagine that one of the big shot coaches will come from Europe, and he will succeed. And how he will succeed!! And then, suddenly it will prove that there is no such thing as an ‘Israeli mentality’. (p. 149)

A similar critical sentiment was echoed by Ha’aretz’s columnist Uri Misgav (2005): ‘Let’s face it, beyond tribal identification, we wouldn’t like to see teams like Grant’s [the head coach] team in the World Cup’ (p. A18). In sum, the most recent period studied features approaches unheard of, up to that point, coverage that distinguishes the writer from the national community, places actual achievements (or lack thereof) and soccer aesthetics above national pride, and uses sports as means of discussing the cons of Israeli culture.

Alongside the gradual rise of various alternative voices, the last period studied also featured the first inclusion Israeli-Arab voices. Hence, for instance, Ahmad Tibi, a member of the Israeli parliament and an avid soccer fan, told Ha’aretz in 2005,

I identify with the Arab indifference towards the match [between Israel and Ireland]. I look at this match as sports only. What interests me is that the Arab team players will stand out and show great ability. If [the Arab player] Abbas Suan plays I want to see him scoring goals […] that could shut the mouths of all the country’s right-wing racists. (Gali, 2005: A18)

Following the same line, during the 1990s a self-reflexive discourse addressing themes of journalistic practices reached the sports sections for the first time. Such a discourse that focuses on ethical issues poses a threat to the nationalistic discourse that characterized sports sections up to that point. And so, whereas during the 1980s journalists addressed the professional community in the first person plural, during the 1990s and more so in later decades, one can hear voices that criticize sports reporters who support the national team, unconditionally. Hence, for example, columnist Eli Mohar (1999) wrote in Ha’Ir,

Arrogant journalism that consistently fosters unrealistic expectations and a false picture of our soccer, determined that not making it to the European championship would be a failure […] My sole consolation is that at least the readers of BaSha’ar [Mohar’s weekly column] were not deceived, and were given reliable journalistic service all along the way. (p. 107)

And so, Mohar’s claim that he is no longer guided by blind national pride, but rather by reliable journalistic norms, illustrates the rise of professional discourse at the expense of nationalistic fervor.

The establishment: politicians and heads of the Soccer Association

Following the aforementioned dominance of the political establishment over the sports field during the state’s early years, it is not surprising to find sympathetic descriptions of heads of State and parliament members in the 1940s–1960s reporting on the national team. For instance, Ha’aretz’s 1956 coverage of the Israeli team’s match against Yugoslavia focused on the official reception by the Yugoslav government representative and ignored the players altogether. Furthermore, it was the head of the delegation that provided post-match reactions, rather than the players who actually participated in the game but remained voiceless (Dolev, 1956).

During the 1970s–1980s, as in the previous period, prime ministers and politicians were depicted with respect, and no criticism was leveled against them. In contrast, Soccer Association officials were treated by reporters with profound criticism. The main accusations focused on amateurish management that thwarts the team’s success.

During the last two decades studied, almost all references to politicians disappeared, and the criticism was mostly aimed at Soccer Association officials who were blamed for commercializing the national team and for sacrificing the team’s success for financial gain: ‘Levi [chairman of the Israeli soccer association] preferred the financial consideration […] What are points versus shekels?’ (Beckerman, 1999: 106).

The coach

Sports journalism scholarship indicates that the coach is usually the main protagonist dominating the coverage of team sports. The coach is perceived as representing the entire team and is attributed super-powers and absolute control over the players (Horne et al., 2000). However, an examination of the sports sections in the Hebrew press reveals that the coach was not always positioned at the center of the narrative. Moreover, the coach’s character is structured in the studied coverage as contrary to the team’s character, and he is portrayed, in some cases, as someone who denies team members the opportunity to succeed. During the formative era, the coach’s character was marginal in the narrative, but there was nevertheless some criticism that portrayed the coach as standing in the way of the team – whether by lowering morale or by adopting a cowardly strategy.

Through the 1960s–1980s, sports reporters addressed the coaches via two dominant frames: either as insecure in the personal aspect or as employing defeatist tactics in the professional aspect. Before a match, the coach was portrayed as conservative, overly careful, and fearful of confrontation, whereas the players were often described as confrontational: ‘Coach Shefer’s dark mood is obvious; he is losing his confidence the closer we get to the team’s first match in the World Cup’ (Arazi, 1970: 13). Six years later, a Ha’aretz reporter explained yet another poor performance of the national team in the following manner: ‘in my opinion, [the team didn’t win] primarily because the coach didn’t dare let them play to the best of their ability; that is, to take advantage of their clear technical and tactical superiority’ (Arazi, 1976: 5).

In order to decipher the sports sections contrasting positioning of hesitant and weak coaches versus decisive and manly players, it might be useful to consider the Zionist ideological distinction between diasporic Jews and ‘new Jews’: Peled (2002) argues that the concept of the ‘new man’ is not an original Zionist theme, and like most Zionist discursive tropes, it was borrowed from more modernistic discourse. According to the Zionist master-narrative, the ‘new Jew’ is a modern secular laborer who is young, vital, and brave. In contrast, the Diasporic Jew was portrayed as a detached person, busy with spiritual matters and personal survival, who grovels to the gentiles and spends his time on Talmudic quibbling (Shapira, 1997). Therefore, the sharp journalistic distinction between hesitant coaches and decisive players could be interpreted as an echoing of the ideological void between ‘old’ coach and ‘new’ vital players.

The last studied period reflects a change in this pattern: Shlomo Scharf, the aforementioned national coach, was presented in keeping with the features of the ‘new Jew’. In fact, Scharf was described as ‘the ultimate Israeli’ who is not afraid to take risks. Scharf is often referred to as someone who disregards tactics and theory (‘he despises working from the head’ (Folman, 1999: 149), as charismatic (‘because except for some wise guys in the media, everybody loves Shlomo Scharf’ (Dorfan et al., 1999: 5–6), and as straightforward (‘He’s riffraff, he’s harsh, he’s direct’ (Folman, 1999: 149)).

However, the ‘new Jew’ assumed that the characteristics, which in the past were deemed inherently positive, are now used as means of ridiculing Scharf’s character. Katriel (1999) claims that with the erosion of the tzabar (lit. Opuntia cactus; a symbol of native Israeliness) ethos, directness has lost its appeal as a major ingredient of the Israeli cultural style. Accordingly, Scharf’s typical frankness is now presented as a negative feature and is used as means of unburdening some of the responsibility put upon the players. Scharf’s disdain for theoretical aspects, which echoes the ‘new Jew’, is relentlessly criticized in the sports sections: ‘In an era when the Guttmans and Eli [Israeli soccer coaches] memorize balanced diet tables during summer break … Scharf can at the most, function as a motivator’ (Folman, 1999: 149). The gap between the European knowledge and experience, garnered by Israeli players who play in European teams and the local coach, was now perceived as insurmountable: ‘Just like Revivo, Berkowitz and Banin are playing in Europe, the coach has to be an experienced European’ (Shapira, 1999: 115). Thus, Scharf’s Israeli characteristics were belittled as the players’ ‘European qualities’ were glorified.

The players

During the earliest studied period, in most reviewed newspapers, the players occupied only a marginal role in the narrative. Nonetheless, one can identify two distinctive features attributed to them, for the most part in line with the characteristics of the ‘new Jew’, namely, a fighting spirit and physical fitness although the team was defeated in all of its matches: ‘The Israelis fought like tigers. The match was almost even’ (Bitsur, 1956: 4). The results of matches were perceived as secondary as the team’s fighting spirit, rather than its professional ability, was tested. The disdain for theoretical abstractions accompanied by the glorification of the fighting spirit, all attributes of the ‘new Jew’, was expressed in Ma’ariv: ‘We will be tested neither by technique nor by tactics. We will be tested by the fighting spirit of our boys’ (Ben Avraham, 1956: 4). Alongside the emphasis on the players’ combative mentality, they were also described as being very fit. Thus, Nordau’s (1936) (one of the founders of the Zionist movement) vision of ‘Muscular Judaism’ took shape in the sports sections of 1950s Israeli dailies, with limited reference of the fact that the national team was always defeated.

It should also be noted that at that time, Israeli players were amateurs, which meant that 1940s–1950s journalists were not concerned with the economic aspects of the game. And so, the sole motivation attributed to the players was national pride, which prompted them to fight for the nation, as cited in Ma’ariv: ‘Swifter than eagles, stronger than lions, ² to do the bidding of their audience, who wanted less of them than they [the audience] received’ (Giladi, 1956: 5). During the 1960s–1970s, the players occupied a far more central role in the narrative as they were routinely mentioned, both textually and visually. The players were depicted as motivated, self-assured warriors, who although not always victorious will never give up: ‘The heart expands when seeing our players’ fighting spirit, sacrifice and willingness to give all …’ (Ben Avraham, 1970: 8). Another central aspect that characterized the players’ image was their mental stamina. Whereas, as mentioned, the coach’s character was constructed as hesitant and worried, the players were portrayed as unafraid of any confrontation.

During these years, the players were often described as combining uncompromising fighting spirit with tactical wisdom and use of their ‘Jewish head’. Nevertheless, contrary to the praises of the players’ mental strength, reporters were skeptical about the players’ physical prowess, as they were usually portrayed as physically weak. One can therefore say that during that period the image of the ‘new Jew’, as a key image in sports discourse, was fractured.

Another noticeable change in the reporting patterns of this period was the initial address of the economic aspects of the game. Israeli players of that period were still amateurs, at least allegedly. Whereas in previous years the players’ only reward was national pride, after the 1964 tournament they received, for the first time, limited material benefits – a weeklong hotel vacation. But beyond this one-time prize, the association refused to discuss the issue of regular remuneration. The vacuum created by the gap between the Israeli players’ amateur status and the salaries earned by members of other national teams was bridged during the 1970 games by the Jewish community in Mexico, that promised each of the players a US$200 bonus in order to motivate them in the match against Sweden.

During the 1980s and onward, the players’ image underwent a dramatic change: they were no longer warriors fighting for the nation’s honor, but rather a bunch of spoiled, unpatriotic youths. The players were portrayed as unwilling to fight to the limits of their ability for the nation: ‘Is our new generation less talented than the 1970 generation? Perhaps this is not the case. But they are definitely more spoiled, more fattened and self-satisfied, richer, arrogant and lazy’ (Arazi, 1985: 5).

Following the same line, during the 1985 tournament, some reporters referred to the players’ assumed lack of patriotism:

What we have today is a group of soccer players for whom national honor, the anthem and Israeli pride probably mean very little. It’s a group that is not excited by anything except for a fat headline about a fat fee. (Sagi, 1985: 5)

In terms of Israeli national character traits, the coverage of the 1999 tournament yielded further harsh criticisms: ‘Most painful was the Danish remarks after the match about the Israeli mentality; they knew that Israel – the besieged fighter whose fighting spirit was once its secret weapon – would collapse if it would be handed a goal’ (Mohar, 1999: 107). Hence, the characteristics of the ‘new Jew’, which journalists in previous periods mobilized in order to praise the players, now indicated the gap between the desired ideal and its fulfillment by the players of the national team.

During the last examined period, economic discourse became a major coverage theme. The norm of paying the players for sporting achievements in order to increase their motivation has become routine, and so the press addresses the issue often. Not only is remuneration seen now as natural, but the players feel that it is not high enough and that they have to negotiate its amount. It seems, therefore, that throughout this last examined period, ‘talking Zionism’ is not sufficient to motivate professional players, who need to be financially motivated as well. The players are now perceived as professional mercenaries, fighting solely for their personal careers.