I have resisted this move for a long time. Too long perhaps.
Nevertheless, to explain why and how we finally got here, to my own website, it’s always good to rewind to the very start. I set up the first English-only account on Czech football in July 2019. Around Christmas 2020, just as the second wave of Covid hit Czechia, I decided to run the first mid-season thread utilizing advanced data, back when X was still solidly Twitter, and my greatest ambition was to just not be another Twitter account and bring some nuance to the Grand Twitter Debate around Czech football. That worked out pretty well, and so — drunk with early success, while deep into the Covid-induced isolation and, frankly, boredom — I ventured to Patreon, back when it was still a thing and HeroHero largely wasn’t, to entertain… up to 8 patrons at the height of the era. So yeah, this move didn’t exactly draw a crowd — but it did reaffirm one thing for me: I wanted to channel my earlier graphomania on English Premier League at EuroFotbal.cz and produce longform reads in English on F:L/ChL, too. Just for more people, preferably. Thus, Medium.com became my creative home for the next 4+ years. Until now.
The reasons why I had to make this move — ie. why it indeed became a necessity more than a craving — are varied. First of all, as my parent team stats spreadsheet developed from this in 2020/21 to this in 2024/25, with other spreadsheets following suit in pulling more data and extracting even more trends, I quite simply realized that by rattling off words at the sustained rate (which is the best feasible rate for a human with a 9-to-5 job without sacrificing the usual sophistication and level of detail), I’ve gradually moved from “I’m only hiding a little fluff which is always part of the creative process” to “damn, I’m not showing and/or communicating a lot“. That’s why the Dashboard page is here; to give you a bit more taste and a peak behind the curtain — for now limited, but to be developed the most throughout 2025/26 with more time on my hands following the conclusion of my annual team preview series.
Second of all, as my datasets — and metrics derived from them — got more elaborate, I started to feel that the usual “Behind the quirky metrics” piece I kept publishing in anticipation of each year’s preview series wouldn’t allow you, the reader, to sufficiently follow this time around. That’s why the Statbook page is here; divided by team and player-related stats, giving you a structured overview of what all means. You can always head there (and I’ll make sure there are enough links from articles, too) for background information and concrete examples, while some key and repeatedly used abbreviations like xGA or PPDA will be served on hover for a quickfire explanation so I don’t need to populate the text itself. Anytime an abbreviation is underlined and bold like this, you can be confident in receiving help.
On a related note, and third of all, this structured approach also allows me to introduce tags and categories in a smoother way, so now you can sort through articles by month or topic, see articles for international or club scene only, etc. — a simple function that was, once again, not possible to implement at Medium. While it will take some time for me to move the entire backlog of articles over here, the crossroads already feature some nice little nuggets for you to appreciate, like for example Kuba’s annual forecast performance overview and a list of all pizza-qualified regulars at the top of each Club‘s page.
Finally, the dreaded paywall. Courtesy of the popular demand, it will be there — but only to an extent. My mission remains, in principle, unchanged since the beginning: I want to spread the word about Czech football, and not limit myself to purely Czech audience that’s bombarded by information from all angles. My mantra still goes: it’s better to reach tens or lower hundreds of Czech readers partially (due to a language barrier that’s often mentioned to me by readers themselves) while also reaching a double-digit number of foreigners (EN) than reach double the number of Czechs and no foreigners at all (CZ). They may not be numerous, but outsiders do not have an alternative; my compatriots always do. To keep this spirit alive, then, all English-language text on this website will remain fully accessible, free of charge, while those interested in Czech versions of previews/mid-season reviews, advanced database-related content (ie. dashboards) — or indeed both at the same time — can pick a Plan that suits them.
DISCLAIMER ON CZECH TRANSLATIONS
This is still a website designed primarily to suit English-speaking readers, so all Czech translations will only concern longform articles, and no piece will indeed be primarily written in Czech. For the translated versions to be a viable feature in the first place, I do need to use an automatic translation tool first — specifically DeepL-powered WPML plugin — only to then revise block by block in a neat editor looking like this. This tool, crucially, allows me to both A) save precious time inside the July and January crunch time, B) maintain some creative control over the text flow, tone etc. Thanks to this, you can expect as faithful a translation as possible, signed off on by no one else than the author himself. What you cannot expect is more information; just more of the same. Providing that alone is already time-consuming and costly, hence the need for the paywall — ultimately and definitively.
he logic goes as follows:
- either a particular type of content is the driver behind your targeted spending — you’re here for sortable, filterable dashboards; or you want to read in Czech — so you pick an interest-based plan;
- or you want everything at once, but for how long is the decider for you — you’re here for an initial quick peek; or the long haul because you know our work — so you pick a commitment-based plan;
Or, you may as well screw this logic.
If you’re perfectly fine with reading my original English texts and don’t care about any dashboards, you’re welcome to just refer to the old BuyMeACoffee page and show your much-appreciated support the custom way. Not just for me, but for the whole Czech Footy team that now has three more members.
