Sid Lowe | |
|---|---|
 Lowe in 2018 | |
| Born | Simon James Lowe (1976-06-21)21 June 1976 (age 49) Archway, London, England |
| Education | University of Sheffield (BA, MA, PhD) |
| Occupation | Journalist |
Simon James "Sid"Lowe (born 21 June 1976) is an English columnist and journalist. Born inArchway, London, and based in Madrid, he coversSpanish football for many publications, websites, television channels, radio stations, and football-relatedpodcasts across the world.
Lowe was born and raised innorth London. He is a fan of neitherArsenal norTottenham Hotspur, his two local clubs andfierce rivals, but instead grew up supportingLiverpool. He attributes this to his older brother, Ben Lowe forbidding him from following Queens Park Rangers, the same team as he supported, so Lowe picked Liverpool from a list of teams who played in red, settling on them as he admiredKenny Dalglish.[1]
Lowe studied History and Spanish at theUniversity of Sheffield, spending a year inOviedo for the Spanish language part of his degree. There, he became a fan of local clubReal Oviedo. He later took a master's degree in History, followed by a PhD on 20th-century Spanish history. While in Spain performing research for his master's, he was approached byGuardian journalist and university friendSean Ingle to write a column on Spanish football.[1]
Lowe has been writing forThe Guardian newspaper andguardian.co.uk website since 2001.[2] He regularly appears (via phone or Skype) onThe Guardian's football podcastFootball Weekly where he gives updates on the latest news inLa Liga, the top division of Spanish football. He conducted a series of relatively lighthearted interviews for an interview series known as "Small Talk" forThe Guardian, with Spain-based and Spanish players. Some recurrent questions in the "Small Talk" interview series included: "What was the last CD you bought?", "What was the last book you read?" and "Who would win a fight between a lion and a tiger?"[citation needed]
 | This section of abiography of a living persondoes notinclude anyreferences or sources. Please help by addingreliable sources. Contentious material about living people that is unsourced or poorly sourcedmust be removed immediately. Find sources: "Sid Lowe" – news ·newspapers ·books ·scholar ·JSTOR(March 2023) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
Lowe writes regularly forWorld Soccer andFourFourTwo magazines, and gives updates on the Asian television seriesFourFourTwo. He wasTalksport's reporter in Spain who brought regular reports to theHawksbee and Jacobs show, as well as theDrive Time show withDarren Gough andAdrian Durham. He works as a football commentator and panelist for Spanish, Asian and US television, regularly appearing on ESPN, and appears on the TV channel ofReal Madrid. Lowe could also be heard regularly on the US soccer podcastBeyond the Pitch giving regular La Liga updates several times a month.
Together with Fillippo Ricci, the Spanish football correspondent forGazzetta dello Sport, and Martin Ainstein, a reporter, commentator and correspondent forESPN football in Spain, Lowe participated in aYouTube series calledForeign Desk, devoted to the coverage offootball in Spain. The three journalists discussed the weekly events in Spanish football in a casual and informal manner. Each episode lasted about four-and-a-half minutes.
In February 2008, Lowe completed a PhD, titled "The Juventud de Acción Popular in Spain, 1932-1937", at theUniversity of Sheffield.[3] On 1 October 2010, the thesis was published as a book by Sussex Academic Press titledCatholicism, War and the Foundation of Francoism: The Juventud de Acción Popular in Spain, 1932-1937.[4] The book expanded on his thesis and deals with the political history of the Catholic youth movement during the Spanish Second Republic and Spanish Civil War.[5]
During his time in Spain, Lowe acted as a translator for players likeDavid Beckham,Michael Owen, andThomas Gravesen.[6] He is known to be a fan and shareholder of the Spanish clubReal Oviedo.[7][8]
He is also the author of the acclaimed bookFear and Loathing in La Liga: Barcelona, Real Madrid, and the World's Greatest Sports Rivalry, which chronicles the relationship between the two Spanish giants and was a nominee for theWilliam Hill Sports Book of the Year for 2013.[9]
 | This"criticism" or "controversy" sectionmay compromise the article'sneutrality. Please helpintegrate negative information into other sections or removeundue focus on minor aspects throughdiscussion on thetalk page.(March 2023) |
In August 2008, Lowe wrote a news article forThe Guardian that caused controversy in Spain, in which he reported on a photo that showed theSpain national basketball team posing in a way that could potentially be seen as offensive to Chinese and other Asian people.[10] The Chinese embassy in Spain said that they "didn't consider the gesture as racist".[11] Although the article was relatively short and appeared on page 9 of the newspaper's sports section,[12] it touched off a heated back and forth between Spain and the "Anglo-Saxon" world.[13]
Lowe subsequently wrote an article explaining and defending the publishing of the article in the Media section ofThe Guardian's website. In the article he recounted the backlash that he experienced in the Spanish media after the publication of the article.[14]
