THE 1974-75 season wasn’t a classic for English football. The country had been suffering a long hangover after the national team’s exit from the World Cup. We were excluded from the 1974 finals in West Germany, pinning our hopes on Scotland and Jack Taylor the referee. While the global audience marvelled at the exploits of […]
WITH much of Europe still in the mire when it comes to Covid-19 and the task of mass vaccination likely to stretch across the year, the time may have come to assess whether the European Championship needs to take place or not in 2021. UEFA may yet have to concede that hosting a pan-European competition […]
IN an age of anodyne post-match interviews and black-suited corporate football managers, there would probably be no place for the likes of Tommy Docherty. His bluntness, humour and market-trading improvisation would be totally at odds with the modern game. The “Doc”, as he was fondly known, has died, aged 92, and with him goes one […]
THE Guardian top 100 players is always an interesting end-of-year exercise and almost always reflects the shape of the past 12 months. But this year’s top 20 has a very disconcerting look about it – of the 20, seven are over 30 years of age and the first three are well into their fourth decade. […]
AT the risk of sounding like Messrs Cleese, Idle, Palin, Jones, Gilliam and Chapman, Sheffield United no longer have one of their key weapons: “Surprise”. This is just one of the problems facing the Blades in 2020-21 as they lurch from disappointment to disappointment. The club must be sick of the sound of nerds and […]
THE PASSING of Jim McLean will sadden many people in Dundee and right across Scottish football. He was, after all, one of the instigators of the duopoly that was called “The New Firm” – Aberdeen and Dundee United which broke the Celtic-Rangers stranglehold. For many people, Scottish football had never been more interesting. But it […]
IT was the day after the day after Christmas Day in 1977 and Chelsea were playing West Ham United at Stamford Bridge. Chelsea had won 2-1 and the West Ham fans had been kept in the ground, the usual post-match ritual. This was, after all, the heyday of football hooliganism, tribal battles and non-stop taunting […]
NORWICH CITY are a popular football institution, one that is sometimes too strong for second tier football, but often lacks the financial clout to maintain a top level presence. The club has little trouble gaining support at their homely, compact arena, but with the continued polarisation of English and European football, clubs like Norwich may have […]
BAYERN Munich recently revealed a drop of around € 50 million in revenues in 2019-20 due to the covid-19 pandemic, but the Bavarians’ financial statements make reasonable reading at this stage of the crisis. Bayern made a net profit of € 9.6 million versus € 52.5 million in 2018-19. While matchday income would have been decimated […]
