OLE GUNNAR SOLSKJÆR’s job at Manchester United is under constant surveillance: by the media, by the fans and by the club’s owners and board. If you believe all you read, then OGS is just one more big defeat away from the sack. Every week that passes, the popular Norwegian’s future appears to hang by a […]
I’VE SAT next to two members of the 1966 World Cup winning team, and both are no longer with us. I’ve been in the same bar as two others and I saw one of the England legends snip a ribbon to open a social club. To be in the company of players who achieved something […]
AT A time when the city of Manchester has been in the spotlight over the issue of lockdowns and monetary aid, Manchester United Football Club announced its financials for the 2019-20 season and revealed how the pandemic has affected its off-pitch performance. United’s total income was down almost 19% to £ 509 million, which on […]
IN A UPTOPIAN world, football clubs would represent the towns they come from and their players would be locally-reared, devoted to their places of birth and loyal to their clubs. The world has changed: in Victorian England that may have be the case, an age where someone from a neighbouring town would be treated much […]
WHOEVER advised Liverpool and Manchester United to propose a reset of the Premier League/EFL couldn’t possible have known too much about the culture of football in Britain, indeed Europe. Why on earth did these clubs, supposedly two of the most emotionally-driven football institutions in the world, think they would get away with launching a power […]
MANCHESTER UNITED are in a mess. One of the world’s most popular, richest, celebrated and envied clubs is being mismanaged and is rapidly losing ground both domestically and internationally. The club’s 6-1 home defeat at the hands of Tottenham was a shocker, not so much because they were outclassed by a peer, but because it […]
BAYERN MUNICH joined the illustrious list of teams that have won the treble of domestic league and cup and Champions League when they beat Paris Saint-Germain 1-0 in Lisbon. The Bavarians’ success is remarkable given they changed manager earlier in the campaign, appointing Hans-Dieter Flick as head coach. Flick had been the number two at […]
ENGLISH football was not quick to warm to the prospect of pan-European football and, it had no representation when the Coupe des Clubs Champions Européens kicked off in 1955, an early post-austerity attempt at sporting integration and collaboration. The author, James Walvin, in his seminal work, The People’s Game, remarked that “few areas of European […]
SEVILLA’s 2-1 victory in Köln was not only a reminder that Manchester United are far from the finished article, it was a warning that the UEFA Champions League, for which they have qualified, will be a tough exercise for a “work in progress” team. United were beaten by a club that knows all about Europa […]
