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The Archive

Articles from When Saturday Comes. All 27 years of WSC are in the process of being added. This may take a while.

 

The Guernsey experiment

wsc301 Guerney FC’s decision to leave their domestic league and move to England is leaving opinion divided, writes Simon De La Rue

It had to happen eventually. After seeing their club score 38 goals in eight home league matches while conceding just one, Guernsey FC fans approached Footes Lane on January 21 with confidence. They did not know much about Eversley. But then, the green and white-clad followers of this island club do not really know much about of their Combined Counties League (CCL) Division One opponents.

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Boom and bust

wsc301When their drug money dried up, one of Columbia’s most successful clubs experience their first ever relegation, writes Carl Worswick

América de Cali, Colombia’s best supported football club with 13 league titles and four appearances in the Copa Libertadores final, have hit the bottom. They were relegated in December following a play-off defeat to a team of minnows from the second division. The Red Devils are at their lowest ebb in their 84 years of existence.

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Portsmouth, Darlington

wsc301 The crises faced by Portsmouth and Darlington call into question the way in which of some our clubs are run, argues Tom Davies

Past failures of regulation are rebounding on perhaps the two most persistently crisis-plagued English clubs of the past decade, Portsmouth and Darlington. The legacies of years of debt, unsuitable ownership and mismanagement have pushed both closer to the brink than ever.

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Afghan stars

wsc301 John Duerden on the Afghan national team who, only ten years after their reformation, nearly won their first international trophy

Comedian Jasper Carrott used to joke that he grew up thinking his favourite team as a child were actually called “Birmingham City-nil”. Kids these days could be forgiven for thinking that the adjective “war-torn” was permanently attached to Afghanistan. Yet, for a few short days in December, the nation’s football team was making different kinds of headlines.

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Nothing in reserve

wsc301 Tom Shepherd argues that the concept of feeder teams is not too dissimilar to the current league structure and will have similarly negative effects

André Villas-Boas raised the possibility of introducing “feeder” teams into the English league structure recently. “The youth development system in England is not right, in my belief. The reserve leagues and youth levels are not competitive enough,” said the Chelsea manager. Villas-Boas believes that having a Chelsea feeder side in the lower leagues would help bridge the gap between reserve standards and first-team football. He also wants to improve his club’s youth development. John Terry, the last player to come through the Chelsea academy and become a first-team regular, is now in his thirties.

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