Search: 'Paul Ince'

Dave Jennings gives his impression on Bradford City – years of under achievement, home supporters and what went wrong last season

Why have City underachieved for so long?
Bradford may be a big city, but in recent years it hasn’t been prosperous. Not many people have a lot of spare cash, and City have never had an exclusive claim on the sporting public. Until 1970, soc­cer loyalties were divided between two lower- division clubs: City and Park Ave­nue. The latter then lost their League status and folded four years later, but City still have to com­pete with the highly successful rugby league team, Bradford Bulls. At least there’s no dan­­­­­­ger of their fixtures clashing, as they are currently groundsharing at Valley Parade.

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Tuesday 2 Nine Austrian players refuse to fly to Israel for Saturday’s World Cup qualifier. “It is far too dangerous there,” says one of them, Walter Kogler. Joe Royle says he is suing Man City for a £500,000 pay-off, on the basis that they were still a Premiership club when he was sacked in May, even though they had finished in a relegation spot.

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Belarus missed their two best players as Ukraine pipped them for a World Cup play-off spot. Paul Roberts explains why some saw sinister motives at work

"It was treachery and disgraceful,” said the Belarus coach Eduard Malofeyev. He was referring to the performance of his two key midfielders, Oleksandr Khatskevich and Valentsin Belkevich, after his team’s 2-0 home defeat in the crucial World Cup qualifier against Ukraine on September 2. Khatskevich was substituted at half-time and Belkevich on the hour. The two players then re­fused to travel to Wales for the final qualifier (“still ash­amed of themselves” according to Malofeyev) which a demoralised and weakened Bel­arus lost 1-0. This allowed Ukraine to snatch the group five play-off place at the death, thanks to a controversial late goal by Andriy Shevchenko in Poland.

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When Man Utd went to Turin and beat Juventus in the 1999 Champions League semi, you had to admire them. No really, you did. Well, Cris Freddi did anyway

In the last minute of the first leg at Old Trafford, Un­ited’s chances of reaching the European Cup final for the first time since 1968 seemed just about over. With Zinedine Zidane paralysing them in midfield, Juventus might have led by more than 1-0. Then an injury-time goal by Ryan Giggs snatched a draw, but still left an Alp to climb. History didn’t help. United hadn’t won any of their seven previous matches in Italy, losing all four in Turin – and Juve hadn’t lost at home to an Eng­lish club since Paul Vaessen’s unlikely winner for Ars­enal in 1980. After ten minutes Juventus led 2-0 and you could have named your own odds.

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Dear WSC
Whilst sleeping my way through the recent Varteks v Villa game, the aftermath of a rather nasty tackle by George Boateng reminded me fondly of the late Brian Moore. On seeing the verdict of the referee, Barry Davies announced with a resigned air that “the card is red” when, correct me please if I am wrong, it was quite obviously yellow. Either dear Barry is colour blind or he’s taking it upon himself to replicate the obvious inaccuracies that Brian was regularly capable of. Trouble is, I used to laugh at the old planetarium head, but just found myself shouting “That’s crap Barry, it’s yellow” at the screen in a really irritated manner. I suppose it livened up the worst game this millennium though.
Dave Wallace, via email

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