Wednesday 2 “There was nothing kick and rush about that,” says Martin O’Neill as a Matt Elliott goal takes Leicester to the Worthington final at the expense of Villa. “We had our chance and we choked,” says John Gregory, who also claims that Leicester are about to take Stan Collymore off his hands, though the clubs are yet to agree on a fee. Swindon, eight points adrift at the bottom of the First, call in the administrators. They are currently losing £25,000 a week. “I believe we’ll be the first of many,” says chairman Cliff Puffett. The football authorities lobby the government to bring in restrictions on the number of non-EU players used by English clubs to two per team. “A Premiership team without one player from the UK sends out the wrong signals,” says the PFA’s Gordon Taylor. Ears burning, Gianluca Vialli says: “A quota might protect young English players but clubs won’t be able to compete in Europe if we stop some non-EU players joining us.”
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Dear WSC
Just a pedantic correction to Matthew Taylor’s piece in WSC 156 about foreigners in Britain throughout the century. Danish international Nils Middleboe did indeed play for Chelsea from 1913, but not just for one season. He made 46 appearances for the club between 1913 and 1921, a period encompassing five seasons. As an amateur, he reputedly never even claimed his expenses, rather like today’s foreign contingent. Incidentally, and though I’ve got nothing in particular against Germans or Germany myself, I was interested in Uli Hesse-Lichtenberger’s suggestion in the same issue that the Belgians have never forgotten the German invasion of 1914. The similar over-running of their country in 1940 probably didn’t help either and may be fresher in some elderly Belgians’ memories.
Peter Collins, London SW17
The last thing clubs in crisis need is squabbling, whether within their bored or with their own supporters. We investigate the plunging finances and legal fees
Of all the things football clubs should be spending money on, lawyers would have to be near the bottom of anyone’s list. The case of Newcastle United, however, in which they are being sued by their own fans, may prove to have lasting significance. As has been widely publicised, the club sold bonds for £500 which appeared to guarantee fans the right to a seat for ten years (“your name will be fixed permanently to your seat” promised Kevin Keegan ). With the expansion of the ground, however, the club are now proposing to move 4,000 season ticket holders in the Milburn and Leazes stands, including some bond holders, to less attractive positions, so that their current seats can be used for corporate hospitality.
Monday 3 “Man Utd will be laughing in Brazil,” says David O’Leary as Gareth Southgate scores the Villa goals that beat Leeds 2-1 at Elland Road, while Arsenal are held to a draw at Sheffield Wed and Sunderland lose 1-0 at Wimbledon, where the officials fail to spot Nicky Summerbee being elbowed in the face by Ben Thatcher in the build-up to the game’s only goal. Branko Strupar, the Belgian Croat, scores the first Premiership goal of the 21st century and adds a second as Derby sink Watford deeper into trouble. Southampton move three points clear of third-bottom Bradford after beating them 1-0. The Nigerian FA will demand that Arsenal be dismissed from this season’s FA Cup if they refuse to let Kanu join his country’s African Nations Cup squad until after next weekend’s tie with Leicester.
The West Midlands has a rich heritage of football but, as Steve Field finds out, the desperation to beat the local rivals has sometimes been substituted for success
When Aston Villa’s opponents failed to show up one Saturday in the 1880s, Joe Tillotson (so legend has it) threw down the bloater he was frying in his Summer Lane coffee shop and went next door to the draper’s owned by fellow director William MacGregor. Both men were indignant and declared angrily that something should be done to ensure fixtures were honoured. It was a first faltering step towards modern professionalism and it was to lead to the creation of a Football League for the most prosperous and ambitious clubs in the north and midlands.