Saturday 3 Man Utd don’t manage a shot on target at home to Everton but still win with a deflected goal. Robbie Fowler’s revival continues with two in a 3-0 win over West Ham to take Liverpool up to third behind Arsenal, who win 1-0 at Coventry. Derby’s surprise 1-0 win over Sunderland takes them four points clear of the relegation zone, though they have three players booked in five minutes for disputing offside calls. Man City’s improved form continues with a 1-1 draw at the Riverside, though Joe Royle is furious that a Danny Tiatto goal is disallowed for offside: “The TV replay should embarrass the ref for the rest of his career.” Spurs’ goalless draw with Charlton is their fourth in a row: “We’ll just have to keep grinding our results until we get our strikers fit,” says George Graham with something approaching relish. In the First, Sheff Wed get another turn at the bottom after losing to Watford. “We have it all to do,” predicts Paul Jewell. Joe Kinnear moves one place up the Second Division table by becoming an “adviser” to second-bottom Luton.
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Dear WSC
After hearing for the umpteenth time that 2001 is Tottenham’s year for the Cup (based on the well known logic that they always net the trophy when the year ends in “one”), it occurred to me that it is now ten years since Nottingham Forest let Brian Clough down royally in an inept Cup final display. If Tottenham fans think they’ve had a rough time in the ten years since, they should spare a thought for the eternally depressed Forest faithful who have seen their team slump from being a regular top-ten inhabitant in the top division, to being a penniless First Division club with nothing to look forward to apart from the semi-realistic possibility of Derby County joining us in the First. Sadly, the Nottingham public have no great passion for football and one can’t help wondering if the current situation would be different if we had the kind of committed support that the likes of Newcastle, Sunderland and Manchester City can claim.
Marcus Hesketh, via email
Ian Plenderleith looks back to the late 1970s, when Lincolnshire buzzed with football enthusiasm – for Nottingham Forest
Where is Lincolnshire? It’s the second biggest county in England after Yorkshire, but you’d be surprised how few people know the answer. Even some of the people who actually live there. A similar sense of bafflement can be seen etched on the face of anyone who might be asked the following: name three professional football clubs in Lincolnshire? And what have they ever won?
Clive Charles, one of the most sought after coaches in the US, says he benefited from leaving Britain. Mike Woitalla reports
British coaches in American soccer are as easy to find as fast-food restaurants on Main Street. In a nation long dependent on foreign teachers, who more likely to dominate the tutorial corps than expatriates from a land of the same language?
Update on clubs in crisis
The crisis at Port Vale took a an unexpected twist over the holiday period, when controversial director Charles Machin resigned amid an acrimonious exchange of views with chairman and major shareholder Bill Bell, hitherto seen as a staunch ally. Vale had already made headlines this season thanks to Machin’s bizarre demand of manager Brian Horton that he fill in regular questionnaires on each player, and had also admitted they were using their yellow away strip more frequently because they could not afford to replace the home kit if it wore out. Other festering sores include the ungracious sacking of John Rudge in 1999 (and legal aftermath) and the club’s long-standing failure to complete the Lorne Street Stand at Vale Park.