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Saturday 1 Berlin’s stadium announcer is replaced after urging the crowd to cheer Germany during their quarter-final. Glenn Hoddle resigns at Wolves. “My expectations and the club’s have drifted too far apart,” he says. Paul Ince is tipped to step in.

Sunday 2 David Beckham quits as England captain, although he wants to keep playing. He tearfully mentions Steve McClaren and Peter Taylor twice, with a solitary nod towards “Sven”. “Maybe we’re a victim of our own honesty and Wayne more than most,” reasons John Terry as the campaign against “Sly Senor” Ronaldo gathers momentum. Honest Wayne is quoted as telling team-mates over breakfast that he wants to “smack him on the head and split him in two”, though he may have been referring to his boiled egg.X

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Dear WSC
Where would you say are the game’s real hotbeds? Liverpool, Newcastle and Birmingham? Wrong! Try Ipswich, Norwich, Gloucester and Wolverhampton, some of the places where there is still enough interest to make it worthwhile printing a Saturday night sports paper. We all know that new technology makes information much more easily accessible, but at least in those places the traditional method of getting the latest football news will still be available. Those towns I have named who still have Saturday “Pinks” (or whatever) have papers owned by local companies, whereas the papers in Liverpool, Newcastle and Birmingham are owned by the Trinity Mirror group. It seems therefore that while local companies can still find a way to serve their community, Trinity Mirror can’t be bothered. In view of their hostility to football fans and their contempt for the needs of their regional customers, I suggest that we all boycott all Trinity Mirror papers until such time as they either reinstate the Pinks or sell their local interests to local people.
Mick Blakeman, Wolverhampton

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Friday June 9
Possibly because Barry Davies, the last man who could take these things seriously, is missing, the BBC only show highlights of the opening ceremony. It includes lots of men in lederhosen, some ringing large cowbells attached to the waistbands of their shorts in a vigorous and vaguely pornographic manner. There’s a parade of former World Cup-winning stars, including what Jonathan Pearce describes as “The legend that is Italy”. “Ricky Villa – still tall,” gurgles Pearce later. Pelé arrives with the trophy, but brandishes it like he’s just won it, followed by Claudia Schiffer with Sepp Blatter in tow, sporting luxuriant sideburns that give him the look of Ben Cartwright from Bonanza.

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We may never know the truth about what preceded Tottenham's vital clash with West Ham. But, as Luke Chapman reports, it left players and fans alike sick to the stomach in more ways than one

Is the Premier League run for the benefit of all their clubs or just a select few? Incensed Spurs fans will argue the latter, after what happened in their final game of the season. 

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Wednesday 3 Hearts’ win over Aberdeen means they will take Scotland’s second place in the Champions League. Sam Allardyce seems to have conceded defeat in his bid for the England coach’s job after Bolton’s 1‑1 draw with Middlesbrough: “It just does not look as though I am the favourite at the moment.”

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