Soaring TV deals for Real Madrid and Barcelona have left the rest facing an ever greater struggle to compete. Phil Ball gets out his calculator and an impressive array of signal boosters and cable boxes
Just how much money does any one team need? Real Madrid’s projected deal with Telemadrid, timed to run from 2009 until 2013, would earn them across five years the equivalent of the gross national product of Mali. Who needs an Abramovich?
Indoor football is largely a form of exercise in this country but, as Steve Menary reports, the version known as futsal is a sport in its own right abroad. Can the UK’s FAs catch up?
In three years, England have not won a game and only avoided defeat once. Even that was a 5-5 draw against Cyprus after being three goals ahead.
The Spanish aren't happy, but UEFA could soon have another member if the British territory can see off some last-minute objections. Tim Stannard reports from the sunny Mediterranean
The British territory of Gibraltar is famous for a number of things – purse-snatching monkeys, tax-dodging businessmen and a giant rock, for starters – but certainly not football. All that is about to change, as UEFA are on the brink of making the pint-sized peninsula their 53rd member, enabling a team to join the 2010 World Cup qualifying campaign.
When countries had only one European Cup entrant, the UEFA Cup commanded attention. All that seemed to change. But, asks Luke Chapman, is the junior competition now the less predictable one?
Two years ago, after a defensive display in Turin earned Liverpool a place in the semi-finals of the Champions League, a radio reporter light-heartedly asked a Reds fan what was more important: winning the European Cup or ensuring qualification for the competition next year. “Hmm,” pondered the supporter, apparently in all seriousness, “that’s a tough one."
Leaving Africa can be a culture shock – especially when you think living in Poland or on the Mediterranean are much the same, as Jonathan Wilson reports
Remember Julius Aghahowa? Lightning fast, multiple somersaults whenever he scores, linked with Arsenal? After a series of explosive substitute appearances at the African Nations Cup in 2000, he was Nigeria’s great striking hope at the 2002 World Cup, but essentially football has passed him by. In six years he has gone from teenage prodigy to a 24-year-old yesterday’s man.