Search: ' Euro 68'

The European Union is expanding as rapidly as the waistlines of retired footballers. Al Needham puzzled over an event that brought the two together

The Europe United Masters tournament was held at the London Arena on a miserable October Sunday, wedged between the Disney Channel Kids Awards and Beauty and the Beast On Ice. It had a weird premise: the Foreign Office decided that the best way to mark the admission of ten new coun­tries to the European Union was to organise a kick­about for retired foot­ballers, some of them not exactly re­nowned for their Europhilia (one of the British Masters squad once said living in Italy was like being in a foreign country and another famously told Norway to “Fuck off”). Mind you, if you needed reminding that there have been worse ideas, we’re only a stone’s throw away from the Millennium Dome.

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Jim McLean has finally quit. Ken Gall says the man who made Dundee United great was right about most things, even if he didn't always put it politely

With all four Scottish entrants for European club competition experiencing varying degrees of dis­ap­point­ment and humiliation, and Arsène Wenger openly scoffing at the notion of ever signing a Scottish player, one might imagine that the game north of the border could do with all the help it can get.

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In the past decade, the quest to find Scotland's 'Third Force' has become an increasingly vain one. Gary Panton runs the rule over the brief contenders

Just months after completing their meteoric rise from the lower rungs of Scottish football to a third place finish in the top flight, the critics are claiming that Livingston’s bubble has already burst. Ten games into the season, an im­pres­sive 4-3 UEFA Cup victory over Sturm Graz could not dis­guise the fact that the Livi Lions had slump­ed to the bottom of the SPL.

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Former Belgium goalkeeper Jean-Marie Pfaff now has his own reality TV show, much in the mould of The Osbournes, which John Chapman has watched

The Art Nouveau gates swing open to a soundtrack reminiscent of Dynasty and Dallas. We’re already thinking JR. The characters are introduced: Nicolas and Debbie on the tennis court, Sam and Kelly by the pool, “Bompa” pouring himself another drink and Lyndsey jumping out of a 4×4. There’s Jean-Marie checking the financial news, while his loyal wife Carmen keeps an eye on what’s cooking in the American-style kitchen. But this is no soap. It’s The Pfaffs, Flemish TV’s answer to The Osbournes, and it’s a massive success.

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There is a new management team at Sunderland and Joe Boyle looks at how their coaching qualifications might fair in comparison to findings from a recent book

“Preparation, practice and training.” This is Howard Wilkinson’s way. After that, you’ll get some flair. As the Stadium of Light mustered one final groan at the end of Wilkinson’s first game in charge at Sunderland, the 1-0 defeat against West Ham, it was clear his players were set for a large dose of preparation, practice and training. Give me time, Wilkinson said afterwards. But, as Chris Green’s new book The Sack Race makes clear, time is something man­agers don’t have. Fifteen months is the average ten­ure in a job which, in Green’s account, of­fers long nights, sapping journeys up Britain’s motorways and the inevitable chop from a scapegoat-hunting boardroom.

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