Search: ' Sheffield Wednesday'

Thursday 1 Sighs of relief at Spurs, Wimbledon and Everton: successful appeals give the first two a shot at Europe again and the latter the services of Duncan Ferguson. Joe Kinnear, aged 49, decides he's too young to be the new Ireland boss.

Saturday 3 Eric Cantona returns to Selhurst Park. Once again his feet do the talking, with two goals in Manchester United's 4-2 win over Wimbledon. Newcastle stay nine points ahead, though, with a 2-0 win at home to Sheffield Wednesday. The two most highly-fancied strike forces in the Premiership meet at Anfield – so neither Spurs nor Liverpool can manage a goal. Derby draw at Grimsby, to make sure that Division One keeps that seasonal congested look. Swindon have a clear lead now in Division Two. Nine-man Gillingham close the gap on themselves in Division Three, contriving a 0-0 draw with Cambridge.

Monday 5 Bryan Robson announces that he doesn't want the England job. Glenn Hoddle's criticism of Chelsea fans is taken as evidence that he might; Mick McCarthy, aged 35, definitely wants the Ireland job, and he's got it. "It's a daunting prospect following Jack," he says, "But I'm not going to attempt to copy his ways." Jack himself says:"I know he always felt we could have got the ball down and played a bit more. We argued about that." Could be bad news for Niall and Tony.

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Monday 1 Spurs win the battle of the reserve XIs, beating Man Utd 4-1. Peter Schmeichel, injured in the warm up, misses the second half and will be out for a month, reportedly. "We're up against it," says Alex Ferguson. Liverpool come back from two down to beat Forest 4-2 and are now three points clear in third place. An exchange of views between Joe Royle and Sam Hammam after Everton's 3-2 win at Wimbledon, during which the home side have two penalty appeals turned down, ends with Joe being pursued onto the team coach by Sam and his brother. Their Dads should sort it out.

Tuesday 2 "We have just buried the ghost of Old Trafford," says Kevin Keegan after Newcastle's 2-0 home win over Arsenal takes them seven points clear again. David Ginola scores the first inside a minute. Roy McFarland is sacked by Bolton. Co-manager Colin Todd, left in sole charge, says, "It is nothing to do with me." Uh-oh – FIFA's international board are considering a suggestion to widen goal posts by the diameter of two balls and increase the height by the diameter of one ball. The changes would be introduced after the 1998 World Cup. Plenty of time for petitions.

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With the Bosman judgment likely to prove a disincentive for clubs to carry on with youth development programmes, Chris Hall looks at the controversy surrounding the treatment of young footballers by professional clubs

Terry Murphy, the man in charge of the youth development programme at Arsenal, showed me a chart which illustrates how many players the club have in each position, in each age group, from the youngest players at under-10, to the first team. He uses this chart to plan how many boys will be retained at Arsenal’s centre of excellence from year to year.

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