Call yourself a real football fan? If so, Ian Plenderleith would like a word
I used to live with an Arsenal fan. He knew sod all about football and had only started going to watch them in the mid-1980s because that’s what all the people he met at college did on Saturday afternoon. When Arsenal won the Cup-Winners Cup in 1994 he told everyone that Arsenal had won “the European Cup”. And asked to name his current England XI he put down Niall Quinn. On the left wing.
Martin O'Neill confounded the pundits and delighted Leicester fans by declining the chance to move to a bigger club. Stephen Wagg looks at how the voluble barrack-room lawyer came to hold Filbert Street in the palm of his hand
It’s October 19th 1998, on a chilly evening at Filbert Street. Leicester City and Tottenham Hotspur are awaiting permission to kick off from BSkyB producers. “OK everyone, here comes Martin,” Leicester City PRO Alan Birchenall bellows into the microphone. The crowd stirs. “Now he doesn’t know I’m doing this,” thunders Birchenall, “but if you really want to keep Martin here at the club, SHOW HIM WHAT YOU THINK OF HIM!” Most of the 20,000 spectators jump to their feet and, amid a crescendo of noise, brandish “Don’t Go Martin” posters (issued by the local newspaper) above their heads.
A proven manager was needed to steady the ship at the County Ground after the Robins' relegation from the Premier League. But as Chris Hall explains, that was not enough for some fans
Steve McMahon has gone. Vexed and exasperated by a cost-cutting administration on the one hand, an unforgiving and am-bitious group of supporters on the other. In the end it was no surprise. Things haven’t been looking good at Swindon; results have been poor for months and confidence is low.
ITV have launched a football preview programme with an old name and no new ideas, as Andrew Pitchford reports
I know it’s early days, but can there ever have been a football preview programme as stultifyingly tedious as the all-new On the Ball, ITV’s networked reanimation of the old Brian Moore classic? Since the demise of the Saint and Greavsie double act, the commercial stations have been toying with the idea of introducing another competitor into the pre-match routine on a Saturday lunchtime and, after years of pondering, researching and focus grouping (or maybe after one lunchtime meeting and several fat cigars), they have finally come up with a package which boasts as its unique selling points the very blonde Gabby Yorath and the occasionally blond Barry Venison.
Richard Lander explains how Manchester United supporters are attempting to resist the proposed sale of the club to BSkyB
Behind the tears and the sentiment, the goodies and the baddies – and not least, the £87 million set to be trousered by Martin Edwards – the real problem with Sky’s bid for Manchester United is a clash of business interests that threatens the heart and soul of football.