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Continuing our occasional series on defunct competitions, Lionel Birnie dons his plimsolls and recalls the glory days of the televised indoor tournaments

Despite increasingly sophisticated coaching meth­ods, the humble five-a-side has endured. It is still the traditional way for teams to round off the last training session of the week. But despite its far-reaching popularity, no one would think of organising an indoor  tournament for Premiership clubs. Can you imagine Sir Alex’s face if he was asked by the FA to send David, Roy and Juan Sebastian to the G-Mex the night before a Champions League match?

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Ian Cusack inadvertantly found out where the next generation of Chinese stars is coming from – Slough

Most teachers of English as a foreign language spend the close season working in summer schools, where the work is badly paid and desperately unrewarding. This year, however, I found my dream post. “WANTED!! Exper­ienced teacher with a knowledge of football to teach a party of teenage Chinese student footballers.” A quick email of my CV and a five-minute phone interview got me the job. The place was called Teikyo Women’s College, just outside Slough. On arrival I was introduced to my colleague, who would coach the team while I was employed to teach in the afternoon and show them videos at night.

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Every club now has a community scheme, but some are much more effective than others. We looked at how two first division clubs have tried to balance ambitions on the field and engagement with their local area. Millwall chairman Theo Paphitis outlines his strategy to Andy Lyons

Is there a tension between trying to get Millwall into the Premiership and trying to maintain the community pro­grammes the club has established?
No, they go hand in glove. Without the community you haven’t got a football club. The community scheme is about remembering your roots. If we get some success on the playing side along the way then that’s great too, but it shouldn’t happen in a way that prejudices the connection with the community. Without the club funding our community scheme couldn’t operate but it is run separately from the club as a charitable trust. We have just taken on the Lions Centre, which is what used to be the council leisure centre around the corner and that is the hub of our operations. What we’ve got here dedicated to community is probably more than what a lot of people have got dedicated to their entire football club. That’s been key from the day I arrived. It means we can get kids to come to us. Going to schools with a couple of people in club tracksuits giving away a few freebies is fine, but actually geting them here to let them spend a day at the club, see the stadium, see the changing rooms, play on the five-a-side pitches with some professional FA qualified coaches – that’s totally different. Also, it allows us to have classrooms and computer equipment. Football is the key, but we don’t bring them in just to knock a ball about.

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In the first of a series on players who have had an unusual appeal to fans, Al Needham mourns the failure of his schoolmate to hit the heights

It’s a galling experience when you realise you’ll never make it as a football star, but even more of a kick in the nuts when you live vicariously through someone else and they don’t manage it either. Only two people I grew up with made it in football; one was a call girl pictured on the front of the News of the World with Alan Hudson. The other was Wayne Fairclough. 

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Saturday 2 Germany drop World Cup points in a 2-2 draw with Finland, who had been two up at half-time. Northern Ireland suffer a fifth successive defeat, 1-0 to Bulgaria (“It was Sunday park defending,” groans Sammy McIlroy) while Ryan Giggs misses an open goal in Wales’ 2-1 home defeat by Poland. The Rep of Ireland are held 1-1 at home by Portugal. The two sides’ pre-match sniping is rounded off by Portuguese coach Antonio Oliveira making a rude gesture at Mick McCarthy at the final whistle.

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