Aside from the bad memories it holds, Roy Chuter examines why Heysel is not safe enough to stage major football matches
Of all the places you’d think you have a right to expect to find the latest planning and technology, and where the lessons of eighties disasters would have been most thoroughly learnt, the Heysel Stadium has to be top of the list. But for many of the Irish fans who visited the redeveloped stadium in November, it was obvious that problems remain.
Phil Dorward looks at the impact of Ivan Golac, one of the first foreigners to manage a football club on these shores
When Ivan Golac was sacked as manager of Dundee United in March 1995 he returned to his native Yugoslavia to buy a chocolate factory. It was totally in keeping with the events of the previous two years: Golac realised the dream of winning the Scottish Cup, United’s first victory in seven attempts, before dispensing with tactics and getting United relegated the next season. In essence, Golac was a pseudo European manager, chocolate being the only continental thing he ever produced.
Boyd Hilton wonders what went wrong for a great Arsenal No 7
Once upon a time, in the era before Sky, before the Taylor Report, before Football Came Home, there was a great player for Arsenal who proudly and appropriately wore Liam Brady’s Number 7 shirt and earned the admiration of 50,000-strong Highbury crowds.
Scotland's biggest clubs are threatening to resign from the league. Paul Hutton details their bizarre plans
Even the most casual observer of Scottish football can hardly have been surprised by the news that Scotland’s Premier League teams were planning to resign from the League at the end of the season. It was, after all, common knowledge that they had already employed an accountancy firm to investigate how the Scottish game might be improved (bless ’em). More importantly perhaps, almost five whole years had elapsed since the leagues were last tinkered with.
Newcastle don't have happy memories from their last European campaign. Ian Cusack explains why
The last trophy Newcastle United won was the 1968-69 Fairs Cup, now the UEFA Cup. Defending the trophy the next season, The Toon went out on away goals to Anderlecht in the quarter-finals. Most people probably imagine that was the extent of Newcastle’s European experience until 1994’s comedy defending allowed Athletic Bilbao to come back from the dead to win on away goals.