Search: ' Spain'

Cris Freddi recalls a narrow escape against Austria in 1932, when the 'man of paper' exposed the shakiness of England's supposed dominance over the Continental teams

The last time England had played a foreign country, almost exactly a year earlier, they’d thrashed Spain 7-1. Now the selectors decided it was no more Mr Nice Guy. Putting it another way, they were bricking it. With just cause, too. While Spain were a perfectly res­pectable side (the great Ricardo Zamora simply had a shocker in goal), Austria were something else. In a run of 13 unbeaten games, they’d hammered Scotland 5-0, Ger­many 6-0 and 5-0, Switzerland 8-1 and Hungary 8-2. 

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Players from eastern Europe may soon have the same rights as their EU team-mates. Simon Evans does not think that is any reason to panic

The Bosman ruling may have had a massive impact on the game but until now its reach has been restricted to the borders of the European Union. Whatever deal is reached over the new transfer system, it is almost certain to involve an extension of the Bosman principle to those countries with associate agreements and trade deals with the EU – and that means most of eastern Europe.

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Do England really need a new national stadium? And more specifically, does it have to be London?

The past month has seen two games which gave a tantalising hint of how things might have been if football had not got into such a mind-boggling mess over the reconstruction of Wembley.

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Saturday 3 Man Utd don’t manage a shot on target at home to Everton but still win with a deflected goal. Robbie Fowler’s revival continues with two in a 3-0 win over West Ham to take Liverpool up to third behind Arsenal, who win 1-0 at Coventry. Derby’s surprise 1-0 win over Sunderland takes them four points clear of the relegation zone, though they have three players booked in five minutes for disputing offside calls. Man City’s improved form continues with a 1-1 draw at the Riverside, though Joe Royle is furious that a Danny Tiatto goal is disallowed for offside: “The TV replay should embarrass the ref for the rest of his career.” Spurs’ goalless draw with Charlton is their fourth in a row: “We’ll just have to keep grinding our results until we get our strikers fit,” says George Graham with something approaching relish. In the First, Sheff Wed get another turn at the bottom after losing to Watford. “We have it all to do,” predicts Paul Jewell. Joe Kinnear moves one place up the Second Division table by becoming an “adviser” to second-bottom Luton.

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Steve Field appreciates of I See It All by Gil Merrick, the former Birmingham City and England goalkeeper

This book has a curiously casual approach to games and events long since regarded as seminal. You would expect some acknowledgment that 23 England appearances in goal – all between 1952 and 1954 – was, for a Second Division player, rather an unusual record. Or that setting up the Nat Lofthouse strike which con­firmed the “Lion of Vienna” legend was a notable achievement, or even that the 6-3 Wembley defeat against Hungary in 1953 actually took place. The explanation probably lies somewhere between Gilbert Merrick’s famed coolness and a clearly hurried printing deadline hot on the heels of the World Cup cam­paign which ended his international career.

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