Search: ' La Liga'

Coventry filled their old ground for a fantastic finale, but often struggled to do so and Neville Hadsley wonders why they have to move to a venue fit for Kylie and U2

It hasn’t been a good 12 months for Coventry City chairman Mike McGinnity and his board. First he sacked a popular manager, Eric Black, then compounded the error with City’s worst appointment in living memory – Peter Reid – who, instead of achieving the “instant success” McGinnity declared he wanted, pitched the club into a relegation battle.

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The Italian authorities have reacted hard to recent embarrassments, but are also groping their way towards a more positive ‘English solution’, writes Paul Virgo

The shower of flares that halted Internazionale’s Champions League derby with AC Milan triggered some tough talking from the Italian authorities. Police have been instructed to call off matches at the first sign of trouble, inside or outside the stadium. Likewise, the Italian federation (FIGC) has given referees instructions to suspend matches if fans hurl flares or other missiles. Turnstile checks have been beefed up to make it more difficult to smuggle flares or offensive banners into the grounds. Teams whose fans are responsible for trouble causing a match to be abandoned will automatically lose the game 3‑0. If the trouble involves both sets of fans, both teams lose 3‑0.

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The death of 39 fans at the 1985 European Cup final was the culmination of an era when, as Mike Ticher recalls, English football appeared to be in terminal decline

It’s the timeworn right of each generation to complain that things are not what they used to be. In 1983, Geoffrey Pearson’s classic work Hooligan: A history of respectable fears showed how at any given point in the past 150 years public opinion held firmly that society’s current state of violence and mayhem contrasted with a peaceful “golden age”, consistently located about 20 years previously. Oddly, the very time he was writing has proved the exception to his rule. In football at least, no one in their right mind would want to risk a return to the mid-1980s.

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Australia may be getting a slightly easier ride to the World Cup by joining the Asian qualifying system, say Matthew Hall, but naturally, this one's all about money

Don’t get confused. Australia’s entry into the Asian Football Confederation is not about a fairer passage to the World Cup finals. Although taking part in a genuine qualifying campaign of up to 16 games, home and away (rather than beating American Samoa 31-0 then facing a rampant Uruguay in a play-off) is an excellent side dish, the main meal is about something a little more complicated: money.

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Referee Robert Hoyzer has caused chaos in Germany by admitting that he fixed matches for sex, money and high-value electrical goods, as Paul Joyce reports

Bribery scandals have rocked German football before, not least during the 1970-71 season when more than 50 players were discovered to have manipulated the outcome of Bundesliga matches. Few be­lieved, however, that the man in the middle could be involved in match-rigging until January 2005, when 25-year-old referee Robert Hoyzer admitted receiving €67,000 (and a plasma TV) for fixing the results of four matches, and attempting unsuccessfully to influence the outcome of two others.

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