1928/29 Season Preview

Reproduced here is The Times' thoughts on the season ahead published on Friday 24 August 1928, the eve of the new campaign. Follow the fortunes of Chapman's Arsenal, in real time, on Twitter @ChapmansArsenal and here on the Football Fairground.

The opening of the season

The football season of 1927-28 ended in a tense atmosphere. Up to the very last afternoon it was uncertain which League clubs would be promoted and which relegated - so even indeed, was the position in the First Division that the result of one match could almost transform a club from one of the struggles at the bottom of the table into one of the aristocrats at the top. In the end Tottenham Hotspur and Middlesbrough descended and Leeds United and Manchester City went up, while London found no mean consolation in the rise of Millwall, the heaviest scoring club of all time, from the Southern Section of the Third Division into the Second.

The season, which opens to-morrow, will start on a note of somewhat childlike optimism. All the defeats, disappointments, and injuries of last season will be forgotten, every club sees themselves potential Champions, and a ghostly cup glitters in not a few committee-rooms. Everton, last year's Champions, are a triumphant example of the success of the policy of wholesale buying of players. The year before saw them struggling to avoid relegation; they bought heavily, saved themselves, and in the next season won their way to the top of the table. They owe a bigger debt to Dean, however, than they do to their money. One man as a rule cannot make a football team as he can a cricket side, but Dean is no ordinary footballer. He is the great centre-forward of to-day - fast, tireless, and powerful with both the will and the ability to shoot. He should keep Everton again well in the first half of the table.

Huddersfield's greatness

The real heroes of the season, however, were Huddersfield Town. No team in recent years has come so near to winning both the Cup and the Championship - at one time, indeed, both seemed within grasp, but a reaction brought about by too much football set in at the end and cheated them of both. At their best, as in their wonderful Cup-tie with Tottenham Hotspur, they were a team to challenge comparison with the great sides of football history and make every other in the country seem second-rate and stereotyped. They are a team in the fullest sense of the word, and will make a big effort this season to win the prizes they lost last. The Arsenal have definitely established themselves now as London's senior club. They will miss Buchan, however, this year, and the weakness in front of goal will become more pronounced than ever. The Arsenal badly want a centre-forward. Brain, hard as he tries, has never been an inspiration to the team, and he never inspires the spectator with the confidence that the chances he is given will not be thrown away. The Arsenal have, however, signed on Jones, an inside forward from Nottingham Forest, who played a magnificent part in his side's victory Cup-tie last season against Cardiff City. West Ham United, London's other team in the First Division, have rather fallen away since that great day in Wembley in 1923. They are a good, not an exhilarating, side, but they have the fortunate knack of producing their best form when, on paper, the chances seem all against their winning. They, too, have a centre-forward problem which has never been properly solved.

Manchester City, who come up, are a side whose success no one can grudge. It was their fate to win their way to the final tie of the Cup the year they were relegated. Undismayed, they fought bravely for re-entrance into the First Division the next season, and only an infinitesimal fraction cheated them of promotion. Always a heavy scoring side, they piled on the goals last season and finished on top of the table, two points ahead of Leeds United.

The Second Division

Chelsea at one time last season had cut out a big lead in the Second Division and it looked more probable that they would win promotion. They fell away badly, however, during the last part of the season. Their team is a strong one with a fine pair of backs and a half-back line, now that Bishop, of Leicester City, has come into it, as good as, or perhaps better than, any other in England. Tottenham Hotspur are an extremely rich club, but in spite of their relegation they have not spent fortunes on acquiring new players. One capture they have made, however, and it is a very important one - Roberts, an English International centre-forward, has been signed on from Preston North End. Osborne was never really happy as a centre last year, and the whole forward line should benefit immensely from the presence of Roberts. Tottenham are an uneven side, capable of brilliant and of feeble football, but it would not be surprising if these two London clubs were concerned at the end of the season in the fight for promotion. Millwall should do very well in the higher division. A successful side is better left alone, and the directors have very wisely given the side that won promotion the chance to gain further honours.

It is greatly hoped that Plymouth Argyle will follow them up at the end of this season. During the last seven years Plymouth Argyle have six times been runners-up in the Southern Section of the Third Division and once third - a record on consistency that indeed deserves a reward.

Football and The Falklands

Today marks the 30th anniversary of Argentina's invasion of the Falkland Islands. Events are being held in the UK and in Argentina to commemorate the conflict that lasted 73 days and claimed the lives of over 900 military personnel  in total from both sides.

From a football point of view, it's easy to forget that the conflict began just two months before the start of the 1982 World Cup, a competition featuring England, Scotland, Northern Ireland and, of course, Argentina. The ongoing events in the Falklands would cast a shadow over the preparations being made by all four countries, and this is highlighted in a back page article from the Daily Mirror on 6 May 1982.

The main headline shouted 'We Won't Go!' with the sub-headline 'Brooking says he would back a World Cup walk-out.' Yes, England's modern-day Wizard of Dribble and Gentleman of The Beautiful Game appeared to be leading the call for his fellow team-mates to drop out of the Finals, at the time only 38 days away. A look at the text that followed, however, shows that the West Ham star had probably been picked out randomly for his opinion in order to generate a little sensationalism.

In the article by Kevin Moseley, Brooking says: "I shall be supporting the nation – the lads who are out fighting for us. I feel strongly about it. I support the principle that people should be against acts of aggression like Argentina's in the Falkland Islands." He went on: "I know it's only my view, but I am sure I speak for most footballers. It's my last chance to appear in a World Cup, but I would give it up if it was morally and politically right."

Moseley pondered on the possibility that a withdrawal by England could theoretically lead to Scotland and Northern Ireland doing the same. "So it now seems unlikely that the World Cup in its present form, will go ahead" said Moseley. "FIFA may have to choose between the banning of Argentina or a walk-out by the three home countries."

To make matters worse, the Daily Mirror journalist speculated further: "The competition could be completely ruined if Brazil and the other South American countries came out against any ban on Argentina."

Hindsight obviously tells us that no such course of action came to pass as all four countries participated in the World Cup in 1982. Quite what the repercussions might be if the same thing were to happen in the modern era is something for further discussion. Could a World Cup be postponed outright if the competing nations took sides with the warring parties? Let's hope we never find out.

The 10 matches that will decide the Premier League

Following tonight's Merseyside derby, there are just 100 fixtures remaining to complete the calendar for 2011/2012 Premier League season. We've sifted through them to select the ten most decisive matches remaining.

1. Manchester City v Chelsea

In a season that's provided more than its fair share of bizarre results and ill-advised, gung-ho performances, this one could be the daddy of them all. For Chelsea, missing out on Champions League football will hit them much harder than missing out on the title will hit City. I'm going to say about eight or nine goals in this one.
(19.45 Wednesday 21 March, LIVE: Sky Sports 1/HD1)

2. Chelsea v Tottenham Hotspur

Beyond this fixture the remainder of Tottenham's run-in is relatively straightforward, defeat here though could narrow the gap between themselves, Arsenal and Chelsea and make the final weeks far more worrying.
(12.45 Saturday 24 March, LIVE: Sky Sports 2/HD2)

3. Bolton Wanderers v Blackburn Rovers

Both sides look the most likely out of the bottom five to escape relegation; that may change of course after this fixture.
(15.00 Saturday 24 March)

4. Wolverhampton Wanderers v Bolton Wanderers

A must win for Wolves, an away win could well see Bolton pull clear from danger.
(15.00 Saturday 31 March)

5. Arsenal v Manchester City

City's last real test before facing United for the title. Arsenal may take a more pragmatic approach to this fixture - choosing a point to help secure fourth spot rather than gambling for the win in a bid to finish higher than Spurs.
(16.00 Sunday 8 April, LIVE: Sky Sports 1/HD1)

6. Chelsea v Newcastle United

The further into the future you look, the less sure you can be of the significance of fixtures. As it stands though, this could be Newcastle's last chance to grab a deserved Europa League spot without having to hope that a non-qualifer doesn't make it to the FA Cup final.
(15.00 Saturday 14 April - will be re-scheduled if Chelsea get to the FA Cup semi-finals)

7. Arsenal v Chelsea

A straight play-off for the fourth Champions League spot. Chelsea's run-up to this fixture is much tougher, though in the desperate scramble for European places, both teams could be all played out by the time this comes around.
(12.45 Saturday 21 April, LIVE: Sky Sports 2/HD2)

8. Manchester City v Manchester United

If United gain a four point lead going into this game, the title is theirs if they can get a victory here. Whoever has the advantage at the end of this game should go on to take the crown.
(20.00 Monday 30 April, LIVE: Sky Sports 1/HD1)

9. Blackburn Rovers v Wigan Athletic

At the time of writing it looks like Wolves and QPR will go down along with Wigan. An away win here could drag Blackburn back into the mire, and for Wigan lead nicely to their final fixture.
(14.00 Sunday 6 May)

10. Wigan Athletic v Wolverhampton Wanderers

Twice in the last six seasons, Wigan have left it to the final day to escape relegation. This fixture could provide them with yet another Houdini act.
(15.00 Sunday 13 May)

New England Shirt: Your questions answered...

So another new England shirt is launched and predictably the reaction to it is largely negative. What's more, the reaction comes mostly from people who think the world at large benefits from its weak, misplaced views, the product of less mental effort than it takes to work out what day of the week it is.

Yes, the people who have ventured out onto the information super-highway to express their impulsive vitriol today are all wrong. Not wrong in their opinions of the new Umbro offering, after all, everyone's entitled to their own opinion. They're just wrong to think their view matters on any one of the many sub-issues this matter provides.

Here at Football Fairground, however, we wouldn't want you to think we're also content to think a few sentences is good enough by way of valid comment. Nor, for that matter, would we want you to miss out on the waterfall of England-shirt-related insipidness spilling out onto the internet today.

What we've done, therefore, is provided you with a sample of the comments received on the website of one UK national newspaper along with our replies to each. We provide this service to show that negativity need not be a way of life, hopeful that the next time a new England shirt is launched, fewer of these tin-pot revolutionaries will hammer their computer keyboards until they're satisfied something barely plausible comes out.

Note: The usernames of the people commenting below have been removed to protect their own stupidity. Spelling and punctuation mistakes (yes, there were some, amazingly) have been corrected where appropriate. Swear-words have been obscured. (We know - equally remarkable for such a fine, upstanding bunch of Mensa inductees.)

"Another new home shirt? This is getting f***ing ridiculous!"

Yes, another new home shirt. Not very long since the last one, granted, but another new home shirt. A reminder, at this stage, of two facts: (1) No-one will actually be forced to buy one, and (2) it's 2012 and this sort of thing has been happening quite a lot since, ooh, the 1980's.

"Atrocious. Collar is awful."

A new collar, and a sculpted one at that. Still, it's different, and this being a fashionable garment of sorts, it's only natural that a bit of originality is used to avoid it being in any way identical to the previous England shirt.

"It seems every time Umbro launch a new England jersey they have to have something on it that 'harks back to 1966'…  I wish they could look forward instead of constantly referencing the past."

Well for one thing, the new England shirt features a red badge for the first time, which is pretty-forward thinking. And tradition and pride in past achievements is hardly a bad thing either, is it?

"Can't see them winning anything in that."

Fine. It won't look out of place compared to the previous sixteen, then, will it?

"Listen, Umbro. The England shirt is white with blue rim, always has been. Don't mess with it. Now we'll turn up at the Euros looking like a Poland away side. Great."

'Always has been' isn't even remotely close to being true, sadly. Luckily enough, Poland will probably turn up at the Euros looking like an Austrian away side, so that's alright, we figure.

"Essentially identical to all the others. Lot of white. Three Lions. One lonely star."

A quick hunt around the internet for, ooh, 25 seconds, proves your theory to be wrong. As for the 'lot of white' bit, you do know it's been England's national football colour for nearly a century and a half now, don't you?

"If we want to wear red, go back to the 98 World Cup away kit. The first England shirt I ever had, and still has pride and place in my loft."

Wow, you like it that much, huh?

"This one is pants. And all of them have been pants since the mid-90s when shorts and shirts started being made four sizes too big."

The world of football and/or fashion clearly isn't for you, is it?

"Can anyone actually remember the last decent kit Umbro made?"

Yeah, but there'd be no point telling you because there's a very good chance our opinion would differ from yours. Clearly you're not able to deal with those levels of incomprehension, so best move on...

"What’s with the star?? What's that in aid of?"

Right, well it all started back in 1930 when this Frenchman called Jules Rimet... oh forget it.

"Too f***ing bland... just like the team we'll put out this summer."

Good. Does that mean you won't be watching Euro 2012 and boring us with that lonely thought withering inside your pea-sized brain?

"Looks like a piece of ladies’ leisurewear."

Excellent. At least Umbro can expect some revenue from one portion of the British public.

"Aaaahh, yet another ridiculous England shirt, and almost certainly the worst ever. I would like to meet the a***holes that design this s**t as they should all be thrown into the River Thames at Wapping at low tide! That stupid collar and button - it looks like a girl's blouse. The FA should all commit hara kiri right now for f***ing up with what should be a great English icon. Simple v-neck or round neck - no collars!  Job done. The red round neck shirt worn by the England World Cup winners in 1966 became an icon and if it was good enough for Bobby Moore it should be good enough for now."

Presumably this is the shirt you wear every day as you wander aimlessly around that mental institution you call home, is it?

"Umbro - don't hold a gun to people’s heads and force them to buy it. Sheesh."

Hang on... Just checking the Sale of Goods Act 1979... No obvious mentions of compulsory firearms usage that we can make out...

"I didn't know EDL members got jobs at Umbro, fair play to them."

Yes, shame on you Umbro for so willingly and irresponsibly exploiting the national flag of England so shamelessly. May you never sing another verse of Jerusalem again.

So there you have it. Next week: The weather, and why there’s hope on the way for those people that aren’t satisfied with the type they’re getting...

England Managers: The clubs they left behind (Part 2)

As discussed in Part 1, the effect of a departing club manager enticed by a tilt at the England job can often be detrimental to the club itself. There are always exceptions to the rule, of course, and one of them occurred when Terry Venables stepped down after Euro 96.

Chelsea and Glenn Hoddle

Three years before Glenn Hoddle arrived at Stamford Bridge, Chelsea had finished fifth in the old First Division table. Under Bobby Campbell, The Blues had achieved their highest end-of-season placing since 1970 and won the Full Members Cup, but a slide towards mid-table mediocrity set in soon after. Once Ian Porterfield and David Webb had tried and failed to get the club back to the top end of the table, the task fell to the 35-year-old Hoddle who had recently taken Swindon Town up into the top flight.

The hallmark of Hoddle's reign as Chelsea manager was that of good cup form but non-achievement in the league. The mid-table standard that had set in before his arrival was maintained as the former England midfielder guided Chelsea through their first few Premier League campaigns. Elsewhere, the team reached the 1994 FA Cup Final, the semi-finals of the 1994/95 European Cup-Winners Cup (eliminated by eventual winners Real Zaragoza) and the semi-finals of the 1995/96 FA Cup, but ultimately silverware remained elusive.

Under Glenn Hoddle, Chelsea had showed signs of improvement as he brought in more and more quality players to strengthen the squad. After he resigned to become England national team manager in May 1996, that gradual upward curve actually became more steeper as first Ruud Gullit, then Gianluca Vialli and Claudio Ranieri built on the foundations laid down by Hoddle. Chelsea had cast off their reputation as a middling, average team and in a trice were transformed into a regular challenger for domestic trophies and Premier League heavyweights.

Glenn Hoddle's period in charge of Chelsea shown in grey.

* (Click graph for bigger version.)

Fulham and Kevin Keegan

If Chelsea had gone up a gear in the post-Hoddle period, Fulham must have gone up several after Kevin Keegan left. To be fair, Keegan only spent 20 months at Craven Cottage and the first eight of those were as Chief Operating Officer, but it was at least the spell that saw Fulham blast off from third-tier insignificance on their way to Premier League orbit.

Fulham ended the 1995-96 season eight places off the bottom of the entire Football League – their lowest ever finish. Micky Adams began the recovery process by getting The Cottagers promoted the following season but the arrival of new owner Mohamed Al-Fayed in the summer of 1997 saw a new management team brought in to continue Adams' work.

Initially a combination of Kevin Keegan acting as a 'Director of Football' and Ray Wilkins dealing with team training, the pairing was pared down a year later to allow Keegan full control of management duties. Fulham had just lost out in the 1997/98 promotion play-offs, but the former Liverpool and England striker made up for that in 1998/99 by guiding Fulham to the Second Division title, accumulating an impressive 101 points along the way.

By this time, Keegan had already been named as the new England manager, officially succeeding Glenn Hoddle in February 1999. Yet it wasn't until the end of the season that he finally said goodbye to Fulham, and though he went on to give a brief shot in the arm to England's fortunes, it could be said that he missed out on his old club's magnificent rise to greatness.

Under Paul Bracewell and subsequently Jean Tigana, Fulham took just two seasons to reach the Premier League. They'd done so only five years after finishing 85th out of 92 league teams and since then have established themselves very much as part of the Premier League furniture. Would Fulham have done so well with Keegan still at the helm?  That is a matter for some debate.

Glenn Hoddle's period in charge of Chelsea shown in grey. *

Lazio and Sven-Göran Eriksson

A double-dip regression - that's what Lazio experienced in Serie A after Sven-Göran Eriksson took the England manager's job in January 2001.

Looking to replicate the success he'd experienced at Benfica in particular, Eriksson chose Lazio as the third Italian club on his CV in the summer of 1997. Having been frustrated not to have won more at Sampdoria and Roma, he finally found the magic touch by eventually steering the Biancocelesti to a league runners-up spot in 1998/99 and the Serie A title the season after that.

A raft of other silverware also arrived during Sven's reign: a UEFA European Cup-Winners' Cup and Super Cup win in 1999, two Coppa Italias and two Italian Super Cups all reinforced the belief that the Swede had what it took to bring success to a team, and it was hardly a surprise that the English FA put his name at the top of their list once Kevin Keegan had resigned towards the end of 2000.

Lazio finished the 2001/02 season sixth in Serie A having seen Dino Zoff and latterly Alberto Zaccheroni fail to maintain Eriksson's high standards. An improved finish of fourth the season after suggested improved fortunes were back on the agenda, but four seasons further on, Lazio ended their 2005/06 campaign in 16th position - mainly, but not exclusively due to their involvement in the 2006 Calciopoli scandal. Only very recently have the Roman club shown anything like a return to former glories.

Sven-Göran Eriksson's period in charge of Lazio shown in grey. *

Middlesbrough and Steve McClaren

There is no doubt that Steve McClaren, for all the criticism he received from Middlesbrough fans and neutrals alike, worked wonders at the Teeside club. True enough, their league form during this time wasn't much to write home about - Boro finished mid-table in the Premier League for all but one of his six seasons there - but their achievements away from the league, plus the fortunes of the club after he left, show he had a genuinely positive effect at the Riverside Stadium.

As with Glenn Hoddle at Chelsea, it was the cup competitions that McClaren found joy in. An FA Cup semi-final appearance in his first season, 2001/02, was bettered the season after when Middlesbrough won the League Cup. It meant Boro had a European campaign to negotiate for the first time in their history and to McClaren's credit they got to the last 16 of the UEFA Cup, knocked out finally by eventual runners-up Sporting Lisbon.

Before the Yorkshireman left for Soho Square, he guided Middlesbrough to one more FA Cup semi-final plus the UEFA Cup final where Sevilla handed out a 4-0 thumping, but this was uncharted territory for Boro fans everywhere and all too fleeting at that. Two seasons of consolidation arrived under the management of Gareth Southgate while a third saw the club relegated to the Championship. Tony Mowbray currently has the job of trying to turn the clock back and returning Middlesbrough to the Premier League and winning ways again.

Steve McClaren's period in charge of Middlesbrough shown in grey. *

Real Madrid and Fabio Capello

The most recent England manager wasn't at Real Madrid very long - at least not in his second spell at the Bernabeu. Brought in to arrest an extended trophyless run in July 2006, he was out of the door again eleven months later and had a further six months to wait before his first England press conference.

At Real, his remit was simple: win the La Liga title, the Champions League or both. By Spring 2007, Real were already eliminated from the latter and the pressure started to grow on the experienced Italian, but that wasn't the end of the story. In the latter stages of the 2006/07 season, Capello turned things around as Madrid not only closed the sizeable points gap with leaders Barcelona but also overtook them. A La Liga title that at one point looked unlikely was Real Madrid's eventual reward, yet it was not enough for Capello to keep his job. He was relieved of his duties at the end of June 2007.

Since then, Real have remained more or less on a par with the side Capello managed, winning one or two trophies but missing out on others. In the league, they won the Spanish championship the season after he left, but have played second fiddle to their bitter rivals Barcelona ever since.

Fabio Capello's period in charge of Real Madrid shown in grey. *

Summary
So there it is. We've looked at nine England managers and assessed the fortunes of the clubs they left behind. In five cases, it can be said that those clubs were worse off after the event. Aston Villa and Real Madrid carried on much the same after Graham Taylor and Fabio Capello left respectively, while Chelsea and Fulham went on to better things in the absence of Glenn Hoddle and Kevin Keegan.

If Harry Redknapp does get the nod in time for Euro 2012, Tottenham fans had better hope he shares a lot in common with Hoddle and Keegan's style of management.

England Managers: The clubs they left behind (Part 1)

So if Harry Redknapp does get the England manager’s job (and let’s remind ourselves that nothing’s a foregone conclusion), what kind of impact would that have on Tottenham? Come to think of it, how would any club fare if its manager walked out in favour of a dream job as national team coach?

If history is anything to go by, the answer is ‘potentially catastrophic.’ In the vast majority of cases, a club left leaderless by a manager tempted away by the blazered bureaucrats of the FA has seen its fortunes founder in the years that followed.

Ipswich and Alf Ramsey

Take Ipswich Town, for example. An innocent, unassuming club nestling in the serene backwaters of Suffolk, it’s provided two of England’s finest coaches but on both occasions fell from grace when doing so.

Alf Ramsey was the first. Taking the reins as manager of Ipswich in 1955, it took him a while to get the Portman Road machine working the way he wanted, but within five years he’d not only dragged the club up into Division Two but also Division One. They’d never played in the top flight before, but in that first memorable season of 1961-62, Ipswich Town, under the leadership of Ramsey, won the Football League championship. He’d done so with a squad which at best could have been considered ‘average’ and with next to no money to spend on improvements. It was nothing short of miraculous.

When the FA needed a replacement for Walter Winterbottom, it was hardly surprising that they paid a call on the Dagenham-born pariah. Though Ipswich were heading for a 17th-place finish the following season, there was no doubt as to who their number one candidate should be. In April 1963, Alf Ramsey stepped into the role of England manager – the first to take care of team selection and training – and Ipswich were left without the man that had transformed them single-handedly in less than a decade.

Without him, they fell like a stone down the league table. The following season after Ramsey’s departure (1963-64), Ipswich conceded 121 goals in their 42 games and were relegated back to Division Two, finishing 22nd and last. By 1966, ironically the year of Alf Ramsey’s greatest ever triumph, Ipswich were flirting with relegation back to the third tier and it was only in the 1967-68 that they finally gained promotion as Division Two champions.

Alf Ramsey's period in charge of Ipswich Town shown in grey.

* (Click graph for bigger version.)

Ipswich and Bobby Robson

Not long after, Bobby Robson took charge at Ipswich. He, too, had a remarkably positive effect on the club, guiding the team to a series of top six finishes between 1972 and 1982 (except for the 1977-78 season). European football became a regular privilege under his leadership and with players like Arnold Muhren and Frans Thijssen bolstering an already impressive squad, silverware soon started to appear in the Ipswich trophy cabinet.

An FA Cup win in 1978 and a UEFA Cup bagged in 1981 (not to mention a couple of league runners-up honours in the early 1980’s) was all the FA needed to see. When Ron Greenwood indicated that the 1982 World Cup would be the last chapter of his England managerial career, it was Bobby Robson that got the nod to replace him once the dust had settled in Spain.

Good news for Robson, but ultimately bad news for the club he left behind. In their first season under new boss Bobby Ferguson, Ipswich finished 9th. The following season it was 12th, the season after that it was 17th and finally in the 1985-86 Ipswich finished 20th and were relegated. It would be another six years before The Tractor Boys returned to the top tier.

Bobby Robson's period in charge of Ipswich Town shown in grey.*

Leeds and Don Revie

In Don Revie’s case, Leeds United held off the threat of relegation much longer once he’d taken on the national job but the drop into Division Two eventually came about just as it had done when Robson left Ipswich.

Revie joined Leeds as manager in 1961 with the club treading water in Division Two. Having narrowly escaped the drop into the third tier the following season, Revie gradually turned things around, strengthening the youth team setup and adding players to the squad with the occasional canny purchase.

The 1963-64 season saw Leeds return to Division One and once there, they never finished outside the top four from then until Revie left for the England job in 1974. Again, the turnaround was remarkable; before he left, Revie had guided Leeds United to two league titles, won the FA Cup, League Cup and two Inter-Cities Fairs Cups. Afterwards, however, the decline was notable, if gradual.

Beginning with Brian Clough’s infamous 44-day stretch in the manager’s hot seat, Leeds finished the 1974-75 season in ninth position, although it ended with an appearance in the European Cup Final against Bayern Munich which they lost in controversial circumstances. After that, Leeds had to settle for top-half finishes in the First Division as many of their great players moved on or retired. Managers came and went too (Jock Stein lasting barely longer than Clough in 1978) and in 1982 the club were relegated to the Second Division, eight years after Don Revie’s departure.

Don Revie's period in charge of Leeds United shown in grey.*

Exceptions to the rule

Not all managers go straight from club to country. Two England managers were otherwise engaged at the time of their appointment having stepped down from their regular first-team training duties. Ron Greenwood had ‘moved upstairs’ to become General Manager at West Ham some three years before he took over from Don Revie in the national setup. Terry Venables, meanwhile, had been made Chief Executive at Tottenham well before his acrimonious exit from White Hart Lane in 1993.

Ironically, Greenwood's appointment was seen initially as a short-term solution but was made more permanent following early wins over Italy and West Germany as well as a draw against Brazil, the latter two matches being friendly internationals. Conversely, Venables' contract was supposed to be permanent yet despite England reaching the last four of the 1996 European Championships, Venables stepped down after the tournament to deal with various court cases. He'd occupied the England managerial role for only 27 months covering just 24 matches.

Aston Villa and Graham Taylor

In the modern era, managers were less likely to stay at a club for upwards of five years as Ramsey, Revie and Robson had done, so when the men from the FA made their move, it tended to be for someone only recently flushed with success. Not only that, but one could argue the clubs they left behind were not much worse after the event. Whether that can be put down to the manager in question setting the club on a decent footing for the future is a matter for some debate.

Graham Taylor arrived at Aston Villa in June 1987 just weeks after they'd been relegated to Division Two, only five years after their famous European Cup win. In his first full season at Villa Park, however, he helped his team finish as runners-up to gain promotion back to the top flight again. A tough 1988/89 season followed during which relegation was a constant threat, but the following season, Villa finished third in the league and it was then that the FA made their move.

With Taylor gone, Aston Villa wobbled slightly - particularly during the brief era under the tutelage of Josef Venglos - but eventually they steadied the ship and remained a decent top-flight club. After another worrying relegation threat had passed during the 1994/95 season, they regularly finished in the top seven of the newly-formed Premier League for many campaigns thereafter.

Graham Taylor's period in charge of Aston Villa shown in grey.*

Coming soon in Part 2: Hoddle, Keegan, Eriksson, McClaren and Capello.

Would losing the Football League Show be that bad?

Despite being on the cards since the new TV deal was announced in April, the mainstream media has used the recent scheduling controversy of the BBC’s Football League Show to declare that the programme may well be axed at the end of the season. This is on the basis that the BBC have not renewed their contract with the Football League and according to reports, have no intention of doing so.

First the early rounds of the FA Cup on ITV and now the Football League Show. It seems that lower league football is struggling to find a home on terrestrial TV in the UK. It is possible that with more imaginative scheduling and audience profiling, they may find the format and timeslot that will suit its core audience. However, it does appear that a significant portion of football fans who watch Match Of The Day on Saturday night change the channel when the Football League Show starts. You could blame the dominance of the Premier League, the late night scheduling of the programme or Steve Claridge. The fact remains that an existing football-heavy audience watches something else when the programme starts and that is not good.

It is also worth considering that the highlights have been up for grabs since the early part of 2011 and the other Free-To-Air commercial broadcasters seem uninterested. This suggests that they do not believe they can make it work or that the League are charging too much money. If that is the case then is it really in the interest of TV Licence payers to bid for the rights to something that commercial broadcasters don’t want? Before we all throw up our arms in outrage about the BBC’s decision, we should consider the fact that Football League is either too expensive or not as popular as we think it is or want it to be.

However, the Football Fairground is all about the silver linings and forever in search of the Utopian dream so with the prospect of no weekly highlights show for the Football League, the opportunity exists for the League to do something more interesting with their highlights. If the broadcast realm cannot find a home for them then surely the digital realm can. At the very least, the Football league should open a YouTube channel with free, extensive highlights available to all and sharable for all.

Imagine what top independent Football League sites like The Seventy Two, The Two Unfortunates and We Are Going Up could do if they could utilise this footage. If that seems a little fanciful then why not sell licences for footage to commercial football websites and have cut down free versions for non-commercial bloggers. The digital solution may not be a universal one (particularly for viewers in rural parts of the UK who have little or no broadband coverage) but it is surely a more interesting way of dispensing free highlights rather than waiting for terrestrial broadcasters to get round to showing them. In years to come there may be opportunities to develop applications for viewers to build their own highlight show, tailored to their own club and division. If the Football League cannot appeal to a mass audience then maybe the time has come to embrace its niche.

It will require investment and no doubt some delicate negotiations with Sky Sports who produce the coverage but if the Football League can’t find someone to pay for their free stuff then perhaps they should consider giving their stuff away for free.

The Football Fairground Periodic Table

For no other reason than it's Christmas and few of us working very hard right now, we present the Football Fairground Periodic Table - an opportunity for you to while away the hours with a football-related piece of whimsy.

The premise is simple: we simply want to fill the table shown below with the names of football players whose initials match the letters in each of the cells. So for instance, element 105 - Dubnium - has the letters 'Db', so in our world that element gets renamed 'David Beckham'.

The thing is, despite our undoubted intelligence, we couldn't possibly fill in the whole table on our own, so we'd like you to help us out. If you can think of a name to go in one of the spaces on our periodic table, leave us a comment below or contact us on Twitter by sending a message to @FutblFairground using the hashtag #ffpt. The first name suggested for each element will earn the contributor a mention in our 'Contributors' section below.

As you can see, we've already filled in some of the spaces to give you an idea of what to do. The footballer names can be from anywhere in the world and from any era, but ideally they should be someone we've actually heard of so please curb your temptation to send us the name of a Venezuelan non-league reserve goalkeeper unless you really have to.

One thing to accept right from the start is that we won't be able to fill all the cells as some contain triple-letters like 'Uut' and 'Uup'. Given that there can only be so many football players with the first name Ulysees - let alone a middle name beginning with the same letter - we've decided to grey those out. As for all the other tricky ones, we'll just have to leave those unnamed for the ages.

*** UPDATE *** UPDATE ***
It's all over - our Periodic Table is complete! A huge thanks to all of you for your contributions - we couldn't have done it without you!!!

(Click image for larger version)

Contributors:
6, 19, 33, 42, 47, 82, 87, 89, 91, 105: @coakleyftbl
9, 12, 18, 24, 43, 116: @_pjt
5, 15, 21, 35, 98, 106: @micrich3
16: @terryduffelen
37, 56, 84, 86: @Dockx_1
7, 77: @UFJamesT
70, 94: @mirkobolesan
92, 104: @footysphere
1, 90: @365DaysFootball
45: @aidenmccartney
59, 61, 64, 74, 80, 109: @unitedite
8: @amcgarrie
28, 29, 49, 53, 63, 67, 97, 101: @AGibneyftbl
11, 14, 31, 34, 38, 51, 55, 57, 58, 65, 76, 81, 95, 103, 111: @andrewcharding
3, 4, 10, 13, 20, 22, 23, 27, 30, 46, 48, 50, 54, 66, 69, 73, 83, 88, 93, 99, 112: @mattrowson
102: @jwking 
17, 25, 36, 52, 78, 96, 107, 110, 114: @theexiledrobin
62, 100: @jon_hartley
75: @2ndyellow
26, 32, 41, 46, 60: @abujaandy321
108: @davidrbiggs
39, 44, 79: @grahamsibley
2: @scamp27
68, 72: @theiron
71: @jamiecutteridge

...also an honorary mention for @MiguelitoG1979 who came up with Uns Uwe Seeler for 117! Many thanks to all of you that have suggested names for our Periodic Table - give yourselves a gold star!

English League Medal Table

Someone once said 'no-one ever remembers who the runners-up were', but here at FootballFairground.com, we're happy to prove that statement wrong. Not only that, but we're also happy to remember who finished third too - specifically with reference to former campaigns in the Premier League and old First Division.

And how best to calculate top three finishes in all previous league campaigns? Why, with an Olympic medal table metaphor, of course. Witness thus (click image for larger version)...

As you can see, Manchester United occupy the USA position in the table, just ahead of Liverpool who take on the mantle of Russia for the purposes of this flimsy premise. (Imagine that the next time those two teams play.) Arsenal are third as China, so to speak.

At the other end of the table with only a token bronze medal each are Crystal Palace, Middlesbrough, Norwich and West Ham. Or Venezuela, Afghanistan, Israel and Moldova in our world.

And who in the table would be Great Britain, we wonder? Perhaps Sunderland - a team that once achieved much but is now merely a shadow of its former self.

Discuss...

On Poppies

As if English football has enough trouble with race rows it now finds itself embroiled in a deeply emotive argument about the annual tradition of displaying a poppy to remember the soldiers who died in battle during Great Britain and its Commonwealth's numerous wars. The English FA, as a gesture of support and remembrance, want the England players to wear shirts featuring a poppy motif this weekend in their friendly match against Spain. FIFA have refused on the basis that wearing the poppy contravenes their rule on the use of political symbols during their football matches.

Needless to say, large sections of the English media and the British government are up in arms. Everyone from Sepp Blatter to the Germans seems to be responsible for FIFA's refusal to break their own rule and make an exception for the Poppy. However, I believe that, not for the first time, the English media and the British government are wrong.

Expressing solidarity with soldiers who have died in battle is a political statement and wearing a poppy symbolises that statement. The poppy is also a fundraising device for the Royal British Legion which, although charitable in nature, is political.

As much as the poppy may represent a harmless act of charity and remembrance it is still a political symbol and as such is against FIFA rules on political neutrality.

FIFA have to deal with some federations whose national governments have some pretty strange views on how things should be done. This is one of the reasons why they banned political symbols on football shirts in the first place.

I know it's easy and fashionable to attack FIFA. However, on this occasion, they are right. Were the poppy to be exempt from the rule, the door would be open to politicians and other ne’er-do-wells to use football to propagate dodgy ideologies and odious politics. If FIFA were to refuse then they would be accused of bias and double standards. If they were to agree they would be accused of supporting those same views by the same people criticising them now for not allowing the England team to wear poppies on their shirts.

Unfortunately, I believe there are some folk who are using the poppy ban to push their own anti-FIFA agenda. I find this distasteful and disrespectful to the memory of those who died and to those who survived the battlefield.

Between banning political symbols and people who exploit the memory of the fallen in order to pursue their own agenda, I am with the former.

Football Fail: Everton v Liverpool

Part of the experience of being a football fan – even being a neutral – is that from time to time you have to accept the failings of the modern game. The Merseyside Derby at Goodison Park on Saturday was just such an occasion.

For those of you just returning from a weekend excursion to a nearby planet, the Everton-Liverpool game was predictably noisy, fiery and antagonistic. Liverpool were the eventual winners (2-0), but the main talking point was the sending off of Everton player Jack Rodwell.

To be brief, Rodwell lunged in with both feet to win the ball from Liverpool striker. Rodwell won the ball cleanly, but the nearby Suarez opted to leap in spectacular fashion as if the Everton midfielder had actually made contact with him. The referee, Martin Atkinson, blew his whistle, trotted confidently up to Rodwell and showed him the red card.

With the atmosphere inside the stadium already at thermonucleic levels, the air became even more saturated with ire and vitriol between the two sides and the referee. The match staggered on through a series of ever more ill-tempered episodes as several players tried to dismantle their opposing number using sheer brute force. Unconfirmed reports also suggest that some actual football broke out, but that’s not vital to our discussion right now.

What is important to note is how stupefying an effect the game had on everyone involved in it. For a start there was Referee Atkinson who was almost universally condemned for not spotting the legality of Rodwell’s tackle. Many observers have commented that Rodwell didn’t even deserve a yellow card, let alone a red one, and technically they’re correct.

That said, no-one seems to be asking why Rodwell needed to lunge in with both feet for an open ball. True, he didn’t actually touch Suarez or anyone else and yes, the match was as heated as it has been in recent times, but the potentially dangerous lunge showed the Everton player to be lacking responsibility in his play. Ifs and buts, perhaps, but worth acknowledging ahead of a serious injury that Rodwell’s likely to inflict on an opponent in the future.

Then we have the managers, Kenny Dalglish and David Moyes. In the post-match interviews seen on Match of the Day, Dalglish was first asked about the sending off. He told the interviewer that he was disappointed to be discussing the incident rather than the game as a whole. Aside from the fact that there was little football in the match to actually discuss, he went on to admit that he hadn’t seen the incident very clearly anyway. Perhaps the former Scotland international should have said that in the first place, but hey-ho.

Moyles, as you’d expect, was keen to criticise the referee and his apparent failings, yet for all that he didn’t even bother to lodge a complaint with Atkinson after the game. Hardly the actions of a man who believes in his own principles and certainly redolent of the modern football manager that thinks ‘all refs are crap’ / ‘none of them like us’. For the record, Everton have now lodged an appeal against Rodwell’s red card, presumably under sufferance.

We obviously can’t speak of football failings without a further mention of Match of the Day, if only briefly. There was an obvious irony in hearing pundit Alan Shearer complaining that the referee hadn’t done his job properly, especially when you recall Shearer’s ‘Ben Arfa’ episode from last season, but that wasn’t the biggest fail on their part.

For reason’s best known to themselves, they failed to acknowledge the terrible sight of Everton fans throwing plastic bottles and other objects at nearby Liverpool players towards the end of the game. Here was a chance for the BBC to humiliate the mindless idiots who do such stupid things, yet they chose not to bother. An ideal opportunity wasted, one would have to say.

All in all then, a multiple fail on the part of players, managers, broadcasters and fans alike. Not exactly a high point in the history of Premier League football, but hopefully one that everyone can improve upon the next time these two teams meet.

Motty: 40 Up

Love him or loathe him, John Motson is just about the most experienced football commentator on British television right now. Saturday 1 October 2011 sees Motty celebrate the 40th anniversary of his first appearance on Match of the Day, so we thought it was worth taking a look back at some of the high points of his BBC career to remind ourselves of just what a career it's been...

"Radford again... Oh what a goal! What a goal!"
Ronnie Radford's goal helps Hereford United dump Newcastle United out of the FA Cup as Motty audibly immortalises the 1972 BBC Goal of the Season...



"A chance on here... and Pearson is the scorer!"
Motson finally wrestles the Cup Final microphone from David Coleman's grasp to give us his take on the climax to the 1976-77 campaign.



"Armstrong!"
Northern Ireland give 1982 World Cup hosts Spain the shock of their lives by beating them 1-0 to top the group. Motson wasn't really expecting Gerry Armstrong to score, but then again, who was?



"Chipping it in... and a posbilmnhra... oh Rossi!"
More tongue-tied brilliance from the 1982 World Cup as a whipped-in cross catches out the entire Brazilian defence and Motty with it...



"This is getting better and better and better!"
Motty allows himself to be anything other than neutral as England come from a goal down to beat Germany 5-1 in a qualifier for the 2002 World Cup.



"Beckham... YES! YES! He's done it!"
Despite humiliating the Germans, England still managed to nause up their qualifying campaign to the point where they needed a draw in their final game against Greece. 2-1 down and three minutes into injury time, Motty was ready to commentate on the most dramatic of outcomes...



"Van PersEEE!"
Boxing Day 2008 and we witness the weird phenomenon of a man's voice momentarily reverting back to its 8-year-old self as Arsenal aim to go 3-0 up at Villa Park.

Life without Brian

Despite the euphoria of England’s emphatic 5-1 win over Germany in a World Cup qualifier ten years ago today, it was something of a bittersweet victory for me. As television coverage of the match ended, I remember watching the news bulletin that followed where it was announced that Brian Moore, one of the finest TV commentators there’s ever been, had died earlier in the day.

It’s strange to think ten years have passed since then. Somehow it seems like longer to me, but then Brian Moore had been retired from football commentating for three years at the time of his passing. I recall my thoughts at the time, feeling sorry that we wouldn’t hear his voice in accompaniment to live games on TV anymore. That said, Moore followed the pattern of many commentators who forged a television career back in the 70’s: a bright and shouty start, a progression into steady familiarity before a tail-end where the ability to quickly pick out incidents and player names seemed more of a struggle.

I choose not to remember the last part of his career. I don’t have to. Brian Moore lit up far too many football matches with his sincere, warm vocal tones to render that an insignificance. He was gloriously shouty in his early days though. As the main commentator on LWT’s The Big Match in the late 60’s, he adopted the delivery of a man clearly intent on losing all self-consciousness while immersing himself in the joy of watching football during a particularly brilliant era here in England. This he did well into the 1970’s before reining in his commentating style, but continued to remark on the events unfolding before him with reverence, conciseness and intelligence.

What provided an extra dimension to his persona, however, was his ability to present TV programmes as well as commentate on the football matches within them. As the front man to The Big Match for many years, he showed professionalism and composure in bringing together the component parts of each show. For the first few years, that meant co-presenting with Jimmy Hill with whom Moore enjoyed a friendly on-screen relationship. Much later, Jim Rosenthal joined the show to convey minor news stories when The Big Match shed the last of its early innocence, but Brian Moore rightly retained top billing throughout.

He was, to me, a perfect broadcaster. Able to accentuate the elation within football or showing compassion and dignity when the moment requested it, Brian Moore was someone who brought out the very best that the game had to offer. The internet thankfully ensures that his legacy lives on and his contribution to TV’s presentation of football should never be overlooked or forgotten. He remains sadly missed.

Transfer Deadline Day Template

It is Wednesday 31st August 2011 – the first ‘Transfer Deadline Day’ of the 2011/12 football season. It’s a day that I’ve come to appreciate about as much as a satellite TV channel dedicated to 24-hour coverage of rotting fish, and yet now I feel ready at last to embrace it fully for all its virtues.

Maybe I’m getting soft in the head as I’m getting older but I now see Transfer Deadline Day for what it is – a comedy festival for the culturally blinkered. I used to get worked up by the hoards of fans wasting their time over so many irrelevances, but now I realise I was missing the point. Thanks to the advances in modern technology (© BBC Tomorrows World 1981), everyone can chip in with a jolly joke, a shaggy dog story or, heaven forfend, report an actual sighting of a player arriving at his new footballing home.

To guide you through this momentous day, there are several options available. For those of you wanting the televisual equivalent of Red Bull being intravenously fed into your bloodstream while your nether regions are stung by a thousand scorpions, there’s Jim White on Sky Sports News, a man who starts his shift on Deadline Day like someone who believes the Lord Jesus Christ himself is returning to Earth for the second coming. And then increases his enthusiasm tenfold every hour from that point onwards.

For those that want to avoid a TV-induced cardiac arrest before lunchtime, there’s a vast array of news websites that truly come into their own on such occasions. Auto-refreshing minute-by-minute coverage ticks over from first thing in the morning ‘til last thing at night in an attempt to cover all the breaking news from every angle. An anachronism of itself it may now be, but you do at least know what you’re going to get when TDD finally rolls around.

As if to prove it, here’s a template for anyone wanting to recreate the joy of Deadline Day on their own website with full guidance on how to apply it:

08:00 Cheery introduction. Greet your transient, bewildered audience like you’ve just sat down at your desk with nothing but the provision of a personal, dedicated news service on your mind. No-one, of course, will believe you.

08:02 Tell people what they can expect over the next 15 hours, even though no single human being remains on the planet that doesn’t know the drill by now. This includes lost tribes of Amazonian forest people, high court judges and cast members from The Only Way Is Essex.

08:15 Admit that things are obviously very quiet so far and take the opportunity to remind your visitors how they can get in touch with you, ensuring at all times to spell your Twitter, email and Facebook details correctly (unless you want a quiet day ahead of you, naturally).

08:19 First message from a chancer subtly advertising his own website on yours. Message usually says something like: “I’m really looking forward to the day ahead and will certainly be keeping my eye on mytransferdeals.com for all the latest information.” Git.

08:22 First message from a fan hoping that his team buys someone quickly for fear of seeing their season fall apart before their very eyes. Hardly original.

08:38 First reminder to fans of all the deals that are expected to be finalised today, what with it being so quiet still and all.

08:52 Inaugural appearance of an old favourite – the (ho ho!) sighting of a football player at an airport located near to a club he couldn’t possibly be going to. Such fun.

09:05 Quick mention of all the main transfer details completed during the last 72 hours. It is still very quiet at this time of the morning, after all.

09:16 Various reports from clubs across Europe about enquiries received/not received for players who “weren’t for sale anyway”.

10:04 League Two club sends out a message to say they’ve not yet received an offer for their top player while secretly hoping this prompts the exact opposite to happen.

10:22 First receipt of a message from a fan trying to show his far-sightedness by saying “If Team A sells Player B, how likely will Team C be to release Player D so that Team A can sign him as a replacement?” Makes you think…

10:40 Latest batch of joke ‘sightings’ arrive, with fans now taking up the ‘play-on-words’ approach, i.e. ‘Welsh player Dai Annudyr-Day seen arriving at The City of Manchester Stadium’, etc, etc.

11:11 Initial instance of a player trying to whip up a sense of frenzied excitement among his followers on Twitter by saying “You’ll never guess who I’ve seen in the club car park!” Oh the anticipation!

11:35 CONFIRMATION OF AN ACTUAL SIGNING… and it involves a 20-year-old one-time young offender signing for a Conference club only a short drive from his old club.

11:40 David Moyes confirms Everton won’t be buying anyone. Tick.

11:56 Details arrive that a club has enquired about the availability of a player at another club. Watch this space…

13:00 Remind visitors to your site that THE TRANSFER WINDOW SHUTS IN TEN HOURS.

13:21 Arsenal fans start getting angry at the prospect of (a) their club not buying anyone, (b) their club not firing their manager, (c) their club selling everyone, or (d) all of the above.

14:44 Tell your website visitors that they’ve really kept your spirits up with their funny messages all day, despite the fact that you’re actually on the verge of having a total psychotic breakdown.

15:12 First mention of a former legend of the world game signing on for an Arab minnow.

15:23 Fans start to realise the sheer futility of what they’ve experienced over the last seven hours or more before a reminder that there’s still another eight hours to go before the transfer window closes.

15:48 Stop to ponder whether the people spreading rumours about player sightings on Twitter are actually the same people that spread malicious rumours about riots breaking out across unaffected parts of the UK recently.

16:33 Time for a recap on the number of deals actually completed since the start of play this morning. Two.

16:50 Someone from Opta chips in with a statistic that is neither useful, interesting or funny about the amount of money that’s changed hands in today’s transfers. Still six hours to go before the transfer window closes.

17:40 Express bewilderment that the proposed transfer of Player A to Club B still hasn’t gone through yet.

18:14 Use bold and capital letters to say that Player A’s move to Club B is NOW OFF before blaming Sky Sports for making you believe it could happen in the first place.

18:53 Attention turns towards confirming that specific players are now staying put at their original clubs. No reference to barrels or associated scraping noises, strangely.

19:27 Report the return of an English player from the continent that’s quoted as saying “living on the continent wasn’t really for me” which everyone predicted would be the case except the individual concerned.

20:31 Inevitable sighting of the old ‘Russian team looking for a perestroikas’ gag. Tick.

21:00 TWO HOURS TO GO UNTIL THE TRANSFER WINDOW CLOSES.

21:46 Time to trot out the old chestnut about football agents needing to check their mobile phones to make sure they’ve been switched on all day. Some traditions should never be overlooked.

22:00 ONE HOUR TO GO UNTIL I CAN SWITCH MY PC OFF... er, I mean THE TRANSFER WINDOW CLOSES

22:26 Late breaking news… a Premier League club have urgently contacted the FA over their faulty fax machine which is preventing the pending transfer of a little known Japanese triallist / desperate last-minute punt.* (* delete as applicable)

22:53 Various reports of lights being visible from the offices of at least 70 clubs across the UK, thereby indicating deals are still being thrashed out or someone with access to Sky is seeking salvation in the 900+ channels.

23:00 Tell the world that THE TRANSFER WINDOW HAS CLOSED. You can now go to bed, call The Samaritans or drink copious amounts of strong alcohol, depending on your level of abject desperation after today’s events.

Beating the blogger blues

Well done for finding this article. No really, well done. This is just one of over 250 articles on Football Fairground and one of millions upon millions of blog articles being published on the web each and every day. How you found this piece is anyone’s guess.

Actually, it’s worth having a guess. Perhaps you reached this page via a message on Twitter? Maybe you had Football Fairground on your RSS Feed list? Could it be conceivable that you found it via a Google search? However you found this page, it’s fair to say you did so against all the odds. With every passing day, more and more blog posts are being written and more and more blog sites are being created.

And that’s rather troubling. Troubling in the sense that as the creator of a new or recently-created football blog site, you’re probably finding it difficult to get your own blog pages on other people’s screens. Troubling, possibly, because as an avid reader of football articles, you now have so much choice that you hardly know where to start.

Either way, you’re probably falling victim to information overload. Nothing to worry about, of course, if you’re behind one of the bigger football blog sites of this world. Reputation alone ensures your audience figures remain consistently high through all the hard work you’ve previously invested in your project.

Similarly, as a reader, you might be a subscriber to one or two football blog sites that you particularly like, in which case you have all that you need. It’s a bit like buying your favourite newspaper from the local corner shop every morning. No need to waste time infuriating the shopkeeper by browsing through the other papers on the counter if you know they’re not quite your cup of tea. If you always go for the reliable option, you barely even notice the alternatives.

Unfortunately as a blogger myself, I have the upmost sympathy for anyone that’s only just getting on the football blogging ladder and hoping for a moderate number of visitors to their site. Once upon a time, it was de rigueur to simply write posts and wait for Google to add them to its search index or for people to start leaving comments on your articles. The information super-grapevine was good enough to see your blog’s popularity steadily grow. Nowadays it’s the done thing to force-feed details of your output down the throats of anyone that will listen until they spew up your barely-digested online utterances and those of several other bloggers besides.

For new football bloggers, the news is not good. Google is now clogged up not only with the indexed posts from other people’s blog sites but also personal blog sites and blogs set up explicitly to drive people to money-making entities on the web.

But what about Twitter and Facebook, you may say? Surely they’re the perfect tools to publicise and promote your blog writing? Of course they are, and that’s why millions of other football bloggers are currently doing just that. Not only are you competing against the world and his wife on the blogging front, but also on the social media front too, somewhat depressingly.

So what to do? Well as a writer you could always join one of the growing number of football ‘super blogs’ to get your posts out to a wider audience, but you’d be sacrificing your own individual blog identity by doing that – a very valuable thing worth nurturing, believe me. You could also offer your services as a guest writer to any number of other football sites, but there again readers won’t find it easy to keep tabs on all your work as it gets scattered around the web.

You therefore have to ask yourself whether it’s actually worth blogging at all these days for all the competition you’re up against. Aren’t there too many blog sites already? Well not necessarily. Some people might counter that remark by saying that perhaps there are too many books already, and they’d be right in many ways. The key is making sure your book is the one that people want to find amongst the millions of others that are out there, and you can’t do that unless you have original, well-written content that you’re unlikely to find anywhere else. Get that right, and you’re well on your way.

Oh sure, you can promote your writing on Twitter and Facebook if you like. You might even increase your blog audience, but be under no illusions – people will quickly see your weaknesses if you don’t have a decent end product to promote in the first place.

And if you’ve got a niche subject on which to base your football blog, so much the better. The more obscure the subject, the more likely you are to be viewed an authority on it. You’ll also be seen as less boring and mainstream than many of your peers which can only be a good thing.

Here endeth the lesson, and frankly I’m a fine one to be giving it. Just lately I’ve been getting more and more disillusioned by the ever-growing mass of football-related information being pumped out via blog sites and social media outlets. How the hell are you supposed to process it all, let alone read some of it at length or get your message heard above it? The key, as I’ve found, is to know what’s worth reading and forget all the rest. There simply isn’t the time to bother with everything else.

So if you’re a football writer or blogger, let this be your mantra - write well, promote if you must, but above all do the best that you can. If your work is of an excellent standard, people will want to read it.

Oh, and as I’ve been telling myself, don’t give up. Someone somewhere likes what you do.

Panini and me

I’m hacked off. No really, I’m monumentally hacked off. All this recent talk about Panini stickers has reopened a wound of mine which had barely healed after almost a year.

In case you’ve been busy shredding Jack Warner’s bank statements for the last week or two, Panini football stickers have got tongues wagging again because the German public have gone mad over a new 2011 Women’s World Cup collection. Apparently Panini had to produce an extra million packets to satisfy demand in a country which has seen its women’s national team become one of the world’s best over the years.

All good news for women’s football and indeed Panini who to this day continue their battle for the hearts and minds of modern children more interested in pursuits such as Nintendo and under-age sex. The thing is, this story has sparked a collective reverie among those thirty- and forty-somethings who last year collected Panini’s World Cup 2010 stickers.

For a while last summer, it seemed as though some sort of clandestine society had been set up that I hadn’t been invited to join. I’d visit friends at their homes and find the topic of conversation quickly turning to the battered pages of the sticker albums they’d been filling. I’d attend a barbecue somewhere only to have thrust upon me a large wad of doubles, tightly bound in rubber bands, each sticker referred to lovingly in somewhat guilty tones.

And there was I utterly oblivious to the phenomenon that was unfolding. Worse still, I wasn’t even collecting those World Cup stickers myself, an ironic twist of fate which still rankles to this day. I say ‘ironic’ as I have something of a history when it comes to Panini sticker collections.

I first became aware of those hallowed compilations of self-adhesive wonderment back in the late-70’s. Friends of mine had owned the albums for Football ’78 and Football ’79, but my first collection was Europa ’80. With its black cover and copious spaces inside waiting to be filled with pictures of Bob Latchford, Mick Mills and other international greats of the time, this was where my addiction to sticker collecting began.

Alan Dunn was my schoolmate when I was only 8 years old. He was collecting Europa ’80 too and with him I first enjoyed that sense of justice you could only get by swapping those stickers you’d annoyingly ended up with more than one of. More annoying, however, was the fact that I’d followed Alan’s lead of colouring in the little outline drawings of football players that were on every page of that Europa ’80 album. Little was I to know the words ‘eBay saleability’ would take on greater significance thirty years hence.

Later that year came my first annual Panini collection, Football ’80, which I collected enthusiastically without ever coming close to filling the album, just like Football ’81. Actually sending off a postal order and a letter to buy any remaining stickers seemed like an incredible faff to me, so I never ever did it. The important thing to my mind was that I’d completed as much of the album as possible by buying my own packets (at a not-to-be-overlooked 5p each) and swapping my own doubles. That, in itself, was a lasting tribute to my persistence and patience, thank you very much.

As the years went by, more and more incomplete albums were added to my collection. In 1984, however, something truly wondrous happened. My Dad was a regular down at our local pub back then and he knew an elderly gentleman who would often join him for a pint of mild ‘n’ bitter on a Friday night. One particular occasion saw the old guy ask my Dad if his son collected football stickers. Having replied in the affirmative, he told my Dad he’d pop round to the house one night with something to give me as a gift.

A few nights later, the doorbell rang and there waiting on the doorstep was the old man clutching a Football ’84 album and a Golden Virginia tobacco tin. He explained that since his wife had passed away he’d become a little lonely and had decided to collect football stickers as a hobby to fill the quiet hours. This he had done, even going to the trouble of sending off for the last remaining stickers to complete his collection.

Having filled the album and written notes below some of the pictures to bring them up to date (“John Wark – Now Liverpool”), his work was now done. On that cold winters night, he’d come to hand over his completed sticker book and a tobacco tin full of doubles to a small boy who’d never even seen a full album before. Having told his story and seen the growing smile on my face, he bid me farewell and turned to walk back home again on that dark, cold night. Twenty-seven years later, I can still picture him in my mind, standing there on my doorstep. I also still have that album along with my own incomplete one. Don't even bother asking which one I like best.

A couple of years later, I found myself attending the offices of a non-descript building in Camden to have my photo taken for Issue 1 of Panini Magazine. Such was my dedication to the sticker-based pastime that I must have written Figurine Panini a letter at some point telling them how much of a fan I was. I can't actually recall doing so, to be honest, but no matter – I was just the sort of charming schoolchild they were looking for to be in their very first 'Collectors Corner' feature.

They told me to bring in all my albums, so with my friend Martin Lewis in tow, we hot-footed it onto the Tube one day clutching carrier bags stuffed to the gunnels with sticker-related ephemera. On arrival, a photographer began snapping merrily away at me, after which a woman from the magazine said: "So Chris, you've filled up all these albums of yours, have you?"  Ah. Not actually filled, no. Surely I’d mentioned that in my letter, hadn’t I?

Crestfallen, the woman went away to check whether I remained justified in having so much fuss made of me, but luckily she returned and the photo shoot was duly completed. Some weeks later, they sent me some photos from the day along with a copy of the magazine I appeared in. Aside from the fact that I looked a bit of a dork, I was quite proud of my achievements.

Sadly that magazine went the same way as my Football '80 and Football '81 albums, a casualty of my Mum's over-eager attempts to tidy up by bedroom cupboard. I have still got the photos, but trust me, the internet contains enough dubious photographic content as it is without me publishing them here.

In 1987, my school days came to an end and I started working in my first job. To find myself suddenly moving in more adult circles meant I would put away my childhood toys and become a man, albeit a very young one. Football ’87 was to be my last Panini sticker collection for thirteen years and in that time, Figurine Panini lost the rights to make stickers for top-flight football in England and more and more kids turned their attention to the much-maligned video game. Sticker collecting was fast fading into my distant past, but the chance to make new memories arrived at the turn of the millennium.

When Euro 2000 came along, Panini brought out a new sticker album to commemorate the event. Bright and bold with the official logo emblazoned all over it, it caught my eye and got me thinking perhaps the time had come to re-embrace the favourite pastime of my youth. And so it was that as a sheepish-looking 28-year-old, I wandered into my nearest branch of WHSmith and bought a Panini Euro 2000 album and a box of stickers.

That’s right – a box. Never before had I been so privileged but then I wasn’t earning a wage of my own before. The shop assistant seemed a little shocked, mainly because no-one ever bought a whole box in one hit before. Better that than being shocked at the sight of a 28-year-old buying stickers, I felt. Anyway, I took my merchandise home and one by one opened each packet before sticking its contents into the book. I didn’t finish off the whole box in one sitting – that would’ve been plain wrong – but I did heartily savour that long-forgotten feeling of ripping open each packet and pulling out a mystery selection of players, or better still, foil badges.

Sadly I had no-one to share the feeling of nostalgia with. Martin didn’t want to collect Euro 2000 stickers with me (or perhaps couldn’t afford it) and any open invitation to a wider social circle may have resulted in me being admitted to a mental institution. Still, collect those stickers I did, but this time I sent off a cheque in order to finish my album with the stickers I’d missed. Glory be.

I did the same again for Panini’s 2002 World Cup collection and their Euro 2004 collection, too. I even completed my Panini 2006 World Cup collection, but at that point I decided to call it a day and concentrate on buying old Panini albums on eBay. The internet truly is a wonderful thing sometimes.

And that would have been a happy ending to my story, except that many of my friends suddenly decided to jump on Panini’s World Cup 2010 bandwagon and delude everyone with their fair-weather
sticker worship.

Where were they a few years back? Why only come out of the woodwork now after all this time?  Call themselves Panini fans?

It really got my goat, but having missed out on all the fun I can say one thing for certain. If they ever come crawling back to me to collect Panini with them in future, I shall take great delight in telling them where to stick it.