Sorry, your browser is out of date. The content on this site will not work properly as a result.
Upgrade your browser for a faster, better, and safer web experience.

Search: ' Alexander Hleb'

Stories

Alexander Hleb

wsc302Damian Hall tells the sorry tale of a a fragile winger who valued the art of passing over the business of winning and made a mistake leaving Arsenal

Alexander Hleb was a classic Arsène Wenger signing. He was relatively unknown in England, technically excellent, yet cursed with a pathological preference for a pass over a punt at goal. When the six-time Belarus player of the year and sometime captain of the national team arrived in 2005, he did not look like a footballer. Hleb was scrawny, too thin for his shirt – which always went untucked – with socks around his ankles. But he could play.

Read more…

Blue burden

Chris Sanderson assesses Birmingham City’s mixed season and how a return to the Championship has affected the club’s finances and tactics

In a Premier League awash with money and abetted by a hyperbolic media, journeyman teams like Birmingham City face an impossible dilemma. How can we join the celebrity foam party when we turn up wearing M&S slacks, looking for the carvery?

Read more…

Letters, WSC 286

Dear WSC
I would like to ask my fellow readers if their clubs have something called “The Nardiello Factor”. The Nardiello Factor is a phenomenon where a striker’s popularity is based in a large part on the exotic nature of his name. At Barnsley we have seen no finer example of this than in recent months with the arrival of Jerónimo Morales Neumann. My fellow Tykes have been beside themselves at the thought of this player, and have wondered how Mark Robins can possibly limit him to just warming the bench. This opinion seems based on nothing more than the fact that he has a name that would be good to shout out when (if) he scores. Our Jerónimo accordingly scores a Nardiello Factor rating of nine (the maximum score is ten). Contrast this with Chris Woods, our loanee from West Brom. He scores a paltry NarFac rating of four. Were he to slightly change his name to Christiano Woodaldo he would up his NarFac rating to eight but, alas, this is not to my knowledge due for consideration. As a consequence the support from the terraces has been a little limited to date. Liam Dickinson scores a NarFac rating of one, though I am willing to concede that, even if he changed his name to Galileo Figaro Magnifico, he’d do well to register a NarFac rating of five. His yellow boots have had a negative impact.
Ian Marsden, Belper

Read more…

Bernd Stange

On October 15, England face a Belarus team whose coach used to be an informer for East Germany’s secret police. Paul Joyce reports

“Football trainers shouldn’t mix work and politics,” Belarus coach Bernd Stange stated in March. “That is dangerous.” His critics would argue that Stange has often used this tenet as an excuse to pursue his career while closing his eyes to the political and human consequences of his actions. A media-friendly, yet curiously elusive, figure, Stange was known in the former East Germany as “der Lügenbaron” – a modern-day Baron Münchhausen whose tall tales about his exploits needed to be taken with copious pinches of salt.

Read more…

Copyright © 1986 - 2024 When Saturday Comes LTD All Rights Reserved Website Design and Build NaS