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Search: 'Francis Jeffers'

Stories

Keeping out

Damian Hall takes a look at the decline of former England goalkeeper Richard Wright

Ten years ago he was playing for England, but at just 32 Richard Wright is without a club. Arsène Wenger may act like he’s lost his credit card nowadays but back in the summer of 2001 he was swiping it about like a madman. Arsenal purchased Giovanni van Bronckhorst, Francis Jeffers, Richard Wright and Junichi Inamoto for around £26 million. Fast forward nine years and most of those players’ careers have taken fairly predictable paths, especially the injury-prone Jeffers. But not Richard Wright’s.

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The joy of failure

Footballers are increasingly viewed by extremes in the press. James Calder worries that we have become too quick to judge

I haven’t heard much about Titus Bramble lately. I can’t say I’ve followed his career assiduously but I’m definitely hearing less about him than I used to. Time was when he seemed to be everywhere – pranging cars, giving away soft goals and attracting cheap gags from anyone with an opinion on the game. Once the epitome of “comedy defending”, the term of choice for caustically humorous bloggers and writers everywhere, Bramble seems to have slipped out of the public eye. Well, out of my eye anyway.

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Ambitious minds

It’s not about money, of course. But occasionally players wonder if their clubs are as eager to win trophies as they are – and if not, whether they should consider a move. Harry Pearson sympathises

The arrival of the British summer used to be heralded by the swooping of a swallow. These days, though, the most reliable signal that it is time once again to stand around a barbecue with rain dripping from your nose is a chorus of football’s top names wondering aloud in the press if “this club’s ambition matches my own”.

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July 2006

Saturday 1 Berlin’s stadium announcer is replaced after urging the crowd to cheer Germany during their quarter-final. Glenn Hoddle resigns at Wolves. “My expectations and the club’s have drifted too far apart,” he says. Paul Ince is tipped to step in.

Sunday 2 David Beckham quits as England captain, although he wants to keep playing. He tearfully mentions Steve McClaren and Peter Taylor twice, with a solitary nod towards “Sven”. “Maybe we’re a victim of our own honesty and Wayne more than most,” reasons John Terry as the campaign against “Sly Senor” Ronaldo gathers momentum. Honest Wayne is quoted as telling team-mates over breakfast that he wants to “smack him on the head and split him in two”, though he may have been referring to his boiled egg.X

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Foreign legions

Arsène Wenger isn’t prejudiced against English players, says Jon Spurling, but the exploits of Paul Merson, Francis Jeffers and Jermaine Pennant won’t have impressed him or anyone

Having been described in Le Monde as “une honte” and in Die Welt as “eine Schande”, Arsène Wenger appears to be “a disgrace” in every European language. Paul Merson’s comments, which first ap­peared in the Daily Mail, were quickly taken out of context by an assortment of newspapers around the continent. Le Monde excelled itself, suggesting that Merson had also labelled his former manager “une brome” (“a joke”). In fact, Merson had described the absence of any British players in Arsenal’s squad to face Crystal Palace as “a joke”, rather than directly name-calling Wenger. By selecting an all-foreign squad, the Arsenal manager left himself open to a raft of criticism. José Mourinho claimed that “the backbone of my Chelsea team will always be English”, ignoring the fact that only three of his regular starting XI (John Terry, Wayne Bridge and Frank Lampard) are British and that a spate of injuries could easily leave him in the same boat as Wenger. Mourinho added: “He [Wenger] is forgetting the influence which English players have had on Arsenal.” The opposite is true. Wenger is totally au fait with the legacy left by English players at Highbury, perhaps overly so.

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