Reviews from When Saturday Comes. Follow the link to buy the book from Amazon.
Yes, Delia Smith committed quite the faux-pas with her half-time rantings, says Caroline Bailey, but perhaps it's been taken a bit too far
There was a time when “doing a Delia” meant investing in a non-stick omelette pan. But since that infamous night in February when the Norwich City director, eyes rolling like a colicky mare, tottered on to the Carrow Road turf with a microphone, it has come to mean something slightly different.
Even if League Two strugglers Cambridge United are saved by a supporters’ trust they could be in the Conference next season, to Graham Dunbar 's chagrin
In his working life, as director of the prime minister’s media strategy, Godric Smith can sleep easy, all but sure that he will be on the winning side at the expected general election on May 5. His sporting life offers less certainty. As a supporter of Cambridge United, he cannot be sure he will have a club to watch after the League Two season ends two days later.
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.
UEFA’s quotas for home-grown players could simply increase the trade in teenage players and lead to more switches in national allegiance, argues Michael Dunne
Where, ask those who condemn the record number of foreigners in British football, will the next generation of England players come from if young English talent is not given its head in the Premiership?
Howard Pattison looks ahead to Manchester United's trip to the other St James Park
On the day of Exeter City’s FA Cup replay against Manchester United, a football liaison officer from Devon’s police force warned of strict punishment for anyone caught touting tickets outside the ground. “It is an offence to tout tickets for designated matches where it may lead to away supporters being in the home sections and cause trouble,” he remarked. Leaving aside the apparent admission that there are some games where it’s perfectly fine to sell tickets at inflated prices, this also leaves you wondering who on earth he thought was going to fill the home terraces at St James Park.