Book reviews

Jon Spurling looks at how footballers' holidaying habits have changed radically since the days of the maximum wage

For England’s multimillionaire footballers, there is one major consolation to having flopped so dismally on the grand stage earlier this summer. With cash to burn, they have the choice of jetting off to any destination in the short gap between the World Cup and the new season. Frank Lampard, with girlfriend Christine Bleakley in tow, holidayed in Italy with the Redknapps while the newly single Ashley Cole took a break in Los Angeles. According to the tabloids, Cole quickly got over the trauma of his split from Cheryl by partying until the early hours in “the city’s top nightspots”.

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First Division defences extended the season of goodwill to Boxing Day in 1963, when 66 goals were scored. Jon Spurling reports

As Christmas 1963 approached, weathermen warned a shivering nation to expect a recurrence of what had happened 12 months previously. The winter of 1962 was the worst since the big freeze of 1946, when the snow began on Boxing Day and wiped out football for virtually the next two and a half months. The occasional game was played here and there, but most were played out in the minds of the newly created Pools Panel, who met each weekend in a secret London location and guessed what each result might have been.

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Against his instincts, Huw Richards wonders whether promotion from the Championship would actually benefit his club

Psychotic, uncontrollable, infinite envy. That is how Swansea City fans are supposed to feel about Blackpool at the moment. They usurped the final play-off place last season, then seized the prize of promotion to the Premier League. They will play Manchester United, Arsenal and Liverpool. We’ve got Millwall, Cardiff and Bristol City. Some Swans fans, as postings on the soon sadly to be lost scfc.co.uk website make clear, do feel that way. But for others, disappointment was almost outweighed by relief that it is them, not us.

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Although they both have grounds on the same street, the fortunes of Dundee and Dundee United have contrasted sharply in recent seasons. Neil Forsyth looks at a remarkable few months on Tayside.

In any two-team city a football club’s perceived success is measured in two ways – their success and the comparative success of the other. For the city of Dundee that delicate arrangement has just encountered a volatile season.

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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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