The Archive

Robert Shaw looks back at a Sao Paulo team filled with future Brazilian World Cup winners who won their third league title

The long-term significance A landmark season for Sao Paulo and coach Tele Santana, 1991 would prove a false dawn in the reform of Brazil's domestic football. The squad that Tele built featured 11 players including Cafu, Leonardo and Rai who would play international football. Championship success in 1991 established the platform for Sao Paulo's Libertadores and World Club titles in 1992 and 1993. The 20 clubs played each other once: play- offs between the top four followed, meaning the 1991 Serie A was the simplest format since the establishment of the competition 20 years previously.

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Going to your first football match isn't always memorable for the normal reasons, as Josh Widdicombe explains

With the exceptions of the third round of the FA Cup and the career of Stan Bowles, few things are over-romanticised by the average football fan more than their first visit to a live match. So, as a man easily won over by a nostalgic ideal, I have long bought into the received wisdom that to be a proper fan your first taste of professional football in the flesh must have been like some sort of religious conversion; rather than just sitting in a cold church hoping the monotonous service would soon be over. 

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Phil Town analyses the plight of Boavista in the last decade

The turn of the century was very kind to Boavista FC. They had finished second two years earlier but still surprised everyone in Portuguese football by winning the title in 2001 – only the second team outside the Três Grandes (FC Porto, Benfica and Sporting) to do so, the other being Belenenses in 1946. Around this time, they were also putting in very respectable performances in Europe, the highlight a UEFA Cup semi-final in 2003 which Celtic just shaded. Paradoxically, however, it was this purple period that was a key contributing factor to Boavista’s current plight.

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There is a section of Italy that it using football as a way of campaigning for independence. Matthew Barker tells all

Last month’s European and local elections saw the Lega Nord increase its support base beyond the traditional heartland of the Veneto and Lombardy in the north-east of Italy, reaching as far down as Emilia Romagna and the northern edges of Tuscany. The Lega, seeking to break away from the national government in Rome and the Mezzogiorno south, forms a strong coalition with Silvio Berlusconi’s ruling People of Freedom party, and has been steadily winning over disgruntled voters with far-right policies based exclusively around twin obsessions of immigration and security.

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Saul Pope reports on Euro 2012 developments, and in some cases lack of development, in co-host nation Ukraine

Apparently there were tears of joy on the streets of Kiev when Ukraine was awarded the opportunity to joint host Euro 2012 two years ago. The surprise decision was seen as an opportunity for Ukraine to develop its crumbling infrastructure at the same time as boosting its standing within European football. However, UEFA’s recent warning that the country has until November 30 to prove that three of its cities are capable of hosting any matches suggests that the tears in the near future may be of a different type.

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