The Archive

Wembley may not be full but for fans of two former League clubs the Blue Square play-off final represents more than just a day out. And for the players, there’s the chance to meet Martin O’Neill. Taylor Parkes was there

One of the innumerable problems with the concentration of power in 21st century football is the banalisation of the big event. Like boy pharaohs fed powdered gold, fans of the chosen few grow blase and faintly nauseous (“not Barcelona again!”), while the rest exist in a world of shadows and reflections, where up and down begin to lose their meaning. Days like this can restore your faith. Neither Cambridge nor Torquay are strangers to League football, so re-entry is an itch that must be scratched, more than an adventure – but for everyone involved, this is a very big deal. Wembley Park station is heaving, not just with shaven-headed forty-somethings but kids and old ladies, girlfriends and boyfriends, well-wishers and day-trippers (and a child in a Chelsea shirt who doesn’t quite get it). Grey skies and high winds don’t so much dampen the festive mood as accentuate the drama, as we weave through police horse dung down old Olympic Way, towards what will, for men of a certain age, always be “the new” Wembley Stadium.

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On the 40th anniversary of the “football war” Jonathan Barker asks if a World Cup play-off really led to armed conflict

On December 29, 1968, Honduras, widely regarded one as of the lesser lights of Central American football, caused a major surprise in the 1970 World Cup eliminators by overcoming a Costa Rica side that had been favoured to qualify for Mexico. Their opponents in the next round would be neighbouring El Salvador. Seemingly of little interest to the outside world, the three games the countries played in June 1969 would become the focal point of simmering tensions between the two governments, with the subsequent conflict coming to be known, however misleadingly, as the “football war”.

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Huw Richards sums up the Championship season whilst asking of whether being at the top of the division correlates with playing better football

Do you want your team to play in the Premier League? Well, yes, me too. But this year’s Championship season shows that achieving what we’re told is the Holy Grail – or at least the answer to a £60 million question – can have unwanted side-effects. When your team is newly risen from the lower orders you have certain expectations. Better grounds, bigger crowds and classier football. No doubt about the first two, but hope of number three went largely ungratified.

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Derek Brookman reports on how the latest attempt to create a "superclub" in the Dutch region of Limburg hit the buffers

The notion of creating a football powerhouse in Limburg, the sliver of the Netherlands wedged between Belgium and Germany, is not new, and resurfaced this season with a plan to merge Fortuna Sittard and Roda JC. The idea of a Limburg superclub was mooted as far back as 1996, and extensive negotiations also took place in 2002 involving a third Limburg club, MVV Maastricht, as well. Tensions ran so high then that two members of the Roda board wore bullet-proof vests before addressing their own fans on the subject. In the end, just like six years earlier, there were too many differences of opinion to proceed.

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The arrest of Steaua Bucharest’s zealous owner has sparked hope that his power might finally be waning, writes Jonathan Wilson

For the Steaua Bucharest owner Gigi ­Becali to berate underperforming players is nothing unusual; what is less common is for the player to answer back, particularly with the wit (at least, you assume he was joking) shown by Dayro Moreno. The Colombian forward’s form has been poor since the winter break, and Becali, using his coach Marius Lacatus as a translator, was pointing out his deficiencies with characteristic robustness. “Dayro,” he said finally. “What’s wrong with you?” “Boss,” Moreno, “my form has dipped because I was so worried about you when you were arrested.” Becali, as he tends to be when his ego is flattered, however mockingly, was charmed. “He may act like a child,” he said, “but he’s the only real footballer we have.”

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