The Archive

The Damned United proves Cloughie was perfect for the big screen, says Terry Staunton

It’s not often that a film’s most noticeable, perhaps only, stumbling block is that its star is actually too good, but it’s arguably the case with Michael Sheen’s turn as Brian Clough in The Damned United. Sheen is, as we all know, the go-to guy du jour for screen portrayals of real people, his stock ever rising after taking on, in the last five years alone, Tony Blair (twice), Kenneth Williams and David Frost.

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Enrico Preziosi has faced bankruptcy and a match-fixing conviction, but Paul Virgo finds he’s still a hero to Genoa fans

For someone supposedly banned from professional football, Enrico Preziosi is not doing too badly as chairman of Genoa. This season Italy’s oldest club have outshone Sampdoria, something of a rare occurrence since their upstart neighbours formed in 1946, and at the time of writing they were challenging AS Roma and Fiorentina for Serie A’s final Champions League slot.

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After a winter of mud and ice Ligue 1 sides are eyeing a permanent solution to bad pitches, reports James Eastham

When French sports daily L’Equipe described the Emirates Stadium pitch as “magnificent” the day after Arsenal’s 1-0 win over Roma in the Champions League last 16, you could almost hear the envy in their voice. Ligue 1 has just emerged from a winter in which the dreadful playing surfaces made a mockery of dozens of games. The word bachee (tent) entered the sporting lexicon as French clubs erected great big canvases over their pitches in futile bids to keep the frost at bay. When the covers came off just before kick-off, referees would usually decide pitches were playable, but the evidence in front of our eyes said otherwise.

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Pubs are asserting their right to show matches on foreign channels and games are being fed online. Dave Lee looks at how our viewing habits are threatening Sky’s stranglehold

Broadcasters, football clubs and the Premier League have stepped up their pursuit of pubs using foreign subscriptions to show live games – and the battle is going all the way to the European Court of Justice.

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Setanta will be covering half as many Premier League games as a result of their new deal. Denis Hurley ponders the implications

Where now for Setanta? The Irish company’s attempt to play hardball in the recent Premier League live TV rights negotiations ended with it winning only half of what it previously had. They will be paying £159 million to show 23 live games on Saturday evenings for the three years from 2010-11, down from the 46 of the previous deal as Monday night games were lost.

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