The Archive

Declining attendances but still little movement on ticket prices. Bruce Wilkinson discovers why

When the then minister for culture, media and sport negotiated with the EU in 2005-06 to save the Premier League’s right to retain collective TV bargaining, there was supposed to be a payback. Richard Caborn believed that part of the money the clubs would get from the next huge TV deal would be used to reduce ticket prices. A couple of football seasons and sports ministers down the line and we are yet to see much evidence of the Premier League members fulfilling their part of the bargain.

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No other coach has won as many Serie A titles as Giovanni Trapattoni – and that includes England’s coach. Paul Doyle looks at the reaction to the appointment of the Republic of Ireland’s new boss

And so, with the appointment of ­Giovanni Trapattoni to replace Steve Staunton, the Republic of Ireland team prepare to leap from one extreme to the other: from the era of the bungling novice to the reign of the revered veteran.

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Richard Scudamore’s assault on the English language as he tried to defend “Game 39” was his only option, believes Taylor Parkes, because the bullshit stopped him having to face up to how flawed the scheme is

Much has been said in the past few weeks about the insane premise and fundamental absurdity of “Game 39”. Still, one question has not been asked: when Richard Scudamore spoke endlessly of “host-city event-management expertise”, told Radio 5 Live that “we think it is a ten-year play in terms of protecting our domestic position”, and argued that his scheme “allows us to grasp the globalisation nettle”, because “I would be criticised wholly if we let the league stray into the slow lane while others passed us in the fast lane” – who did he think he was talking to?

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Is the Premier League the Holy Grail or the Emperor without his clothes, asks Gavin Barber

As I recall there have been two distinctively epiphanic moments in my life, on which the significance of an apparently mundane occasion has crept up on me unnoticed before revealing itself in a flash of enlightenment. The first was a few years ago when, at the age of 30, I bought and assembled a garden shed, and suddenly understood that the process of turning into my dad was inexorable and irreversible, and that I should embrace it rather than trying to resist. The second came at Portman Road on February 9, 2008.

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The Italians are going off the English model, says Matthew Barker

Having long been the mantra of choice for would-be reformers of the sport here, adopting the modello inglese is beginning to lose its appeal. Italian reaction to the Premier League’s proposals for a 39th game generally chimed with Michel Platini’s widely reported comments about foreign owners, foreign coaches, foreign players and now foreign fans: that English football had finally gone a step too far and was steadily losing its soul.

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