Saturday 1 All the action in Man Utd’s 3‑2 win at Fulham happens before half-time. Despite his team’s defeat, Chris Coleman senses a weakness: “Defensively, I didn’t think they were great.” Spurs come back from two down to win 3‑2 at Charlton, but stay behind them in third on goal difference. Blackburn fans get their first sightings of Shefki Kuqi’s rupture-threatening bellyflop celebration after he scores both goals in a 2‑0 defeat of West Brom, who drop to 19th. “I was happy for once with a scrappy goal,” says Arsène, who is ageing quickly, after Arsenal need a late deflection to beat Birmingham. Sunderland’s 1‑1 draw with West Ham takes them out of the bottom three. Sheffield Utd’s eight-match winning run ends in a 2‑1 defeat to their nearest Championship challengers, Reading; Neil Warnock will face an FA charge after eyeballing the referee over not getting a late penalty. “The laws of football are black and white and the referee has seen purple,” say Blackpool keeper Les Pogliacomi of League One leaders Swansea’s decisive goal in their 3‑2 win when striker Lee Trundle, in an offside position, backs away from a cross that goes in while the defence stand still, appealing. Swindon are five points adrift at the foot after a 3‑1 defeat at second-bottom MK Dons. Wycombe remain the League’s only unbeaten team, but slip to third in League Two after a 3‑3 draw with Chester. In the SPL, Hearts finally drop points, needing an injury-time equaliser to draw 2‑2 with Falkirk. Celtic, 5‑0 winners at Livingston, are three points behind.
The Archive
Articles from When Saturday Comes. All 27 years of WSC are in the process of being added. This may take a while.
We're told it often enough, "the Premier League is the most exicting league in the world". But is it worth it?
At any particular moment the state of mind of many football fans is a fusion of cynicism and stoic despair, an outlook (leavened, of course, with brief bouts of bonhomie and joie de vivre) that we try to reflect. It’s not always the dominant view in most sections of the media, concerned more with selling the game, and especially “the most exciting league in the world”, than with reporting on it. But every so often what might be seen as the WSC default position comes back into vogue.
Thursday 1 “Toshack hates me, I can handle that,” says Robbie Savage, soberly conceding that his international career is over after being left out of the Wales squad and not called up when others pulled out. Northern Ireland drop Jeff Whitley and Phil Mulryne for going on an all‑day drinking session.
Cameron Carter struggles to see the funny side
It’s been a bit of a month for weak jokes. On September 15, John Helm interrupted his commentary on Bolton v Lokomotiv Plovdiv on Five to make a pun that is even now being investigated by forensic humorists in search of traces of comedic activity. John said: “Lokomotiv look rattled. Excuse the pun – Lokomotiv, rattled.” That was the entirety of his joke. Now we all know that his co-commentator that evening, Terry Butcher, is a brave lad who carries on playing when his head is broken, but even Terry bottled it when it came to asking for some form of explanation. Instead a wondering silence ensued until John returned to his day job.
A Spanish football-themed thirtysomething comedy? Sounds like a formula for success, but as David Stubbs found out, no one was laughing
As a sometime film critic, I’m usually inclined to opt for foreign movies to review. This isn’t out of some cineaste snobbishness but simple logic. Whereas all kinds of Hollywood or, worse, UK-produced balderdash is liable to get a release in Britain, foreign movies that make it to the distribution stage here will generally have been through a rigorous sifting process, been nominated at one of the prestige European festivals, put up for the Palme D’Or and so forth. Hence, they’re more likely to be good.