The Archive

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.

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As the media storm around Sven-Göran Eriksson reaches gale force, Barney Ronay considers the combination of football failings and tabloid prurience that got us here

The career of a modern England manager tends to follow a familiar pattern. Things kick off in a fug of giddy optimism, inspired more than anything by general relief at the departure of the last fellow. Some promising results follow. Glenn Hoddle had Le Tournoi in 1997 (the second most important trophy England have ever won). Graham Taylor went unbeaten for a year. Even Kevin Keegan had his moments. After this, almost directly, comes the long, slow drawn-out death. More or less every recent England manager’s reign has finished in the same way: with a very public kind of nervous breakdown. Currently Sven-Göran Eriksson is entering the end game. Everybody knows it’s coming. There’s just a lot of this stuff – this terrible head-shaking indignation – to get through first.

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In two years Wales have gone from the brink of qualification glory to an effective play-off for last spot with Azerbaijan. Huw Richards looks for optimistic signs

Laughter may have echoed from Anglesey to Usk when David Healy angled his shot across Paul Robinson at Windsor Park, but Northern Ireland’s victory over England was not without its downside for Wales. As well as putting plaudits for a spirited display against the English at the Millennium Stadium into more sobering perspective, the result ended any chance of matching an initial fourth-place seeding. Victory over Azerbaijan in the final home match would at least avert a last-place finish, but come what may at Windsor Park on October 12, Wales cannot finish higher than fifth.

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Northern Ireland’s shock victory over England was a welcome tonic on and off the pitch, as Robbie Meredith reports

Strange as it seems now, the visit of England to Windsor Park wasn’t originally particularly important. Sure, it was a rare chance for us to ogle at the Team England circus and gain some attention from Motty, Wrighty and… um… Woolnoughy, but many Northern Ireland supporters initially viewed the Azerbaijan match the preceding Saturday as more vital. It was a realistic chance to pick up a rare win, whereas most of us assumed that England would stroll into town, patronise us with a load of guff about how they expected a tough contest, then cuff us with relative ease. 

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The success of players such as Michael Chopra and Zesh Rehman may be an advance on the position ten years ago but, Steve Wilson writes, this is not enough and those behind a new report – Asians Can Play Football – are challenging the game to reform

On the day in September when Trevor Phillips, the chairman of the Commission for Racial Equality, warned that “we are sleepwalking our way into segregation” and Home Secretary Charles Clarke outlined his “commission on integration” to combat anti-Islamic feelings in the wake of the July London bombings, a group of Asian football fans were lamenting a wasted decade for the advancement of British Asian footballers and challenging the football authorities to back up good intentions with the resources and actions needed to foster genuine change.

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