The Archive

While most of the country was focused on the climax to the football season, some, as always, were seeking to exploit the game for political gain, writes Barney Ronay

Last month a survey named Wayne Rooney as the number-one choice among children under 13 for prime minister – narrowly edging out Harry Potter and Charlie from the defunct boy band Busted. News of Rooney’s popularity will surely have made waves among the image handlers and style technicians in Whitehall. At some point in the run-up to the general election a process of Wayne-ing up of the Prime Minister will have been tentatively focus-grouped; the potential pull of the retrosexual number-three crop debated; and yak fur Wellington boots with matching, custard-coloured gilet ordered in Cherie’s size.

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Spam email often claims that it can help with feelings of inadequacy, but Ian Plenderleith is using the internet to make up for sortcomings he's been feeling for 27 years now: in his Panini collections

When Panini fever hit my school in the late 1970s, I couldn’t run with the pack. A search of my closet reveals the sad truth that for the two years I was an active collector, I fell short every time – 21 stickers shy of a full Euro Football album and nine too few for a total Football 78. Meanwhile the huge gaps in World Cup 78 and Football 79 reveal a young teenager tiring of the pre-pubescent norms and possibly collecting pictures of a different nature altogether.

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Good news for Swedish oenophiles: Anders Frisk has opened a wine business. Marcus Christenson reports on other reactions to the referee’s sudden retirement

“Frisk” means healthy in Swedish and for many years fans amused themselves by singing “Frisk, Frisk, Frisk, you must be ill” when the now world-famous referee was having a bad game.

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Dear WSC
While listening to Alan Green’s Five Live commentary on Chelsea’s game with Barcelona I was struck by the big Ulsterman’s remarkable similarity to the voice of Shaggy from Scooby Doo at excitable moments. Have any other readers noticed similarities between commentators and their cartoon characters? I’ll certainly be keeping an ear open for it in future.
Steve Morgan, Kingston

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James Medhurst takes us back to the turn of the century when the Southern League was teaching the Football League a thing or two

The long-term significance
This was the peak season of the Southern League as a credible competitor to the Football League, characterised by Tottenham’s success in winning the FA Cup, the only non-League side to do so since 1888. The strength of the eventual champions, Southampton, was also demonstrated by an England international against Ireland at The Dell, featuring three Saints players, plus one each from Bristol City and Millwall, a record Southern League contribution to the national team. However, it was also the beginning of the end, as second-placed City successfully applied to join the Football League, to be followed in later years by Spurs and Fulham. In 1920, the top division of the Southern League was swallowed up, as Division Three (South).

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