The Archive

Sepp Blatter can try all he like, according to Ben Lyttleton, the FIFA World Player of the Year award is still a farce

Ronaldinho’s success in becoming FIFA’s World Player of the Year was sealed the day before the announcement, when FIFA president Sepp Blatter said Thierry Henry deserved to win the award. Blatter was pre-empting claims that he and his cronies work behind the scenes to give the prize to his chosen player. It’s a clever wheeze: Blatter publicly backs Henry and then – shock horror! – that rascal Ronaldinho pips him to the crown. Sepp then spends the rest of the night trying to look surprised.

Read more…

Paul Casella of fanzine The Lion Roars believes that Millwall fans are used to false accusations being made against the club, but a recent article in the Sun took the level of misrepresentation to new levels

As the nearest club to Wapping, a disproportionate amount of senior newspaper journalists visit The Den on a regular basis. It is not rare for the press box to see stars of stage and screen; or at least, stars of Jimmy Hill’s Sunday Supplement. Indeed, judging by the amount of media coverage, Millwall are by far and away the “biggest” club that has 10,000 fans in the country.

Read more…

Ron Atkinson may be apologetic his infamous faux pas, but as David Stubbs writes, he isn't exactly convincing

“Whatever happened to forgiveness?” asked Ron Atkinson in plaintive response to a verbal pounding from Darcus Howe on Adrian Chiles’s documentary What Ron Said (BBC1, December 13). Howe was lambasting Atkinson for his infamous off-microphone outburst regarding Marcel Desailly, whom he dubbed “a fucking thick lazy nigger.” Howe suggested that Atkinson should be made to clean Rio Ferdinand’s boots for ten weeks, which Atkinson protested was “out of order”.

Read more…

Selling a star striker was the worst mistake Scunthorpe ever made. George Young recalls how the Iron threw away their best chance to reach the top flight

Last season West Ham were disappointed by their fourth place in the First Division. Their failure to go up was linked to the sale of their best striker, Jermain Defoe, by an unpopular board. Which is pain­fully familiar to any middle-aged Scunthorpe United fan, since that fourth position, achieved in 1962, still represents the pinnacle of our achievements. Not only that, but the club’s best striker, Barrie Thomas, was sold mid-season – a decision that still has re­percussions for the Iron today.

Read more…

Armed gratefully with your votes, Ian Plenderleith picks out some of the very best sites, many of which have featured in this column over the past five years, though they appear in no particular order

Stadiums
Pyramid Passion Sister site to the excellent Nomad Online (covering Sussex non-League football), both run by David Bauckham, PP boasts great pictures and text about English non-League stadiums, plus galleries of dug-outs, floodlights, ground signs and even “rollers and mowers”.

Read more…