The Archive

Having made £6 million less from last season's Champions League than the previous year, Manchester United chief executive David Gill yearns for UEFA to revert to the second group stage format for the competition

There is a never a shortage of opportunities to despair at how the businessmen who run major clubs do not understand the principles of football. David Gill, chief executive of Manchester United, for example, recently declared that he wants to see the return of the second group stage in the Champions League when the current contract ends in 2006. “I think all the big clubs would have preferred to keep it. There was a higher quality of opposition in the second group phase than the first one.” “Higher quality”, of course, means western European teams containing famous players who ap­­pear in Nike ads and would fill all the stadiums for three extra group games with tickets at 30-plus quid a throw.

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Derided in England, worshipped in Belgium, the much travelled injury-prone sweeper has a novel approach to being axed by Australia, as Matthew Hall writes

In late August, Paul Okon was telephoned by Aus­tralia coach Frank Farina and told he would not be called into a training camp the next month. Nor would he be in a 25-man squad for the 2005 Confederations Cup play-offs against the Solomon Islands in October.

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Ian Plenderleith embarks on his annual search to unearth that rarest of cyberspace entities – the funny football website. The good news is, he is successful this time. The bad news is, not very often

Some years ago this page printed a very unkind review of a new football “satire” website called Sports Offensive , which res­ponded by publishing an admittedly pertinent parody of the author’s regular online column. Since then, and having added the sub-heading “Big Games – Big Lies”, the site has gone from mindless crudity to witty burlesque, inspired in the main by both the hyperbole and inanity of mainstream sports journalism.

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Corruption scandals in the domestic game are overshadowing the national team's fine form, writes Sam Beckwith, our man in a car park with an envelope of cash

Euro 2004 aside, it’s a depressing time to be a Czech football fan. Away from the bright lights and big names of the national team, a year of bribery scandals has offered a shocking glimpse of just how corrupt the domestic game might be, with clubs that don’t bribe officials seemingly the exception rather than the rule.

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Sunday 1 Mark Palios resigns, saying: “My action is essential to enable the Football Association to begin to return to normality.” Sven gossip-broker Colin Gibson is also reported to have offered to quit. At this rate Tord Grip will soon be answering the phones.

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